44 Analyses of Booh . [January, 
some have supposed, the meteors which make so striking a dis- 
play in August and November. 
Mr. Prodtor’s paper contains certain incisive references to his 
brother astronomers. He remarks that “ Even so late as 1879 
M. de Fonvielle, editor of * La Nature,’ presented it not as a 
doubtful theory, but (after the manner which is characteristic, 
and I cannot but think a characteristic defeCt, of French popular 
science-teachipg) as a known faCt, which his readers were to ac- 
cept because he said it — fe votes le dit, Moi.” This charge is 
by no means unfounded. Again, Mr. ProCtor, referring to M. 
Guillemin and Mr. Lockyer (the editor of ‘ Nature’), says, “Yet 
here are two professed teachers of the general public — rather 
condescending teachers too — not only describe this impossible 
movement, but even endeavour to picture it.” 
** The Norway Fjords ” is the title of a pleasantly written ac- 
count of a ten-weeks’ trip to the Norwegian coast, by Mr. J. A. 
Froude. As a matter of course we find here little in the way of 
scientific observation, but for all this there are passages well 
worthy our notice. The author tells us that his friend and 
travelling companion X. “ was a sportsman, but a sportsman only 
as subsidiary to more rational occupations. He was going to 
Norway to catch Salmonidas ; not, however, to catch them only, 
but to study the varieties of that most complicated order of fish.” 
We have here a rather strong admission on the part of a sports- 
man and a defender of sport ! Mr. Froude notices concerning 
the people of Bergen that “ For politics they care nothing, not 
supposing that on this road is any kind of salvation for them.” 
They are wise ; such an atmosphere would prove speedily fatal 
to our English speech-makers and ochlogogues. The author 
speaks of the “ cleanness ” of the houses, not noticing, perhaps, 
that the Norwegian spits more promiscuously than ever did the 
American. Had he gone onwards to the Loffodens, however, he 
would have found squalor such as is unknown in England. 
The following passage is worth quoting as a proof of that old 
but still negledted truth — the impossibility of getting all men to 
think and feel alike. Says Mr. Froude : — For lakes and 
mountains, however beautiful, the appetite becomes soon satiated. 
They please, but they cease to excite ; and there is something 
artificial in the modern enthusiasm for landscapes. Velasquez or 
Rubens could appreciate a fine effedt of scenery as well as Turner 
or Stansfield ; but with them it was a framework, subordinate to 
some human interest in the centre of the pidture. I suppose it 
is because man in these democratic days has for a time ceased 
to touch the imagination that our poets and artists are driven 
back upon rocks and rivers, and trees and skies ; but the eclipse 
can only be temporary, and I confess, for myself, that, sublime 
as the fjords were, the saw-mills and farm-houses and fishing- 
boats, and the patient industrious people wresting a wholesome 
living out of that stern environment, affedted me very much more 
nearly.” ' 
