413 



circumstances of the origin of the present society were nar- 

 rated, and the purposes of the Field Meetings, in encouraging 

 the observation of nature, and a fuller acquaintance with 

 the productions of every man's own town, were considerably 

 enlarged upon. No man, till he has actually examined na- 

 ture, has any adequate idea of the beauties that dwell in 

 every leaf, and mouldy sod and rocky fragment. Here, said 

 he, is a mossy stick, a chance thing picked up in the day's 

 ramble. Every one of these encrusting mosses is a plant of 

 rarest elegance, perfect in structure, its roots, its stems, its 

 fruitful capsules, all complete symmetrical and charming in 

 their adaptedness to their appropriate ends. Here too, is 

 a fern, not, perhaps, rare ; yet upon this one species a lec- 

 ture might be based, extending profitably through a whole 

 afternoon. Nor are such investigations useless ; for it is to 

 such fungous vegetation, in many cases that the diseases are 

 due that effect agriculture and injure our corps ; and here 

 the naturalist becomes a public benefactor, for by his investi- 

 gations we learn the nature of the pest that afflicts us and 

 how, if at all, we may rid ourselves of its presence. 



R. H. Wheatland of Salem, was pleased to have re- 

 ceived such a large aiid interesting variety of zoological speci- 

 mens as the results of the day's efforts. Here was a large 

 Trout, caught by Mr. Allen, and several small but not less 

 curious specimens of the Common Eel. We are so fortu- 

 nate, moreover, as to have found some Sticklebacks, the 

 smart little fishes that build nests in the water as birds do in 

 the air, and inhabit them for the same purposes. There are 

 snakes in Beverly also, for we have a good specimen of the 

 Ribbon Snake, and one of what is known as the Checkered 

 Adder, still young. Some one has likewise captured a 

 Striped Squirrel in the woods, and about the meadows these 

 Salamanders and Frogs have been found to add to the list. 

 One of the former was formerly known to scientific men as 

 the Salamander venenosa, as every one supposed it to be ve- 



