There was plenty of it. Evidently the reporter had regarded it as a "scoop," and the editor had backed him up with ample space and hair-raising head-lines.
"HORRIBLE DISCOVERY IN A WATERCRESS-BED AT SIDCUP!"
"A startling discovery was made yesterday afternoon in the course of clearing out a watercress-bed near the erstwhile rural village of Sidcup in Kent; a discovery that will occasion many a disagreeable qualm to those persons who have been in the habit of regaling themselves with this refreshing esculent. But before proceeding to a description of the circumstances of the actual discovery or of the objects found--which, however, it may be stated at once, are nothing more or less than the fragments of a dismembered human body--it will be interesting to trace the remarkable chain of coincidences by virtue of which the discovery was made.
"The beds in question have been laid out in a small artificial lake fed by a tiny streamlet which forms one of the numerous tributaries of the River Cray. Its depth is greater than usual in the watercress-beds, otherwise the gruesome relics could never have been concealed beneath its surface, and the flow of water through it, though continuous is slow. The tributary streamlet meanders through a succession of pasture meadows, in one of which the beds themselves are situated, and here throughout most of the year the fleecy victims of the human carnivore carry on the industry of converting grass into mutton. Now it happened some years ago that the sheep frequenting these pastures became affected with the disease known as 'liver-rot'; and here we must make a short digression into the domain of pathology.
"'Liver-rot' is a disease of quite romantic antecedents. Its cause is a small, flat worm--the liver-fluke--which infests the liver and bile-ducts of the affected sheep.
"Now how does the worm get into the sheep's liver? That is where the romance comes in. Let us see.
"The cycle of transformation begins with the deposit of the eggs of the fluke in some shallow stream or ditch running through pasture lands. Now each egg has a sort of lid, which presently opens and lets out a minute, hairy creature who swims away in search of a particular kind of water-snail--the kind called by naturalists _Limnoea truncatula_. If he finds a snail, he bores his way into its flesh and soon begins to grow and wax fat. Then he brings forth a family--of tiny worms quite unlike himself, little creatures called _rediae_, which soon give birth to families of young _rediae_. So they go on for several generations, but at last there comes a generation of _rediae_ which, instead of giving birth to fresh _rediae_, produce families of totally different offspring; big-headed, long-tailed creatures like miniature tadpoles, called by the learned _cercariae_. The _cercariae_ soon wriggle their way out of the body of the snail, and then complications arise: for it is the habit of this particular snail to leave the water occasionally and take a stroll in the fields. Thus the _cercariae_, escaping from the snail find themselves on the grass whereupon they promptly drop their tails and stick themselves to the grass-blades. Then comes the unsuspecting sheep to take his frugal meal, and, cropping the grass swallows it, _cercariae_ and all. But the latter, when they find themselves in the sheep's stomach, make their way straight to the bile-ducts, up which they travel to the liver. Here, in a few weeks, they grow up into full-blown flukes and begin the important business of producing eggs.