suitable for the gape of his royal mouth? All this with eye and lens I carefully noted, also the gradual diminution of the mass and its total disappearance down the gullet of the animal. All was engulphed, not a particle or vestige remained. From first to last the performance occupied just twenty minutes, and I would that every twenty minutes in a man's existence were as pleasantly and as profitably spent. During this time I never once removed my eyes from my little friend. Had he been disposed to play me a scurvy trick by tossing the pellet overboard, or otherwise attempting to conceal it, he could not have done so. Such an act would not have escaped my vigilant eye. The various processes through which the pellet passed, and its gradual consumption, all tending to one end, preclude the possibility of my arriving at any other conclusion that that which the poet affirmed when he said that spiders eat their own webs. After the conclusion of the experiment, I took the animal into my hand and overhauled every part of his body most carefully with my Coddington lens, but failed to discover any trace of the missing web. I might have killed and dissected the object of my study and should probably have exhumed some portion of the web from his stomach, but had I done so, it would not have strengthened my faith in the poet's statement which from henceforth I think should be received by a prosy public not as fiction of the poet's brain, but as a well-authenticated fact.
THE PRESERVATIVE POWER OF FERNS.
Doubtless many of the readers of this journal when passing the shops of large fruiterers in London and elsewhere have observed apples, pears, and other fruit packed in hampers containing fern-leaves, and had they but inquired why these leaves in particular were used, the more intelligent of the vendors would probably have told them they assisted in preserving the fruit from mildew and decay. Some years ago, when residing in the Isle of Man, I noticed that the bracken (Pteris aquilina) was in large demand for packing the fresh-caught herring forwarded daily by steamboats to the Liverpool markets; and more recently, during a brief sojourn at Frodsham, in Cheshire, brackens were collected on the Overton hill to line the hampers of new potatoes transmitted to the Manchester markets. Upon my return to the north of England, in a year when the potatoe disease was threatening the destruction of that valuable esculent, the rector of a parish in my neighbourhood at my suggestion induced one of his farmers to "hog" his winter potatoes on the ground where they grew, and to cover them with bracken instead of the customary straw. The farmer, sceptical about the result, only covered half the "hog" with ferns, leaving the other half protected by straw; earthing and sodding up the mound to exclude rain and frost. Winter arrived, and the "hog" was opened for a fresh supply of tubers, when it was discovered that those potatoes which had been stored in brackens were sound and good, whilst those protected by straw were so much decayed as to be scarcely worth the labour of removing. To me this experiment was very satisfactory and suggestive.
That ferns contain some peculiar preservative property there can be little doubt. Both the bracken and male fern abound in alkaline matter, which was once used by the manufacturers of soap and glass, and their astringent properties are well known to country people, and the dressers of leather. I believe the aroma from this family of plants to be repugnant to most insects and inimical to the growth of that species of fungi known as mould. I cannot now recall to my recollection ever having seen the larvæ of any lepidopterous insect feeding upon the fronds of our common ferns, nor do I remember having noticed insects of any orders resting upon them unless it were for shelter during a shower of rain. The peculiar odour thrown off by ferns must be familiar to all who have wandered near their place of growth. Is it due to an essential oil? The Russian leather so much prized in this country for its enduring properties and grateful smell is said to be prepared with oil distilled from the birch tree, and it has been stated that bales of this valuable leather frequently lie for months in damp warehouses at the London Docks without spotting or being otherwise injured by mildew. That essential oils of all kinds will prevent to a great extent the growth of fungi, we have but to mix a few drops in our flour-paste and see how long a time we may keep it unattacked by their sporules. Ferns boiled up with our paste would probably answer the same purpose. Hops, also, possess antiseptic properties, and dead game has been preserved in them for a lengthened period without showing any signs of decomposition. The root of the male shield-fern (Lastra filix mas), when administered in the form of powder or decoction, is a powerful anthelmintic, and is frequently made use of for the expulsion of that pest of our race—the tape-worm. The young unexpanded fronds of this fern when cooked are said to be equal to asparagus. Dried ferns make a most enduring thatch for outbuildings on the farm, and should be largely used for the bedding of all animals affected with entozoaic diseases—the pig in particular. If in some parts of Germany and Denmark beech leaves are used to stuff mattresses in which fleas and bugs cannot exist, I think the poor of our own land might profitably collect the dead fronds of our ferns for the same purpose and ensure the same immunity from these midnight tormentors.
SNAKE STONES.
Allow me to call attention to the following statement, copied from No. 139 of All the Year Round—"Description of a Snake-stone on the Island of Corfu, Ionian Isles.—Description of the Blue Stone.—This stone is of an oval shape, 1 long, , broad, thick, and having been broken formerly, is now set in gold.
"When a person is bitten by a poisonous snake, the bite must be opened by a cut of a lancet or razor longways, and the stone applied within twenty-four hours. The stone then attaches itself firmly on the wound, and when it has done its office falls off; the cure is then complete. The stone must then be thrown into milk, whereupon it vomits the poison it has absorbed, which remains green upon the top of the milk, and the stone is then again fit for use.
"This stone has been from time immemorial in the family of Ventura, of Corfu, a house of Italian origin, and is notorious, so that peasants immediately apply for its aid. Its virtue has been been impaired by the fracture; its nature or compositions is unknown.
