180 SHELLS AND MOLLUSCOUS ANIMALS. 



young, as that it would readily be supposed to 

 belong to the crustaceous tribe ; but that excellent 

 naturalist, Mr. J. V. Thompson, watched one of 

 these animals through all the wondrous changes of 

 its existence, and clearly ascertained and described 

 them. 



When we see how common an object the duck 

 barnacle is, we wonder how, age after age, the 

 strange story came to be generally believed, that 

 this shell-fish was the young of a species of goose, 

 and that as it increased in size the goose gradually 

 developed itself. Nor was this the notion only of 

 the unthinking, unobserving portion of mankind. 

 Scientific men of former ages believed it. The 

 Doctors of the Sorbonne in Paris declared that the 

 geese were not to be considered as birds, but that, 

 having their origin in the sea, they might be eaten 

 as fish on the fast-days. Old writers, not content 

 with graphic descriptions of the animal, have left 

 engravings representing barnacle-goose trees, on 

 the branches of which hang the young half-formed 

 ducklings, suspended by the bill, while the full- 

 grown ducks are quietly swimming beneath the 

 shadow of the boughs whence they have fallen. 

 But those were days when, if men believed not as 

 the ancients did, that the dew-drops which glis- 

 tened on the grass were shed by the stars, yet 

 they thought that they fell from the clouds, and 

 had wondrous virtues when gathered at early 

 morning ; and time, and study, and patient thought 

 have been needed to bring us to our present state 

 of knowledge of Natural History, incomplete and 

 imperfect as it yet is. Gerarde, to whose memory 

 all praise is due to the skill and intelligence of his 

 great work, the " Historic of Plants," closes that 



