Memory Lost After Fall on Ice

1903

As the-result of falling on the icy sidewalk, Samuel A. Chapman, of Boston, a student at Annandale College, is suffering from a peculiar malady.

On the evening of January 20 Chapman, in company with two other students, called on friends near the college. On their return Chapman slipped on the icy path and, falling backward, struck the base of his spine. He suffered no immediate effects, and being helped up by his companions, walked on to the college. Next day he was unconscious, remaining so for two days. Upon regaining consciousness his memory was a blank. In about two weeks he made some progress, looking to the improvement of his memory. He is nineteen years old.


Cats' Eyes

Cats and other beasts of prey reflect fifty times us much light from their eyes as human beings.

Owls Well Equipped by Nature

1919

Simple Explanation of Remarkable Sense of Hearing Possessed by the Owl

It Is held by naturalists that in order to capture its prey the owl must depend even more upon its sense of hearing than upon its sense of sight. The tufts of feathers that distinguish the short-eared and the long-eared owls are, of course, no more ears than they are horns. The true ear of the owl is a most remarkable organ.

The facial disk of feathers that gives the owl its characteristic appearance serves as a kind of sounding-board or ear-trumpet to concentrate the slightest sounds and to transmit them to the orifice of the true ear, concealed in the small feathers behind the eye. Even in the barn owl, which possesses the least complicated arrangement of this kind, the orifice of the ear is covered by a remarkable flap of the skin, while in the other species there are striking differences in the size and shape of this orifice and its covering flap on the two sides of the head.

The exact way in which owls utilize this elaborately specialized apparatus has still to be discovered.

Grizzlies Feast on Sheep

1905

Early one frosty October morning when the little Nimrod was sitting in a crevice of the mountain's side basking in the sun he espied way down in the valley three grizzlies, says a writer in the Metropolitan. From the former trailing he had done he knew them to be a great male and two females as his mates.

As the boy watched them he says that they went off in different directions, one ascending the face of the opposite mountain, while the other two worked their way around either side of its base before commencing the ascent. As he watched them he noticed that while the bear that was climbing up the mountain's face took things leisurely the other two were going much faster and that they were heading up toward the back of the mountain.

The lad, wondering what the bears were about, began to scan the mountain and discovered a band of big-horn sheep feeding on the mountain's front very near the top. Standing Wolf felt sure that something of interest was about to happen, so he watched the bears and the sheep attentively. After awhile, when the lower bear, the only one now in view, had climbed to a point which revealed him to the sheep, they became restless and began to ascend rapidly. Whenever the bear was seen to quicken his pace the big-horns would at once quicken theirs.

Up, up, up the rugged precipice they scurried and ever faster followed the bear. After an exhausting ascent of the steepest cliff on the mountain's side the band gained the top and for a second rested. Then, as two great forms rushed out among them, confusion seized the herd and they dashed away in all directions, many leaping panic-stricken over the precipice.

A moment later, after having killed the couple they had seized, two grizzly bears that had ascended the back of the mountain waddled forward to the edge of the cliff and, stared down at their accomplice feasting upon sheep that had been mangled upon the crags below.

The Intelligence of Toads

1874

The belief is common in old countries that toads live a hundred years without partaking food, for they have been found in little cavities of rocks, where is no apparent entrance to admit the animal, and hence the theory that the toad must have been there when the rock was formed, or thrown up ages ago. The toad can live a long time on water or moisture alone, as it imbibes it rapidly through its very porous skin; but that it lives thus a hundred years is totally absurd, the most reasonable solution of the problem being that a very small, almost imperceptible crack or opening at the cavity exists, through which an egg of a toad was washed in, and hatched or grew or developed into a fair-sized creature, and there lived and thrived a reasonable time on small insects which now and then crept or drifted in.

The intelligence of a toad is certainly remarkable. When an insect is too large to swallow, it thrusts the creature against a stone to push it down its throat. On one occasion, when a toad was attempting to swallow a locust, the head was down the former's throat, the hinder parts protruding. The toad then sought a stone or clod, but as none was to be found, he lowered his head and crept along, pushing the locust against the ground. But the ground was too smooth (a rolled path), and the angle at which the locust lay to the ground too small, and thus no progress was made. To increase the angle he straightened up his hind legs, but in vain. At length he threw up his hind quarters, and actually stood on his head, or rather on the locust sticking out of his mouth and, after repeating this once or twice, succeeded in getting himself outside his dinner.

On another occasion a toad was seen to dispose of an earthworm, which was so long that it had to be swallowed by sections. But while one end was in the toad's stomach the other end was coiled about his head. He waited until the worm's writhing gave him a chance, and swallowed half an inch; then taking a nip with his jaws, waited for a chance to draw in another half inch. But there were so many half inches to dispose of, that at length his jaws grew tired, lost their firmness of grip, and the worm crawled out five-eighths of an inch between each half-inch swallowing. The toad perceiving this, brought its right hand to his jaws, grasping his abdomen with his foot, and by a little effort got hold of the worm in his stomach from outside; he thus, by his foot, held fast to what he had gained by each swallow, and presently succeeded in getting the worm entirely down.

An Anemone's Live Morsel

1884

In one of the apartments of the San Francisco Aquarium, the interior being plainly visible through the plate-glass front, are a number of sea anemones, or sea sunflowers, about three or four inches in diameter, clinging to pieces of rock, and among them several young halibut.

Near the front, in plain view of the writer the other day, was a halibut about five or six inches long in a natural horizontal position, with his nose just touching the center or mouth of the anemone, apparently feeding. Looking closer it was observed that the anemone was in motion, and in a short space it was doubtful whether the fish or anemone was the eater. Presently the ineffectual struggle of the fish to loose himself denoted his capture. It seemed that the finny marauder had pushed his nose against the innocent-looking mouth of the plant in pursuit of food and was caught. The face of the anemone, which had previously been flat and circular, like its namesake, the sunflower, became concave and closed up and around the head of the fish, elongating itself for the purpose, and in about five minutes the head was covered entirely to the gills. While closing the plant raised the fish to a vertical position. Soon the head was covered to the gills; its respiration almost stopped.

At this juncture the writer's pity for the fish prevailed over his curiosity and he released the prisoner. In two minutes more it would have passed, or at least so much of it as would have answered the purpose, into food for the anemone. — The San Francisco Call.