16 THE OAK. 



me, and I shall satisfy them by the testimonie of good 

 witnesses." 1 



This strange fable took its rise from a certain shell-fish 

 being frequently found attached to pieces of wood which 

 had long lain in salt-water. This shell-fish, now called 

 Lepas anatifera, is provided with a long leathery tube, by 

 which it attaches itself to the bottom of vessels, and to 

 other timber ; it is also furnished near the other extremity 

 with a number of curved, feathery fibres, which, when 

 expanded, bear some resemblance to the tail of a bird. 2 

 From this fancied similarity, and the coincidence that the 

 shell-fish was found in abundance in places which the 

 Barnacle-goose frequented, probably to make them its food, 

 the fable originated a fertile imagination making up for 

 the barrenness of the facts. Before the Reformation, Dr. 

 Walsh tells us, the fishy origin of the bird was so firmly 

 believed, that the question was warmly and learnedly 

 disputed whether it might not be eaten in Lent. 



The story may have gained a more ready credence from 

 the fact that the Oak is more prolific in animal life, 

 supplying more insects with food, than any other tree. 

 According to Mr. Stephens, an excellent authority, nearly 

 half of the British insects which feed on vegetables, either 

 exclusively or partially inhabit the Oak. If to this 

 number we add the insects which live on the above, it 

 will be found that the total of insects which, during some 

 period of their existence, derive their support either from 



1 Herbal, p. 1391. 



2 " It is hardly worth while to mention the claylcs, a sort of geese, 

 which are believed by some, with great admiration, to grow upon 

 trees on this coast, and in other places ; and, when they are ripe, to 

 fall down into the sea, because neither their nests nor eggs can any- 

 where be found. But they who saw the ship in which Sir Francis 

 Drake sailed round the world, when it was laid up in the River 

 Thames, could testify that little birds bred in the old rotten keels 

 of ships, since a great number of such, without life and feathers, 



. stuck close to the outside of the keel of that ship. Yet I should 

 think that the generation of these birds was not from the logs of 

 wood, but from the sea, termed by the poets 'the parent of all 

 things.'" Camdfn's Britannia. 



