196 THE FARMER AT HOME. 



not to trace the progress of human architecture, which, in the early 

 stages of society, is extremely rude, but to confine ourselves to that of 

 the inferior tribes of animated beings. 



With regard to quadrupeds, many of them employ no kind of 

 architecture, but live continually, and bring forth their young, in the 

 open air. When not under the immediate protection of man, these 

 species, in rough or stormy weather, shelter themselves among trees 

 or bushes, retire under the coverture of projecting rocks, or the sides 

 of hills opposite to those from which the wind proceeds. Besides 

 these arts of defence, to which they are prompted by instinct and 

 experience, nature furnishes them, during the winter months, with a 

 double portion of long hair, which protects them from cold, and other 

 assaults of the weather. 



Of the quadrupeds that make or choose habitations for themselves, 

 some dig holes in the earth, some take refuge in the cavities of 

 decayed trees, and in the clefts of rocks, and some actually construct 

 cabins, or houses. But the artifices they employ, the materials they 

 use, and the situations they select, are so various and so numerous, it 

 would be impracticable to enter into any minute specifications in this 

 short article. It may, however, be remarked, that the architecture 

 of several of these creatures denotes a degree of intelligence, or per- 

 haps, instinct it should be called, that is wonderful ; and the study of 

 it would be amusing, to say the least. Take as samples, the labors 

 of the Beavers and the Alpine Marmot, which indicate an adaptation 

 to the object to be attained that is extraordinary in the extreme. 



HAIL. In Natural History, a meteor, generally defined frozen 

 rain, but differing from it in that the hailstones are not formed of sin- 

 gle pieces of ice, but of many little spherules agglutinated together. 

 Neither are the spherules all of the same consistence, some being 

 hard and solid like perfect ice ; others soft, and mostly like snow 

 hardened by a severe frost. Sometimes the hailstone has a kind of 

 core of this soft matter ; but more frequently the core is solid and 

 hard, while the outside is formed of a softer matter. Hailstones are 

 of various figures ; some round, others pyramidal, crenated, angular, 

 thin, and flat, and some stellated, with six radii like the small crystals 

 of snow. Natural historians record various instances of surprising 

 showers of hail, in which the hailstones were of extraordinary magni- 

 tude. Mezeray, speaking of the war of Louis XII., in Italy, in 1510, 

 relates, that there was for some time a horrible darkness, thicker than 

 that of night ; after which the clouds broke into thunder and light- 

 ning, and there fell a shower of hailstones, or rather (as he calls 

 them) pebble stones, which destroyed all the fish, birds, and beasts, 

 of the country. 



Hail, so far as has been discovered, never produces any beneficial 

 effect. Rain and dew invigorate and give life to the whole vegetable 

 tribe ; frost, by expanding the water contained in the earth, pulverises 



