NOTES TO THE 
digestion by these humble and hitherto unappreciated fellow- 
La]30urers with farmers to ameliorate the condition of the earth's 
surface, and to adapt it to the production of grass, food for the 
higher animals. Thus the whole of the earth which forms a 
rind of turf has again and again passed through the entrails of 
the successive generations of earth-worms. A check upon the 
too great increase of earth-worms is afforded by their being the 
food of birds and moles. See also Literary Gazette, Nov. 25, 
1857." 
The earth-worm is admirably adapted by its structure for 
tunnelling in the earth, and its wonderful borings are often 
laid bare in the railway and other cuttings. When we consider 
the great pressure of earth, besides its solidity, through which 
these worms have to bore, it seems surprising that their delicate 
organisms should not be crushed. The body is made of a number 
of small rings, which are armed with short, stiff, harsh bristles, 
by means of which they pull themselves along. As the sea- 
mouse has brilliant hairs, and the Cape mole has lustrous fur, 
so the earth-worm's cuticle has a shining, iridescent lustre, the 
reason of which I am not in a position to explain. The nervous 
and vascular system of the earth-worm is very complicated. It 
lays eggs, for which the reader should look in decayed dung 
heaps. The mouth consists of two small lips, the superior of 
which resembles, in some degree, that of the Tapita. In the 
Koyal College of Surgeons, there is an admirable preparation 
(No. 470) of the anatomy of the earth-worm. 
"The oesoi^hagus, a wide membranous canal, is continued straight 
down for half an inch, and ends in a delicate bag, or reservoir ; 
to this succeeds a muscular stomach, or gizzard, disposed in the 
form of a ring. The intestine is constricted at each segment of 
the animal by a series of ligaments or partitions connecting it 
to the parietes of the body, and swells out in the intermediate 
spaces when distended by the particles of earth." 
j\Ir. Davy informs me that common snails are very palat- 
able food for hungry people. Cut off the point of the 
shell and pick them out with a pin like a winkle ; put 
them in salt and water for an hour. In winter they are 
capital eating. Tiiey should be boiled in milk, but are very 
good when eaten raw. Snails are used by hundredweights in Lon- 
don and the provinces for feeding thrushes and blackbirds ; the 
men collect them in market-gardens and hedgerows. They are 
sold wholesale at 2^d. to M. per quart ; there are about five dozen 
in a quart. Birds won't eat water-snails ; they are too sloppy ; 
there is no body in them. No small bird eats the black and 
