THE DRIFT OF THE SEA. 3X9 



soon passed that they have no influence on the ship, but they cer- 

 tainly beat very hard against the ship's sides, and jarred her all over. 

 They are felt even when below, and will wake one out of sleep." 

 916. But besides tide-rips, bores, and eagres,* there are the 



* The bores of India, of the Bay of Fundy, and the Amazon are the most cele- 

 brated. They are a tremulous tidal-wave, which, at stated periods, comes rolling in 

 from the sea, threatening to overwhelm and ingulf every thing that moves on the 

 beach. This wave is described, especially in the Bay of Fundy, as being many feet 

 high ; and it is said oftentimes to overtake deer, swine, and other wild beasts that feed 

 or lick on the beach, and to swallow them up before the swiftest of foot among them 

 have time to escape. The swine, as they feed on muscles at low water, are said to 

 snuff the " bore," either by sound or smell, and sometimes to dash off to the cliffs be- 

 fore it rolls in. 



The eagre is the bore of Tsien-Tang river. It is thus described by Dr. Macgowan, 

 in a paper before the Royal Asiatic Society, 12th January, 1853, and as seen by him 

 from the city of Hang-chau in 1848 : 



" At the upper part of the bay, and about the mouth of the river, the eagre is scarce- 

 ly observable ; but, owing to the very gradual descent of the shore, and the rapidity 

 of the great flood and ebb, the tidal phenomena even here present a remarkable ap- 

 pearance. Vessels, which a few moments, before were afloat, are suddenly left high 

 and dry on a strand nearly two miles in width, which the returning wave as quickly 

 floods. It is not until the tide rushes beyond the mouth of the river that it becomes 

 elevated to a lofty wave constituting the eagre, which attains its greatest magnitude 

 opposite the city of Hang-chau. Generally there is nothing in its aspect, except on the 

 third day of the second month, and on the eighteenth of the eighth, or at the spring-tide, 

 about the period of the vernal and autumnal equinoxes, its great intensity being at the 

 latter season. Sometimes, however, during the prevalence of easterly winds, on the 

 third day, after the sun and moon are in conjunction, or in opposition, the eagre 

 courses up the river with hardly less majesty than when paying its ordinary periodical 

 visit. On one of these unusual occasions, when I was traveling in native costume, I 

 had an opportunity of witnessing it, on December 14th, 1848, at about 2 P.M. 



" Between the river and the city walls, which are a mile distant, dense suburbs ex- 

 tend several miles along the banks. As the hour of flood-tide approached, crowds 

 gathered in the streets running at right angles with the Tsien-Tang, but at safe dis- 

 tances. My position was a terrace in front of the Tri-w.we Temple, which afforded 

 a good view of the entire scene. On a sudden all traffic in the thronged mart was 

 suspended, porters cleared the front street of every description of merchandise, boat- 

 men ceased lading and unlading their vessels, and put out in the middle of the stream, 

 so that a few moments sufficed to give a deserted appearance to the busiest part of 

 one of the busiest cities of Asia. The centre of the river teemed with craft, from 

 small boats to huge barges, including the gay 'flower-boats.' Loud shouting from 

 the fleet announced the appearance of the flood, which seemed like a glistening white 

 cable, stretched athwart the river at its mouth, as far down as the eye could reach. 

 Its noise, compared by Chinese poets to that of thunder, speedily drowned that of the 

 boatmen ; and as it advanced with prodigious velocity — at the rate, I should judge, of 

 twenty-five miles an hour — it assumed the appearance of an alabaster wall, or, rather, 



