The Log of the Sun Part 15

Lizard, through such forms as _lesarde_, _lezard_, _lagarto_, _lacerto_, is from the Latin _lacertus_, a lizard; while closely related is the word alligator by way of _lagarto_, _aligarto_, to alligator. The prefix may have arisen as a corruption of an article and a noun, as in the modern Spanish _el lagarto_,--a lizard.

Monitor is Latin for one who reminds, these lizards being so called because they are supposed to give warning of the approach of crocodiles.

Asp can be carried back to the _aspis_ of the Romans, no trace being found in the dim vistas of preceding tongues.

Gecko, the name of certain wall-hunting lizards, is derived from their croaking cry; while iguana is a Spanish name taken from the old native Haytian appellation _biuana_.

Of the word frog we know nothing, although through the medium of many languages it has had as thorough an evolution as in its physical life. We must also admit our ignorance in regard to toad, backward search revealing only _tade_, _tode_, _ted_, _toode_, and _tadie_, the root baffling all study. Polliwog and tadpole are delightfully easy. Old forms of polliwog are _pollywig_, _polewiggle_, and _pollwiggle_. This last gives us the clew to our spelling--_pollwiggle_, which, reversed and interpreted in a modern way, is wigglehead, a most appropriate name for these lively little black fellows. Tadpole is somewhat similar; toad-pole, or toad's-head, also very apt when we think of these small-bodied larval forms.

Salamander, which is a Greek word of Eastern origin, was applied in the earliest times to a lizard considered to have the power of extinguis.h.i.+ng fire. Newt has a strange history; originating in a wrong division of two words, "_an ewte_," the latter being derived from _eft_, which is far more correct than newt, though in use now in only a few places. Few fishermen have ever thought of the interesting derivation of the names which they know so well. Of course there are a host of fishes named from a fancied resemblance to familiar terrestrial animals or other things; such as the catfish, and those named after the dog, hog, horse, cow, trunk, devil, angel, sun, and moon.

The word fish has pa.s.sed through many varied forms since it was _piscis_ in the old Latin tongue, and the same is true of shark and skate, which in the same language were _carcharus_ and _squatus_. Trout was originally _tructa_, which in turn is lost in a very old Greek word, meaning eat or gnaw. Perch harks back to the Latin _perca_, and the Romans had it from the Greeks, among whom it meant spotted. The Romans said _minutus_ when they meant small, and nowadays when we speak of any very small fish we say minnow. Alewife in old English was applied to the women, usually very stout dames, who kept alehouses. The corpulency of the fish to which the same term is given explains its derivation.

The pike is so named from the sharp, pointed snout and long, slim body, bringing to mind the old-time weapon of that name; while pickerel means doubly a little pike, the _er_ and _el_ (as in c.o.c.k and c.o.c.kerel) both being diminutives. Smelt was formerly applied to any small fish and comes, perhaps, from the Anglo-Saxon _smeolt_, which meant smooth--the smoothness and slipperiness of the fish suggesting the name.

Salmon comes directly from the Latin _salmo_, a salmon, which literally meant the leaper, from _salire_--to leap. Sturgeon, from the Saxon was _stiriga_, literally a stirrer, from the habit of the fish of stirring up the mud at the bottom of the water. Dace, through its mediaeval forms _darce_ and _dars_, is from the same root as our word dart, given on account of the swiftness of the fish.

Anchovy is interesting as perhaps from the Basque word _antzua_, meaning dry; hence the dried fish; and mullet is from the Latin _mullus_. Herring is well worth following back to its origin. We know that the most marked habit of fishes of this type is their herding together in great schools or ma.s.ses or armies. In the very high German _heri_ meant an army or host; hence our word harry and, with a suffix, herring.

_Hake_ in Norwegian means hook, and the term hake or hook-fish was given because of the hooked character of the under-jaw. Mackerel comes from _macarellus_ and originally the Latin _macula_--spotted, from the dark spots on the body. Roach and ray both come from the Latin _raria_, applied then as in the latter case now to bottom-living sharks.

Flounder comes from the verb, which in turn is derived from flounce, a word which is lost in antiquity. Tarpon (and the form _tarpum_) may be an Indian word; while there is no doubt as to grouper coming from _garrupa_, a native Mexican name. Chubb (a form of cub) meant a chunky ma.s.s or lump, referring to the body of the fish. Shad is lost in _sceadda_, Anglo-Saxon for the same fish.

Lamprey and halibut both have histories, which, at first glance, we would never suspect, although the forms have changed but little. The former have a habit of fastening themselves for hours to stones and rocks, by means of their strong, sucking mouths. So the Latin form of the word _lampetra_, or literally lick-rock, is very appropriate. Halibut is equally so. _But_ or _bot_ in several languages means a certain flounder-like fish, and in olden times this fish was eaten only on holidays (_i.e._, holy days).

Hence the combination halibut means really holy-flounder.

The meaning of these words and many others are worth knowing, and it is well to be able to answer with other than ignorance the question "What's in a name?"

THE DYING YEAR

When a radical change of habits occurs, as in the sapsucker, deviating so sharply from the ancient principles of its family, many other forms of life about it are influenced, indirectly, but in a most interesting way.

In its tippling operations it wastes quant.i.ties of sap which exudes from the numerous holes and trickles down the bark of the wounded tree. This proves a veritable feast for the forlorn remnant of wasps and b.u.t.terflies,--the year's end stragglers whose flower calyces have fallen and given place to swelling seeds.

Swiftly up wind they come on the scent, eager as hounds on the trail, and they drink and drink of the sweets until they become almost incapable of flying. But, after all, the new lease of life is a vain semblance of better things. Their eggs have long since been laid and their mission in life ended, and at the best their existence is but a matter of days.

It is a sad thing this, and sometimes our heart hardens against Nature for the seeming cruelty of it all. Forever and always, year after year, century upon century, the same tale unfolds itself,--the sacrifice of the individual for the good of the race. A hundred drones are tended and reared, all but one to die in vain; a thousand seeds are sown to rot or to sprout and wither; a million little codfish hatch and begin life hopefully, perhaps all to succ.u.mb save one; a million million shrimp and pteropods paddle themselves here and there in the ocean, and every one is devoured by fish or swept into the whalebone tangle from which none ever return. And if a lucky one which survives does so because it has some little advantage over its fellows,--some added quality which gives just the opportunity to escape at the critical moment,--then the race will advance to the extent of that trifle and so carry out the precept of evolution. But even though we may owe every character of body and mind to the fulfilment of some such inexorable law in the past, yet the witnessing of the operation brings ever a feeling of cruelty, of injustice somewhere.

How pitiful the weak flight of the last yellow b.u.t.terfly of the year, as with tattered and battered wings it vainly seeks for a final sip of sweets! The fallen petals and the hard seeds are black and odourless, the drops of sap are hardened. Little by little the wings weaken, the tiny feet clutch convulsively at a dried weed stalk, and the four golden wings drift quietly down among the yellow leaves, soon to merge into the dark mould beneath. As the b.u.t.terfly dies, a stiffened Katydid scratches a last requiem on his wing covers--"_katy-didn't--katy-did--kate--y_"--and the succeeding moment of silence is broken by the sharp rattle of a woodp.e.c.k.e.r. We shake off every dream of the summer and brace ourselves to meet and enjoy the keen, invigorating pleasures of winter.

NOVEMBER

NOVEMBER'S BIRDS OF THE HEAVENS

As the whirling winds of winter's edge strip the trees bare of their last leaves, the leaden sky of the eleventh month seems to push its cold face closer to earth. Who can tell when the northern sparrows first arrive? A whirl of brown leaves scatters in front of us; some fall back to earth; others rise and perch in the thick briers,--sombre little white-throated and tree sparrows! These brown-coated, low-voiced birds easily attract our attention, the more now that the great host of brilliant warblers has pa.s.sed, just as our hearts warm toward the humble poly-pody fronds (pa.s.sing them by unnoticed when flowers are abundant) which now hold up their bright greenness amid all the cold.

But all the migrants have not left us yet by any means, and we had better leave our boreal visitors until mid-winter's blasts show us these hardiest of the hardy at their best.

We know little of the ways of the gaunt herons on their southward journey, but day after day, in the marshes and along the streams, we may see the great blues as they stop in their flight to rest for a time.

The cold draws all the birds of a species together. Dark hordes of clacking grackles pa.s.s by, scores of red-winged blackbirds and cowbirds mingle amicably together, both of dark hue but of such unlike matrimonial habits. A single male red-wing, as we have seen, may a.s.sume the cares of a harem of three, four, or five females, each of which rears her brown-streaked offspring in her own particular nest, while the valiant guardian keeps faithful watch over his small colony among the reeds and cat-tails. But little thought or care does mother cowbird waste upon her offspring. No home life is hers--merely a stealthy approach to the nest of some unsuspecting yellow warbler, or other small bird, a hastily deposited egg, and the unnatural parent goes on her way, having shouldered all her household cares on another. Her young may be hatched and carefully reared by the patient little warbler mother, or the egg may spoil in the deserted nest, or be left in the cold beneath another nest bottom built over it; little cares the cowbird.

The ospreys or fish hawks seem to circle southward in pairs or trios, but some clear, cold day the sky will be alive with hawks of other kinds. It is a strange fact that these birds which have the power to rise so high that they fairly disappear from our sight choose the trend of terrestrial valleys whenever possible, in directing their aerial routes. Even the series of New Jersey hills, flattered by the name of the Orange Mountains, seem to balk many hawks which elect to change their direction and fly to the right or left toward certain gaps or pa.s.ses. Through these a raptorial stream pours in such numbers during the period of migration that a person with a foreknowledge of their path in former years may lie in wait and watch scores upon scores of these birds pa.s.s close overhead within a few hours, while a short distance to the right or left one may watch all day without seeing a single raptor. The whims of migrating birds are beyond our ken.

Sometimes, out in the broad fields, one's eyes will be drawn accidentally upward, and a great flight of hawks will be seen--a compact flock of intercircling forms, perhaps two or three hundred in all, the whole number gradually pa.s.sing from view in a southerly direction, now and then sending down a shrill cry. It is a beautiful sight, not very often to be seen near a city--unless watched for.

To a dweller in a city or its suburbs I heartily commend at this season the forming of this habit,--to look upward as often as possible on your walks. An instant suffices to sweep the whole heavens with your eye, and if the distant circling forms, moving in so stately a manner, yet so swiftly, and in their every movement personifying the essence of wild and glorious freedom,--if this sight does not send a thrill through the onlooker, then he may at once pull his hat lower over his eyes and concern himself only with his immediate business. The joys of Nature are not for such as he; the love of the wild which exists in every one of us is, in him, too thickly "sicklied o'er" with the veneer of convention and civilisation.

Even as late as November, when the water begins to freeze in the tiny cups of the pitcher plants, and the frost brings into being a new kind of foliage on gla.s.s and stone, a few insect-eaters of the summer woods still linger on. A belated red-eyed vireo may be chased by a s...o...b..rd, and when we approach a flock of birds, mistaking them at a distance for purple finches, we may discover they are myrtle warblers, clad in the faded yellow of their winter plumage. In favoured localities these brave little birds may even spend the entire winter with us.

One of the best of November's surprises may come when all hope of late migrants has been given up. Walking near the river, our glance falls on what might be a painter's palate with blended colours of all shades resting on the smooth surface of the water. We look again and again, hardly believing our eyes, until at last the gorgeous creature takes to wing, and goes humming down the stream, a bit of colour tropical in its extravagance--and we know that we have seen a male wood, or summer, duck in the full grandeur of his white, purple, chestnut, black, blue, and brown. Many other ducks have departed, but this one still swims among the floating leaves on secluded waterways.

Now is the time when the woodc.o.c.k rises from his swampy summer home and zigzags his way to a land where earthworms are still active. Sometimes in our walks we may find the fresh body of one of these birds, and an upward glance at the roadside will show the cause--the cruel telegraph wires against which the flight of the bird has carried it with fatal velocity.

One of the greatest pleasures which November has to give us is the joy of watching for the long lines of wild geese from the Canada lakes. Who can help being thrilled at the sight of these strong-winged birds, as the V-shaped flock throbs into view high in air, beating over land and water, forest and city, as surely and steadily as the pa.s.sing of the day behind them. One of the finest of November sounds is the "Honk! honk!" which comes to our ears from such a company of geese,--musical tones "like a clanking chain drawn through the heavy air."

At the stroke of midnight I have been halted in my hurried walk by these notes. They are a bit of the wild north which may even enter within a city, and three years ago I trapped a fine gander and a half a dozen of his flock in the New York Zoological Park, where they have lived ever since and reared their golden-hued goslings, which otherwise would have broken their sh.e.l.ls on some Arctic waste, with only the s...o...b..rds to admire, and to be watched with greedy eyes by the Arctic owls.

A haze on the far horizon, The infinite tender sky, The ripe, rich tints of the cornfields, And the wild geese sailing high; And ever on upland and lowland, The charm of the goldenrod-- Some of us call it Autumn, And others call it G.o.d.

W. H. Carruth.

A PLEA FOR THE SKUNK

In spite of constant persecution the skunk is without doubt the tamest of all of our wild animals, and shares with the weasel and mink the honour of being one of the most abundant of the carnivores, or flesh-eaters, near our homes. This is a great achievement for the skunk,--to have thus held its own in the face of ever advancing and destroying civilisation. But the same characteristics which enable it to hold its ground are also those which emanc.i.p.ate it from its wild kindred and give it a unique position among animals. Its first cousins, the minks and weasels, all secrete pungent odours, which are unpleasant enough at close range, but in the skunk the great development of these glands has caused a radical change in its habits of life and even in its physical make-up.

Watch a mink creeping on its sinuous way,--every action and glance full of fierce wildness, each step telling of insatiable seeking after living, active prey. The boldest rat flees in frantic terror at the hint of this animal's presence; but let man show himself, and with a demoniacal grin of hatred the mink slinks into covert.

Now follow a skunk in its wanderings as it comes out of its hole in early evening, slowly stretches and yawns, and with hesitating, rolling gait ambles along, now and then sniffing in the gra.s.s and seizing some sluggish gra.s.shopper or cricket. Fearlessness and confidence are what its gait and manner spell. The world is its debtor, and all creatures in its path are left unmolested, only on evidence of good behaviour. Far from need of concealment, its furry coat is striped with a broad band of white, signalling in the dusk or the moonlight, "Give me room to pa.s.s and go in peace! Trouble me and beware!"

Degenerate in muscles and vitality, the skunk must forego all strenuous hunts and trust to craft and sudden springs, or else content himself with the humble fare of insects, helpless young birds, and poor, easily confused mice. The flesh of the skunk is said to be sweet and toothsome, but few creatures there are who dare attempt to add it to their bill of fare! A great horned owl or a puma in the extremity of starvation, or a vulture in dire stress of hunger,--probably no others.

Far from wilfully provoking an attack, the skunk is usually content to go on his way peacefully, and when one of these creatures becomes accustomed to the sight of an observer, no more interesting and, indeed, safer object of study can be found.

Depart once from the conventional mode of greeting a skunk,--and instead of hurling a stone in its direction and fleeing, place, if the opportunity present itself, bits of meat in its way evening after evening, and you will soon learn that there is nothing vicious in the heart of the skunk.