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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

upon you, and desire not for anyone the things you would not desire for yourself.”

Baha’u’llah in Gleaning (from www.scarboromissions.ca/Golden_rule/sacred_texts.php,

February 7, 2010). From www.religioustolerance.org/reciproc.htm (February 7, 2010),

Black Elk of Native American Spiritually is quoted “All things are our relatives; what we

do to everything, we do to ourselves. All is really One.” Plato also stated, “May I do to

others as I would that they should do unto me.” Many students may remember being

reasoned with by a parent or teacher on such lines of thinking.

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Students may remark that the appeal for many charities, particularly those who feed and

clothe the less fortunate and those who provide disasters relief, are often based upon a

form of the Golden Rule.

2. The following statements about virtue were made by noted

philosopher/writers.

(a) MacIntyre in his account of Aristotelian virtue states that integrity is the

one trait of character that encompasses all the others. How does integrity

relate to, as MacIntrye said, “the wholeness of a human life?”

(a) Integers are whole numbers. This is the base word for integrity. Things with integrity

are the same all the way through, or whole throughout. If we can assume that everyone

knows good treatment of their own interests and everyone knows good choices for their

own short run, integrity might mean applying those same best choices to situations which

affect others or affect the long run of all concerned.

A person of integrity acts with courage, sincerity, and honesty. Integrity encompasses all

the other traits or values of character because it also implies action. Integrity requires a

person to be honest, but to also act on that honesty. Integrity requires that a person have

courage but also to act on that courage. Integrity requires that people not only have

principles and values, they also have to stand by those principles and values and not bow

to pressure thereby foregoing those principles.

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Students often think that integrity is synonymous to honesty. Many dictionaries even state

that honesty is the synonym for integrity and vice versus. Yet, just because a thief is being

honest in one circumstance does not mean that he has integrity. A way to consider integrity

is how consistently honest a person is, not just whether that person was honest in one

circumstance.

(b) David Starr Jordan (1851-1931), an educator and writer, said, “Wisdom

is knowing what to do next; virtue is doing it.” Explain the meaning of this

phrase as you see it.

This quote addresses the fact that it is not enough to know what is right or wrong; one

must also act on that knowledge. Knowledge without action would be hollow. Maya

Angelou (1928 - ), an author has said that “Courage is the most important of all the

virtues, because without courage you can't practice any other virtue consistently. You can

practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.”

Ethical dilemmas are situations where deciding what is best requires weighing ethical

arguments between alternatives. Deciding what the best thing to do is almost always easier

than actually doing it. Josephson Institute refers to moral temptations as a choice which is

clear but still unattractive. The ratio of moral temptation to ethical dilemma might be four

to one. Even those of us with the worst eating and exercise habits seem to know a lot about

healthy alternatives. However, making yourself eat vegetables when you are hungry for

chocolate is difficult and making yourself consistently prefer vegetables to

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cheeseburgers might require something beyond our abilities. Wisdom is mostly knowledge

but virtue is mostly desire, and habit.

3. (a) Do you think it is the same to act in your own-self interest as it is to act in

a selfish way? Why or why not?

Acting selfishly and in your own self-interest do not have to be the same thing. Normally

acting selfishly is only being concerned with self and being very short sighted; it is being

concerned with immediate gratification of some sort. Acting in one’s best interest may

also mean acting in the best interest of all involved. For instance, I can turn up the

television loud while I study because that is what I like, who cares if it is bothering my

roommate or anyone else. Or, I have the television at a moderate volume so as not to

disturb my roommate or anyone else. I do this in hopes that I am not disturbed by loud

volumes at 3 am while I’m trying to sleep and my roommate is coming in from a job. In

the former case I am acting selfishly and in the other I am acting in my self-interest while

considering others.

(b) Do you think “enlightened self-interest” is a contradiction in terms, or is

it a valid basis for all action? Evaluate whether our laissez-faire, free market

economic system does (or should) operate under this philosophy.

“Enlightened self-interest” may seem like a contradiction in terms. Nevertheless, an

individual has to be “enlightened” to consider the long term effects of a choice upon self,

others, and the whole of humanity. For example, an individual may want the road near his

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house to be free of litter out of self-interest (resale value, dislike of clutter and untidiness,

etc.), but can extend that desire to wanting all the roads of a neighborhood or city to be

free of litter for the good of the community. In fact, long term self-interest requires that

an individual consider others, since an individual does not live in a vacuum without

interaction with others. A totally selfish person will probably face negative consequences

from others.

The doctrine of laissez-faire, free market system is based upon the belief that economies

should not be encumbered by regulation; an economy works best with enlightened self-

interest, competition, and the laws of supply and demand. Adam Smith used the term

“invisible hand” to describe how enlightened self-interest, competition, and supply and

demand worked to self regulation markets without needing regulation. The 2008-2009

financial crisis has raised questions as to whether the invisible hand works. There are

many cases during in the crisis where enlightened self-interest gave way to greed and

egoism. Such cases have raised cries for new/stricter regulations of the free markets.

Although competition and, sometimes, supply and demand can be regulated, can self-

interest, egoism or greed really be regulated? If those could be regulated, then regulations

alone could create and protect a moral economy.

4. (a) What (who) has had the most influence on your personal ethics to this point

in your life? Do you feel that your ethics are still evolving? What would cause

you to change your ethics positively or negatively?

Students will immediately think of religion, parents, and the fear of consequences as what

made them “moral.”

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Ask Students if they were members of moral training organizations like scouting or got

moral lessons at school? Would going to church change people, even if they are attending

against their free will to start with? Would preaching have more influence on certain ages

or certain types of people? Did memorized scout laws, pledges, or oaths have any effect?

Ask Students to separate two kinds of experiences: dramatic and habitual. Are certain

ethical lessons only learned by direct experience?

Make a list of life-changing experiences with +/- sides for making you better (+) or worse

(-). Can you be made better by someone helping you? Can you be made worse by a

betrayal? Besides a near-death experience or having a child, are there any other experiences

that you can only know by doing it?

Ask Students if new born babies are innocent and moral or selfish and impatient? How

soon do children develop moral habits like telling the truth, keeping promises, and sharing

with others? How old before these developments become ingrained in their adult habits?

Ask Students if animals are moral or immoral? Are some animals more capable of learning

and changing than others? Are some animals innately moral? Besides loyalty, what moral

traits can animals learn? Does being good require reasoning skills? Intelligence?

Knowledge? At what age are you done developing morally?

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(b) Some believe that the absence of role models has negatively affected the

overall ethics in society especially with respect with respect to young people.

Do you agree or disagree?

Role models can make mistakes and act unethically at times; being human guarantees this.

However, role models should show how to act with courage in situations where lapses in

judgment need to be corrected and overcome. Unfortunately, role models sometimes end

up as role models of what not to do. Some might say that in the age of 24-hour news and

Internet information, many sports figures or movie stars have been turned into a role

models based upon their fame rather than personal character and virtues.

5. One explanation about rights is that, “There is a difference between what we

have the right to do and what is the right thing to do.” Explain what you think

is meant by this statement.

Having a right to do something allows one to be concerned with one’s self interest only

(egoism). Doing the right thing often requires one to consider others besides one’s self.

6. In this chapter we discuss how John Edwards ruined his reputation by having

an affair, covering it up, and then not admitting to fathering a child out of

wedlock. Shortly after the Edwards disclosure, the public was stunned to find

out that one of its most celebrated sports heroes – Tiger Woods – had also

engaged in extra marital affairs. Do you think Tiger should be forgiven by the

public for his transgressions? What about sponsors such as Nike? Should they

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drop Tiger and others who violate societal standards from their role as

endorsers of products?

The companies he has endorsements with will have to decide if Tiger’s affairs will harm

them by association. For instance, Accenture decided that integrity was a core value and

that Tiger as a spokesperson harmed the company. Nike said that Tiger was hired to be a

spokesperson due to his golfing ability. However, Nike did decide to pull Tiger ads while

he was taking a sabbatical from golf. Companies that have long term contracts with Tiger

will have to decide if Tiger helps sales more than he hurts sales. The public will have to

decide if Tiger misled them or not and if Tiger’s apology is sincere.

7. (a) Steroid use in baseball is an important societal issue. Many members of

society are concerned that their young sons and daughters may be negatively

influenced by what apparently has been done at the major league level to gain

an advantage and the possibility of severe health problems for young children

from continued use of the body mass enhancer now and in the future. Others

wonder whether players such as Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire, two

potential future hall-of-famers for their accomplishments in home run

productivity, should be listed in the record book with an asterisk after their

names and an explanation that their records were established at a time when

baseball productivity might have been positively affected by the use of steroids.

Some even believe they should be denied entrance to the baseball Hall of Fame.

What do you think about these issues? Be sure to use ethical reasoning to

support your position.

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Using steroids is cheating. What theories would support cheating? Virtue ethics would

want doing the right thing to become a habit. Deontology would emphasize the duty of

doing the right thing. Fairness would emphasize equals competing against one another.

When athletes compete against one other, each one should have the same advantages and

disadvantages. Another concern with steroids is safety. If competition is pressuring some

individuals to do dangerous things, agreeing about what EVERYONE will not do

protects all from that pressure.

Steroids might increase speed and strength if well administered and athletes could make a

case that if every baseball player had access to them competition would be equalized;

similar to giving every one access to good shoes or the weight room. There are two

dangerous issues to consider. Steroid-using batter facing an equally enhanced pitcher

might seem fair, and steroid-using Yankees against steroid-using Red Sox might seem

fair, but faster pitching hit by stronger hitters might create a danger to spectators and

players.

Underneath an almost cult like reverence for athletes is the celebration of sporting,

unearned luck of birth talent, healthy respect for the virtues of diligence, courage,

dedication, discipline, and sometimes teamwork. Baseball is different from some other

sports in that until very recently, it looked like a sport anyone could play. Baseball looks

like a fair game in that short guys, fat guys, skinny guys, and athletic looking guys got to

play. We celebrate the virtues of sports which we ought to celebrate in ordinary life,

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where we are not all born with talent and not all born with inherited resources but we all

can be diligent, brave, honest, and fair.

(b) Mark McGwire admitted on January 11, 2010 that he used steroids on and

off for nearly a decade, including during the 1998 season when he broke the

then single-season home run record. What do you think motivated McGwire

to make the confession almost ten years after being questioned about it by

Congress? How would you characterize his admission at that time? Do you

think he acted ethically in making the confession?

McGwire made the confession about steroids because he was slated to become hitting

coach for the St. Louis Cardinals. He admitted using the steroids but felt that taking them

did not enhance his hitting performance. Some sports writers felt the confession had “but”

attached to it which made light of the confession. Was McGuire sorry that he was caught

and had to confess or was he sorry that he used steroids? Adding a “but” to a confession

and apology is a form of rationalization and not taking full responsibility for the ethical

lapse. The confession is a good start, but McGwire will need to take full responsibility.

8. Your best friend is from another country outside the U.S. One day after a

particularly stimulating lecture on the meaning of ethics by your instructor,

you and your friend disagree about whether culture plays a role in ethical

behavior. You state that good ethics are good ethics and it doesn’t matter

where you live and work. Your friend tells you that in her country it

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is common to pay bribes to gain favor with important people. Comment on

both positions. What do you believe?

The basic moral principles of respect, fairness and kindness are timeless and worldwide;

although different circumstances can affect how they are implemented. There have to be

certain ways of treating people that almost always hurt and are almost always wrong; you

might mention a few obvious ones, like robbery, rape, and murder. Likewise there are

cultural practices of great importance without moral significance. An example is which

side of the road you drive on. Left and right sides might be morally equal, but once

everyone promises to drive on the left side, the wrong side becomes promise-breaking and

deadly. Playing “football” in any country besides the United States implies a promise not

to use one’s hands, and doing so would be considered cheating. Touching the ball and

thereby breaking the rules might ruin the game, but is not often a life and death betrayal.

In many countries, restaurant staffs are not tipped, in other countries, nearly everyone tips

the same percent and in some places how much you tip influences how well you are treated.

A lot, but not all of cultural morality differences are unwritten rules and expectations that

seem fair if applied to and by everyone. Arbitrary choices become moral obligations when

other peoples’ well being depends on keeping promises to follow those choices.

Some cultural differences in morality have to do with beliefs more than differences in

ethical reasoning. In some places, people are accorded better treatment according to their

sex, age, race, wealth, or status. This mixes personal traits which are earned with traits that

unearned or due to birth. If you believe wealth and power are earned, then their

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privileges seem fair, but if you believe children do not choose or earn their parents, then

those very same privileges are unfair and discriminatory.

9. Some people believe that ethics is relative to the situation. Others believe we

should act the same way in similar situations. Comment on these opposing

points of view.

Some believe reacting differently in similar situations undermines one’s integrity. Many

would believe that the study of ethics is to help one react the same way in similar situations.

Virtue ethics and deontology would require that one act the same way in similar situations.

Others may believe that reacting differently in similar situations is normal and represents

considering others and evaluating each situation for the greatest good and for the greatest

number as per utilitarianism.

10. (a) What is the relationship between the ethical obligation of honesty and

truth-telling?

Ask Students to differentiate between telling a lie and breaking a promise.

List some lies no one believes and therefore are not very harmful and list some lies that

people might believe and thus could be hurt by believing them. List some promises no one

believes and some people might believe and could count on, to their detriment.

Have we sometimes “promised” to tell the truth and other times “almost warned” people

that we weren't going to tell the truth?

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

Telling the truth reveals our respect for the other person’s decision making ability when he

is provided the truth. We lie to people we think would misuse the truth in unfair or

dangerous ways. Keeping the truth secret or deceiving people is only effective when those

people believe we are providing them with the truth. Lies only work if we lie infrequently

enough, to be believed and relied on when we do lie.

Honesty is about keeping promises to tell the truth. Accepting our promise to tell the truth

puts someone is a relationship with us. In the terms of Robert Fulghum in All I Really Need

to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten, a promise is like riding the teeter-tauter: Believing

promises puts you at risk of a hard fall, but breaking promises leaves you alone and unable

to play.

(b) Is it ever proper to not tell someone something he or she has a right to

know? If so, describe under what circumstances this might be the case. How

does this square with Rights Theory? If you believe it is never right to

withhold such information, consider the virtue of caring or empathy to

evaluate your action.

The conflict of not telling someone something that he may have a right to know is choice

between two rights. This situation may cause a person to tell a lie. For example, assume

John works in payroll for PQR Inc. PQR has announced that it will be laying off 100

people from its workforce. Due to the need to prepare all the

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separation paperwork and final payroll for the employees being laid off, John knows who

the 100 employees are. He has sworn to keep the list secret until management has told

each of the employees. One of his co-workers is on the list. This co-worker comes to

John and asks if she is on the list. She is a single mother and wants to start looking for

another job if she needs to do so. How does John choose between his co-worker and the

requirements of his job?

If John decides that his co-worker has the right to know the pending lay-off, he may be

using the virtue of caring or empathy to justify his action. He will have chosen loyalty to

his co-worker over loyalty to his employer. However, since confidentiality and

trustworthiness are important principles for accountants, choosing loyalty to his co-

worker over his employer could limit his career.

11. Assume you are coming home from the store one day and see a fast moving

fire approach your neighbor’s house. You notice that the neighbor’s car is in

the garage. The garage door entrance to the house is locked. You bang on the

door and no one answers. You call the neighbor on your cell phone and no one

answers. You don’t think there is enough time to call the fire department ten

miles away before serious damage is done to the house. What would you do

next and why?

Using the Golden Rule, what would you want someone to do if it were your house? Would

you want the fire department to be notified? You would want to notify the department, and

also make sure that your neighbor is not inside the house. In addition, you would want to

protect your neighbor’s property as much as possible. You may want

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

to use the garden hose to wet the roof or start a fire break. Depending on the rate of speed

of the approaching fire, you may want to notify other neighbors.

12. In the discussion of loyalty in this chapter a statement is made that: “Your

ethical obligation is to report what you have observed to your supervisor and

let her take the appropriate action.” We point out that you may want to take

your concerns to others. Do you think there are any circumstances when you

should go outside the company to report financial wrongdoing? If so, to what

organization would you go? Why? If not, why would you not take the

information outside the company?

Whistle blowing has had a bad name since before Rolf chose his duty to Nazi youth over

his affection for the Von Trapp family in the “Sound of Music.” Telling to get someone in

trouble is called tattling. Tattling often has the bad reputation due its mean-spirited

motivation. Telling to get someone out of trouble is usually the right thing to do. The

difference in the two situations above turn on motives and has to consider future versus

past harms. Whistle-blowing could stop something which is about to happen or will

continue happening. It does matter whether whistle-blowing can change the future and it

does matter how important those changes are in the lives of those in peril.

Whistle-blowing is different for Accountants because it violates client trust and break

promises the profession has made on behalf of each of its members. Accountants, as

professionals, have access to truth and knowledge BECAUSE we as a profession promise

that clients can absolutely count on the Accountants not to violate that trust by sharing

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

secrets. If the profession did not promise confidentiality and our promise was in doubt,

clients would try to get professional accounting services while keeping secrets from their

accountants. Alternative services would be weak or poor at best.

While there are situations where Professional Accountants have to go outside their chain

of command, the whole profession’s reputation for reliability is damaged whenever that

promise of confidentiality is broken. Whistle blowing for a Professional Accountant is

promise breaking. The best justification for breaking promises is what we call an

emergency: time sensitive, future changing, no one else can do it and it has to be done

situations. It is easier to imagine corporations in its personnel, operations and marketing

departments doing dangerous and harmful things that must be stopped in a hurry than in

the finance or accounting departments.

There are circumstances where future harm to people who deserve our protection is so great

that professional duty is superseded by duty as a human being. There are also circumstances

where individual accountants are the only one person who can prevent or reduce that harm

by acting. Accountants can almost always trust their supervisors to do the right thing and

follow up on what needs to be investigated. If there is honesty, diligence, and adequate

time to follow the chain of command, whistle-blowing for financial wrongdoing would not

be justified. An organization truly corrupt to its top ought to be a stunningly unusual

situation, although recent events might suggest otherwise.

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

13. In the new age of texting, blogging, tweeting, and updating one’s facebook, a

variety of new activities have occurred that raise interesting ethical questions.

For example, stay-at-home moms that blog often during the day are being

wined and dined by giant food companies such as Nestle in return for the

unwritten understanding that they will blog positively about company

products. In November 2009, Nestle paid to put up sixteen so-called “mommy

bloggers” at the posh Langham Huntington hotel in Pasadena, California.

These bloggers were treated to a private show at the Magic Castle in

Hollywood and sent packages of frozen Omaha steaks to their families to tide

them over while the women were away learning all about the company’s latest

product lines. In return, the virtual sisterhood filed Twitter posts raving about

the Nestle’s canned pumpkin, Wonka candy and Juicy Juice drinks. Is there

anything wrong with these practices? If not, why not? If so, explain what you

think may be wrong from an ethical perspective.

Would the blogs from the mommy bloggers raving about new Nestle products be as well

received if it was known that the mommies were receiving perks from Nestle? Would

consumers feel misled if it was known that they were being paid by Nestle? Isn’t this a

conflict of interest? Would the mommies be as willing to pan the products after receiving

the products and pampering by Nestle? These situations raise questions of honesty and

integrity of the bloggers. If the perks are not disclosed and later come to light, the bloggers

will have lost creditability and trust. Using the Six Pillars of Character, the bloggers broke

an implied promise to tell their opinion of products. This would violate trustworthiness and

could lead to a loss of respect.

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14. (a) Assume you have been hired by the head of a tobacco industry group to

do a cost-benefit analysis of whether the tobacco firms should disclose that

nicotine is addictive. Assume this is before the federal government requires

such disclosure on all packages of cigarettes. Explain how you would go

about determining what are the potential harms and potential benefits of

disclosing this information voluntarily. Is there any information you feel can

not be included in the evaluation? What is it? Why can’t you include it? If

you could include it, would it impact your recommendation to the head of the

industry group?

Remind Students that the Cost/benefit analysis of this very question was actually

considered by tobacco companies and that cost/benefit analysis of tobacco taxation is still

being done. Three steps of cost benefit analysis are critical: listing costs and benefits,

creating dollar estimates for each cost and benefit, and calculating present value

discounting those dollar costs and benefits.

Listing the benefits of revealing the information is easier than assigning dollar numbers

to the information. Two big benefits to consider are: (i) benefits to potential smokers who

would read the warning and choose not to start smoking and (ii) litigation savings to the

company on not being blamed for secrecy or deceit. It is possible that warnings do not

deter hardly any smokers. However, a company, or industry, keeping secrets can cost a

lot in consumer confidence and trust, and in government and judicial reactions.

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

Effects on smokers and on employees not feeling guilty might be ones the boss would not

want you to consider.

Putting dollar figures on smokers’ illness or death is difficult but it must be done.

Whether to include what the company might be sued for, all out of pocket costs of illness,

or even psychological costs to relatives of watching slow painful death makes a big

difference in the results.

Listing costs of revealing the addiction potential include the out-of-pocket cost of

warnings, the loss of sales profits for any smokers who take heed, and the outrage of

betrayal by consumers to the other tobacco companies. Being the deadly product seller

who tells the truth might cost sales but being the deadly product seller who gets caught in

lies and deceit might be much worse. In general, the cover-up is more reacted to than any

bad news.

Most critical to the cost benefit analysis is the present value discounting. In the case of

smoking dangers, the health risks are discovered and measured after years of smoking or

living with smokers. Dead former smokers and second hand smoke victims stay dead for

many years that they might have lived, so discounting at a fair present value rate is

essential.

(b) Analyze the situation from a rights perspective, justice, and virtue

theory. How might these considerations affect your recommendation to the

head of the industry group?

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Five key rights ought to be considered: Truth, Promises, Personal Property, and Personal

Bodily Health and Privacy. Respect for Smokers’ autonomy requires that we let

intelligent and rational adults make up their own mind one cigarette at a time. Chemical

addiction provides an argument for taking away the free choice of even adults, so we

often outlaw addictions even from adults. If your body belongs to you and your money

belongs to you (assuming you have no duty and have made no promises to your children

to raise them, to a spouse to love, or parents to not watch you die) then you ought to be

able to make up your own mind…..with full truth available to help you decide. (Plenty of

products do not reveal all the possible consequences of the misuse of the product, but

other than guns, tobacco is about the only product which kills 33% of the time when used

as expected, directed, and intended.)

Justice is often measured as fairness. We might compare tobacco to other products in

safety market freedom and requirements of disclosure. Cars might be an example of

products which might be partly analogous to tobacco. Cars kill and while we rarely call

driving an addiction, it is certainly a habit which on any one occasion is by percentages

safe but across large numbers and across time deadly. We argue by fairness that products

equally dangerous might be treated differently by earned difference or by needed

difference. Slippery slope arguments are made that if tobacco is restricted, red meat and

lack of exercise ought to be likewise, but slippery slope arguments can be seen through.

Few people die from second hand fatness, and there are healthy amounts of every food.

Tobacco has no safe amount and few benefits to earn it a place in the marketplace.

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

We ought to treat tobacco fairly compared to other drugs or compared to other addictions.

We regulate gambling and pornography to protect people who might not be old enough to

make up their own minds. A fairness issue certainly ought to be the age of consent. Is

eighteen years too old or young? Why?

The key virtues of a disclosure decision are truthfulness, kindness and diligence. The

consequences of disclosing the addictive property of a deadly product is the legal liability

that results from admitting that the secret had been kept for years. People smoking

because the secret was revealed will lead to more blame placed on the tobacco company,

and people starting to smoke after the addictive property is revealed will have more of the

blame shifted to them for assuming that known risk. If we could claim that we had no

idea it was addictive until the day before we disclosed that knowledge, it would help out

in court and in public opinion.

The key moral issue is: Respect for autonomy requires that we allow adults to hurt (only)

themselves, but addiction negates their free will and thus their right and ability to decide.

The moral bankruptcy of tobacco is, knowing nicotine is addictive.

15. Former associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Potter Stewart (1915-

1985), said: “Fairness is what justice really is.” How would you interpret this

statement in the context of business decision-making?

The chapter discusses how justice emphasizes rights, fairness and equity. Justice Stewart

simplifies justice down to fairness. This implies that justice and fairness are the same

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

thing. If justice achieves fairness, then rights and equity will also have been achieved.

16. How does virtue theory apply both to the decision maker and the act under

consideration by that party? Explain.

Virtue theory basically says you are what you do. Goodness is habitual practice of good

choices. One might decide what a desired virtue is by looking at people to emulate that

virtue or a person might decide what to do by following a chosen virtue. It is a circular

theory in that deciding what is right might be defined as what good people do and good

people might be defined as people who do those kinds of things.

Aristotle’s virtue was success based. Therefor, his virtues are those traits which, when

combined with good fortune, allow and promote success. Benjamin Franklin’s virtue list

is written as if instructions for becoming what he valued becoming. Virtues are defined as

success promoting traits that change across time and circumstances in priority. The

foundation for Kant’s hypothetical imperatives are virtues. The different imperatives are

based on different virtues. Virtues of highest importance in one sport, say endurance or

hand eye coordination might be less important than rhythm or size in another sport. If you

want to succeed at something, then you practice the traits that make you successful.

17. Distinguish between ethical rights and obligations from the perspective of

accountants and auditors.

Ethical rights describe how a person is entitled to be treated by another person.

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

Ethical obligations are the duties to treat others in an ethical manner. Ask students what

they think are their rights. Now which of those rights have ethical basis? Have the

students make a list of their ethical rights. If a student’s ethical right conflicts with the

student’s ethical obligation, what should a student do? From the perspective of

accountants and auditors, obligations to the public are integrity, independence,

objectivity, and responsibility. Accountants and auditors have a right to be treated as

trained professionals.

18. Assume in the DigitPrint case that the venture capitalists do not provide

additional financing to the company even though the adjustments have not

been made. The company hires an audit firm to conduct an audit of its

financial statements to take to a local bank for a loan. The auditors become

aware of the unrecorded $1 million in accrued expenses. Liza Doolittle

pressures them to delay recording the expenses until after the loan is secured.

The auditors do not know whether Henry Higgins is aware of all the facts.

Identify the stakeholders in this case? What alternatives are available to the

auditors? Use the AICPA Code of Professional Conduct and Josephson’s Six

Pillars of Character to evaluate the ethics of the alternative courses of action.

The stakeholders in the DigitPrint case are the stockholders and employees of the

company, the local bank, suppliers and customers of the company. The auditors may try

to get Ms. Doolittle and Mr. Higgins to record the expenses; tell the board of directors of

the situation; issue a qualified or adverse opinion if the expenses are not recorded; or

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

they could do as Ms. Doolittle is pressuring them to do. Caving into the pressure from

Ms. Doolittle would be unethical and would violate the AICPA principles of integrity,

independence, responsibility, public interest and due care. Using these principles and the

Six Pillars of Character, the auditors should meet with the board of directors to try and

get support for the recording of the expenses. If that fails, then the auditors should issue a

qualified or adverse opinion. This would be in keeping of the AICPA principles. Under

the Six Pillars of Character, the auditors would be displaying trustworthiness,

responsibility, fairness, and citizenship.

19. In their landmark book that was published in 1966, Ethical Standards of the

Accounting Professioni, John Carey and William Doherty state that: “The

[AICPA] code [of ethics] in effect is an announcement that, in return for the

faith which the public reposes in [CPAs], members of the profession accept

the obligation to behave in a way that will be beneficial to the public.”

Comment on the meaning of this statement as you understand it.

Carey and Doherty are stating that the AICPA code is an implied contract with the public.

The CPA promises to have integrity, objectivity and independence, responsibility, due

care and utmost public interest in mind. In return for these promises, the public trusts and

has faith in the CPA profession. Scandals over the last decade have shown that CPAs are

not meeting their obligations on the promises. A result of the scandals is that the

profession has lost some faith and trust of the public.

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Chapter 01 - Ethical Reasoning: Implications for Accounting

20. Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832), the Scottish novelist and poet wrote: “Oh what

a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.” Comment on what

you think Scott meant by this phrase.

Lies often require stories which seem simple, but if examined, may call for further lies. In

some cases, merely remembering a lie is more difficult than remembering the truth. Fiction

is filled with stories of one lie leading to others. You might collect a list of those famous

stories.

1-29
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
giant reptile has no means of ridding itself of its persistent
insignificant torments, the flies, and is at the mercy of the Nile bird’s
appetite to get relief.
The mother crocodile lays her eggs in the sand, which she heaps
over them, and leaves the sun to warm them into life. A recent
traveller says that he took seventy-nine eggs from a crocodile’s
place of deposit near the bank of an African river. There was no
effort to make a nest, but the mother had chosen a spot a few paces
from the bank of the river, and had made it clear of plants in a circle
of several yards in diameter. To do this she had placed herself on the
spot and wheeled her heavy body round a number of times, making
the earth clear. Then she had laid down a few branches, as if to
prevent the eggs from rolling away. Next she dug out four pits, each
about two feet deep, obliquely set. The eggs were laid twenty or
twenty-five each day, until a hundred had been placed in the pits,
one pit being dug and filled before another was made.
After the eggs are laid the mother crocodile remains asleep near
them a great part of the time, basking in the sun, and leaving the
place of deposit only to go to the water and seek food. The egg-
laying occurs but once a year, about the opening of January. It is two
months before the young hatch out, and about the time they appear
the rainy season sets in. As they come from the hatching place they
take to the water by instinct, and there the mother is waiting to give
them what defence she can, for the male adult crocodiles are ready
to devour them, and wild beasts of various kinds make them a prey.
The young crocodiles show their fierce disposition at once, fighting,
biting, and making themselves generally disagreeable as soon as
they get into the water.

FOOTNOTES:
[70] Specimens even longer than this have been noted.
 LESSON XXXVIII.
EL LAGARTO.

Basking upon a log he lies;

Around him skim the dragon flies;
Above the squirrel drums his tune;
The rabbit steals along the brake,
And trembles lest his footsteps wake
The tyrant of the still lagoon.

The alligator is an American crocodile.[71] The order crocodilia,

which includes the gavial of India, the true crocodile of the Nile, the
cayman of the Orinoco region, and the American alligator, is plentiful
in Florida and some of our other Southern States, and takes its
scientific name from the Mississippi River,[72] one of its favorite
homes. The name alligator is of Spanish origin, el lagarto, the lizard,
and was given by the early Spanish explorers of our Southern States
because this was the greatest lizard they had ever seen.
This American crocodile, the alligator, is one of the best-known
creatures in the world. Being easily caught, and easily reared, it is
seen in the cheapest shows, museums, and menageries, and in
many public aquariums and zoological gardens.
For my own part I never felt a deeper sympathy with any wretched
beast than I did with a pair of alligators in the Brighton Aquarium,
England. Lying in a grotto, where all that could be done in the way of
providing them with a few inches of water, and a certain amount of
damp heat had been done to testify to the general good will of their
keepers, were those miserable exiles from their hot, native lagoons. I
fancied that among the mists and raw cold of “John Bull’s tight little
island” these creatures longed, as I did, for the vivid blaze of a
southern
sun.
While an
alligator
basking
on a log in
hot
sunshine,
deep
water
close at
hand to
slip into
for safety,
is a
picture of
intense
lazy
enjoyment
, an
alligator LURKING.
blinking at
an electric
light in an aquarium, a chilly beast stretched upon wet stones, seems
in his stillness a picture of apathetic misery. I doubt if either of the
beasts in the aquarium could have roused to enough interest in life
to snap at its favorite food, a puppy, had one ventured near. They did
not even show appreciation of the fact that a person like myself, with
a toleration for dog-days, and a hearty longing for palmettoes,
trumpet-creepers, magnolias, and red-birds, was looking at them
with sympathy and a gleam of kindness!
The adult alligator is easily taken prisoner by being seized from
behind as it lies basking; its legs are securely bound, its mouth
muzzled, and then—away to a showman’s cage! The Orinoco
cayman and the Mississippi alligator are often captured in the
following curious fashion. A hook baited with some small animal,
which the alligator especially likes as food, is dropped into the water,
and when seized by the alligator, the hook which is not sharp, but
blunt and double, is arranged to expand and fill the creature’s throat,
but will not pierce or tear it. Then by pulling at the chain or rope
attached to this hook, the brute is drawn ashore. A strong man next
leaps on its back, grasps its fore-legs and draws them bridle-wise
back to serve as reins. Thus mounted the captor maintains his seat
as on a fractious horse, during all the creature’s plunges and tail-
lashing, until finally it succumbs, fairly worn out by its own battle.
Once entirely exhausted, it becomes weak, mild, and obedient.
The food of the alligator is squirrels, rabbits, water-rats, water-fowl,
fish, hares, and young dogs, but it will attack men and kill children if
it has opportunity. Its method of preying is much like that of the Nile
crocodile; the victim is first pulled under the water and drowned, and
then eaten at leisure.[73] The alligator seems to know that while he is
merely enjoying a little agreeable change under the surface of the
water, his prey will drown.
Why does not the water rush into the lungs of the alligator, and so
smother it, as the alligator is a lung-breathing animal? Because it
has at the base of its tongue an interior collar which expands and
guards the passages to the lungs when it is under water. When it
wants a mouthful of air it elevates its head above water while its
hands hold its victim below the surface.
The alligator is a smaller animal than the crocodile, its length being
from five to ten feet; its head is shorter and broader than that of the
crocodile, and its snout is more obtuse. The large, long teeth on the
lower jaw do not, as in the crocodile, fit into external furrows on the
upper jaw, but into pits made there to receive them. The hind legs
and feet of a crocodile have a jagged fringe which the alligator does
not have; the alligator’s hind feet are webbed only about half way up
the toes, and the crocodile’s hind feet are webbed to the very tip.
Despite the strong musky odor of the alligator’s flesh, it has
sometimes been eaten: so also there are people who will eat
crocodile’s flesh and eggs. To a civilized appetite no flesh could be
more loathsome.
The alligator’s bill of fare is not confined to the living creatures we
have just mentioned as furnishing its favorite food. Alert for its
breakfast, this pirate of the lagoons and bayous gathers up fish,
flesh, and fowl for its table, but swallows, as a condiment, whatever
comes handy. An old rubber shoe floating in the water, an empty
soda-water bottle, a lost jack-knife, a battered tin can, a stone as big
as an orange, part of a broken lamp,—any of these are welcomed as
serving to fill the yawning vacancy in its stomach, and to aid in
grinding up more digestible food. Similarly an ostrich will swallow a
horseshoe, a table-knife, a spoon, a leather strap and buckle, a few
spools of thread, or any other trifle left in its way, seeming to
consider its stomach, as a school-boy does his pocket, a general
receptacle for almost anything that comes to hand!
Baby alligators make rather amusing pets for a number of months,
before they begin to exhibit hereditary traits, when they at once fail to
be agreeable. They will eat eggs, raw or cooked meat, rats, mice,
birds, frogs, toads. They learn to come when they are called, enjoy
hearing a whistle, and, on rare occasions, show some slight degree
of gratitude and affection, amiable characteristics which they
speedily outgrow. When these baby alligators are a few months old,
they must be killed or put back into the water where their relatives
live.
Alligators are usually silent animals, but in the spring, when the eggs
are being laid, they all become noisy and excited, and bellow like
buffaloes. A number of adult alligators roaring together make a
sound like distant heavy thunder.
The mother alligator builds with her front feet a mound of mud, or
sand, though if she finds a mound just to her taste, she takes that,
and saves herself trouble. In the mound she places her eggs, and in
due time the sun hatches them. The eggs of reptiles are not
enclosed in hard, brittle shells, as those of birds, but in a thick,
tough, elastic skin, as if the white skin that lines a bird’s egg-shell
had grown parchment-like and served instead of shell. The eggs are
the size of hen’s eggs, but more pointed.
As soon as the little alligators come from the egg, they scuttle off to
the water and are ready to fight their enemies and begin their
predatory lives. As they are smaller and less fierce than the gavials,
caymans, or true crocodiles, they are far less destructive. An
alligator of twelve feet long is a giant of his kind. Not only are the
alligators smaller than crocodiles, but they have fewer teeth, and are
“less handy with their tails,” not being able to strike out quite so
vigorously.
The alligator is among the animals that are disappearing before
perpetual hunting and the presence of men about their old haunts.
They are still numerous, but fewer than they were some years ago.
They will die out speedily unless people undertake to raise them on
alligator farms. And why should people do that? For the sake of their
skins. Alligator skins make a strong and handsome leather, very
beautiful for bags, portmanteaus, purses, boots, portfolios; and for
the sake of their skins they should be reared.

FOOTNOTES:
[71] A true Crocodilus Americanus, long overlooked or mistaken
for an alligator, has been discovered in America.
[72] Alligator Mississippiensis.
[73] The alligator, like the crocodile, can close the nostril opening
and remain under water for some time.
 LESSON XXXIX.
WISER THAN ANY BEAST OF THE FIELD.

“Beyond the shadows of the ship

I watched the water snakes;
They moved in tracks of shining white;
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.”

—Coleridge, Ancient Mariner.

Between man and the snake there seems to be placed an instinctive
and unappeasable enmity. The snake, seeing any human being,
either glides off in haste, or coils itself up and hisses, or throws itself
forward in attack. The human being, on the other hand, experiences
fear, disgust, aversion, and seizes stick or stone, or makes use of his
heel, if well protected, to kill the snake. “War to the death, and no
quarter,” seems to be the cry between the highest of the mammals
and the serpent tribe.
“As hideous as a snake” is a common phrase, born of the hatred
between man and the ophidian order, but in point of fact, were
enmity left out of the question, the creatures of the serpent tribe are
not hideous. A lithe, long, cylindrical body, coated with glittering
scales, and splendid with all the colors of the rainbow, elegantly
arranged in rings, lines, or dots; bright eyes; graceful motions; a
tongue that plays to and fro like lightning in an open throat, often of
vivid flame color; a head sometimes crested as if bearing a royal
crown,—these are some of the characteristics of that serpent family,
which instinctively we call “hideous” and “hateful.”
To the above briefly noted particulars we may add that the eyes of
snakes are lidless and the sight somewhat feeble; the sense of smell
 is better developed, and the
nostrils are placed close to
the mouth. The mouth is
large proportionately, and
opens widely; the tongue is
the organ of touch; there
are no external ears, and
snakes seem to be deficient
in hearing. Snakes have no
external limbs, except in
two or three species, where
there are mere rudiments of
hind-legs visible. The
snake’s body is elastic and
capable of enormous
distention. It is furnished
with a spinal column, and
with numerous ribs. The
ribs and scutes, or large
scales, are the chief organs
of locomotion.
OUR NATURAL ENEMY.
The method of crawling
shown by the worm, as
described in Nature Reader, No. 2, is very much like that of some
snakes. There are three ways in which snakes make their
progression. First, they may glide forward with a perfectly straight
motion, by pushing with the scutes, or large scale-like plates of the
under part of the body, to which the ends of the ribs are attached.
Second, these scutes may open out as the scales of a fish when
scraped backward from head to tail,[74] and on the edges of these
opened scute-plates, the snake may walk. Third, they may go
forward by pushing; stretching out the body, and then contracting it,
and making the same motion over again, these motions being
sinuous, or wave-like, from side to side.
The light, smooth body of the snake, provided with numerous small,
powerful muscles, renders its progress by any of these methods
exceedingly rapid. Water snakes swim, waving the body from side to
side, and using the tail as an oar is used in sculling. No serpent can
move on a perfectly smooth surface, as glass; it must have some
ridges, or roughness to resist the motions of the scales and ribs.
Serpents are dumb except for their hiss, which is produced by
driving the air swiftly from the lungs. In some snakes the hiss is
varied to a whine or hum.
Serpents, like the batrachians, cast off their skins and come out in
gleaming new skins which have grown under the old ones. If the
serpent for any reason cannot cast its skin at the proper time, it
sickens and dies. The cast coat is perfect in form, but is generally
turned inside out. Cast snake-skins are sometimes found in the
woods by sharp-eyed boys. Sometimes the lucky boy finds a whole
skin; at other times the cast skin has been partly destroyed by ants,
beetles, or the effects of the weather. Some snakes swallow their
cast-off skins.
Snakes usually move about and hunt in the day-time, and sleep at
night. They hibernate, or take a long winter sleep, as the lizards do.
For hibernation they retire to caves, to holes in logs or in the ground,
and may be found torpid, a number rolled closely together. At such
times the most poisonous snakes, as the viper and rattlesnake, may
be handled without danger. In the spring they begin to revive with the
first warm weather.
I remember that when I was a little girl a very beautiful hollow or
cave in the river-bank not far from Niagara Falls was called “The
Rattlesnake’s Cove,” because so many snakes lived there. In
summer the place was carefully avoided. In early spring, before the
snakes awoke from their sleep, this cove was a favorite place for
picnics, and the school-boys often went there armed with knives,
hatchets, picks, and hoes, and hunted for the torpid snakes and
killed them by scores.
In hot countries, where there is no winter to send them off to sleep,
the snakes are for some part of the year stupid and drowsy, and lie
for several weeks in a nearly comatose condition. In this state they
are too dull to be either timid or ill-tempered. On the other hand,
when casting their skins, they are exceedingly nervous and vicious.
All snakes are flesh eaters, and have very hearty appetites. They
drink a large amount of water, and when a captive snake is well
supplied with water, it can live for several weeks without food.
However, it is doubtless hungry, and the experiment is a cruel one to
try even on a snake.
The serpents have many teeth, sharp, cone-like, and pointing
backward. These teeth grow constantly; when they become at last
old and worthless, they are at once renewed. Lucky snakes! no
toothless gums, no worn-out, broken teeth, no aching teeth, no
dentist’s bills. Nature keeps their teeth perfect from infancy to old
age.
Snakes lay eggs, and with the one exception of the python, which
carries her eggs in a fold of her body, they deposit the eggs in safe
places, leave them to hatch by sun heat, and let the little ones take
care of themselves as soon as they come forth from the eggs. There
are also a few species of snakes which have their little ones born
alive, not in the egg. Snakes’ eggs are enclosed in a leathery skin
like those of turtles. There is a widely spread story that the young of
some kinds of snakes accompany their mother, and in time of danger
she stretches open her mouth, and they take refuge in her throat,
where they remain safely until the danger is passed. The keepers of
the “snake-house” in the London Zoological Garden told me they had
never known a case of the kind, and the best scientific writers have
found no proofs that such story is true. Therefore this tale is open to
grave doubts.
The snake is a creature about which fables have been gathering
from the earliest times. The snake was one of the first objects of
false worship; coiled in a ring with its tail in its mouth, it was taken as
a symbol of eternity. The Magi of the East used it as the emblem of
their order and their arts; a serpent twined on a stick was also the
emblem of physicians, and of the art of healing. It is strange that a
creature exhibiting so many deadly varieties should have been
chosen as the insignia of the physician, and not less strange that to
the serpent should have been attributed great wisdom. Snakes
exhibit fear and anger, but almost no wisdom or anything that seems
like reason. Nearly all domestic animals—ants, bees, spiders, and
many fishes—show far more forecast, ingenuity, architectural ability,
than any snake. And yet “crafty as a snake,” “wise as a serpent,” are
frequent expressions.
Snakes vary greatly in their habits: there are snakes which live on
the ground, hiding under stones, leaves, or brush, and in rock
crevices; other snakes live chiefly in the water, making their holes in
the bank below water-mark; others live in trees, and some others
almost entirely underground.
To this tribe surrounded by enemies, nature has given abundant
means of self-preservation,—swiftness of motion; instinct of instant
flight; poison, sometimes deadly to its enemies; vast size and
strength, as in some boas and pythons, and especially colorations,
which closely imitate their surroundings. Thus ground snakes have,
especially on the back and sides, brown, gray, black, and white in
spots and markings, which together look much like earth, twigs,
pebbles, and dead leaves, so that the snake can scarcely be
distinguished from its bed or home. Tree snakes, and snakes that
live in grass or mosses, are usually green, marbled, or streaked with
black and brown. Snakes from the marshes or muddy banks are
nearly black; among the abundant flowers and gayly colored shrubs
of the tropics, snakes take very brilliant hues. Snakes of temperate
climates are also often tricked out with scarlet, or white or orange
stripes and bands.
Snakes are largest, most numerous, and most brightly colored in hot
countries. Like all the cold-blooded vertebrates, they delight in hot
sunshine, and will lie motionless, basking for hours. In taking a
position for this sun-bath, they select a place where they will not be
conspicuous. I have often noticed that while a gray snake will stretch
itself out in the sun on a bare rock, a green snake never chooses
such a post. Instead, the green snake extends itself on a bed of
moss, or close, short grass, or if slim and light of body, will crawl up
the midrib of a big leaf, or the stalk of a fern frond, where its color is
scarcely discernible from the vegetation about it. A dark brown or
black snake seems to know that it is tolerably secure lying upon a
fallen, decaying tree-trunk. So a gray, or black and white snake, may
often be seen sunning himself on a fence-rail, or on the top of a
stone wall.
There seems to be a common notion that because a creature is a
snake, it must be dangerous and poisonous. This is quite wrong, for
in point of fact, very few of the numerous serpent families are
venomous. The greater number of their species are quite harmless.
One of the most dangerous of all snakes, the boa-constrictor, does
not kill its prey by poisoning, but by crushing it. In general, the head
of the harmless snake is rounded and oblong, while the poisonous
species have heads flat and triangular.
Snakes prey upon birds, toads, rats, mice, frogs, gophers, and
destroy much harmful vermin. The common snakes, called “milk
snakes” and “garter snakes,” which frequent barns, are not at all
poisonous, but, on the contrary, are useful, destroying rats and mice.
Nearly all snakes are very fond of milk, and will glide up to a bowl of
bread and milk, especially if it is warmed, and eat it with great relish.
Black snakes are seldom harmful to people, but are cruel enemies of
birds, devouring the young and the eggs, and tearing up the nests.
Snakes seem to be able to “charm” or mesmerize small animals, and
sometimes even human beings, by fixing their gaze steadfastly upon
them. The victim appears to be smitten dumb and motionless with
terror, and a bird thus charmed will presently flutter straight toward
the open mouth of the snake. I have seen one case of a snake so
charming a bird, but I had a better opportunity to study a cat
charming a bird, and probably the process is much alike in both.
The cat placed itself on the outside sill of my window, near to a pine
tree. A bird presently alighted on the pine tree, no doubt not
observing the cat. The cat fixed its attention on the bird. The cat’s
eyes were widely opened, and shone with a peculiar brightness; its
head was raised and intent, the fur on its neck and about its face
slowly stood up, as if electrified. Except for this rising of the fur, and
a certain intensity of life in the whole attitude of the beast, it was as
still as if cut from stone. The bird quivered, trembled, looked fixedly
at the cat, and finally, with a feeble shake of the wings, fell toward
the cat, which bounded to seize it.

FOOTNOTES:
[74] Nature Reader, No. 3, Scales and Teeth.
 LESSON XL.
OUR COMMON ENEMY.

“Within the shadow of the ship

I watched their rich attire,
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and shone, and every track
Was a flash of golden fire!”

—Coleridge.
One day while sitting at dinner I heard a loud outcry from some
bluebirds, especial pets of mine, which had their nest in a little grove
of dwarf oaks near my house. Hurrying out to inquire into the
troubles of my favorites, I saw the mother bird sitting on a twig, her
wings dropped wide and slack, her tail drooping, her head stretched
forward, quivering with fear; the father bird was flying about crying
wildly, while on a limb of the oak, and approaching the nest, was a
large black snake. The nest was full of nearly hatched eggs.
To throw a big stone at the snake was the first performance. Then
some one ran for a cane to beat the monster; but the snake had
concluded that discretion was the better part of valor, and waited
only to receive one good blow, before he glided off among the
bushes so swiftly that we could not find him. Where these big
climbing snakes are numerous, the birds have a hard time to raise a
brood, for the snakes destroy the nests, and devour alike parents
and fledglings.
Except for their attacks on the birds, tree-climbing snakes are usually
of the harmless kind, and are sometimes even useful. There is,
however, a tree snake in hot countries, which seems to have a
spiteful disposition, and darts from the branches at the eyes and
faces of passers-by, often inflicting a sharp, though not poisonous
wound.
I once formed the acquaintance of a girl who acted as “snake-
charmer” in a museum. She astonished the public by going into a
glass cage filled with snakes, which she handled and played with.
She held the snakes in her lap, twined them about her neck and
arms, and made free with them in many ways. She told me
confidentially, that while these snakes looked as if they were terrible
monsters, they were the most of them fangless and of harmless
varieties. Those which were of poisonous species had been
rendered safe playthings by having their fangs cut out.
The poisonous snakes have a poison sac or bag, which empties into
a little duct or canal running along each side of the jaw to a large
tooth or fang; by an action of the throat muscles, the serpent presses
poison from the sac through the canal, and ejects it through the tooth
as it bites. By cutting out the fangs the snake is rendered harmless,
but only for the time being. The poison apparatus reproduces itself,
and unless the process of growth is watched and the fang again cut
out, the lately harmless snake may suddenly become harmful, and
the snake-charmer be fatally wounded.
“The poisonous ones do not keep from biting because I charm them,
or because they like me,” said the snake-charmer frankly. “Snakes
never know or like anybody, so far as I can see; it is only that they
can’t bite, that’s all. Folks think the snakes love me because they coil
about me. It is only because I am warm that they do that. They are
cold creatures, the snakes, and they like the heat of my arms, neck,
and lap, that’s all.”
Among the snakes without poison glands are the pythons, the
species that watches over and incubates its eggs. The mother
python coils herself round and over the eggs, and for three months
retains this position, until the little ones are hatched. She seems to
be very fond of her young, and is the model mother of all the snake
tribe. The larger pythons eat birds, cats, rabbits, hares, frogs, and
dogs. They seldom meddle with human beings in any way. The sand
snakes are nearly related to the pythons and are also non-
poisonous.
The largest of all snakes, the boa-constrictor, belongs to the same
sub-order as the python, and would be harmless if it were not for its
rabid appetite, which tempts it to devour every living thing which it
sees, while its great strength enables it to master almost any prey.
Thus it will wind about a man, an ox, or a horse, and crush such
victims to death, and feed upon them at leisure. The boas and most
of the pythons are natives of hot countries.
A man who had long been a sailor gave me an account of the
capture of a boa-constrictor, which is now in the London Zoological
Garden. This sailor wanted to go to the interior of the island of Java,
to see the country. When he landed in Java he met an English
gentleman, Sir Henry ——, who was fond of travel and hunting, and
had come to Java intending to capture some wild animals to present
to the Regent’s Park Zoological Garden. A rajah of Java had invited
Sir Henry to go to his bungalow in the central part of the island, and
have a big hunt. Sir Henry offered to take the sailor along to aid him.
They caught a tiger and several other beasts, and I will describe to
you the way in which they captured a boa-constrictor.
They found a place in the forest, where the crushed grass and brush
showed that a boa frequently passed by. Then at evening, they
fastened a goat to a tree that its crying might attract the big snake.
For two or three nights something carried off the goat, or it managed
to escape. Finally they chained the goat. The hunters were watching
and waiting some way off. At last they heard cries from the goat,
which cries the natives said meant that a snake was coming. Then
all was still, and they said that meant that the boa was eating the
goat.
Accordingly they hurried to the spot. There, stretched out his full
length, lay a huge boa; he had swallowed the goat, which distended
the front part of his body so that he would have had hard work to
move, even if he had not been held by the chain attached to the
swallowed goat. This chain was fastened to a plane tree, and held
the boa fast, as he could not disgorge the goat. The boa does not
dismember or chew its food; it crushes it, and swallows it whole.
Then it lies quiet, and waits for the mass to digest. Thus the boa was
captured by the chain down its throat.
Several strong natives now leaped upon the monster’s tail and held
it down. Others laid a long, thick bamboo on each side of the boa,
from head to tail. Then with strong, new ropes they wound and
bound the snake to the bamboos until he was stiffly imprisoned. Next
they released the chain from the tree, and left the end dangling from
the snake’s greedy mouth. Then a dozen or more strong natives
picked up the bamboo sticks, with the great serpent between them,
and marched off to the coast, where a cage had been prepared for it
on an English ship.
The sub-order which includes the greatest snakes in the world, as
the boas, pythons, and anacondas, includes also some of the very
smallest, tiny creatures not over an inch in diameter and a few
inches in length. These snakes exhibit every variety of color and
marking,—green, gold, crimson, white, black, brown, violet, yellow;
they gleam in the splendors of the rainbow.
I remember once on a crest of the Lehigh Mountains I was looking
up some of the lower vertebrates, when, happening to glance over
the side of a big stone on which I was sitting, I saw the most
beautiful little snake that I could imagine. It was coiled up in the sun,
and was only about ten inches long, and less than one inch in
diameter. It was of a vivid emerald green color, and as the sun
touched its tiny scales they seemed bordered and powdered with
gold. The under part of its body paled to pea green and silver white,
a few dots of red glittered about its neck and shoulders, like coral
beads. Its wide-open mouth was reddish and bordered with yellow.
Its tiny tongue played like lightning to and fro, caught the sunshine,
and gleamed as if dipped in gold. Alarmed at seeing me, and afraid
to leave its retreat on the sunny side of the stone, it erected its head
with a low hiss, darted it from side to side, and seemed to try to
frighten me away.
Almost as pretty as this little dweller on the mountains are some of
the water snakes, which are often iridescent, and change in tints of
red, purple, crimson, orange, and green. Good swimmers and
fishers, they pass a happy life among the lily-pads.
 LESSON XLI.
WITH A HOUSE ON HIS BACK.

And through the mossy wood-paths slow

I see the silent tortoise go.
The flecks of light, the shadows dim,
The springing flowers, are naught to him;
The dry pine needles are his bed,
His house is always o’er his head,
The fungus is his table spread.

Several years ago, walking one morning in a wood in Pennsylvania, I

surprised a wood turtle or box tortoise, eating his breakfast. The
season had been rainy and many varieties of large fungus had
attained a prodigal growth. The woods were full of what are popularly
called toad-stools; many of them were of the diameter of a tea-plate,
and stood five or six inches high. As I walked through the wood I
observed that many of these fungi had been gnawed off evenly, as if
cut by a knife, leaving only the central pillar intact. What had done
this? I soon discovered; for moving noiselessly over the mossy earth,
I came to a little opening, where grew one of the finest of these toad-
stools, and there was a wood turtle taking his breakfast.
The animal had already made one or two rounds of his plate, and
was eating with praiseworthy deliberation. He would bite off a
mouthful of toad-stool, chew it carefully until he had extracted all the
juice, then open his mouth and drop out the chewed fibre, and take a
fresh mouthful, not biting inward toward the stem, but breaking off
the morsel next beside that which he had just eaten. He paced round
and round the fungus as he took his bites, eating his plate like
Æneas and the other Trojans,[75] and as the fungus decreased in
regular circles, the circle of chewed fragments increased. In three-
quarters of an hour he had eaten all the disk of the fungus to the
stem part, and then he walked slowly off to look for another.
I found the crumbs that had fallen from his vanished table quite dry,
nothing nutritious being left in them. Why he rejected the central part
of the fungus and the stem, I could not imagine, but he left it in every
instance. If he came upon a decayed or wormy portion of the toad-
stool, he did not “bite round it,” but abandoned it altogether, and went
for a fresh one.
At another turn in this wood, I found, under a pine tree, the shell and
entire skeleton of a turtle, from which every particle of flesh and
muscle was gone. The animal had died on his bed of pine needles,
and his decaying body had been devoured by ants, which had left a
delicately white skeleton. The little horny jaw had a very close
resemblance to the beaks of certain birds.
The turtle is a four-legged reptile, with a short, stout, oval-shaped
body, encased in a bony frame or box, from which the animal is able
to protrude its head, legs, and tail, and into which it can withdraw
them at pleasure. In different varieties of turtle, the size and shape of
the box-like covering varies. The box tortoise can retire into its shell
and close the under part into a groove of the upper edge, and thus
form for itself an impregnable retreat; but there are varieties only
partly encased by the shell, which cannot bring their heads and feet
under cover.
The turtle wanders about with its house on its back as the snail does,
and against its enemies it can close its doors and be emphatically
“not at home.” Turtles have keen sight and hearing; they have no
teeth, the jaws being simply cased in horn, like those of birds. Many
of them are capable of making loud sounds.
Turtles lay eggs which are buried in earth or sand, and left to
themselves to hatch. The sea turtle is the largest variety, and will
sometimes lay as many as two hundred eggs in a single heap. Sea
turtles weighing a thousand pounds have been caught in tropical
lands. Turtles of five or six hundred pounds weight have been
captured on the United States coast.