MISCELLANEOUS ANIMALS 



427 



may whistle, shout, or even fire a toy pistol, but the worms 

 give no response. They cannot hear at all. To test for 

 smell, place a bit of onion a little to one side and near 

 the head of the worm. It soon reaches about and finds 

 it. It can smell a little. This experiment may be made 

 with the worms in the aquarium, as Darwin has shown, by 

 burying the onion, when it will always be found and dug 

 up by the worms. Lacking all 

 the special senses that higher 

 animals use so much, if a worm 

 lets go the burrow, it cannot find 

 it again, but is obliged to make 

 a new one. It may be lost within 

 an inch of its home, and most of 

 those we see about the pave- 

 ments die by drying up before 

 they can find a place to bur- 

 row. Lacking the other sense 

 organs, earthworms have a most 

 delicate sense of touch. Jar 

 the earth a little, stroke with 

 a feather, blow lightly ; in re- 

 sponse to all these stimuli the 

 worm dashes like a rabbit into its burrow. 



Earthworms lay eggs almost too small to see with the 

 unaided eye, but they are done up in capsules about 

 the size of mustard seeds, which may be found by sharp 

 eyes near the openings of the burrows along in June. 

 They may be hatched in a watch glass, and a little 

 fine, moist earth may be added as soon as they come 

 out. 



FIG. 172. EARTHWORMS " RAIN- 

 ING UP" ON A VERTICAL 

 PANE OF GLASS 



