342 
water, the time of their occurrence, and the range of the 
tide for every day of the same month as before. Table 
III. is similar to Table I., but the hours are counted each 
day from the upper culmination of the moon, instead of 
from noon. By thus arranging the table, the sun’s in- 
fluence is eliminated in the means for each hour, and the 
moon’s influence on the tide is thus made apparent. 
Table V. corresponds to Table IV. The remaining 
tables, VI. to XII., give information as regards the inter- 
val of time between the moon’s upper or lower culmina- 
tion and high water, and similarly for low water; also 
the height of the highest and lowest high and low water 
recorded each month, specifying the direction of the wind 
and the height of the barometer ; and lastly, the greatest 
and least range of the tide during each month. 
The report concludes with a comparison of the semi- 
menstrual inequality as calculated by Whewell’s formule, 
and the actual observed inequalities. The agreement is 
very close. 
There is no discussion in the report of the results 
obtained, this being reserved for future publications, 
when the observations at the other stations are available. 
The report is accompanied by five plates, showing 
the registering apparatus, and giving specimens of the 
diagrams. 
SCIENTIFIC HERESIES IN CHINA 
ee belief of the old writer who explained the dis- 
appearance of the swallows in autumn, by the 
assumption that they all rolled themselves together into 
a mass, beak to beak and wing to wing, and plunged 
“‘fluminibus lacubusque,” there to remain until the 
return of spring, is but an instance of the thousand and 
one theories which have from all time been held by 
unscientific observers on the subject of the annual 
appearance and disappearance of migrating birds. It 
is not so very long ago that even among ourselves 
the question of the migration of sand martens was a 
moot point; and it need not be a matter of surprise, 
therefore, that the Chinese, though keen observers of 
nature, should be guilty of holding heretical hypotheses 
to account for the presence in summer and the absence 
in winter of birds of passage, as well as for other pro- 
cesses of nature which are enacted before them. Like 
most common fallacies, those current in China on these 
subjects are derived from ancient authorities, but, unfortu- 
nately, in the case of the Chinese, whose respect for every- 
thing that is old is supreme, this antiquity only entails 
upon them the more unquestioning faith. They are, 
therefore, perfectly content to believe that the disappear- 
ance of quails in autumn is sufficiently accounted for by 
the assumption that at that time of the year they are 
transformed into moles, and that in spring they succeed 
in reappearing again in beaks and feathers. The expla- 
nation of this fallacy is simple enough. The ploughman 
who in the spring and summer has seen the quails flitting 
among the mole-hills, finds that when, the birds having 
disappeared, he ploughs over the same land in winter, 
the moles, which he has not before seen, are the sole 
occupants of the ground. 
Another generally accepted belief is based on what 
Max Miiller calls a disease of language. At the opening 
of spring, hawks are said to become pigeons, and at 
midsummer to be reconverted to their original shapes. 
Now it happens that Az, the Chinese name for a pigeon, 
forms the second syllable of the word for a crested hawk 
(Shwang-kiw), and it would appear that by a corrup- 
tion of terms and a confusion of ideas the first syllable 
has been dropped and the last has been allowed to 
stand in its literal and isolated meaning. Thus the 
original assertion that during the breeding season hawks 
become crested has been perverted into a meaningless 
and self-condemnatory myth. Chinese writers on natural 
NATURE 
[/ed. 8, 1883 
history lay stress on the fact that during the spring, when 
“the rearing instinct in birds becomes excessive, birds of 
prey become excited,” and when excited or angry, hawks, 
as is well known, erect the feathers on the head, giving 
the appearance ofa crest. 3 
Much in the same way has arisen the legend that in 
late autumn certain small birds go into the sea and be- 
come crustaceze. In this case the error depends on the 
word wez, which is here translated “ become,” but which - 
also means ‘for,’ and which, when so read, converts an 
absurdity into the record of a fact concerning the birds 
probably referred to, namely, sandpipers. These birds, 
we know, “frequent sandy sea-shores, some of them con- 
gregating in numerous flocks in autumn and winter, and 
seek their food by probing the sand,with their bills, and 
by catching small crustaceans in pools or within the 
margin of the sea itself.”?_ The same mistake, which is, 
however, complicated by a further misunderstanding, 
makes it incumbent on Chinamen to believe that in winter 
pheasants go into the lakes and become clams. The 
word here translated “clams” means also “sweet flags 
and water rushes,” and in search of these hungry pheasants 
might very probably be tempted to seek the margins of 
swamps and lakes. A curious and unaccountable super- 
stition was anciently and is still connected with this habit 
of Chinese pheasants. We have it on the authority of 
one of the Classics that ‘‘if within ten days from the 
beginning of winter pheasants do not go to the great 
waters, lascivious women will multiply in the country.” 
' Otters and polecats, again, are the subjects of a more 
sentimental belief. They are said to be in the habit of 
offering up, the one fish, and the other animals, in sacri- 
fice. This strange myth is accentuated in the “ Imperial 
Encyclopedia,’’ published by order of the Emperor 
K’ang-he (1661-1722), by an illustration attached to the 
chapter on otters, in which one of those animals is repre- 
sented as squatting down on the bank of a river with his 
two forepaws on a newly-captured trout, and with a most 
devout expression on his upturned face, which is directed 
towards the moon. The explanation of this legend is 
not far to seek. 
The habit common to both otters and polecats of 
destroying many more creatures than they are able to 
devour, and of leaving their victims apparently untouched 
after having satisfied their appetites with the flakes at 
the back of the fishes’ necks, and with the blood of the 
animals, suggests to careless and superstitious observers 
the semblance of propitiatory sacrifices offered up to the 
patron saints of vermin, 
Many other generally accepted myths might be quoted, 
which are but the perverted representations of facts. 
But if we descend to a lower level, to the vulgar supersti- 
tions ofthe masses, we find ourselves in a region where— 
‘Wisdom and Wit are little seen, 
But Folly at full length.” 
A resemblance in outward form, or even in disposition, 
is enough to give rise to a belief that the animals are 
interchangeable. Thus eels are said at times to be trans- 
formed into serpents, mice into bats, and sharks into 
tigers, and vice versé. By a curious connection of ideas, 
between kings and whales, also comets, those stars so 
abhorred by rulers, are considered to be as destructive to 
the lives of the monarchs of the deep as of the sovereigns 
of the soil. 
NOTES OF TRAVEL IN SARDINIA 
WE Sicily possesses classical associations and 
remains of the highest interest, together with 
physical features more or less dependent upon the 
presence of the most famous volcano in the world; and 
| while Lipari and the associated islands are remarkable 
for their evidences of past and present volcanic action, 
1 Chambers’ Encyclopedia. 
