A. Berghaus

“ Our domestic animals, which mostly came from Asia, have gone with man to all the quarters of the world; and it is worthy of note that it is just those cereals and domestic animals that have proved themselves most useful to man, and are essential to civilized life, that preeminently possess the faculty of adapting themselves to all climates, and of producing the most diversified varieties.
The power of adaptation to climates appears to be most highly developed in man. ”

“ ANIMALS and plants are fitted by their organization to adapt themselves to many changes of place and vicissitudes of climate. Most of the domestic plants that are cultivated in the north originated in southern regions. ”

“ Among such regions is the Gaboon valley, in which even the negro is disabled. The inhabitants of that district are decidedly weaker in constitution, and have greatly diminished reproductive powers, and the women are considerably in excess. There are similar regions nearer the centers of civilization. The Tuscan Maremma is famous for its deadly air, and the swamps of Corsica are of like character. In France the ponds of the Dombes and the mouth-country of the Charente were, till recently, no less dangerous. Life in great cities also seems to exercise a special influence on reproduction. ”

“ Between the jaws passes the very narrow throat, which can be opened and closed at will by means of a transverse muscle. The animal derives its importance to man from the close aggregation of the movable lips, the narrow throat, and the toothed jaws, for it is enabled by this peculiarity to break through the skin and suck the blood from it. ”

“ Only the dog is able to follow man as far and as high as he can go; but this animal, too, loses his acute smell in Congo and Syria, and the power of barking in Surinam and at great heights; and the finer breeds of dogs can not long endure the conditions of a height of more than 3,760 metres, or 12,500 feet, while there are towns in the Andes at as great a height as 13,500 or 14,000 feet.
But there are regions in which even man perishes, to whatever race he may belong, and however well prepared he may be to resist their deadly influence. ”

“ The beauty and fertility of the alluviums at the mouths of rivers, with the conveniences they offer to trade, have generally been tempting enough to determine the location of the settlement, regardless of its qualities with reference to health; and towns have been planted in such places in consideration of the apparent value of the money-investment, but in complete forgetfulness of the immense capital in human lives they are destined to swallow.—Translated for the Popular Science Monthly from Das Ausland. ”

“ The cultivation of the eucalyptus, a tree of remarkably quick growth, appears to be one of the most effective means now available for improving the condition of unhealthy localities. There are frequently tracts of limited extent in the most sickly regions where the process of acclimatization is relatively easy and secure. Such points should always be chosen by new settlers. ”

“ The successful stocking of a pond with leeches is a work requiring considerable care; the animal has many enemies, against which it must be protected, and will not thrive except under specially favorable conditions. The mother-leeches, when planted in the pond, lay their cocoons (which contain the eggs) as in nature, and the young brood is hatched out at the proper time; but this brood, besides protection, requires its natural food, sickens if it does not find it, and can not be fed artificially. The young worms will not thrive in artificial ponds ”

“ Man can also sustain an almost incredible degree of heat. The celebrated physician, Boerhaave, believed that no being breathing with lungs could live in an atmosphere having as high a temperature as that of the blood. ”

“ To what extent the more or less pronounced dangerousness of a locality is affected by normal conditions or by casual injurious influences is not always easy to estimate. The character of the soil, a higher or lower temperature, dryness, and moisture, are not all that determine the character of a country. ”

“ MANY swamps and ponds, which are now considered utterly worthless, might be made sources of great profit by devoting them to the production of a worm which is exceedingly valuable, and the cultivation of which requires no expensive outlay. ”

“ Chestnuts, originally at home only in warmer Asia, are now equally so in Italy and Western Germany. Some plants, notably the cereals, have enjoyed a very extensive diffusion in the course of centuries, and are now cultivated in nearly every part of the habitable earth. ”

“ He is less than any other being bound to any particular zone, and is further suited to the widest diffusion, because, confined to no especial food, he is, in the fullest sense of the word, omnivorous. ”

“ Several straight lines run along the back for the whole length of the body, while the belly is of a clearer color and is mottled with irregular dark spots. The body of the leech is so elastic that it can stretch itself out to a length of nearly ten inches, and draw itself up again to within the dimensions of an olive. ”

“ We know that a variety of conditions must combine to produce such miasms, and we know also that man is able to contend against them. It is possible for man to open a campaign against Nature wherever he goes, and to introduce conditions more favorable to his becoming acclimated. ”

“ When the lips close in a circle upon the air-tight skin, the jaws are also brought down to it and their saw-like teeth are pressed tight upon the cuticle. The throat having now become fast closed, the head of the worm is drawn back a little, and the lips are thereby given the form of an exhausted cupping-glass, which is divided internally, by the jaws still fastened to the skin, into three distinctly separated parts. ”

“ Neither the land nor the sky has changed since the Polynesian archipelagoes were discovered; yet the aboriginal population is diminishing at a really frightful rate, while its bastard offspring and the pure Europeans are increasing rapidly. ”

“ Yet it appears to be established that the greatest difficulties in the way of Europeans becoming acclimated in places where their business leads them to settle are due to the presence of swamp miasms. ”

“ The demand for it has become very great; France and Germany, for example, use about thirty million, and the exportation from Hamburg alone has been thirty million in a year. [1] It is not surprising that so important a demand has raised the price of leeches till they have become a very profitable article of trade. ”

“ The long, narrow maw is competent, by means of twenty-six peculiarly formed sacs or valves, which are arranged in two rows, to retain an immense quantity of blood without any of it being driven back by the muscular activity of the body ”

“ Men live on the southwest coasts of Africa, and in other hot regions, where the heat of the sand under their feet reaches 140° or 150°. Men in deep mining-shafts and under diving-bells are able to support an atmospheric pressure of 30,000 kilogrammes as well as a pressure of only 8,000 kilogrammes on the highest mountains. Cassini thought that no animal could live at a greater height than 4,700 metres, or 15,000 feet ”

“ But he has so far not been able to bring a whole country immediately into a healthy condition; only time seems to be competent to bring such a work to completion, and, waiting its course, numerous victims have to be offered up. ”