P OP ULAR MIS CELL ANY. 



855 



tion incomplete and of very uncertain efficacy 

 without the reference to arbitration in case 

 of disagreement. Employers and employed 

 were equally emphatic on this point. They 

 thought the knowledge of an appeal to arbi- 

 tration being in reserve was absolutely essen- 

 tial to a successful negotiation at the Con- 

 ciliation Board. The right of appeal might 

 seldom be used, but in their opinion it must 

 always be there, otherwise, though things 

 might not go so far as a strike, there would 

 be constant worrying and keeping up of a 

 contention." Two rules contribute greatly 

 to the smooth working of the system : one, 

 forbidding any suspension of work at any 

 place under the jurisdiction of the board 

 before the cause of dispute has been sub- 

 mitted to the consideration of the board ; and 

 the other, making the board's decision retro- 

 spective, so as to take effect from the date 

 of the raising of the point. Both these rules 

 have been observed by both sides in good 

 faith. These boards have further exercised 

 a salutary influence in promoting a more 

 reasonable spirit among employers and em- 

 ployed. " There is very much more reason 

 than there used to be formerly ; so much so, 

 indeed, that more disputes are now settled 

 at home without going to the board at all 

 than were settled at home before its estab- 

 lishment, and all in consequence of the 

 growth of habits of reasonable consideration 

 and mutual forbearance, which have been 

 bred through the board." 



Symbolical Communication. — Writing of 

 the language of signs or the symbolism in 

 ceremonial and current use among the lower 

 tribes of Farther India, General A. R. Mac- 

 Mahon says : " The chief's special messenger, 

 carrying his carved and ornamented spear as 

 an emblem of authority — potent as a magis- 

 trate's seal in other countries — dumb though 

 he be in presence of people to whom his 

 dialect is a foreign tongue, metaphorically 

 speaks in accents that can not be mistaken 

 when he flings down the gauntlet in the 

 shape of the war-dah with strip of crimson 

 cloth in token of defiance, or produces the 

 cross or dagger-shaped plurvi or wand, made 

 of strips of bamboo, which, simple as it may 

 appear to the uninitiated, under some condi- 

 tions furnishes the materials for a lengthy 

 dispatch, if reduced to a written medium. If 



the tips of its cross-pieces be broken, for in- 

 stance, it signifies a money demand for each 

 fracture. If one cross-piece be charred, it 

 means an urgent summons, directing people 

 to come by torchlight if it arrives at night. 

 A capsicum fixed on the plurvi signifies that 

 disobedience to the order will ' make it hot ' 

 for the recipient. If the plurvi be made of 

 cane instead of bamboo, it betokens that this 

 punishment will take the form of flogging. 

 The smooth, round stone which was all that 

 Lieutenant Wilcox received from the Abora, in 

 reply to interminable verbal negotiations sug- 

 gesting the advisability of their submission 

 to British authority, was utterly meaningless 

 to that very intelligent officer till interpreted 

 by a rude native of the jungle who happened 

 to be present when the mission arrived. The 

 translation ran thus : ' Until this stone crum- 

 bles in the dust shall our friendship last, and 

 firm as is its texture, so firm is our present 

 resolution.' . . . Captain Lervin's policeman, 

 when required to explain why he . . . de- 

 sired a week's leave, said, ' A young maiden 

 has sent me flowers and birnee rice twice as 

 a token, and if I wait any longer they will 

 say I am no man.' " 



Animals and Mnsic. — A curious account 

 of the effects of various kinds of music on 

 different animals is given by a writer in the 

 Spectator. The general order of the ex- 

 periments, based upon the supposition that 

 animal nerves are not unlike our own, was so 

 arranged that the attention of the animals 

 should be first arrested by a low and gradu- 

 ally increasing volume of sound, in those 

 melodious minor keys which experience 

 showed them to prefer. The piccolo was 

 then to follow in shrill and high-pitched con- 

 trast ; after which the flute was to be played 

 to soothe the feelings ruffled by that in- 

 strument. Pleasure and dislike were often 

 most strongly shown where least expected ; 

 and the last experiment indicated stronger 

 dislikes, if not stronger preferences, in the 

 musical scale, in the tiger than in the most 

 intelligent anthropoid apes. With " Jack," 

 a six-months-old red orang-outang, " As the 

 sounds of the violin began, he suspended 

 himself against the bars, and then, with one 

 hand above his head, dropped the other to 

 his side, and listened with grave attention. 

 He then crept away on all fours, looking 



