October 28, 1915] 



NATURE 



229 



My house here stands in a fairly open and elevated 

 [position, about 155 ft. O.D., with no higher ground in 

 rthe immediate vicinity, or between me and Ypres. 

 Many of my neighbours, who live in similar situations, 

 'also hear the sound, and recognise clearly what it is. 

 'It seems much less audible at lower elevations, and 

 j^quite inaudible among houses. For instance, I cannot 

 [hear of its ever having been heard in the adjacent 

 -town of Chelmsford, or in any part of London. 



Miller Ciikisty. 

 Broom Wood Lodge, Chignal St. James, 

 Chelmsford, October 19. 



The Cumberland Earthquake of October 2. 



I WAS interested to read the note in Nature of 

 )ctober 21 (p. 208) referring to an earthquake in the 

 [Lake District, Cumberland, on October 2, at 3.15 a.m. 

 j^y wife and I spent some weeks at Seatoller, Borrow- 

 Idale, leaving on October 2. Early in the morning of 

 jthat day we were awakened by a strange noise and 

 ^the house vibrating. The noise and vibration were 

 so completely similar to what occurs in my own house 

 iwhen the hot-water boiler is overheated and steam, 

 i condensing in the pipes, causes "hammering," that I 

 was on the point of getting up to turn on the bath- 

 room tap, when it ceased. As we were leaving in the 

 morning the proprietors inquired if we had heard the 

 noise in the night, and I replied at once that I had 

 heard the hammering in the pipes of the hot-water 

 system, but was told that it was quite impossible for 

 ■ 'le water to have been hot at the time. I had no 

 of the true explanation until I read the note 

 ferred to. Seatoller is about 30 miles S.S.W. of 

 irlisle and 4I miles N.N.E. of Scafell Pike. Pos- 

 )ly it may be of interest to record that at this place 

 B earthquake was accompanied by concussions and 

 )rations sufficient to waken the inhabitants. 



Frederick Soddy. 

 October 23. 



There can, I think, be no doubt that " chincough " 

 a good English word, meaning whooping-cough 

 |and nothing else. It has nothing to do with chien 

 dog), as Mr. Hart supposes (Nature, October 21), 

 with chin, although to anj^one who has noticed the 

 >ression and thrusting forward of the lower jaw 

 iring a paroxysm this derivation might seem prob- 

 »le. The word is, according to Skeat, properly 

 link-cough, and in Scotland and some parts of Eng- 

 id a paroxysm is called a kink, which, again accord- 

 to Skeat, means a catch in the breath, from kik, 

 kuk, to gasp, an imitative word, which is also the 

 of cough. The term kinkhost, still in use in 

 )tland, resembles the German equivalent, ketich- 

 tten, which is also imitative. The French coque- 

 ihe is more puzzling, but probably has reference to 

 crowing inspiration which follows the expiratory 

 >sm. Dawson Williams. 



London, October 22. 



.\s your correspondent (Nature, October 21) points 

 out, chiricough has certainly nothing to do with "hic- 

 cough " ; but has it anything to do with the French 

 chien = SL dog, as he supposes? Chincough is the 

 softer English equivalent of the Scotch kink-host 

 I (Dutch, kink-hoest). Besides, the noun there is also 

 ; the verb, to kink (O. Dutch, kinken = to cough), an4 

 I ever^ an Englishwoman, at least in the north, who 

 calls the disease whooping-cough, will tell one when 

 j her child began to "kink" with its cough. My dic- 

 , tionary compares the word with the Anglo-Saxon 

 "cincung" = a fit of laughter, and kink is sometimes 

 '• also used in that sense, or in connection with any 

 choking inspiratory spasm. Finally, there is nothing 

 , in the sound of whooping-cough to suggest a dog, 

 ! though the cough of croup might do so. M. D. 



Longitudes of Two Markings on Jupiter. 



In Nature of October 14 the longitudes of the 

 S. Tropical Disturbance and the Red Spot which I 

 gave should be in each case minus 75.14°, if they are 

 to correspond with the adopted period of System 11. : — 



The Etymology of " Chincough." 



Whooping-cough is, or used to be, called in the 

 )uth of Scotland, "chincough," but the "ch" was 

 lard, so that it sounded kincough, or kink-cough. In 

 ijamieson's Scottish Dictionary the word "kink" has 

 the meanings (i) a violent fit of coughing attended 

 with suspension of breathing, (2) a regular fit of the 

 (hincough. "To kink" is to labour for breath in a 

 severe fit of coughing. The more purely Scottish 

 word for whooping-cough is "kinkhost," in the Belgic 

 language kink-hoest. L. B. 



October 23. 



CHINESE DEFENSIVE ARMOUR.^ 



THE somewhat ponderous title of the work 

 before us rather obscures the subject of this 

 monograph, which is upon the origin and history 

 of defensive armour, a theme of considerable cul- 

 tural importance and here treated systematically 

 for the first time. As a result, we have a masterly 

 description of Oriental protective armour, and 

 sug-g-estive fresh light is also thrown upon certain 

 sources of early Chinese civilisation. 



The research is based primarily upon a large 

 collection of ancient Chinese clay figures dug up 

 (apparently by the author) from g'raves in the 

 provinces of Shen-si and Ho-nan during the years 

 1908-1910, and deposited among the rich collec- 

 tions from the Far East now in the Field Museum 

 of Natural History at Chicago, of which the 

 author is a well-known curator and field-explorer. 

 The hides of the archaic Chinese cuirasses of 

 the pre-metal age are ascribed by ancient tradi- 

 tion to two animals named respectively Se and Si, 

 which are identified by the majority of sinologists 

 with one or two species of rhinoceros. Dr. 

 Laufer, who combines with his scientific physical 

 training also a scholarly knowledge of Chinese, 

 i revises the Chinese texts at first hand, and 

 I appears to substantiate his identification of the 

 ! Se as the single-horned and the Si as the two- 

 ! horned Sumatran rhinoceros. In addition to the 

 j mass of mythological and folk-lore references to 



1 "Chinese Clay Figures" Part i.. Prolegomena on the History ol 

 De'«nsive Armour. By H. Laufer. Field Museum of Natural History 

 Publication 177, Anthropological .Series, vol. xiii., No. 2. Pp. 69-315+64 

 plates. (Chicago : Field Museum of Natural History, 1914.) 



NO. 



2400, VOL. 96] 



