221 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Errors 

 Eruption 



animals and plants, absolutely and specific- 

 ally distinct from those of the preceding 

 historical periods, was called into existence 

 at once, and now again peopled the globe for 

 thousands of years, till it again was sud- 

 denly destroyed in the crash of a new revo- 

 lution. HAECKEL History of Creation, vol. 

 i, ch. 3, p. 60. (K. P. & Co., 1899.) 



1076. 



The Will Once 



Deemed a Separate Faculty. All our deeds 

 were considered by the early psychologists 

 to be due to a peculiar faculty called the 

 will, without whose fiat action could not 

 occur. Thoughts and impressions, being in- 

 trinsically inactive, were supposed to pro- 

 duce conduct only through the intermedia- 

 tion of this superior agent. Until they 

 twitched its coat-tails, so to speak, no out- 

 ward behavior could occur. This doctrine 

 was long ago exploded by the discovery of 

 the phenomena of reflex action, in which 

 sensible impressions, as you know, produce 

 movement immediately and of themselves. 

 JAMES Talks to Teachers, ch. 15, p. 170. 

 (H. H. & Co., 1900.) 



1077. 



Volcanic Confused 



with Sedimentary Rocks. Thus on the 

 shore near Portrush, in the North of Ire- 

 land, and in the skerries which lie off that 

 coast, there occur great rock-masses, some 

 of which undoubtedly agree with basalt in 

 all their characters, while others are dark 

 colored and crystalline, and are frequently 

 crowded witu Ammonites and other fossils. 

 We now know that the explanation of these 

 facts is as follows: Near where the town 

 of Portrush is now situated, a volcanic vent 

 was opened in Miocene times through rocks 

 of Lias shale. From this igneous center, 

 sheets and dikes of basaltic lava were given 

 off, and in consequence of their contact with 

 these masses of lava, the Lias shales were 

 baked and altered, and assumed a crystalline 

 character, tho the traces of the fossils con- 

 tained in them were not altogether obliter- 

 ated. In the last century the methods which 

 had been devised for the discrimination of 

 rocks were so imperfect that no distinction 

 was recognized between the true basalt and 

 the altered ^ shale, and specimens of the lat- 

 ter containing Ammonites found their way 

 to almost every museum in Europe, and 

 were used as illustrations of the " origin of 

 basalt by aqueous precipitation." JTJDD 

 Volcanoes, ch. 9, p. 249. (A., 1899.) 



1O78. 



Wild Conjecture of 



Sir John Herschel Supposed Living Crea- 

 tures on the Sun. We must remember how 

 much there is unknown in the sun still, and 

 what a great mystery even yet overhangs 

 many of our relations to that body which 

 maintains our own vital action, when we 

 read the following words, which are [Sir 

 John] Herschel's own. Speaking of these 

 supposed spindle-shaped monsters [shown in 

 certain drawings of the sun's surface], he 

 says: 



" The exceedingly definite shape of these 

 objects, their exact similarity to one an- 

 other, and the way in which they lie across 

 and athwart each other all these charac- 

 ters seem quite repugnant to the notion of 

 their being of a vaporous, a cloudy, or a 

 fluid nature. Nothing remains but to con- 

 sider them as separate and independent 

 sheets, flakes, or scales, having some sort of 

 solidity. And these . . . are evidently 

 the immediate sources of the solar light and 

 heat, by whatever mechanism or whatever 

 processes they may be enabled to develop, 

 and as it were elaborate, these elements 

 from the bosom of the non-luminous fluid in 

 which they appear to float. Looked at in 

 this point of view, we cannot refuse to re- 

 gard them as organisms of some peculiar 

 and amazing kind; and tho it would be too 

 daring to speak of such organization as par- 

 taking of the nature of life, yet we do know 

 that vital action is competent to develop at 

 once heat and light and electricity." 



Such are his words; and when we con- 

 sider that each of these solar inhabitants 

 was supposed to extend about two hundred 

 by one thousand miles upon the surface of 

 the fiery ocean, we may subscribe to Mr. 

 Proctor's comment, that "Milton's picture 

 of him who on the fires of hell ' lay floating 

 many a rood,' seems tame and commonplace 

 compared with Herschel's conception of 

 these floating monsters, the least covering a 

 greater space than the British Islands." 

 LANGLEY New Astronomy, ch. 13, p. 14. (H. 

 M. & Co., 1896.) 



1O79. ERUPTION OF MONTE NUOVO 



Fish Taken on Land Birds Falling Dead. 

 Sir William Hamilton has given us two 

 original letters describing this eruption [by 

 which Monte Nuovo was formed]. The first, 

 by Falconi, dated 1538, contains the follow- 

 ing passages : " It is now two years since 

 there have been frequent earthquakes at 

 Puzzuoli, Naples, and the neighboring parts. 

 On the day and in the night before the erup- 

 tion ( of Monte Nuovo ) , about twenty shocks, 

 great and small, were felt. The eruption be- 

 gan on the 29th of September, 1538. It was 

 on a Sunday, about one o'clock in the night, 

 when flames of fire were seen between the 

 hot baths and Tripergola. In a short time 

 the fire increased to such a degree that it 

 burst open the earth in this place, and threw 

 up so great a quantity of ashes and pumice- 

 stones, mixed with water, as covered the 

 whole country. The next morning (after 

 the formation of Monte Nuovo) the poor in- 

 habitants of Puzzuoli quitted their habita- 

 tions in terror, covered with the muddy and 

 black shower which continued the whole day 

 in that country flying from death, but with 

 death painted in their countenances. Some 

 with their children in their arms, some with 

 sacks full of their goods; others leading an 

 ass, loaded with their frightened family, 

 towards Naples; others carrying quantities 

 of birds, of various sorts, that had fallen 

 dead at the beginning of the eruption ; oth- 



