258 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



in 1822, describes the effect on the mind as something which begins 

 before any other sign of the earthquake has manifested itself at all 

 an anticipatory horror, which is even more marked in the case of the 

 lower animals. " Before we hear the sound, or at least are fully con- 

 scious of hearing it, we are made sensible, I do not know how, that 

 something uncommon is going to happen ; everything seems to change 

 color ; our thoughts are chained immovably down ; the whole world 

 appears to be in disorder : all nature looks different to what it is wont 

 to do ; and we feel quite subdued and overwhelmed by some invisible 

 power, beyond human control or apprehension." In the Neapolitan 

 earthquake of 1805, these anticipatory signs were most remarkable in 

 relation to the life of the animal world. An Italian writer, quoted in 

 Mr. ^yittich's " Curiosities of Physical Geography," says : " I must 

 not omit in this place to mention those prognostics which were derived 

 from animals. They were observed in every place where the shocks 

 were such as to be generally perceptible. Some minutes before they 

 were felt, the oxen and cows began to bellow, the sheep and goats 

 bleated, and, rushing ii? confusion one on the other, tried to break the 

 wicker-work of the folds ; the dogs howled terribly, the geese and 

 fowls were alarmed and made much noise ; the horses which Avere fast- 

 ened in their stalls were greatly agitated, leaped up, and tried to 

 break the halters with which they were attached to the mangers ; 

 those which were proceeding on the roads suddenly stopped, and 

 snorted in a very strange way. The cats were frightened, and tried 

 to conceal themselves, or their hair bristled up wildly. Rabbits and 

 moles were seen to leave their holes ; birds rose, as if scared, from the 

 places on which they had alighted ; and fish left the bottom of the 

 sea and approached the shores, where at some places great numbers 

 of them were taken. Even ants and reptiles abandoned, in clear day- 

 light, their subterranean holes in great disorder, many hours before 

 the shocks were felt. Large flights of locusts were seen creeping 

 through the streets of Naples toward the sea the night before the 

 earthquake. Winged ants took refuge during the darkness in the 

 rooms of the houses. Some dogs, a few minutes before the first shock 

 took place, awoke their sleeping masters, by barking and pulling them, 

 as if they wished to warn them of the impending danger, and several 

 persons were thus, enabled to save themselves." AYhat it is, before 

 the sound or shock of earthquake is felt, which warns both animals 

 and human beings of the approach of some dreadful catastroj^he threat- 

 ening the very basis of their existence, no one, of course, can say, since 

 the impression made upon the nervous system is, at least as regards 

 our own species, evidently one of general disturbance, and not one to 

 which experience attaches any explicit significance. It may be, of 

 course, that some very great change in the magnetic conditions of a 

 spot threatened with earthquake leads to that extreme excitement of 

 mind exhibited by all living creatures previous to the onset of the 



