[Rd] data messed up by read.table ? (PR#9779)

[100700.3013 at compuserve.com]

Full_Name: Joerg Rauh
Version: 2.5.0
OS: Windows 2000
Submission from: (NULL) (84.168.226.163)


Following Michael J. Crawley "Statistical Computing" on page 9 the worms.txt is
required. After downloading it from the book's supporting website, which is 
http://www.bio.ic.ac.uk/research/mjcraw/statcomp/data/ I visually check the data
against the book and they look identical. Then I do a read.table as suggested:
worms<-read.table("C:/Programme/R/R-2.5.0/Data/Worms.txt", header = T).

Typing "worms" to see the data, it's no longer the same: Four lines have been
added to the beginning of the file. One is the header line and three lines are
from further down in the file, i.e. lines 10,11 and 12 in reverse order.
Please look at a copy at the end of this mail. If the first four lines weren't
there, the data would be o.k. I tried different parameter settings in read.table
but couldn't obtain any improvement.

Please let me know, how I can correct this.

Best regards

Joerg

>  worms<-read.table("C:/Programme/R/R-2.5.0/Data/Worms.txt", header = T)
> worms
          Field.Name Area Slope Vegetation Soil.pH Damp Worm.density
1           Oak.Mead  3.1     2  Grassland     3.9    F            2
2       Church.Field  3.5     3  Grassland     4.2    F            3
3            Ashurst  2.1     0     Arable     4.8    F            4
4         Field.Name Area Slope Vegetation Soil.pH Damp Worm.density
5       Nash's.Field  3.6    11  Grassland     4.1    F            4
6     Silwood.Bottom  5.1     2     Arable     5.2    F            7
7      Nursery.Field  2.8     3  Grassland     4.3    F            2
8        Rush.Meadow  2.4     5     Meadow     4.9    T            5
9   Gunness'.Thicket  3.8     0      Scrub     4.2    F            6
10          Oak.Mead  3.1     2  Grassland     3.9    F            2
11      Church.Field  3.5     3  Grassland     4.2    F            3
12           Ashurst  2.1     0     Arable     4.8    F            4
13       The.Orchard  1.9     0    Orchard     5.7    F            9
14     Rookery.Slope  1.5     4  Grassland       5    T            7
15       Garden.Wood  2.9    10      Scrub     5.2    F            8
16      North.Gravel  3.3     1  Grassland     4.1    F            1
17      South.Gravel  3.7     2  Grassland       4    F            2
18 Observatory.Ridge  1.8     6  Grassland     3.8    F            0
19        Pond.Field  4.1     0     Meadow       5    T            6
20      Water.Meadow  3.9     0     Meadow     4.9    T            8
21         Cheapside  2.2     8      Scrub     4.7    T            4
22        Pound.Hill  4.4     2     Arable     4.5    F            5
23        Gravel.Pit  2.9     1  Grassland     3.5    F            1
24         Farm.Wood  0.8    10      Scrub     5.1    T            3
>