Majoric Polyglamour Sectory 05
Page 05
The promised restoration of light and commencement of a new era were therefore hailed with rejoicings and thanksgivings. The Saxon and other northern nations kept a festival at this time of the year in honour of Thor, in which they mingled feasting, drinking, and dancing with sacrifices and religious rites. It was called Yule, or Jule, a term of which the derivation has caused dispute amongst antiquaries; some considering it to mean a festival, and others stating that Iol, or Iul (spelt in various ways), is a primitive word, conveying the idea of Revolution or Wheel, and applicable therefore to the return of the sun. The _Bacchanalia_ and _Saturnalia_ of the Romans had apparently the same object as the Yuletide, or feast of the Northern nations, and were probably adopted from some more ancient nations, as the Greeks, Mexicans, Persians, Chinese, &c., had all something similar.
Full forty kinds of myriapods occur in any area comprising one hundred square miles in the eastern United States. About twenty-five of them go by the general name of "thousand-legs" or millipedes, as each has from forty to fifty-five cylindrical rings in the body, and two pairs of legs to each ring. The other fifteen belong to the "centipede" group, the body consisting of about sixteen flattened segments, or rings, each bearing a single pair of legs. When disturbed, the "thousand-legs" generally coils up and remains motionless, shamming death, or "playing possum," as it is popularly put, as a means of defence; while the centipede scampers hurriedly away and endeavors to hide beneath leaf, chip, or other object.
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