SOME FACTS AND FICTIONS OF ZOOLOGY. 79 



eaten), and in the small boris and hollis (holes) thairof 

 growls small worms." Our author no doubt here alludes to 

 the ravages of the Teredo, or ship-worm, which burrows into 

 timber, and with which the barnacles themselves are thus 

 confused. Then he continues, the "wormis" first " schaw 

 (show) thair heid and feit, and last of all thay schaw thair 

 plumis and wyngis. Finaly, quhen thay ar cumyn to the 

 l"ust mesure and quantite of geis, thay fle in the aire as othir 

 fowlis dois, as was notably provyn, in the yeir of God ane 

 thousand iii hundred Ixxxx, in sicht of mony pepyll, besyde 

 the castell of Petslego." On the occasion referred to, Boece 

 tells us that a great tree was cast on shore, and was divided, 

 by order of the " lard " of the ground, by means of a saw. 

 Wonderful to relate, the tree was found not merely to be 

 riddled with a " multitude of wormis," throwing themselves 

 out of the holes of the tree, but some of the " wormis " had 

 " baith heid, feit, and wyngis," but, adds the author, " they 

 had no fedderis (feathers)." 



Unquestionably, either the scientific use of the imagina- 

 tion had operated in this instance in inducing the observers 

 to believe that in this tree, riddled by the ship-worms and 

 possibly having barnacles attached to it, they beheld young 

 geese ; or Boece had construed the appearances described, as 

 those representing the embryo stages of the barnacle geese. 



Boece further relates how a ship named the Christofir 

 was brought to Leith, and was broken down because her 

 timbers had grown old and failing. In these timbers were 

 beheld the same "wormeetin" appearances, "all the hollis 

 thairof" being " full of geis." Boece again most emphati- 

 cally rejects the idea that the " geis " were produced from 

 the wood of which the timbers were composed, and once 

 more proclaims his belief that the " nature of the seis resolvit 

 in geis " may be accepted as the true and final explanation 

 of their origin. A certain " Maister Alexander Galloway " 

 had apparently strolled with the historian along the sea- 

 coast, the former giving " his mynd with maist ernist besynes 

 to serche the verite of this obscure and mysty dowtis." 



