197 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



der the leaf; the dog takes refuge against 

 the legs of his master; the hen covers the 

 chickens with her wings. Living nature is 

 hushed dumb with astonishment. Night has 

 come a night sometimes intense and pro- 

 found, but oftener incomplete, strange, and 

 extraordinary, the earth remaining vaguely 

 illuminated by a reddish light reflected from 

 distant regions of the atmosphere situated 

 outside the cone of the lunar shadow which 

 produces the eclipse. Sometimes we see 

 shining during the eclipse all the stars of 

 the first and second magnitude which are 

 above the horizon, sometimes only the 

 brightest of the planets. The temperature 

 of the air rapidly sinks several degrees. 

 FLAMMAKION Popular Astronomy, bk. ii, ch. 

 9, p. 194. (A.) 



963. ECLIPSES CALCULATED IN 

 FAR ANTIQUITY Chinese Astronomer* Pun- 

 ished for Neglect. Indeed, each of the great 

 civilizations of the ancient world seems to 

 have had its own system of astronomy 

 strongly marked by the peculiar character 

 of the people among whom it was found. 

 Several events recorded in the annals of 

 China show that the movements of the sun 

 and the laws of eclipses were studied in that 

 country at a very early age. Some of these 

 events must be entirely mythical. . . . 

 But there is another event which, even if 

 we place it in the same category, must be 

 regarded as indicating a considerable 

 amount of astronomical knowledge among 

 the ancient Chinese. We refer to the tragic 

 fate of Hi and Ho, astronomers royal to one 

 of the ancient emperors of that people. It 

 was part of the duty of these men to care- 

 fully study the heavenly movements, and 

 give timely warning of the approach of an 

 eclipse or other remarkable phenomenon. 

 But, neglecting this duty, they gave them- 

 selves up to drunkenness and riotous living. 

 In consequence, an eclipse of the sun oc- 

 curred without any notice being given; the 

 religious rites due in such a case were not 

 performed, and China was exposed to the 

 anger of the gods. To appease their wrath, 

 the unworthy astronomers were seized and 

 summarily executed by royal command. 

 Some historians have gone so far as to fix 

 the date of this occurrence, which is vari- 

 ously placed at from 2128 to 2159 before the 

 Christian era. If this is correct, it is the 

 earliest of which profane history has left us 

 any record. NEWCOMB Popular Astronomy, 

 pt. i, int., p. 2. (H., 1899.) 



964. ECSTASY OF HEALTH Animate 



Share with Man. We see that the inferior 

 animals, when the conditions of life are fa- 

 vorable, are subject to periodical fits of glad- 

 ness, affecting them powerfully and standing 

 in vivid contrast to their ordinary temper. 

 And we know what this feeling is this pe- 

 riodic intense elation which even civilized 

 man occasionally experiences when in per- 

 fect health, more especially when young. 

 There are moments when he is mad with joy, 



when he cannot keep still, when his impulse 

 is to sing and shout aloud and laugh at 

 nothing, to run and leap and exert himself 

 in some extravagant way. Among the heav- 

 ier mammalians the feeling is manifested in 

 loud noises, bellowings, and screamings, and 

 in lumbering, uncouth motions throwing 

 up of heels, pretended panics, and ponder- 

 ous mock battles. HUDSON Naturalist in 

 La Plata, ch. 19, p. 280. (C. & H., 1895.) 



965. EDIFICE NOT SEEN TILL SCAF- 

 FOLDING IS REMOVED Admission of 

 German Scientist Accumulation of Details 

 Spoils Perspective. There is, perhaps, some 

 truth in the accusation advanced against 

 many German scientific works, that they 

 lessen the value of general views by an ac- 

 cumulation of detail, and do not sufficiently 

 distinguish between those great results 

 which form, as it were, the beacon-lights of 

 science, and the long series of means by 

 which they have been attained. This method 

 of treating scientific subjects led the most 

 illustrious of our poets [Goethe] to exclaim 

 with impatience, " The Germans have the 

 art of making science inaccessible." An edi- 

 fice cannot produce a striking effect until 

 the scaffolding is removed, that had of ne- 

 cessity been used during its erection. 

 HUMBOLDT Cosmos, vol. i, int., p. 47. (H., 

 1897.) 



966. EDIFICE OF A HIDDEN BUILD- 

 ER Crystal Shaped According to Law Form 

 Determined by Polarity of Molecules. I 

 wish you to realize intellectually the process 

 of crystalline architecture. Look then into 

 a granite quarry, and spend a few minutes 

 in examining the rock. It is not of perfectly 

 uniform texture. It is rather an agglomera- 

 tion of pieces, which, on examination, pre- 

 sent curiously defined forms. You have there 

 what mineralogists call quartz, you have 

 felspar, you have mica. In a mineralogical 

 cabinet, where these substances are pre- 

 served separately, you will obtain some no- 

 tion of their forms. You will see there, also, 

 specimens of beryl, topaz, emerald, tourma- 

 lin, heavy spar, fluor-spar, Iceland spar 

 possibly a full-formed diamond. . . . 

 These crystals, you will observe, are put to- 

 gether according to law; they are not 

 chance productions; and, if you care to ex- 

 amine them more minutely, you will find 

 their architecture capable of being to some 

 extent revealed. They often split in certain 

 directions before a knife-edge, exposing 

 smooth and shining surfaces, which are 

 called planes of cleavage; and by following 

 these planes you sometimes reach an inter- 

 nal form, disguised beneath the external form 

 of the crystal. Ponder these beautiful edi- 

 fices of a hidden builder. You cannot help 

 asking yourself how they were built; and 

 familiar as you now are with the notion of 

 a polar force, and the ability of that force 

 to produce structural arrangement, your in- 

 evitable answer will be that those crystals 

 are built by the play of polar forces with 



