OX TIMBER AND VEGETABLES. 



The moon, therefore, has no connexion whatever with this 

 effect ; and it is certain that plants would suffer under the same 

 circumstances whether the moon is above or below the horizon. 

 It equally is quite true that if the moon be above the horizon, 

 the plants cannot suffer unless it be visible ; because a dear sky 

 is indispensable as much to the production of the injury to the 

 plants as to the visibility of the moon ; and, on the other hand, 

 the same clouds which veil the moon and intercept her light, give 

 back to the plants that warmth which prevents the injury here 

 adverted to. The popular opinion is therefore right as to the 

 effect, but wrong as to the cause ; and its error will be at once 

 discovered by showing that on a clear night, when the moon is 

 new, and, therefore, not visible, the plants will be similarly 

 affected. 



3. Time for felling Timber. An opinion is generally enter- 

 tained that timber should be felled only during the decline of the 

 moon ; for if it be cut down during its increase, it will not be of 

 good or durable quality. This impression prevails in various 

 countries. It is acted upon in England, and is made the ground 

 of legislation in France. The forest laws of the latter country 

 interdict the cutting of timber during the increase of the moon. 

 M. Auguste de Saint Hilaire states that he found the same 

 opinion prevalent in Brazil. Signer Francisco Pinto, an eminent 

 agriculturist in the province of Espirito Santo, assured him as 

 the result of his experience, that the wood which was not felled 

 at the full of the moon was immediately attacked by worms and 

 very soon rotted. 



In the extensive forests of Germany, the same opinion is 

 entertained and acted upon with the most undoubting confidence 

 in its truth. Sauer, a superintendent of some of these districts, 

 assigns what he believes to be its physical cause. According to 

 him, the ascensional force of the sap is much greater during the 

 increase than during the decrease of the moon, and he infers, 

 therefore, that timber which is felled in the first or second 

 quarter of the moon, when the vessels are more filled with sap, 

 will be spongy and more easily attacked by worms ; that it will 

 be more difficult to season, and that it will warp and split by 

 exposure to very slight variations of temperature ; but that, on 

 the contrary, timber felled in the third or fourth quarter, when 

 the sap ascends with diminished force, will be more dense and 

 durable, and fitter for the purposes of structure. 



Can there be imagined in the whole range of natural science 

 a physical relation more extraordinary and unaccountable than 

 this supposed correspondence between the movement of the sap 

 and the phases of the moon ? Assuredly theory affords not the 



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