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ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



THE SALAMANDER EMBLEM OF FRANCIS I 



THE SALAMANDER-IN-THE-FIRE 



MYTH 



By Ida M. Mellen 



"Vanish in the iiery glow, 

 Salamander!" — Faust. 



THE, salamanders on exhibition at the Aqua- 

 rium are always viewed with interest and 

 curiosity. They comprise several of the 

 smaller varieties, — the Marbled, {Amhly stoma 

 opacum), the Red, {Splerpes ruber), Red-Bel- 

 lied, (Diemyctylus torosus), Spotted, (Ambly- 

 stoma punctatum), and Shasta, {Chondrotiis 

 tenehrosris) salamanders, all indigenous forms 

 leading an amphibious life ; and three of the 

 larger, wholly aquatic varieties — the Giant Sal- 

 amander of Japan, (^Cryptohranchus maximum), 

 the sole and diminutive representative of the gi- 

 gantic salamanders of prehistoric times, our 

 native species of Mud Puppy, {^Necturus macu- 

 latus) which permanently retains its external 

 gills, and the Hellbender or Water-dog (Cryp- 

 tobranchus alleghaniensis) , remarkable for its 

 tenacity to life. 



Few animals have gained in history the prom- 

 inence of the salamander, and there are few re- 

 garding which so much groundless superstition 

 has prevailed. To this day people wonder 



whether the strange stories they have heard 

 about salamanders are true, the strangest of all 

 being that they live in fire. 



Did we but possess an Aladdin's lamp at the 

 Aquarium, we might summon up a magician who 

 would conduct our visitors to the engine room 

 and point out salamanders in the hot coals of 

 the furnaces. But, without such occult aid, we 

 of the 20th century cannot "do the trick." 



The belief that salamanders lived and bred in 

 fire had origin in an antiquity so remote that we 

 may never know in what age or country, or for 

 what reason, it arose. Time out of mind, wise 

 and foolish alike held to the amazing conviction. 



The priests of ancient Egypt employed its 

 image to symbolize those steadfast souls whom 

 the Fire of Affliction could neither conquer nor 

 consume, and Christianity adapted the symbol 

 to its own purposes. On the font in Winchester 

 Cathedral, and in other European churches, a 

 salamander appears, significant of the prophecy 

 of St. John, "He shall baptize you with the 

 Holy Ghost and with lire;" and the emblem of 

 one of the Kings of France, Francis I (1494- 

 1547) depicted a salamander amid flames, with 

 the inscription "Nutrisco et extinguo," — I nour- 

 ish, and I extinguish. 



Man}^ people still imagine that salamanders 

 live in flames. The writer, when a child, cer- 

 tainly thought so, and on one memorable oc- 

 casion melted the wax nose off her best beloved 

 doll while eagerly watching a grate fire in naive 

 hopes of seeing one of the weird creatures. 

 This was directly the fault of Benvenuto Cel- 

 lini, the celebrated Italian sculptor, who so fas- 

 cinatingly narrated in his Autobiography the 

 story of his father having called himself and his 

 sister on a bitter cold day to see a salamander 

 in a "good fire of oak-logs." The future sculptor 

 was then only five years old, but the elder Cel- 

 lini adopted a method which, though harsh, was 

 entirely effective in causing his son to retain 

 through life a vivid recollection of the incident. 

 He carefully pointed out to the children a little 

 creature "sporting in the core of the intensest 

 coals" ; and thereupon, Cellini relates, "]\Iy fa- 

 ther gave me a great box on the ears which 

 caused me to howl and weep with all my might. 

 Then he pacified me good-humoredly and spoke 

 as follows: 'My dear little boy, I am not strik- 

 ing you for any wrong that you have done, but 

 only to make you remember that the lizard 

 which you saw in the fire is a Salamander, a 

 creature which has never been seen before by 

 anyone of whom we have credible information.' 

 So saying, he kissed me and gave me some 

 pieces of money." 



