INTRODUCTION. 27 



worms in " boring, perforating, and loosening- 

 tlie soil, and in throwing up such infinite num- 

 ber of lumps of earth called wormcasts, which is 

 a fine manure for grain and grass," and although 

 he said, furthermore, " a good Monograph of 

 Worms would afford much entertainment and 

 information at the same time, and would open 

 to a new and large field on Natural History," 

 it was not until more than a century had elapsed 

 that Darwin's work on ' The Formation of Vege- 

 table Mould through the Action of Worms ' was 

 published. Yet all the time, in every field, 

 abundant evidence of the influence of worms was 

 displayed before the eyes of naturalists in the 

 shape of hundreds of tons of earth raised to the 

 surface in the form of wormcasts. 



I make bold to say that, in like manner, most 

 of the future discoveries of great moment to the 

 naturalist will be made, not in the remote and 

 minute ramifications of science such as are occupy- 

 ing the attention of so many of our learned in- 

 vestigators, but among the everyday phenomena 

 which are open to the eyes of all. It is in this 

 truth (for truth is scarcely too strong a word 

 when all past experience declares and confirms 

 the rule) that the hope of the amateur naturalist 



