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GARDNER

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Originally appearing in Volume V11, Page 464 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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GARDNER , a township of See also:

Worcester See also:county, See also:Massachusetts, U.S.A. Pop. (1890) 8424; (1900) 10,813, of whom 3449 were See also:foreign-See also:born; (1910 See also:census) 14,699. The township is traversed by the See also:Boston & See also:Maine railway. It has an See also:area of 21.4 sq. m. of See also:hill See also:country, well watered with streams.and ponds, and includes the villages of Gardner (15 M. by See also:rail W. of See also:Fitchburg), See also:South Gardner and See also:West Gardner. In the township are the See also:state See also:colony for the insane, the See also:Henry See also:Heywood memorial See also:hospital, and the See also:Levi Heywood memorial library (opened in 1886), a memorial to Levi Heywood (1800-1882), a prominent See also:local manufacturer of chairs, who invented various kinds of See also:chair-making machinery. By far the See also:principal See also:industry of the township (dating from 18o5) is the manufacture of chairs, the township having in 1905 the largest chair factory in the See also:world; among the other manufactures are toys, baby-carriages, See also:silver-See also:ware and oil stoves. In 1905 the See also:total factory product of the township was valued at $5,019,019, the See also:furniture product alone amounting to $4,267,064, or 85.2% of the total. Gardner, formed from parts of See also:Ashburnham, Templeton,See also:Westminster and Winchenden, was incorporated in 1785, and was named in See also:honour of See also:Col. See also:Thomas Gardner (1724-1775), a patriot See also:leader of Massachusetts, who was mortally wounded in the See also:battle of Bunker Hill. See W. D.

See also:

Herrick, See also:History of the See also:Town of Gardner (Gardner, 1878), covering the years 1785-1878. GARE-See also:FOWL 1 (Icelandic, Geirfugl; Gaelic, Gearbhul), the anglicized See also:form of the Hebridean name of a large See also:sea-See also:bird now considered See also:extinct, formerly a visitor to certain remote Scottish islands, the See also:Great See also:Auk of most See also:English See also:book-writers, and the Gare-Fowl, or Great Auk. Alca impennis of See also:Linnaeus. In See also:size it was hardly less than a tame See also:goose, and in See also:appearance it much resembled its smaller and surviving relative the See also:razor-See also:bill (Alca torda); but the glossy See also:black of its See also:head was varied by a large patch of See also:white occupying nearly all the space between the See also:eye and the bill, in See also:place of the razor-bill's thin white See also:line, while the bill itself See also:bore eight or more deep transverse grooves instead of the smaller number and the See also:ivory-like See also:mark possessed by the See also:species last named. Otherwise the coloration was similar in both, and there is satisfactory See also:evidence that the gare-fowl's See also:winter-plumage differed from that of the breeding-See also:season just as is ordinarily the See also:case in other members of the See also:family Alcidae to which it belongs. The most striking characteristic of the gare-fowl, however, was the comparatively abortive See also:condition of its wings, the distal portions of i The name first appears, and in this form, in the See also:Account of Hirta (St Kilda) and Rona, &c., by the See also:lord See also:register, See also:Sir See also:George M'Kenzie, of Tarbat, printed by See also:Pinkerton in his Collection of Voyages and Travels (iii. p. 73o), and then in See also:Sibbald's See also:Scotia illustrata (1684). See also:Martin soon after, in his Voyage to St Kilda, spelt it " Gairfowl." Sir R. See also:Owen adopted the form " garfowl," without, as would seem, any precedent authority.which, though the bird was just about twice the linear dimensions of the razor-bill, were almost exactly of the same size as in that species—proving, if more See also:direct evidence were wanting, its inability to See also:fly. The most prevalent misconception concerning the gare-fowl is one which has been repeated so often, and in books of such generally. See also:good repute and wide dispersal, that a successful refutation seems almost hopeless. This is the notion that it was a bird possessing a very high See also:northern range, and consequently to be looked for by See also:Arctic explorers. How this See also:error arose would take too See also:long to tell, but the fact remains indisputable that, setting aside See also:general assertions resting on no evidence worthy of See also:attention, there is but a single See also:record deserving any See also:credit at all of a single example of the species having been observed within the Arctic Circle, and this, according to Prof.

Reinhardt, who had the best means of ascertaining the truth, is open to See also:

grave doubt.2 It is clear that the older ornithologists let their See also:imagination get the better of their knowledge or their See also:judgment, and their statements have been blindly repeated by most of their successors. Another error which, if not so widely spread, is at least as serious, since Sir R. Owen unhappily gave it countenance, is that this bird " has not been specially hunted down like the See also:dodo and dinornis, but by degrees has become more scarce." If any reliance can be placed upon the testimony of former observers, the first See also:part of this statement is absolutely untrue. Of the dodo all we know is that it flourished in See also:Mauritius, its only See also:abode, at the See also:time the See also:island was discovered, and that some zoo years later it had ceased to exist—the mode of its extinction being open to conjecture, and a strong suspicion existing that though indirectly due to See also:man's acts it was accomplished by his thoughtless agents (Phil. Trans., 1869, p. 354). The extinction of the Dinornis lies beyond the range of recorded history. Supposing it even to have taken place at the very latest See also:period as yet suggested—and there is much to be urged in favour of such a supposition—little but oral tradition remains to tell us how its extirpation was effected. That it existed after New See also:Zealand was inhabited by man is indeed certain, and there is nothing extraordinary in the proved fact that the See also:early settlers (of whatever See also:race they were) killed and See also:ate moas. But evidence that the whole See also:population of those birds was done to See also:death by man, however likely it may seem, is wholly wanting. The contrary is the case with the gare-fowl. In See also:Iceland there is the testimony of a See also:score of witnesses, taken down from their lips by one of the most careful naturalists who ever lived, See also:John Wolley, that the latest survivors of the species were caught and killed by expeditions expressly organized with the view of supplying the demands of caterers to the various museums of See also:Europe.

In like manner the fact is incontestable that its breeding-stations in the western part of the See also:

Atlantic were for three centuries regularly visited and devastated with the combined See also:objects of furnishing See also:food or bait to the fishermen from very early days, and its final extinction, according to Sir See also:Richard Bonny-See also:castle (Neufoundland in 1842, i. p. 232), was owing to " the ruthless See also:trade in its eggs and skin." There is no doubt that one of the See also:chief stations of this species in Icelandic See also:waters disappeared through volcanic See also:action, and that the destruction of the old Geirfuglasker drove some at least of the birds which frequented it to a See also:rock nearer the mainland, where they were exposed to danger from which they had in their former abode been comparatively See also:free; yet on this rock (Eldey=See also:fire-island) they were " specially hunted down " whenever opportunity offered, until the stock there was wholly extirpated in 1844. A third misapprehension is that entertained by John See also:Gould in his Birds of Great See also:Britain, where he says that " formerly this bird was plentiful in all the northern parts of the See also:British Islands, particularly the Orkneys and the See also:Hebrides. At the commencement of the i9th See also:century, however, its See also:fate appears to have been sealed; for though it doubtless existed, and probably bred, up to the See also:year 1830, its See also:numbers annually diminished until they became so few that the species could not hold its own." Now of the 2 The specimen is in the Museum of See also:Copenhagen; the doubt lies as to the locality where it was obtained, whether at Disco, which is within, or at the Fiskernas, which is without, the Arctic Circle. voeok,'Ot .~ Orkneys, we know that George See also:Low, who died in 1795, says in his posthumously-published See also:Fauna Orcadensis that he could not find it was ever seen there; and on See also:Bullock's visit in 1812 he was told, says See also:Montagu (Orn. See also:Diet. App.), that one male only had made its appearance for a long time. This bird he saw and unsuccessfully hunted, but it was killed soon after his departure, while its See also:mate had been killed just before his arrival, and none have been seen there since. As to the Hebrides, St Kilda is the only locality recorded for it, and the last example known to have been obtained there, or in its neighbourhood, was that given to See also:Fleming (Edinb. Phil. Journ. x. p. 96) in 1821 or 1822, having been some time before captured by Mr Maclellan of See also:Glass.

That the gare-fowl was not plentiful in either See also:

group of islands is sufficiently obvious, as also is the impossibility of its continuing to breed " up to the year 1830." But mistakes like these are not confined to British authors. As on the death of an See also:ancient See also:hero myths gathered See also:round his memory as quickly as clouds round the setting See also:sun, so have stories, probable as well as impossible, accumulated over the true history of this species, and it behoves the conscientious naturalist to exercise more than See also:common caution in sifting the truth from the large See also:mass of error. Americans have asserted that the specimen which belonged to See also:Audubon (now at Vassar See also:College) was obtained by him on the See also:banks of See also:Newfoundland, though there is See also:Macgillivray's distinct statement (Brit. Birds, v. p. 359) that Audubon See also:pro-cured it in See also:London. The account given by Degland (Orn. Europ. ii. p. 529) in 1849, and repeated in the last edition of his See also:work by M. Gerbe, of its extinction in See also:Orkney, is so manifestly absurd that it deserves to be quoted in full: " Il se trouvait en assez See also:grand nombre it y a une quinzaine d'annees aux Orcades; mais le ministre presbyterien dans le Mainland, en offrant une forte See also:prime aux personnes qui lui apportaient cet oiseau, a ete cause de sa destruction sur See also:ces Iles." The same author claims the species as a visitor to the shores of See also:France on the testimony of See also:Hardy (Annuaire normand, 1841, p. 298), which he grievously misquotes both in his own work and in another place (Naumannia, 1855, p. 423), thereby misleading an See also:anonymous English writer (Nat. Hist.

Rev., 1865, p. 475) and numerous See also:

German readers. John Milne in 1875 visited Funk Island, one of the former resorts of the gare-fowl, or " See also:penguin," as it was there called, in the Newfoundland seas, a place where bones had before been obtained by Stuvitz, and natural mummies so lately as 1863 and 1864. Landing on this rock at the See also:risk of his See also:life, he brought off a See also:rich See also:cargo of its remains, belonging to no fewer than fifty birds, some of them in size exceeding any that had before been known. His collection was subsequently dispersed, most of the specimens finding their way into various public museums. A literature by no means inconsiderable has grown up respecting the gare-fowl.. Neglecting See also:works of general bearing, few of which are without many inaccuracies, the following See also:treatises may be especially mentioned:—J. J. S. Steenstrup, " Et Bidrag til Geirfuglens Naturhistorie og saerligt til Kundskaben om See also:dens tidligere Udbredningskreds," Naturh. Foren. Vidensk.

Meddelelser (Copenhagen, 1855), p. 33; E. Charlton, " On the Great Auk," Trans. Tyneside Nat. See also:

Field See also:Club, iv. p. III; " Abstract of Mr J. Wolley's Researches in Iceland respecting the Gare-fowl," See also:Ibis (1861), p. 374; W Preyer, " Uber See also:Plautus impennis," Journ. fiir'Orn. (1862), pp. 110, 337) ; K. E. von See also:Baer, " Uber das Aussterben der Tierarten in physiologischer and nicht physiologischer Hinsicht," See also:Bull. de l'Acad. See also:Imp. de St-Petersb. vi. p.

513; R. Owen, " Description of the See also:

Skeleton of the Great Auk," Trans. Zool. See also:Soc. v. p. 317; " The Gare-fowl and its Historians," Nat. Mist. Rev. v. p. 467; J. H. See also:Gurney, jun., " On the Great Auk," Zoologist (2nd See also:ser.), pp. 1442, 1639; H. Reeks, " Great Auk in Newfoundland," &c., op. cit. p.

1854; V. Fatio, " Sur 1'Alca impennis," Bull. Soc. Orn. Suisse, 1,. pp. I, 80, 147; " On existing Remains of the "Gaye-fowl," Ibis (1870), p. 256; J. Milne, " See also:

Relics of the Great Auk," Field (27th of See also:March, 3rd 'and loth of See also:April 1875). Lastly, reference cannot be omitted to the happy exercise of poetic See also:fancy with which See also:Charles See also:Kingsley was enabled to introduce the chief facts of the gare-fowl's extinction (derived from one of the above-named papers) into his charming See also:Water Babies. (A.

End of Article: GARDNER

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