thanks K. for the riddle of the Barnacle Goose



"I'm found under water held fast by my mouth,
Swirl of the sea-tides goes sweeping beneath me

Fathom-deep sunk under surges I grew.
Bending roof of billows above me:

My body adrift on a floating beam.
You'll find me alive if you lift me and free me.

Dull is my coat as I come from the deep,
But straight I am decked with streamers of white,

Bright when the freshening breeze brings me from underseas
Heaves me up and urges me far

O'er the sea-bath salty.
Say what I'm called."

*

"There are founde in the north parts of
Scotland, and the Ilands adjacent,

called Orchades, certain trees,
whereon doe growe certaine shell fishes,

of a white colour tending to russet;
wherein are conteined little living

creatures: which shells in time of maturitie
doe open, and out of them grow those little living things

which falling into the water
doe become foules, whom we call Barnakles . . .

but the other that do fall upon the land,
perish and come to nothing:

this much by the writings of others, and also from the mouths
of the people of those parts...."


*

"A species of wild goose
nearly allied to the Brent Goose,

found in the arctic seas
(where alone it breeds),

and visiting the British coasts in winter.
This bird, of which the breeding-place was long unknown,

was formerly believed to be produced
out of the fruit of a tree growing

by the sea-shore, or itself to grow
upon the tree attached by its bill

(whence also called Tree Goose),
or to be produced out of a shell

which grew upon this tree,
or was engendered as a kind of mushroom

or spume from the corruption
or rotting of timber in the water."