638 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



habit common to swine in their feral condition, just as we see a dog 

 turn about half a dozen times before lying down. 



In an interesting paper on local w'eather-lore, read by Mr. Amos 

 "W. Butler before the American Association for the Advancement of 

 Science, during the Philadelphia meeting of 1884, the author has an- 

 other version of this saying : " When hogs gather up sticks and carry 

 them about, expect cold weather." This is wholly at variance with 

 what I have observed, for my memoranda record this habit almost 

 ■wholly during the hot w^eather, and this must necessarily be the rule 

 with New Jersey swine, or the local weather-prophets would not have 

 coined the verse as I have given it. 



As to the other couplet, it is about as near meaningless as any say- 

 ing can well be. Some rustic rhymer, a century ago, may have added 

 it as a piece of fun, but it "has stuck most persistently. As it stands 

 now, it has stood for quite one hundred years. 



In reference to the dog, I have heai'd the following more preten- 

 tious stanza, which has now taken its place among our nursery 

 rhymes, where, indeed, it is best fitted to remain : 



" "When drowsy dogs start from their sleep, 

 And bark at empty space, 

 'Tis not a dream that prompts them to, 

 But showers come on apace." 



Ilere we have essentially the same inference as in that of the rhyme 

 about cows, but it is not to be explained away so readily. Such acts, 

 as described, can not be attributed to annoyance by flies, for they too 

 often emerge from dark quarters, where they have been unmolested ; 

 but the all-important fact must not be overlooked that such acts are 

 not confined to summer. If they were, the electrical theory might be 

 advanced with some confidence. From what I have noticed in such 

 dogs as I have owmed, the habit of dreaming, which in the rhyme is 

 denied to be the exjolanation, is probably the key to the mystery. 

 Again, statistics show^ that the correspondence between such habits 

 and sudden showers is only what w^e should expect in the way of 

 coincidences. Dogs certainly are not to be considered as reliable 

 barometers. 



The same may be said of the domestic cat. Its movements have 

 all been carefully noted, and the yawning, stretching, scratching, and 

 waving of the tail appear to have been accredited with some special 

 meteorological significance. Careful observation has not confirmed 

 any of these impressions. Table-legs are scratched time and again by 

 Tom or Tabby, and no rain falls for twenty-four or forty-eight hours. 

 They stretch themselves after a nap, lick their sides and wash their 

 faces with the same regularity in midwinter as in midsummer, yet it 

 is only showers, and not snow-storms, which these actions are supj^osed 

 to predict. 



When in summer the signs fail, my country friends conveniently 



