Curiosities of natural history / by Francis T. Buckland.

  • Francis Trevelyan Buckland
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Curiosities of natural history / by Francis T. Buckland. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    mouthed and expectant, placed himself by the side of the weir. The lizard inside, tormented by the salt food, and parched for want of water, heard the sound of the running stream, and came scampering up the man’s throat, and jumping out of his mouth, ran down to the water to drink. The sudden appearance of the brute so terrified the weakened patient that he fainted away, still with his mouth open. In the meantime the lizard had drunk his full, and was coming back to return down the man’s throat into his stomach : he had nearly succeeded in so doing when the patient awoke, and seizing his enemy by the tail, killed him on the spot. I consider this story to be one of the finest strings of impossi- bilities ever recorded. It is possible that the power of secreting or exuding fluid possessed by lizards has given rise to the well- known story of the salamander. The ancients, and some moderns, doubtless, believed, and do yet be- lieve, that the salamander is incombustible, and has the power (like Phillips’s suicidal fire annihilator) of putting the fire out. Aristotle says it is reported that the salamander, when it goes through the fire, extinguishes it. Elian says that it will live in flames, and attack fire like an enemy. From the above erro- neous notions of the poor beast’s power, the name of ‘ Salamander’s wool ’ has been given to asbestos ; and, why or wherefore I know not, but the alchemists tortured salamanders in their attempts to change quick- silver into gold. I have never tried the experiment, nor do I intend to do ; but I conceive it likely that a newt thrown into a fire might escape death, and possibly be able to crawl away, defending himself from the heat by means of his self-moistened skin. The alchemists have not been the only persecutors of