United States or Zimbabwe ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
They are the scavengers of the shore, eating everything, and thus acting as conservators of health, as do the lank pigs of the Philippines. They were in myriads, rushing about seemingly without purpose, and diving into their holes beneath the palm-roots. Their legs, unshelled, are as excellent food as the crabs of the Atlantic.
The Necrophori, "the first of the tiny scavengers of the fields," bury corpses in order to establish their progeny in them; in the space of a few hours an enormous body, a mole, a water-rat, or an adder, will completely disappear, buried under the earth. The Onthophagi purify the soil, "dividing all filth into tiny crumbs, ridding the earth of its defilements."
"Yes, one would have to be a pretty sort of fool to forget that! No, as long as I live I shall never forget the effect your words had on us despised scavengers! It was you who gave us faith in ourselves, and an organization! And even if we aren't quite the most important people, still " "But that's just what you are and now it's your turn to prove it! Could you suspend work this night?"
Another actor appears upon the scene, a prairie wolf, or coyote; consequently a rival, a competitor of the ravens; for he is in the same business. But he belongs to a higher order; for while the ravens are scavengers, the coyote is a hunter as well. He would even prey upon the birds themselves.
Besides being good food for us, and for the fish, Shrimps and Prawns have another use. They are scavengers. They pick to pieces and eat the vegetable and animal stuff which floats in the sea. Before it can decay and become poisonous, these useful creatures use it up as food. Great numbers of Shrimps and Prawns are caught for our markets.
The fox, hungering as he always hungers, foremost, lest other scavengers, like himself, shall steal the prize he seeks; a troupe of broad-antlered deer racing headlong down the valley; shaggy wolves, grey or red, lurking within the shadow, as though fearing the open daylight, or perhaps him whose voice has summoned them; these things they see, but their meaning is lost to the feathered wanderers, as they wing their way onward.
Our deserters are very badly treated by the enemy; those who deserted in France were treated as the lowest of mortals, slaves and scavengers. Nothing but English caprice can account for it; just what makes our noblemen associate with stage-coach drivers, and become stage-coach drivers themselves."
Telegraph-boys, scavengers paid by the town, bell-ringers, policemen, shop-boys, everyone comes bowing and scraping, and men who in England would be ashamed to take a "tip" will touch their hats, and hold out their hands for a few pence. They don't wait to be offered money; they ask for it, like common street-beggars asking alms.
They all give the impression of having been extremely drunk the previous evening, and of having subsequently fallen into some sticky abomination into blood for choice. Being the scavengers of Free Town, however, they are respected by the local authorities and preserved; and the natives tell me you never see either a young or a dead one.
Below the laboring caste there is a substratum which is termed pariah or outcast, and these degraded specimens of humanity are not better than animated machines performing the functions of public scavengers. Throughout India caste is hereditary. The son of a priest becomes a priest, a warrior's son becomes a soldier, and a carpenter's boy a carpenter, and so on.
Word Of The Day