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It had been already shown conclusively by several naturalists that the common earthworm is a creature which really renders services to horticulture that quite overbalance the small amount of damage it is occasionally guilty of. To the illustrious Dr. Darwin it has offered a subject that is particularly suited for his patient inquiry and shrewd observation, the results of which, embodied in his little work upon "Vegetable Mould and Earth-worms," offer a final testimonial in behalf of a despised, or sometimes persecuted, annelid. The main facts, however, are new. We were aware that earthworms are of utility, because in the course of their life they consume decaying vegetable matter and convert it into humus or mould; also that by their burrows they help to bring about a wholesome drainage, preventing the surface becoming caked or hardened. Dr. Darwin, with an enthusiasm that we cannot wonder at, believes it is to the earthworm principally the destiny has been assigned of renewing the face of the earth from year to year, and from age to age. In a single year, so he reckons, where the earthworms are in their average abundance, they deserve the credit of producing about ten tons of good mould upon an acre of land. This represents labour performed during only half the year, for earthworms do not generally busy themselves during the severe weather winter; and of the ordinary day they devote larger portion to repose, night being their time of activity. A scorching sun of all things they appear to dread, and in dampness they particularly luxuriate.

The earthworm, so this naturalist fancies, has its share of intelligence lodged somewhere, perhaps in the cerebral ganglia he has examined, for it constructs and lines its burrows in a very methodical way, shows also much judgment in the mode it adopts of drawing leaves into these according to their shape and size, and it has preferences for certain foods. They eat much, digesting what they swallow by the aid of a singular alkaline secretion, then ejecting the most of it for the benefit of the soil . Everyone is aware that stamping upon the ground makes the worms quit their holes, but, nevertheless, Dr. Darwin thinks they are deaf as well as blind, they are alarmed through the sense of touch. The popular belief that associates worms with the decomposition of dead bodies has nothing of fact to support it, their food being purely vegetable. "They remove decaying leaves, facilitate the germination of seeds and the growth of plants, and create for us most of our wide, level, turf-covered expanses."─ C.