THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATIOiN . 79 



various forms of life. The earthworms also perseveringly 

 descend during' the nights of October to the depth of two to 

 three feet from the surface of fields. These annelids seem to 

 avoid light sandy subsoils and choose in far greater numbers 

 those of the unctuous or tenacious clay variety. When the 

 farmers are engaged in digging pits or depositories on some 

 hillside for the winter storage of root crops, numbers of earth- 

 worms, having penetrated in various stages of growth, are 

 disinterred; a large proportion of young ones are met with, 

 the parent worms having penetrated into the impacted and 

 indurated clay in an astonishing manner. This tunneling can 

 only have been accomplished by the worms softening the 

 matrix by a saliva-like secretion, and the excavated material 

 serves as food. These annelid burrows are met with to a 

 depth of three feet, are beyond the reach of frost, but early 

 in May or sooner the annelids, etc., promptly reappear at 

 the surface to enjoy the increasing vital warmth. 



II. 



An indisputable portent of the approach of spring was 

 the curve of warm temperature that manifested itself dm"ing 

 the second week of February, and of five or six days' dura- 

 tion. On the nth our thermometer stood for several hours 

 at 53 degrees in a Northern exposure. On the loth one of 

 our acquaintances tapped several maple trees, and from sap 

 procured from them on two or three succeeding days informs 

 us that he made more than two quarts of delicious syrup, and 

 during the same week of mild skies those true forerunners of 

 spring, the horned or prairie larks, made good their appear- 

 ance about our pasture stubble-fields in small scattered par- 

 ties. And judging from former experiences these ornithic 

 \isitors might have been expected. They come into these 

 districts usually after the first of February thaw, and are 

 known to our rural residents as the February "larks." They 

 like the town sparrows, are a sort of "scavenger" bird, and 



