species of wasp and is, I think, worthy of 

 careful study. I wish I had space to tell 

 of the almost fiendish ingenuity that cer- 

 tain parasites show in maintaining them- 

 selves at the expense of their hosts. 



The ground hog has a knack of spend- 

 ing his winter in a way that is at once eco- 

 nomical and pleasant. They generally 

 hibernate in pairs, rolling themselves up 

 into balls. They do not seem to breathe 

 or to perform any of the life functions 

 during their long six months' sleep. 

 There is, I fear, no foundation of fact for 

 the ancient fiction of the ground hog ap- 

 pearing and making weather prognosti- 

 cations on the second of February. A 

 gentleman writing in the New York Sun 

 of some years since says : "I took the 

 trouble once to dig into a woodchuck's 

 burrow on Candlemas day, and a warm, 

 cloudy day it was ; just such a day when 

 the ground hog is said to come out of his 

 hole and stay out. I found two wood- 

 chucks in the burrow, with no more signs 

 of life about them than if they had been 

 shot and killed. From all outward ap- 

 pearances I could have taken them out 

 and had a game of football with them 

 without their knowing it." 



Nor is it true that hibernating animals 

 live upon their accumulated fat, for di- 

 gestion, as well as other active life pro- 

 cesses, ceases. Hibernating animals al- 

 ways begin their long sleep upon an 

 empty stomach, and food injected into 

 their stomach is not digested. The fat 

 disappears, it is true, but it is not in any 

 strict sense digested. Any experienced 

 hunter is aware that unless the entrails 

 are removed from the shot rabbit the fat 

 will disappear from about the kidneys. 

 The fat may, and no doubt does, assist in 

 some way in the long sleep. It may act 

 as fuel to keep up the right living temper- 

 ature. At any rate, it is true that hiber- 

 nating animals eat voraciously and grow 

 very fat just before they go to sleep. It 

 is a peculiar fact that many hibernating 

 animals bring forth their young during 

 this period. This is especially true of 

 woodchucks and bears. It is a common 

 experience with hunters that only male 

 bears are, killed during the winter season. 

 Mr. Andrew Fuller of Ridgewood, 

 New Jersey, according to the article 

 above quoted, had an interesting experi- 



ence with a pair of Rocky Mountain 

 ground squirrels. After missing them 

 for a month he accidentally found them 

 curled up under some straw, apparently 

 frozen stiff. He brought them to the 

 house to show his wife the misfortune that 

 had befallen his pets. Soon they seemed 

 to thaw out and scampered about as lively 

 as ever. No sooner were they put out 

 in the cold than they resumed their sleep, 

 which continued all winter, their bodies 

 maintaining a fairly constant tempera- 

 ture, seldom falling below three degrees 

 above the freezing point of water. They 

 came out in the spring as chipper as if 

 they had been asleep but one night. Many 

 hibernating animals will if wakened by 

 being placed in a warm room, eat eagerly, 

 but they soon show a desire to resume 

 their nap. 



The Loir, a peculiar little native of 

 Senegal, never hibernates in its native 

 clime, but every specimen brought to Eu- 

 rope becomes torpid when exposed to 

 cold. The common land tortoise — wher- 

 ever he may be and he is a voracious eater 

 of almost anything — always goes to sleep 

 in November, and wakes some time in 

 May. 



Just as in the north numerous animals 

 hibernate upon approach of cold, so in 

 the south there are species that may be 

 said to estivate during the hottest 

 weather. While the northern animals 

 curl up so as to retain heat, his southern 

 cousin straightens out as much as possi- 

 ble to allow the heat to escape from all 

 parts of the body. 



But it was not my intention to write an 

 essay upon hibernation and allied phe- 

 nomena, but merely to speak of it as a 

 subject that should be investigated. 

 What a splendid arrangement it would 

 be for the poor, the sick, and the melan- 

 choly folk if they could just hibernate for 

 six months occasionally. 



I will merely speak of the light of the 

 so called lightning bug, with its over 

 ninety per centum efficiency and no heat 

 and no consumption of fuel to speak of. 

 Why doesn't some genius learn her lan- 

 guage and find out how she does it ? She 

 has been trying for centuries to demon- 

 strate it but we are too stupid to learn her 

 secret. Rowland Watts. 



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