ILLUSIONS 



125 



The ducks, reeds, and tufts of grass, for instance, 

 are only clods of dirt or sand-banked bushes 

 which are detached at the bottom by heavy drifts 

 of air. We see their tops right side up by look- 

 ing through the air-layer or some broken por- 

 tion of it. But in the same scene there may be 

 trees upside down, and mountains seen in re- 

 flection, drawn out to stupendous proportions. 

 In the Sal ton Basin one hot day in September a 

 startled coyote very obligingly ran through a 

 most brilliant water-mirage lying directly be- 

 fore me. I could only see his head and part of 

 his shoulders, for the rest of him was cut off 

 by the air-layer ; but the appearance was that of 

 a wolf swimming rapidly across a lake of water. 

 The illusion of the water was exact enough be- 

 cause it was produced by reflection, but there 

 was no illusion about the upper part of the 

 coyote. The rays of light from his head and 

 shoulders came to me unrefracted and unre- 

 flected came as light usually travels from ob- 

 ject to eye. 



But refracted or reflected, every feature of the 

 water-mirage is attractive. And sometimes its 

 kaleidoscopic changes keep the fancy moving at 

 a pretty pace. The appearance and disappear- 

 ance of the objects and colors in the mirage 



