Peter Parley's Wonders of the Earth, Sea, and Sky

by Samuel G. Goodrich

The dog is almost the only animal that is prepared to accompany man in all climates. The form and habits of this faithful creature vary most surprisingly, according to the circumstances in which he is placed; but he is everywhere the loving friend and faithful associate of man, and ready to defend him and to share his toil, in the hot and parched deserts of the East, or the icy regions of the North.

There are a few animals that undergo remarkable changes, to enable them to bear the vicissitudes of the climate in which they may be placed. The hares and the foxes of the Northern regions become covered with white hair in winter. Now, it is proved, that a body hotter than the surrounding atmosphere which has a white covering, cools much more slowly than one covered with a dark colour: hence, the heat generated inwardly is preserved and economized by the winter coats of these animals, to the great benefit of their health and comfort.

III. Some kinds of birds that love warm climates, are taught to assemble together at a certain season near the end of summer, almost to a day, and start off on a pilgrimage to distant lands, where nature is still blooming. There are these birds which all live nearly the same sort of life,—the swift, the swallow, and the house marten, which all bear a strong resemblance to each other. They all come to us from the south in spring, and take their departure before the next winter. The swifts form themselves into companies, and take their leave of us before the middle of August; the swallows do the same about the middle of October, and the martens at the end of the same month. Thus these happy creatures manage to live all their life long in summer and sunshine.

They are furnished with astonishing capabilities for performing these very long journeys. You are acquainted with their slender forms, so exactly adapted for cutting through the air, and their long, beautiful wings. Each of these wings is moved by a muscle of prodigious power, situated on each side of the breast-bone. Possibly you may have noticed in larks and other birds, that are in the habit of flying long distances, which are eaten, what a large proportion of their flesh is in these two muscles; in the swallow, it greatly exceeds the weight of the flesh of all the other parts of the body. You will hardly believe it when I tell you, that the swift is able to fly at the rate of more than a hundred miles in an hour. The little bird that perched upon your chimney this morning, may perch to-morrow night upon one of the pyramids of Egypt, and next week may be at the Cape of Good Hope. You think a great deal of travelling twenty miles an hour on a railway, but you see that is slow compared with the travelling of the swallows.

Instead of thus following the summer about over the surface of the earth, some creatures, that love warmth, make the best of it where they are. Some birds get into holes and other sheltered places, put their heads under their wings, and so sleep away the winter months. The pretty little black-eyed dormouse makes up a snug nest, and does the same, and so do some other of our common animals. During this inactive period, all the functions which are necessary to support life become fitted to a state of repose; the circulation gets slower, and the supply of inward heat sinks to the lowest temperature which life will bear.

I dare say you have often found some sorts of snail-shells with the snail inside, and the mouth sealed up firmly, and have taken them for dead: this is not the case. The covering is only put over for the winter to keep out the cold, and the creature lives till spring without food or motion. How it must enjoy the first bright days of spring, when it opens its eyes after its long nap, reaching out its horns, and dragging its shell over the green grass.

IV. Then, in the distribution of different animals, there is not less to engage our attention. The rein-deer is the support and comfort of the Laplanders. It lives constantly on the scantiest, and apparently least nourishing diet, and when brought into warmer climates it soon languishes and dies. The camel only flourishes where there are large sandy deserts, with precarious supplies both of water and solid food; and to fit him for his peculiar line of usefulness, he has a receptacle to contain a stock of water, which he can at pleasure turn into his stomach, and can go eight or nine days without a fresh supply; he eats any kind of vegetables, however dry they may be; and a pound a day is sufficient to support him for weeks together; though he is very much larger than any of the animals which inhabit your country. It is usual for camels to go the whole distance from Cairo to Suez, in Egypt, without tasting a morsel, and this remarkable faculty has been supposed to arise from the hump upon their backs. When the animal is well fed, this hump, which is of a fatty substance, fills out and becomes solid; but when his food is scanty, it wastes away, and its substance appears to go to the nourishment of the more vital parts of his frame. His large feet rest upon the sand without sinking in, and at the rate of about two miles an hour, he will travel thirty miles a day over a parched desert, bearing a burden of seven or eight hundred weight. He is called by the Arabs the Ship of the Desert.