280 PART V -WORKING STAGE. 



throat; but in winter he changes and becomes grey instead of 

 black on the back and his chin and throat become white"; and 

 "the magpie, so wary in England, is tame in Norway, as is 

 the hooded crow in Egypt" (Darwin). Equally, who that had 

 seen but one dog would suspect the existing variety of dogs, 

 or who that had seen the plants of the valleys would suspect 

 the transformation some of them undergo when transferred to 

 the Alpine heights above. Similarly, an ancient Teuton would 

 not have been justified in reasoning that all men are fair, any 

 more than his brother in the tropics who judges that all men 

 are dark brown. Thus, again, whereas a census of school 

 children would furnish a given percentage of fair-hairedness, 

 that of adults would exhibit a conspicuous decrease in the 

 percentage, and whilst one part of a country may be wholly 

 literate or densely populated, another may be almost illiterate 

 or sparsely inhabited. Who, once more, living in the far south 

 would conjecture the existence of the far north, and who, 

 living in either extreme of climate, would surmise that there 

 are many places on earth where decided heat and decided cold 

 alternate during the year? 1 Who, again, living in a mono- 

 gamous civilisation is not surprised to hear of the prevalence 

 in other civilisations of polygamy and polyandry and vice versa ? 

 The towering Patagonian in his retreat imagines that some of 

 his fellows of no more than six feet in height are diminutive, 

 whilst the pigmy of the gloomy African forest would be amazed 

 to face a man who reaches five feet. It is equally a never- 

 ending comment of new-fledged travellers that there should be 



1 "Over the British Islands the average rainfall is about 25 inches per 

 annum; but the amount varies greatly from year to year, and also from 

 place to place. It is greatest in the West and North-West of the country. 

 At Seathwaite in Cumberland, reputed the wettest spot in the British Isles 

 at which regular observations have been made over many years, the average 

 amount is 139 inches per annum. In tropical countries, where the air can 

 contain much larger amounts of water vapour by reason of its higher tem- 

 perature, much higher figures are recorded. Cherra Poonjee in Assam has an 

 average rainfall of 439 inches per annum, the highest known rainfall for 

 any station at which observations have been made for many years. 



"A day on which the rainfall exceeds one inch is regarded as one of 

 heavy rain in all parts of the British Isles, though a glance through a set 

 of rainfall tables for almost any year shows that this phenomenon may be 

 expected to occur at least once in the course of each year at most British 

 stations. The heaviest fall of rain ever recorded in one day in the British 

 Isles again falls to the lot of Seathwaite, where, according to an interesting 

 table of phenomenally heavy rainfalls given in British Rainfall for 1910, 

 8.03 inches of rain were measured in November 12, 1897. Even in our com- 

 paratively dry Eastern counties very heavy falls may occur. The same 

 table records seven instances of falls exceeding 4 inches in 24 hours in the 

 county of Essex. 



"In tropical countries these amounts may, again, be vastly exceeded. 



r example, a typhoon which swept over the Philippine Islands between 

 July 14 and 17, 1911, deposited at one station on four consecutive days 35, 

 S'A T^*? inches respectively, or a total of 89 inches in four days." 

 (K. tr. K. Lempfert, op. cit., pp. 23-24.) 



