EA RTH- WORM, IN REFERENCE TO HORTICULTURE. 47 



stomach is composed of two pouches, of which the first is membranous, 

 and may be compared to a crop ; while the second is muscular, and is 

 analogous to a gizzard. At about one-third of its length from the mouth 

 there is a sort of belt (clitellum) encircling the body, consisting of 

 from six to nine rings, which are more prominent and fleshy than the 

 others, and which indicate the position of the organs required for the 

 reproduction of the species. The worm being hermaphrodite, it fol- 

 lows that every individual is furnished with a similar belt. The 

 earth-worm has a well-developed ganglionated nervous system, but 

 it appears that it has only the senses of taste and touch ; the 

 latter it possesses to an exquisite degree, as every one must have ob- 

 served when approaching a worm half-extended from its hole. The 

 worm is sensibly alive to every influence of the season and of the 

 atmosphere ; burrowing in winter to the depth of three or four feet 

 when the cold is at the greatest, and equally deep during the greatest 

 heats of summer. On the approach of rain or of thaw, it conies up 

 close to the surface ; moderate rains being agreeable to the worms, 

 but standing pools of water over their holes drowning them. The 

 taste of the worm is probably much less acute than its touch, since it 

 is doomed to feed upon the soil in which it burrows, swallowing the 

 earth mixed with all its decaying organized remains, from which its 

 nutriment is extracted. Worms often draw into their holes blades of 

 grass, straws, fallen leaves, and young seedling plants of various kinds ; 

 but these are scarcely for the purpose of food, though they have been 

 found occasionally in the stomach, as well as small stones or gravel. 



Whether worms breed oftener than once a year is uncertain. They 

 either produce their young already hatched, or lay eggs. The eggs 

 are placed at a considerable depth in the soil, and in clusters ; they 

 are produced at every season of the year, but chiefly pig. 3. 



in spring ; and those laid at this season are hatched 

 in June and July. The eggs, when of full size, are 

 as large as a pea, elliptical, with a tubular aperture 

 at one end, through which the young escape, there 

 being more than one worm produced by each egg. 

 In fig. 3, a is an egg before the embryo is visible ; 

 b the same egg with the embryo coiled up ; and c the E ggs of the common 

 embryo worm in the act of escaping. When worms earth-worm in dif- 

 are newly hatched from the egg, they are about an ferent stages. 

 inch in length ; but when they are produced alive, their length is not 

 more than four lines, and they do not attain the size of those that are 

 born from the egg for four months. Young worms do not gain their 

 full size till after a year. 



The popular belief, that if the earth-worm is cut into a number 

 of pieces, every portion will in time become a perfect individual, is 

 only true to a limited extent. The worm has the power of repro- 

 ducing any part of the body cut off behind the belt ; but if it is cut 

 through in the middle of the belt, or between the belt and the mouth, 

 the worm is killed. If the body is divided into two halves, the anterior 

 containing the belt will reproduce a new tail ; but from the posterior 



