The Swan and Her Crew
Page 8
CHAPTER VI.
Mr. Meredith.--"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might."--A Botanical Lecture.--The Goat Moth.--Blowing up a Tree.-- An astonished Cow.--Caterpillars in the Wood.
On the morrow, after morning service, the three boys (Dick having beeninvited to spend the day with Frank) were walking from church andtalking upon the sermon which Mr. Meredith had just preached to them.
It was a beautiful morning--one of those days on which it is a treat tolive. The sun shone from a sky which was brilliant in its blue andwhite, the waters of the lake sparkled diamond-like under the stirringinfluence of a warm westerly wind. The scent of the honeysuckle and theroses in the cottage gardens filled the air with pleasant incense, andfrom every tall tree-top a thrush or blackbird sang his merriest.
"That wasn't a bad motto which Meredith took for his text: 'Whatsoeverthy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might,'" said Frank.
"I think it is a motto you endeavour to carry out, Frank," answeredJimmy.
"Well, I think if a fellow does that he can't be far wrong," repliedFrank; "but here is the parson himself."
A tall, broad-shouldered man came quickly up and said to them:
"Well, boys, I hope you are applying my sermon to yourselves."
"We should be glad to do so if we were quite sure about the application,Mr. Meredith," replied Frank.
"Ah, you young rascal, you could not have been attending; but seriously,what I meant was this: You boys, and especially Master Frank, are veryprone to take up a thing with all your might when once you begin. Nowthat is very right and proper. Whatever you do you should do your bestto do well; but what I want you particularly to understand is thatbefore taking up a thing, you should first of all think well and decidewhether it is the right thing to do, and it is not until that questionis settled that it becomes right to throw your whole heart into it. Nowthe immediate application of this is this: You are going head over heelsinto the study of Natural History, and you are making collections asfast as you can. Now it won't take you long to decide that NaturalHistory is a very right and proper thing for you to take up, andtherefore you may study it with all your might, and, I doubt not, to thepraise and glory of God; but be very careful about the collecting partof the business. Don't let your zeal carry you too far. Don't letcollecting be your sole aim and object, or you will become very lowtypes of naturalists. Let it be only secondary and subservient toobservation. Let your aim be to preserve rather than to destroy.Remember that God gave life to His creatures that they might enjoy it,as well as fulfil their missions and propagate their species. Thereforeif you come across a rare bird, do not kill it unnecessarily; if you canobserve its living motions it will interest you more and do you moregood than will the possession of its stuffed body when dead."
"I quite understand what you mean, sir," replied Frank; "and it is onlywhat my father has often told me before. We will try to follow ourpursuits in moderation."
"Just so; then, as you have heard me so patiently, I will trouble youwith another application of my sermon. Do what you are doing _well_.Don't let your observation be too cursory. Don't be Jacks of all tradesand masters of none. This district is teeming with bird, insect, andanimal life. You boys have peculiar opportunities for learning anddiscovering all that is rare and interesting. You are sharp, young, andactive, and nothing can escape you. Now is the time for you to store upfacts which will always be valuable. Buy yourselves notebooks; put downeverything in writing which seems to you to be strange and noteworthy,and don't trust to your memories. But above all, take up some one branchof study and stick to it. It is well for you to know a little ofeverything, but it is better for you to know a great deal of one thing.Therefore I should advise each of you to take up a line that suits himand to pay particular attention to it. Thus you, Frank, may take upOrnithology; you, Dick, should go in for Entomology; and Jimmy, whyshould you not take up Botany?"
The boys quite concurred in the justice of his observations, but Jimmysaid:
"There is nothing I should like better than to know something of Botany,but there seems so much to learn that I am almost afraid to begin."
"Oh, nonsense," exclaimed Mr. Meredith; "let me give you a first lessonin it now. I suppose you know the names of all the most common flowers;but just look at their beauty. See how this hedge-bank is yellow withprimroses, and yonder you see the faint blue of the violets peeping fromtheir bed of dark-green leaves, and here is the white blossom of astrawberry, which I pluck to show you of what a flower consists. Firstthere is the root, through which it draws its nourishment from theearth. Then there is the stem, and on the top of that is this greenouter whorl or circle of leaves, which is called the calyx. Within thecalyx is the corolla, which is formed of petals, which in this case areof a beautiful white. The corolla is the part in which the colour andbeauty of a flower generally resides. Within the corolla are thestamens, and within the stamens are the pistils. The stamens and thepistils are the organs of reproduction, and the yellow dust or pollenwhich you see on most flowers is the medium by which the seeds arefertilized. Now this flower which I have just plucked is thewood-sorrel. Notice its threefold emerald-green leaf and the delicatewhite flower with the purple veins. It is pretty, is it not? See, if Istrike it roughly, it shrinks and folds up something like a sensitiveplant. It is a capital weather-glass. At the approach of rain both itsflowers and leaves close up, and even if a cloud passes over the sun theflowers will close a little; and, finally, its leaves taste of apleasant acid. There, you will have had enough of my lecture for thepresent, but I should like to tell you more about flowers some othertime."
The boys were both pleased and interested with what he had told them,and expressed their thanks accordingly; and then Mr. Meredith left themand went home to dinner.
"I say, he is a brick of a fellow," said Jimmy; "if all parsons werelike that man everybody else in the world would have a better time ofit."
They went into the boat-house and sat at the open window looking overthe sparkling broad. Frank said:
"I tell you what we must do. We must get Meredith to give us part ofour holiday at the end of May or beginning of June, and we will take acruise over all the rivers and broads of Norfolk and Suffolk. We coulddo it nicely in three weeks and scour every inch of the country in thattime. What do you say? I will undertake to get my father's consent andMrs. Brett's. What will Sir Richard say, Dick?"
"If you go, Frank, I am sure he will let me go; he has every confidencein you, and that you will keep us all out of mischief."
"I will try. Then it is agreed that we go."
"Most certainly. Frank will go in for birds'-nesting, Dick will catchbutterflies and moths, and I must try to do something in the way ofbotany."
"And now it is time to go in; but before we go I just want to say thatthere is an old willow-tree down by the Broad which father thinks is aneyesore. I think that it is a likely tree in which to find thecaterpillars of the goat-moth, which you know live on the wood of awillow, and eat long tunnels and galleries in it. What do you say toblowing the tree up with gunpowder?--it is only good for firewood, andperhaps we may find some caterpillars. Shall we get up early in themorning, bore a big hole into the heart of the tree, and fill it withgunpowder, set a train to it, and blow the whole affair up?"
Such a proposal was sure to meet with consent, and at seven o'clock thenext morning the boys were down at the tree, boring a large hole intoit.
The caterpillar of the great goat-moth feeds upon the wood of timbertrees, notably oak, willow, and poplar. He is a smooth, ugly fellow of ared and yellow colour, with black feet and claws. He makes extensivegalleries through the heart of a tree, eating and swallowing all that hegnaws away from the wood in his onward passage.
During the summer he eats his way slowly through the tree, makingnumerous and winding galleries; but during the autumn and winter hetakes a siesta, first casing himself in a strong covering made of chipsof wood and the silk which he weaves. The next summe
r he renews hiswork, and so he lives and grows for the space of three years, and thenturns into the pupae state, and emerges about July a dark brown but notunlovely moth, which lives for a few weeks and then lays its eggs anddies.
The boring was completed and was rammed full of coarse powder, and themouth of the hole plugged up with a piece of wood. Through this plug asmall hole was bored, and through this a long hollow straw made into afuse was inserted.
Setting fire to this, they retired to some distance to await the issueof their experiment.
There was unfortunately a cow in the same meadow, and this cow was verymuch interested in their movements; so when they left the tree the cowapproached, its curiosity the more aroused by the smoke rising from theburning fuse.
"Now there is an instance of unreasoning curiosity which animalspossess. That cow will poke her nose into that tree, and get blown upfor her pains if we don't stop her. Let's shy stones at her."
But stones in that marshy meadow were not easy to procure, so they toreup clods of earth and threw them at the cow. She scampered away, butwent to the other side of the tree and again approached it. The boysdared not go any nearer to the old willow, because they momentarilyexpected the explosion, and they were in a great fright lest the cowshould suffer damage. Just then, with a loud report and much smoke thepowder exploded. They threw themselves down to avoid any errantfragments, and the cow scampered off unhurt, but exceedingly astonishedand frightened, jumped the ditch which separated the meadow from thenext one, and finally landed herself in another ditch, from which shehad to be drawn with ropes and a vast deal of trouble by some of theneighbours.
The first thought of the boys was to see after the cow, and when theysaw she was in a fair way of being pulled out, they returned to theirtree, and found it split and torn to pieces and thrown about in alldirections. It was quite a chance whether they found any caterpillars inthe tree or not, and, to tell the truth, they hardly expected to besuccessful in their search. What was their delight then to find, thatnot only were there caterpillars there, but a great number of them.Three or four they found dead and mangled by the force of the explosion,but the many perforations in the wood showed that there were many morecaterpillars there. With the aid of a saw and axe they dug out severalcaterpillars not yet full grown, and also several pupae which they knewwould be out in two months' time. They carried some large pieces of thewood up to the boat-house for living caterpillars to feed on, andreinserted the pupae in their wooden chambers, where they were safelykept until their appearance in July.
The caterpillars of the white butterflies which Dick had collected underMary's instructions had some time since come out, and it was a verypretty sight to see the chrysalis split at the head and the insect creepout with its wings all wet and crumpled, and then to watch themgradually expand to their full size and dry and harden, until theperfect insect was ready for flight, when with a few flaps of its wings,as if to try them, it would launch into the sunshine with a strong swiftflight.