April 1, 1886.] 



♦ KNOWLEDGE 



185 



Very many of the early English settlei-s were, no doubt, 

 excellent observei-s ; but they appear at times to have more 

 desii-ed to be looked upon as weather prophets than as 

 naturalists, and strove to have glib nonsense-sayings pass 

 cuwent as evidence of their wisdom, instead of taking pains 

 to correctly interpret the course of Nature and determine 

 the relation of animal life to its en\-ironment. 



Often during my rambles in the neighbourhood I have 

 questioned the few remaining descendants of the original 

 settlers concerning the local weather proverbs, and I find 

 the impression is still prevalent that the purport of all 

 these sayings is substantially correct, and therefore, to a 

 gi'eat degree, that my neighbours are labouring under 

 erroneous impressions. "Is there not wisdom in a multi- 

 tude of counsellor ? " they ask : and I, standing alone, am 

 voted the fool, while thej' pose as sages. 



Iiet us consider this weather-lore, bit by bit, as I have 

 gathered it from time to time, and discuss its merits, if it 

 possesses any, and also its absurdities. 



Of such saying's as refer to our domestic animals, the 

 following ai'e the most noteworthy. Of the cow I have heard 

 it said : — 



When a cow tries to scratch its ear, 

 It means a shower is very near : 



and again : — 



When it thumps its ribs with its tail. 

 Look out for thunder, lightning, liail. 



As is now pretty well known, a short time before a 

 shower in summer there Ls often a highly electrical con- 

 dition of the atmosphere which makes all animals more or 

 less uneasy. Therefore the lashing of the tail, if not merely 

 to brush away flies, may refer to this uneasiness, and so, too, 

 the ears may be more sensitive than the general surface of 

 the body. This is a probable explanation ; but, after all, it 

 is not proved that the cow at such a time sufiers as much 

 from it as is supposed ; nor is it easy to see how the 

 flagellation of a very insignificant part of the body can ease 

 a painful sensation common to the entire surface. On the 

 other hand, it is certain that flies and other troublesome 

 insects are sensitive to atmospheric changes, even a slight 

 lowering of the temperature, such as no mammal would 

 appreciate ; and for an hour or two before a shower, for this 

 reason, they congregate in extraordinary numbers about 

 animals — horses and cows particularly. I have thought 

 that they seek the cows for warmth when the air suddenly 

 cools ; and is it not more than pi-obable that the nervousness 

 on the part of the animal, shown by frantic efforts to scratch 

 its ears with its hind-feet and the lashing of its tail, has to 

 do with the excess of irritation caused by innumerable flies, 

 and not with any unusual electrical titillation 1 If so, the 

 cow's action is still indicative of an approaching change in 

 the weather, and so far may be claimed as a sign of such 

 change, but the connection of the two facts is not such a 

 one as is usually given. It is an indirect, not direct, in- 

 dication of the prophesied rain-storm. But bearing heavilv 

 on the subject is the unquestionable fact that an unusual 

 number of flies often suddenly make their appeai-ance, and 

 torment cattle almost beyond endurance, during the four or 

 six weeks of drought which in summer, early or late, we are 

 so sure to have. In such cases the signs faO. I have asked 

 many a farmer how this could be, and the one reply that I 

 have received in every case is that '" there was a shower in 

 the neighbourhood." It usuall}' happened, however, that 

 the neighbourhood was as parched as we were, and seeing 

 the signs fail with them, they were covetous of the shower 

 they supposed that we had had. Perhaps it is \vith such 

 indications of changes in the weather as it has been said of 

 autumnal proofs of the character of the approaching winter. 



lliles Overfield once remarked, " "When the signs get to 

 failin' 'long in the fall, there'll be no tellin' about the 

 winter." 



Of pigs, I have heard it said very frequently — 



but that- 



" When swine carry sticks, 

 The cloads will play tricks " ; 



" When they lie in the mud, 

 No fears of a flood." 



The first of these couplets is of twofold interest. I have 

 watched pigs for years to see what purport this carrying of 

 sticks and bunches of grass might have, and have only 

 learned that it has nothing whatever to do with the weather, 

 or at least with coming rain-storms. The drought of summer 

 is so far a convenience as to throw light upon this habit, as 

 it did upon the uneasy cows. Pigs carry sticks as frequently 

 then as during wet weather, or just preceding a shower. 

 Furthermore, these gathered twigs are not brought together 

 as though to make a nest, but are scattered about in a per- 

 fectly aimless manner. For some cause the animal is un- 

 easy, and takes this curious method of relieving itself. 

 The probabilities are that it is a survival of some habit 

 common to swine in their feral condition, just as we see a 

 dog turn about half a dozen times before lying down. 



In an interesting paper on local weather-lore, read by ^llr. 

 Axuos W. Butler before the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, during the Philadelphia meeting 

 of 1884, the author has another version of this sajina: : 

 "When hogs g:ither up sticks and carry them abotit, 

 expect cold weather." This is wholh- at variance with 

 what I have observed, for my memoranda record this 

 habit almost wholly during the hot weather, and this 

 must necessarily be the rule with New Jersey swine, or 

 the local weather-prophets would not have coined the vei-se 

 as I have given it. 



As to the other couplet, it is about as near meaningless 

 as any saying can well be. Some rustic rhymer, a century 

 ago, may have added it as a piece of fun, but it has stuck 

 most persistently. As it stands now, it has stood for quite 

 one hundred years. — I'optiltir Science Monthhj. 



(To he concluded.) 



THE RACES OF BRITAIN.* 



1 IIS is what the seventeenth century writei-s 

 woidd have approvingly called a " painful " 

 Ijook, a-s when Jeremy Taylor speaks in 

 praise of Tostatus Ambulensis as "a very 

 painful person and a great clerk." For the 

 rolleetion of the materials tabulated and 

 illustrated in Dr. Beddoe's work has in- 

 volved an appalling amount of labour, to which small hope 

 of large recognition and speedy result could give impetus, 

 but only the desire to lay the foundation for a scientific 

 treatment of the profoundly interesting, but long confused, 

 study of the ethnography of Britain. 



The subject is even now not altogether out of the hands 

 of the "fadicals." Despite ilr. Elton's scholarly and de- 

 lightful ■■ Origins of English History," Mr. Green'sattractive 

 but less authoritative " Making of England," and the moi-e 

 modest but accurate manuals prepared, at the instance of 

 the Christian Elnowledge Society, by Mr. Grant Allen, 



* " The Kaces of Britain : a Contribution to the Anthropology of 

 Western Europe." By John Beddoe, M.D., F.K.S., &c. Bristol 

 Arrowsmith. 



