Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1895-04-17
SLEEP OF ANIMALS.
Hares Always on the Alert and
Vigiiant.
THE STUPoR AND LIGHT SLUMBER
In Animal Life there Appears to be Three
Degrees OF Sleep-How Tigers and
Leopards Rest.

AhOu6h manly AOoh Ou oiSSP
as luxury and make comfortable beds
for its enjoyment, others sleep but
little, and their slumbers are SO light
that they seem to have the power of
becoming instantaneously awake, how
ever soundly they may have been sleep
ing. 1t is commonly said of some crea
lures that they ''sieep with one eye
open." says the London Spectator.
The instantaneous transition by which,
when wakened, they. pass into action,
suoh as flight and escape, with full
possession Of their faculties. almost
suggests that they have some additional
sense, which takes the form of vigilance
in sleep. and remains conscious when
all other consciousness is lost. This
is an easy but not satisfactory explana-
tion of this quick recovery of sense by
sleeping animals, for it attributes to
them faculty not possessed by man,
under conditions in which the life of
men and animals would naturally be
supposed to differ least-that is. when
the use Of their higher faculties is for
a time partially suspended. There is
good reason to believe that the broken
and timid form of animal sleep in the
greater number of species is not such
as they would naturally choose. but is
the result of habits acquired and trans
mitted in centuries Of danger and
avoidance OF their enemies. and that
the same causes which have modified
the hours of sleep have also modified its
character. OF the animals which. when
wild. now sleep by day, snatohing
broken periods of unrestful slumber
and where they can. not twentieth
part are nightfeeders by nature or
choice. The true nocturnal animals
are those which can only find their
food at night. With the exception of
the owls and opossums, which are
partly insectivorous, they are nearly all
inseot-eaters. bats, lemurs. lolises and
night jars: and though the last, like
the owls, do move with rapidity and
some precision when once disturbed.
the others might be distinguished from
those creatures which are only nocturnal
by necessity, by the absence of that
wakefulness in sleep which the latter
possess in such marked degree.
The bats, lemurst and lorises are
during the day stepped and drugged
with slumber. If once discovered they
make no effort to escape; like the
opossums, which let the "black fel
lows" chop them out Of their holes in
the hollow trees without moving from
their sleeping places. it does not seem
possible for them to awaken. Light
benumbs their faculties like freezing
cold, and they seek darkness with the
same instinct that a human being with
senses benumbed by sickness demands
more light. Bats, the only purely
nocturnal animals in this country.
show this characteristic in its complet-
est form. Their daylight sleep para
lyzes them. though not because they are
unable to see and fly with safety in the
sunlight, for they can do both. But if
handled and disturbed they make no
effort even to spread their wings and
seem unable to shake off the drowsy
influence. Not even the great night
flying moths are SO completely the
slaves of this unyielding habit of dur
nal sleep.
Contrssted with this deep repose, the
slumber of the great body of herbivor-
Gus aniamls is SO light and broken
that it may be doubted whether their
senses are ever so completely at rest as
to deserve the name Of sleep at all. In
human sleep tho sense of hearing is
that which remains awake longest, and
to which the brain most readily re
spends. But in sound and heavy sleep
bearing often suggests long train OF
thought in dreams before the brain
awakens to sense of reality. In most
sleeping animals its warning is instan-
taneous, and the faculties obey the call
for action with no apparent interval of
inertia. A sleeping fox will rise,
gallop Off and dodge the hounds with
as much GOODNESS and knowledge of the
ground as if it had been surprised on
the prowl, with all of its wits awake
1t may have allowed the pack to ap-
proach fatally near; but when once
reused it is wholly awoke-not drowsy,
bewildered or confused.
Hares seem never to sleep; however
closely they may lie in their forms. the
eye is alert and vigilant. Stays sleep
soundly when watched by their binds.
But solitary stag, sleeping on hill
side. retains the two senses of bearing
and scent in full vigor. Deer. stalkers
have discovered by experiment that the
sleeping senses of the stag are sensitive
up to a distance of at least 400 yards
on the windward side. Between the
drowsy sleep of the nocturnal animals,
and the representative sleep of those
which spend their lives in constant fea,
of their enemies. place must be found
for the form of slumber enjoyed by
the large carnivora and that of domes
tic animals; the former have no enc