The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1886-07-23
IN THE FOOT HILLS.
An Antediluvian Captive Has His Cell
Broken Into.

ISpeclal correspondence.
PEscADERo, Cal. July ga recent find up
| In the foothills of the Pacific coast range of
| mountains has added another to the catalogue
Of those creatures that are able to maintain
an existence during periods which it makes
| one giddy to contemplate, and, apparently,
under the most unfavorable circumstances.
A few days ago a party of laborers engaged
in excavating for q road along the side of q
| mountain spur, with a precipitous declivity
upon one side and a yawning canyon on tho
other, lighted upon q collection of powders,
water-wom and rounded by tide or current in
| some long past elemental dispensation. One
Of these, too heavy for the handling, was
broken up. Its interior disclosed q cavity
containing member Of that unpleasant fra
ternity of exaggerated spiders known as the
tarantula. When first discovered the animal
was of bright green complexion and symp-
tomatically comatose, but after a brief expe-
rience in this enlarged environment it regained
the inquietude characteristic of its race as well
rs q large share of those irascible and bellig-
erent tendencies by which the tarantulidB are
distinguished. The cavity in which this ante
iiluvian was inclOsed was about an inch
longer than the animal, and at one extremity
of the same there were traces of texile work,
as If at some time or other during its incar-
ceration it had INDUCED in visions of domestic
ties and social enjOyments to be realized in
some dulcified posteriority.
1t is noteworthy that the creature here
spoken of was to all appearances of the same
species with those that are now common in
| the locality where it was discovered. This
would justify the suggestion that the taran-
tulide, in spite of their unpleasant man.
ners and ignoble appearance, arc family Of
no mean antiquity. The rock in which the
Individual was immured being Of the sedi-
mentary species, the commitment must have
occurred while it was in the process of forma-
ton The abundance of remains Of marine
shells in the locality where the discovery was
made would seem to indicate that the stratum
In which the creature was contained had, at
some time, been part of the bed Of an ocean.
From these incidents, with some assistance of
the imagination, we may construct a brief
outline of the history and experiences of The
elderly captive.
At date to which, in all probability,
Adams fall was comparatively an event Of
yesterday, the party in question, taking his
constitutional upon the border of some name
less primordial ocean, was suddenly over
whelmed by "A wave, and buried in the sand
by which it was accompanied. In the course
Of centuries, more or less, the sand having in
the meantime sOlidified, the concrete, through
one of those changes of level which the sur
face of our globe is addicted, became n part
Of the sea bottom, to be inhabited by moluscs
Of various species, and to serve as a cemetery
for the generations of their posterity. Broken
up after cons have elapsed, by some intesti-
terrestrial colaclysm, its fragments, worn
into rotundity by tidal surges, are slowly
lifted by forces from beneath until that which
% L.
top of mountain, there, perhaps, to begiI
again q circuit of subsistence and elevation
How was the involuntary capture affected
by the vicissitudes Of the vehicle in which he
was passenger? Was his life one long leth-
argy, OF did the rude shocks to which his
equipage was, now and then, subjected, rouse
him to a state of semi-consciousness and
prompt him to the utterance of a little taran-
| tular profanity at the roughness of the thor
Oughfare over which he was being trans
| ported. Had he even the shadow Of an idea
| that he was destined to the dignity of living
| link between the unbreeched infancy of the
human world and the Christian civilization Of
| the Nineteenth century: How many empires
| have been erected and subverted; how many
| iynasties have been elevated and extin
| yuished: how much history has been made
| and forgotten: how many millions of millions
If human beings have lived out their little
| span and surrendered to an insatiate oblivion;
how many loves and hates, and faiths and ia
naticisms and ambitions and intolerances,
| have been born and died; how much of hui
man dignity and meanness have been mani
tested and honored or despised, while this in
significant creature has been DOING away the
centuries i'm his memorable environment, and
though deprived of air and food, clinging to
its minute spark of vitality, as if that which
is, to other creatures, sentence of death, were
| 20 it an assurance of an endless existence!
The tarantua- Americana belongs to the
order of burrowing spiders 1tspreads no net
for the capture of its prey, but digs pit I'm
the ground which it lines with tissue of its
own manufacture sllrncunting the same with
trap door SO contrived that it closes of itself,
and so colored upon the surface as to he indis-
inguishable from its surroundings. Hidden
there environed by telephone lines of his own
construction he obtains timely notice of the
approach of any creature with which he in
Lines to hold an interview, and conducts him.
self accordingly. Although able to endure, as
would appear from the foregoing, fast of
few thousand years, more or less, i'm continu-
ance he is q creature of lively appetite and an
untiring Digestion; and, being supplied with
very efficient weapons both of offense and de-
tense, the interviews which he solicits are apt
to terminate to the disadvantage of the party
interviewed
Speaking of burrowing animals, one would
be inclined to suppose that, of all creatures
the one least adapted by natural conforma-
ton and reputed quietude of disposition, to
the work of rock excavation, would be a
clam. And yet there is a species of this
molusk-the very emblem of cOntented ease
and happy inertia-inhabiting the coasts Of
the Pacific, between high and low water,
which bores for itself place of residence in
the friabe sand rock of the region, and there
lives multiplies and expatiates. The burrow-
ing clam is of the round, hardshelled family,
similar to the quahaug in shape, about the
half of silver dollar in diameter, and having
no projecting soft parts. 1t appears to live in
colonies, though each individual has its sepa-
rate homestead, and Is obtained by breaking
up the rock into which it is inclosed. 1t is
priced as an eatable. How this seemingly
helpless creature contrives to penetrate the
rock in which it makes its habitation, what
are the tools which it employs or to what end
are labors which, to compare small things
with great must be Herculean, undertaken
and prosecuted, are questions reserved.
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