NOTES. lv 



Azores, il y a 120 de longitude. C'est vraisemblablement la Tmnde de reactions 

 vokaniques la plus longue et la plus re'guliere, oscillant faiblement entre 38 et 

 40 de latitude, qui existe sur la terre ; elle surpasse de beaucoup en e'tendue la 

 bande volcanique de la Cordillere des Andes dans 1'Ame'rique me'ridionale. J'in- 

 siate d'autant plus sur ce singulier alignement d'ar^tes, de soulevements, de cre- 

 vasses, et de propagations de commotions, qui comprend un tiers de la circonfe- 

 rence d'un parallele a Vequateur, que de petits accidents de la surface, Fine'gale 

 hauteur et la largeur des rides ou soulevements line'aires, comme 1'interruption 

 cause'e par les bassins des mers (concavite Aralo-Caspienne, Mediterranee et At- 

 lantique) tendent a masquer les grands traits de la constitution ge'ologique da 

 globe. (Get aper9u hasarde d'une ligne de commotion re'gulierement prolongee 

 n'exclut aucunement d'autres lignes selon lesquelles les mouvements peuvent se 

 pro pager e'galement.) " (Asie Centrale, t. ii. pp. 1 08. 120.) As the town of Khotan 

 and the country south of the Thian - schan were the most celebrated and most au- 

 cient seats of Buddhism, Buddhistic literature occupied itself early and much with 

 the causes of earthquakes. (See Foe-koue-ki, ou Kelation des Koyaumes Boud- 

 dhiques, trad, par Abel Remusat, p. 217.) The adherents of Sakhyamuni assign 

 eight such causes, among which the turning of a steel wheel hung round with 

 relics (s'arira) plays a principal part; a mechanical explanation, scarcely more 

 absurd than some geological and magnetical myths which were very late ia be- 

 coming obsolete among ourselves. According to a note of Klaproth'ti, mendicant 

 monks (Bhikchous) are imagined to have the power of making the earth tremble 

 and setting the subterranean wheel in motion. The travels of Fabian, the 

 author of the Foe-koue-ki belong to the beginning of the 5th century. 



( 219 ) p. 177. Acosta, Viajes cientificos a los Andes ecuatoriales, 1849> 

 p. 56. 



C 250 ) p. 178. Kosmos, Bd. i. S. 214217 and 444 (English edition, pp. 194 

 197 and 426) , Humboldt, Eel. hist. t. iv. chap. 14, pp. 31 38. Ingenious 

 theoretical Considerations on Waves of Sound through the Earth, and Waves of 

 Sound through the Air, by Mallet, will be found in the Report of the Meeting of 

 the Brit. Assoc. in 1850, pp. 4146, and in the Admiralty Manual, 1849, 

 pp. 201 and 217. In the tropics the animals which, according to my experience, 

 are earlier than human beings disquieted by the slightest earthquake movements, 

 are poultry, swine, dogs, asses, and crocodiles (caymanes), which latter sud- 

 denly leave the bottom of the rivers. 



.( MI ) p. 179. Julius Schmidt, in Noggerath, on the Earthquake of the 29th of 

 July 1846, S. 2837. With the rate of velocity of the Lisbon earthquake as as- 

 signed in the text, the equatorial circumference of the earth would have been gone 

 round in about 45 hours. Michell (Phil. Trans., vol. li. pt. ii. p. 572) found, 



