296 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



[Oct. 1, 1865. 



on a sheet of tinted paper at night, in the morning 

 we shall find the spores deposited on the paper, 

 perhaps forming a white, a brownish, or a blackish 

 stain. Who shall count the myriads of germinating 

 bodies thus originating from a single parent ? Here, 

 too, is work for the microscopist ; for if he will take 

 a fragment of one of the gills, or pores, or teeth, and 

 submit it to observation under his instrument, he 

 will see a new phase in the mysteries of vegetation, 

 for the spores will appear, supported naked on short 

 stems in groups or clusters of four ; and if this is 

 the first time that he has made such a use of his 

 microscope, it will certainly not be the last. 



We might refer also to the great variety of form 

 exhibited by fungi, other than those having a stem 

 and cap. To the cup-like but elegant bright orange 

 Peziza, to the Cornucopia, to the waxy Clavarias, 

 the lobed Tremellas, the shell-like Polypori, the 

 eccentric Starry puff-balls, and the subterranean 

 TrufEes. As a contrast to the disagreeable odour of 

 the " stiukhorn " already alluded to, we might 

 enumerate those possessing a powerful but grateful 

 fragrance; but enough has been said to indicate 

 that there is something worthy of regard in the 

 much-despised but little-known orders to which the 

 " toadstools " belong. ^^^ q Cooke. 



HEEMIT EOOKS. 



HAVE any of your readers, in their wanderings 

 over some lonely hill-side, ever noticed a soli- 

 tary rook haunting the spot like an evil genius, and 

 flitting from mound to hillock a few hundred feet in 

 advance of the traveller ? I am something of an 

 anchorite myself, at least I love a silent walk when 

 wearied sometimes with the din of the great city in 

 which my lot is cast, and I cannot help feeling some 

 sympathy;, for these odd birds, which nature has 

 made gregarious, and which fate or misfortune has 

 driven into solitude. 



I have not made the common mistake, as may be 

 suspected, of taking a crow for a rook, an error 

 which nine-tenths of all townspeople are sure to 

 fall into. I know the distinction well enough, and 

 the difference in their habits, and am seldom suffi- 

 ciently deceived, even for a moment, by the wild 

 and vigilant " corone," to mistake his vigorous mo- 

 tions for the languid action of this melancholy 

 " frugilegus." I use the epithet melancholy not 

 only because he has that aspect, but to introduce 

 one out of three hypotheses to account for a way of 

 life so opposed to the usual gregarious habits of his 

 race. It is at least possible that irrational creatures 

 may be bred occasionally with that peculiar compo- 

 sition of the humours which constitutes a hypo- 

 chondriacal temperament. I remember an old horse 

 of my father's that used at times to heave the 

 deepest sighs — a fact well known to the stableman, 



and he had, besides, the ill-conditioned look and 

 occasional indisposition for work combined with 

 wonderful spurts of energy at odd times, which 

 certainly mark the rider — and if the rixler why not the 

 horse ? — afflicted with this disorder ; unless, indeed, 

 it may be thought that old Herbert's proverb estab- 

 lishes a constant diversity of nature, "the horse 

 thinks one thing and he that saddles him another." 

 But, reasoning from analogy, may we not assign as 

 one possible cause for the lonely habits of a sociable 

 bird the possession of a melancholic system ? He 

 cannot hold up his head among the sprightly ones 

 of his race — their senseless cawing grates on his 

 nerves, and liable as he is, when in company, to 

 aggravation from passing visits of cackling jack- 

 daws and starlings, he retires into the wilderness to 

 indulge in silence and constitutional spleen. Virgil 

 indeed seems to think that impending changes in 

 the weather may thus affect rooks in general — 



Turn cornix plena pluviam vocat improba voce, 

 Et sola in sicca secum spatiatur arena. 



But whatever truth there may be in this, it hardly 

 applies to my supposed hypochondriac, for he, ac- 

 cording to my observation, is not given to much 

 speaking — he moves off mute and sad as you 

 approach him, and giving himself an oblique twirl 

 upwards to break his fall, settles down for, perhaps, 

 the twentieth time with the least possible concus- 

 sion to his bones. 



A different, and, as some may think, a more pro- 

 bable conjecture is, that these hermits are mutilated 

 or disabled birds, incapable of the sustained flight 

 and active habits of their congeners. It is certain 

 that the breeding season makes no difference in their 

 mode of life, and unless we suppose them to be 

 hermaphrodite, or in some way unequal to the cares 

 of a family, we cannot account for their exemption 

 from the passionate instinct that wild creatures 

 have for increasing their kind. Many years ago, 

 when I was living in the valley of Homesdale, I 

 noticed one of these unfortunates haunting the 

 fields at the back of my father's house. Spiritless 

 as he seemed, he kept a sharp look-out, and gave 

 me some trouble before I could satisfy my curiosity 

 by a long shot. He was lying on his back when I 

 came up, and a moment's glance at his black legs, 

 upreared in the air, revealed the cause of his soli- 

 tary habits. One of the metatarsal joints was quite 

 stiff, and enlarged to the size of a blackbird's egg. 

 The three front claws were bent in a general direc- 

 tion backward along with the back claw, and on the 

 stump end or knob the bird hopped and strode 

 about. Doubtless a shot-corn had shattered the 

 joint inauy weeks before, and the poor creature had 

 borne up through the irritation of such a wound, 

 and had found shelter and forage for himself till 

 nature had wrought a moui'uful sort of cure. But 

 he was a hermit for life. 



