Limner

“ There was, as a matter of fact, nothing to disturb its quiet. Not a fish, so far as we could discover, lived in its opalescent water, cloudy as is all glacial water. It is only good to look at, is Lyman Lake, and there are no people to look at it. ”

“ Linnets change their plumage once a year, and have a much more spruce and brilliant appearance when they have their new summer suits on. They are numerous in all parts of the country, and, excepting in the season when they have young, congregate in flocks, and in winter are attracted to the neighbourhood of man, finding much of their food in farm-yards, and amongst stacks.
The linnet of our picture is the greater red-pole—one of four brothers of the linnet family—and is the largest of the four ”

“ Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls: A thousand feet in depth below Its massy waters meet and flow; Thus much the fathom-line was sent From Chillon's snow-white battlement, Which round about the wave inthralls; And double dungeon wall and wave Have made,—and like a living grave. Below the surface of the lake The dark vault lies wherein we lay, We heard it ripple night and day; Sounding o'er our heads it knocked; And I have felt the winter's spray Wash through the bars when winds were high And wanton in the happy sky ”

“ They were shown photographs, and the photographs showed a sparkling stream, winding between willow-lined banks. Fat cattle, grazing. Fields that were uncultivated, but yet were thick with lush grass. And dull, red sand-stone cliffs all about for a background.
The man had found the bed of the stream. It was a stretch of wind-smoothed sand. And he had seen where the willows had been. They were dried and desiccated stumps. And he had even found the natural, bubbling pool of cool and mineralized water, coming up from the depths of the earth, that had fed that stream. ”

“ Standing led an unhesitating way through a natural pass, and down on the other side, into shadows of a thick grove; through thickets; they splashed across a creek, a thin line of clear, cool water slipping through mountain willows, a tributary of the larger stream in the valley below. Down here it was almost dark. But twenty minutes later, climbing another slope where the larger timber stood widely spaced, they came again into the full sunshine.... Lynette began to wonder why he had left his horse so far back; how far did the silent, tireless man mean to walk? ”

“ The inhabitants had dammed the stream lower down and spread it into a nice little lake. The question was would they come out for their walk before it got too dark to see. They came—blessings on their blunt muzzles, they came—as shadows come, drifting down the stream, stirring neither foot nor tail. There were three of them. One went down to investigate the state of the dam; the other two began to look for supper. There is only one thing more startling than the noiselessness of a tiger in the jungle, and that is the noiselessness of a beaver in the water. ”

“ As the lumberman came out clear of the trees, and the gaudy colours of his bundle caught its eye, the bird sank itself lower in the water till only its erect neck and wedge-shaped head were in view. Then, opening wide its beak, it sent forth its wild peal of inexplicable and disconcerting laughter—an affront to the silence, but a note of monition to all the creatures of the lake. The loon had seen men before, and despised them, and found pleasure in proclaiming the scorn. ”

“ At night-time Limulus is apt to leave the sand and progress by a series of short swimming hops, the respiratory appendages giving the necessary impetus, whilst between each two short flights the animal balances itself for a moment on the tip of its tail. ”

“ The low cliffs were lurking places of mystery. Now, the starlight softened the harshness of the sun-baked earth. The place could have been a paradise, with water. But all the water within many miles was a shallow, turgid pool with a winding, twisting passageway leading down into the bowels of the earth, whence the water came.
A wild rabbit crept beneath the starveling willows and to the edge of the pond. ”

“ It lives in, rather than on, muddy beaches, sometimes in crowds of thousands, its shell deeply buried, and its long siphons reaching up to suck in water and food when the tide covers the flat. When the tide is out, a tiny hole in the sand and a spurt of water show the clammer where to dig, and his spade quickly unearths the clam. ”

“ We have, in the winter, vast flocks of the common linnets; more, I think, than can be bred in any one district. These, I observe, when the spring advances, assemble on some tree in the sunshine, and join all in a gentle sort of chirping, as if they were about to break up their winter quarters and betake themselves to their proper summer homes. It is well known, at least, that the swallows and the fieldfares do congregate with a gentle twittering before they make their respective departure. ”

“ Already the roaring overflow was coming into subjection, its loud voice dwindling to a shallow clamour. Then, something happened. Perhaps the wary sentinel on the crest of the dam detected a darker shade stirring among the firs, or a lighter grayness moving inexplicably between the bushes up the bank. Perhaps his quick nostrils caught a scent that meant danger. Perhaps the warning came to him mysteriously, flashed upon that inner sense, sometimes alert and sometimes densely slumbering, which the forest furtiveness seems to develop in its creatures. ”

“ When we went out, it was about eleven o'clock, and the surrounding jungle was full of the horrible noises of an African night; the wail of the small lemur, that sounds like the death-moan of a child; the more distant roar of the lion in the black depths of the forest, too thick for the moonlight to ever penetrate ”

“ The men followed close along the bank of the river, to watch the logs and keep them moving; but at last there came a time when the logs would not move, but lay in a jam from shore to shore while the water foamed about them.
"Who will go out to break the jam?" said the men. They knew that only a brave man and a nimble man could go, for there was danger that the logs might crush him and the river sweep him away. ”

“ They are the first step in turning grass into flesh and fur and feathers. One of the striking facts of lemming biology is the fluctuation in their numbers. Some years they swarm, lemmings are everywhere, and in places they erupt in vast emigration, the tundra and the sea ice being covered with masses of moving lemmings. We know this best from the accounts written about the lemmings of Norway, but the same thing occurs in the American Arctic. At other times they're scarce and it is difficult to find even one. ”

“ And sometimes, when the Imp and the Elf are not paddling, and we are all three of us lying on the bank, we see the shoal swim slowly past us, and watch the minnows fling themselves right out of the water after the tiny flies that play over the surface of the stream. Then it is as if a clever juggler were hidden under the water and were throwing little curved knives up from the bottom of the stream to twist and sparkle in the air, and then fall plosh, plosh, into widening circles of ripples. ”

“ Each and every barge and boat was hard and fast aground, and when the gray daylight came stealing across the lake there was no lake to be seen, only a reeking marsh, covered for miles with a welter of green slime and decaying vegetable matter across which it would seem no human being or animal could flounder. ”

“ Slime always sticks to the corners of these angles, and depositing and rising up from beneath, spreads again its own vegetation.
I see here water-thistles, with lanceolate leaves, and reddish flowers of the thickness of a finger, exactly as are seen in our fish-ponds. Green water-lentils cover the sides of the stream, and are a plain proof of the stagnating water flowing off in it. At half-past eight o’clock I hear from Fadl, at the mast, that we are sailing to the south; that there is a large lake with a village towards the E. and in the S.E. ”

“ He then led the way to a pear-tree, in which a linnet had built her nest. The old linnets seemed much pleased to see their friends the red-breasts, who with great pride introduced their little family to them.
"My own nestlings are just ready to fly," said the hen linnet, "and I hope will make acquaintance with them; for birds so well instructed, as I make no doubt your offspring are, must be very desirable companions." ”

“ So he carried off Linnet to an upland village perched high on the slopes behind the Lake of Thun⁠—⁠not to a great hotel or crowded pension, where she would breathe bad air, eat made French dishes, drink doubtful wine, keep very late hours, and mix with exciting company, but to a châlet nestling high beneath a clambering pinewood, among Alpine pastures thick with orchids and globe-flowers, where she might live as free and inhale as pure and unpolluted an atmosphere as in their own green Zillerthal. ”

“ Certainly their dun-coloured plumage was not of the sort to let them flaunt in the sunlight like other birds; after spending a luxurious morning dozing side by side, they would wake just when the linnets, goldfinches, and chaffinches were going to bed. A great silence brooded over nature; for the giddy-pates who had been playing truant all the day, and had left a feather or two of their plumage to dance in every sunbeam, it would have seemed as dull as death; but they thought otherwise, and for them the night was filled with infinite music. ”

“ Often, too, on a brilliant moonlight night have I sat on a rock out in the middle of the stream, near a favourite drinking place, waiting for a shot at whatever fortune might send my way. How exasperating it was, when the wind changed at the critical moment, and gave me away to the rhino or other animal I had sat there for hours patiently awaiting! ”

“ But about two miles below our farm, the Bagworthy water runs into the Lynn, and makes a real river of it. Thence it hurries away, with strength and a force of wilful waters, under the foot of a barefaced hill, and so to rocks and woods again, where the stream is covered over, and dark, heavy pools delay it. There are plenty of fish all down this way, and the farther you go the larger they get, having deeper grounds to feed in ”

“ Limnaeidae taken from a great depth of water, e.g. from 130 fathoms in the lake of Geneva, have been examined by Forel. [272] The pulmonary sac is full of water, but there is no transformation of organs, no appearance of a branchia, to meet the changed circumstances of their environment. Doubtless a good deal of respiration is done by the skin; being soft and vascular, it respires the air dissolved in the water. Forel cites cases of Limnaea living at much shallower depths, which come to the surface once, and then remain below for months. ”

“ Often, where the pressure is direct, a few blows only are given with the ax, when the log snaps in an instant with a loud report, followed suddenly by the violent motion of the "jam;" and, ere our bold river-driver is jerked half way to the top of the cliff, scores of logs, in wildest confusion, rush beneath his feet while he yet dangles in air, above the rushing, tumbling mass. ”

“ On the road leading from town to the Skunk River one has glimpses of another industry. Limekilns, with uncouth signs announcing lime for sale at twenty-five cents a bushel, thrust themselves almost into the road, and the cabins or neatly-whitewashed board huts of the lime-burners border the way. Some have grass-plots and mounds of flowers around them: others are without ornament, if we except the children with blue eyes, red cheeks and hair like corn-silk that hang on the fence and watch us ride by. ”

“ Fickle as the affections of a jungle-bred lioness, playful as a lioness can be and—dangerous and savage as the lioness when crossed. On that Channel a single hour of time may change the sea from the placidity of a lake to the ferocity of a tempest. ”

“ A small creek runs through its entire length, which generally they followed. The route was difficult, owing to the large number of stones imperfectly covered with snow, and hence all riding ceased after they entered the valley; for the dogs could scarcely pull the sledge and its load, and often required aid. Here they met a piece of drift-wood, indicating that the tide once flowed up the valley, for no tree or wood had ever been seen away from tide-water. One of the dogs becoming sick was turned adrift, trusting to her following the party or returning home. ”

“ Away the logs scamper, reminding one of a flock of frightened sheep fleeing before the wolf. Some logs are so cumbersome that they remain unmoved, even with this artificial accumulation of water. In such cases, embracing the moment when the water is at its highest pitch, in we leap, and, thrusting our hand-spikes beneath them, bow our shoulders to the instrument, often stooping so low as to kiss the curling ripples as they dance by. In this way, sometimes by a few inches at a time, and sometimes by the rod, we urge them over difficult places ”

“ At the point of each digit is a broad elastic pad, plentifully supplied with delicate nerves, and the vital energy which has been directed into them appears to have been withdrawn from the growth of the claws, which have shrunk into fine nails just shielding the fleshy tips. In short, the lemur has a hand on each of its four limbs, and no feet at all. And as it goes about its cage—I am at the Zoo in spirit—with a silent wonder shining out of its great eyes, it examines things by feeling them with its hands. ”