310 On the Source of Motions upon the Earth. 



" having been observed in times of the plague, that the country has 

 been forsaken by birds." In an epidemic fever which occurred at 

 Cadiz, we are told that " canary birds died with blood issuing from 

 their bills ; and that in all the neighbouring towns which were after- 

 wards affected, no sparrow ever appeared." In like manner, ancient 

 writers mention " the silence of the grasshopper, and the drooping in- 

 activity of the bee and the silkworm, among the presages of impending 

 pestilence."* These and similar circumstances are often ascribed 

 to the intemperate seasons, and to a corrupt state of the air, " ma- 

 nifest or occult," which attend or precede epidemics; and the 

 diseases themselves are by some supposed to originate in this 

 unusual weather, and in the deficiency and bad quality of food. It 

 is very possible that these circumstances may have some re-acting 

 and indirect influence ; but if it be considered that all physical states 

 of the atmosphere, and of other inorganic matter — such as windy- 

 ness or stagnancy of the air, moisture or drought, heat or cold — are 

 directly dependent upon the solar, lunar, and perhaps stellar, in- 

 fluences, as we have attempted to shew ; and, again, that all con- 

 ditions of living beings, whether normal or abnormal, ai"e dependent 

 upon the same forces, as well as upon those of life (which, again, 

 are dependent themselves upon the others) — it will perhaps seem 

 more likely that all of these derangements in the physical, vegetable, 

 and animal worlds, are merely concomitant, and that their origin 

 must be sought for, proximately, in the variations in power of the 

 several natural forces, and, ultimately, in the changes of the aspects 

 or influences of the sun, and the other heavenly bodies. 



Before concluding, and in connection with this subject, I had in- 

 tended to advert to what is called the sol-lunar influence in fever, 

 and some other diseases, which has been frequently noticed in India, 

 and in other countries, by accurate and trustworthy observers, and 

 about which much information is given in the writings of Dr Francis 

 Balfour. I had also purposed to endeavour to point out some of the 

 relations which the views we have exhibited have to some other 

 branches of knowledge. This, however, is hardly a fitting place for 

 pursuing the subject farther ; but if any one should deem it worthy 

 of greater consideration, enough has been said to guide them in the 

 first steps, at least, of what seem to me to be some not uninterest- 

 ing inquiries. 



I have thus, in^ a meagre and imperfect outline, attempted to ex- 

 hibit what seems to me to be the existing origin and the course of 

 motions upon the earth. A full description of the subject would 

 have comprehended a history and inquiry into the whole system of 

 nature appertaining to our globe, a work which would have required 

 the learning and the genius of the author of Kosnios. 



* Cyclopaedia of Practical Medicine. Article Epidemics. 



