3i$ THE BIOLOGY OF THE SEASONS 



or Ascidians, which in their adult life are sedentary and 

 sleepy animals, curiously plant -like in a number of ways, 

 notably in the mantle of cellulose which invests the 

 body. 



The general import of hibernation is in most cases plain. 

 Life saves itself by ceasing to struggle, by retiring within 

 its entrenchments. Death is baffled by a deep device, 

 in which activity virtually ceases without life itself being 

 surrendered. Hibernation is the finest organic illustration 

 of the policy of " lying low." 



Yet there are other aspects of the Winter's sleep. To 

 some it is a time of repair a long night after the nervous 

 fatigue of a long day. Thus it is not difficult to understand 

 that, quite apart from the weather, it is good that the 

 queen humble-bee should sleep through the Winter, just 

 as it is well for the fisherman that he should loaf after 

 the storm. In short, we return to our main thesis, that 

 life is rhythmic, and that the seasons punctuate it. 



To others the sleep is in some measure a preparation 

 for a new day. Thus in the seeds which slumber in the 

 earth, each a young life, there is a rotting away of the 

 husks which the delicate embryo could scarce burst, and 

 later on there are processes of fermentation, by which 

 the legacy of hard, condensed food-material is made 

 available for the young plant. That it is not merely the 

 unpropitious weather and the hard soil which make it 

 necessary for the seeds to remain asleep may be proved 

 by experiment, and it is also proved by the fact that not a 

 few normally lie dormant for several years. Similarly, 

 within the cocoons there lie the chrysalids, quaintly 

 mummy-like and inert to all appearance, but slowly 

 undergoing that marvellous transformation, the result 

 of which is the winged butterfly the Psyche. 



