246 THE BOEDERLAND OF SCIENCE. 



crocodiles of the Orinoco, otherwise as dumb as our 

 little lizards, leave the shaken bed of the stream and 

 run bellowing into the woods.' 



Humboldt's explanation of the peculiar sensations of 

 alarm and awe produced by an earthquake upon those 

 who for the first time experience the effects of the 

 phenomenon is in all probability the correct one. 

 < The impression here is not,' he says, ' the conse- 

 quence of the recollection of destructive catastrophes 

 presented to our imagination by narratives of historical 

 events ; what seizes us so wonderfully is the disabuse 

 of that innate faith in the fixity of the solid and sure- 

 set foundations of the earth. From early childhood 

 we are habituated to the contrast between the mobile 

 element water and the immobility of the soil on 

 which we stand. All the evidences of our senses have 

 confirmed this belief. But when suddenly the ground 

 begins to rock beneath us, the feeling of an unknown 

 mysterious power in nature coming into operation and 

 shaking the solid globe arises in the mind. The 

 illusion of the whole of our earlier life is annihilated 

 in an instant.' 



Use habituates the mind to the shocks of earthquake. 

 Humboldt found himself able after awhile to give 

 a close and philosophic scrutiny to the circumstances 

 attending the phenomenon which had at first impressed 

 him so startlingly. And he tells us that the inhabitants 

 of Peru think scarcely more of a moderate shock of 

 earthquake than is thought of a hail-storm in the 

 temperate zone. 



