FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135  
136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   >>   >|  
y bosoms feel the sacred fire, Cradled in snow, and fanned by arctic air, Shines, gentle Barometz, the golden hair; Rested in earth, each cloven hoof descends, And round and round her flexile neck she bends. Crops of the grey coral moss, and hoary thyme, Or laps with rosy tongue the melting rime, Eyes with mute tenderness her distant dam, Or seems to bleat a vegetable lamb." Another curious fiction prevalent in olden times was that of the barnacle-tree, to which Sir John Maundeville also alludes:--"In our country were trees that bear a fruit that becomes flying birds; those that fell in the water lived, and those that fell on the earth died, and these be right good for man's meat." As early as the twelfth century this idea was promulgated by Giraldus Cambrensis in his "Topographia Hiberniae;" and Gerarde in his "Herball, or General History of Plants," published in the year 1597, narrates the following:--"There are found in the north parts of Scotland, and the isles adjacent, called Orcades, certain trees, whereon do grow small fishes, of a white colour, tending to russet, wherein are contained little living creatures; which shells, in time of maturity, do open, and out of them grow those little living things which, falling into the water, do become fowls, whom we call barnacles, in the north of England brant-geese, and in Lancashire tree-geese; but the others that do fall upon the land perish, and do come to nothing." But, like many other popular fictions, this notion was founded on truth, and probably originated in mistaking the fleshy peduncle of the barnacle (_Lepas analifera_) for the neck of a goose, the shell for its head, and the tentacula for a tuft of feather. There were many versions of this eccentric myth, and according to one modification given by Boece, the oldest Scottish historian, these barnacle-geese are first produced in the form of worms in old trees, and further adds that such a tree was cast on shore in the year 1480, when there appeared, on its being sawn asunder, a multitude of worms, "throwing themselves out of sundry holes and pores of the tree; some of them were nude, as they were new shapen; some had both head, feet, and wings, but they had no feathers; some of them were perfect shapen fowls. At last, the people having this tree each day in more admiration, brought it to the kirk of St. Andrew's, beside the town of Tyre, where it yet remains to our day." Du Bartas thus de
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135  
136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

barnacle

 

living

 

shapen

 

Andrew

 

popular

 

founded

 

notion

 

fictions

 
originated
 

analifera


brought

 

admiration

 

peduncle

 

mistaking

 

fleshy

 

remains

 

barnacles

 
England
 

Bartas

 

perish


Lancashire
 

feather

 

appeared

 

sundry

 

throwing

 

asunder

 

multitude

 

feathers

 

people

 

modification


eccentric

 

versions

 

perfect

 
produced
 

falling

 
oldest
 

Scottish

 

historian

 

tentacula

 

Orcades


tenderness

 
distant
 
tongue
 
melting
 

vegetable

 

Maundeville

 
alludes
 

Another

 

curious

 

fiction