THE CLYTHRÆ
The Lily-beetle dresses herself: with her ordure she makes herself a cosy gown, an infamous garment, it is true, but an excellent protection against parasites and sunstroke. The weaver of fæcal cloth has hardly any imitators. The Hermit-crab dresses himself: he selects to fit him, from the discarded wardrobe of the Sea-snail, an empty shell, damaged by the waves; he slips his poor abdomen, which is incapable of hardening, inside it and leaves outside his great fists of unequal size, clad in stone boxing-gloves. This is yet another example rarely followed.
With a few exceptions, all the more remarkable because they are so rare, the animal, in fact, is not burdened by the need of clothing itself. Endowed, without having to manufacture a thing, with all that it wants, it knows nothing of the art of adding defensive extras to its natural covering.
The bird has no need to take thought of its plumage, the furry beast of its coat, the reptile of its scales, the Snail of his shell, the Ground-beetle of his jerkin. They display no ingenuity with the object of securing protection from the inclemencies of the atmosphere. Hair, down, scales, mother-of-pearl and other items of the animal's apparel: these are all produced of their own accord, on an automatic loom.
Man, for his part, is naked; and the severities of the climate oblige him to wear an artificial skin to protect his own. This poverty has given rise to one of our most attractive industries.
He invented clothing who, shivering with cold, first thought of flaying the Bear and covering his shoulders with the brute's hide. In a distant future this primitive cloak was gradually to be replaced by cloth, the product of our industry. But under a mild sky the traditional fig-leaf, the screen of modesty, was for a long while sufficient. Among peoples remote from civilization, it still suffices in our day, together with its ornamental complement, the fish-bone through the cartilage of the nose, the red feather in the hair, the string round the loins. We must not forget the smear of rancid butter, which serves to keep off the Mosquito and reminds us of the unguent employed by the grub that dreads the Tachina.
In the first rank of the animals protected against the bite of the atmosphere without the intervention of a handicraft are those which go clad in hair, dressed free of cost in fleeces, furs or pelts. Some of these natural coats are magnificent, surpassing our downiest velvets in softness.
Despite the progress of weaving, man is still jealous of them. To-day, as in the ages when he sheltered under a rock, he values furs greatly for the winter. At all seasons he holds them in high esteem as ornamental accessories; he glories in sewing on his attire a shred of some wretched flayed beast. The ermine of kings and judges, the white rabbit-tails with which the university graduate adorns his left shoulder on solemn occasions carry us back in thought to the age of the cave-dwellers.
Moreover, the fleecy animals still clothe us in a less primitive fashion. Our woollens are made of hairs interlaced. Ever since the beginning, without hoping to find anything better, man has clothed himself at the expense of the hairy orders of creation.
The bird, a more active producer of heat, whose maintenance is a more delicate matter, covers itself with feathers, which overlap evenly, and puts round its body a thick cushion of air on a bed of down. It has on its tail a pot of cosmetic, a bottle of hair-oil, a fatty gland from which the beak obtains an ointment wherewith it preens the feathers one by one and renders them impermeable to moisture. A great expender of energy by reason of the exigencies of flight, it is essentially, chilly creature that it is, better-adapted than any other to the retention of heat.