last scrap of food was consumed, yet the brave fellows did not despair.
Their boat was very leaky; but on the 5th of September, having repaired
her as far as possible, they took advantage of finer weather to
endeavour to reach some spot where there would be more probability of
getting rescued by a passing ship; but they had scarcely got half-way
across the Straits before there was a terrific snow-storm; it blew a
gale; the boat began to fill rapidly; and finally they were blown back
again into the bay, upset in the surf and nearly drowned, being unable
to swim through having lost the use of their legs from sitting so
long in water. However, they were thrown up by the waves high, though
by no means dry, and in this miserable plight and under a pitiless
snow-storm, they were forced to remain all through the night. The next
day they managed to erect something in the form of a hut, in which they
might lie down and be to some extent protected from the weather, which
was so boisterous as to render it useless to attempt to launch the
boat. For some days, owing to exposure and want of food, they were both
very ill; but still hoping for better weather, they kept themselves
alive by eating sea-weed and such shell-fish as could be found, until
the 12th of September, when the weather suddenly clearing, they again
launched their small boat; and this time, after a day's hard toil,
succeeded in reaching the opposite side of the Straits, where they had
left the ship, which it is needless to say was by this time far away.
When first the men were missed, rockets had been fired, and blue-lights
burned; and on the following day the cutter was sent to the westward,
while the _Chanticleer_ coasted along the opposite side; look-out
men were constantly aloft; but nothing was to be seen of the missing
men. The next day the ship had remained at Port Famine, and exploring
parties were sent in all directions. On the third day they again
weighed anchor, and examined a fresh piece of coast, but all to no
purpose; and finally it was decided, with much regret, to give up the
search, for every one concluded that the poor men must by this time
have perished, even if they had survived the first night's cold, which
no one on board thought possible. Both men were generally popular, and
great grief was felt for their loss. Immediately a subscription was
started by the whole ship's company for the widow of the one man and
the mother of the other. Strangely enough, when the sad news reached
England, the former, in spite of what seemed conclusive evidence,
firmly refused to believe the assurance of her husband's death. Whether
the wife's intuition or the more logical inferences of every one else
proved correct, events will shew.
By the time Henty and Riddles reached, as we have seen, the opposite
side of the Straits it was quite dark; but on the following day they
found that the current had drifted them fourteen miles from Port
Famine, towards which they had steered, and for which place they now
started on foot. Here they saw in the distance a ship under steam
going towards the Pacific; but again all efforts to attract attention
failed. They knew of no settlement that they could hope to reach, and
at this rough season there was not the slightest chance of falling in
with any wandering tribes of natives. The only course left them was to
endure the cold, wait as patiently as might be, in the hope of some
ship passing within hail, and to keep up what little life remained
in them by chewing sea-weed, and seeking and devouring the mussels,
which fortunately were to be found in great abundance on the rocks.
After a time, however, they grew so weak as to be only just able to
crawl out of the place they had made to lie down in, and every day the
effort to gather their scanty nourishment grew harder. Once more, on
the 4th of October, they saw a vessel pass through the Straits, but
were unable to make any signals; on the 7th, both men had grown too
weak to stir, and nothing was left for them but to confront death. The
8th day passed, the 9th, the 10th, and they were still sinking slowly
from starvation. On the 11th, when they could not possibly have lived
more than a few hours longer, and had become little short of living
skeletons, they were picked up by the officers of the _Shearwater_,
and at once taken on board, where, after receiving the most careful
attention, both, although still suffering greatly, began after a time
to recover. Being conveyed by the _Shearwater_ to Rio, they remained
some time in the hospital there, and finally were sent home invalided;
and yet both men lived to regain their full strength, and to serve as
striking examples of what tough human nature can endure in the shape
of physical hardships and mental anxiety. They had contrived, by a
patience and energy almost unprecedented, to lengthen out existence for
a space considerably over a month, with no other food than sea-weed and
shell-fish; the last four days indeed eating absolutely nothing; while
the whole time exposed to intense cold, the roughest weather, and more
hardships than it is possible for those who have never seen that barren
and desolate region even to imagine.
THE MONTH:
SCIENCE AND ARTS.
Mr T. M. Reade, in his presidential address to the Liverpool Geological
Society, discussed the question of 'geological time,' and took as
an approximate measure thereof the denuding effect of rain-water on
the earth's surface. The most rainy districts in England are those
in which the oldest rocks prevail; but the average annual rainfall,
including Wales, may be taken at 32 inches. Assuming the area of the
two to represent one river basin, the quantity of water discharged in
a year would contain more than eight million tons of solid matters;
and at this rate, 12,978 years would be required to lower the surface
of the land one foot. Analyses of sea-water shew that there are in
100,000 tons, 48 tons of carbonate of lime and magnesia, and 1017 tons
of sulphate of lime and magnesia; and the ocean contains enough of the
first to cover the whole of the land with a layer fifteen feet thick;
and of the second to make a layer 267 feet thick. Twenty-five million
years would be required to accumulate the one, and 480,000 years the
other. Again, the total surface of the globe is 197 million square
miles. A cubic mile of rock would weigh 10,903,552,000 tons; so that,
as Mr Reade states, 'to cover the whole surface of the globe one mile
deep with sediment from the land at the rate of 800 tons per square
mile of land-surface, would take 52,647,052 years.'
Geologists have speculated over this question many years: it has now
passed into the hands of mathematicians, without whose aid it will
never be settled. The Rev. Dr Haughton, F.R.S., of Trinity College,
Dublin, in a paper read before the Royal Society on the last evening
of their session, 'On the probable age of the continent of Asia
and Europe, and on the absolute measure of geological time,' says
that the elevation of Asia and Europe from beneath the deep waters,
separated the earth's axis of rotation from the axis of figure by 207
miles, which would produce a large amount of wabbling. At present,
'astronomers are agreed that the motion of the pole is secular and very
slow, all traces of wabbling having disappeared.' Then after a series
of mathematical demonstrations, the doctor continues: 'The geological
age of the continent of Asia and Europe is well marked by the horizon
of the Nummulitic Limestones,' which extend from the Mediterranean to
Japan. 'These rocks make up the backbone of the great continent, and at
its formation were raised from deep water to form the highest chains
of mountains in the globe. Geologically speaking, they are modern,
belonging to the Lower Tertiary Period. My calculations assign to the
Nummulitic Epoch a date not less than 4157 millions of years ago. No
practical geologist will feel any surprise at this result.'
In a paper read at the last meeting of the Geological Society, Mr
Belt discussed various geological questions, and shewed reasons for
believing that in the far remote ages, the north of Europe was covered
by a great lake. 'The formation of this lake was due,' he remarked, 'to
the ice of the glacial period flowing down the beds of the Atlantic
and Pacific, and damming back the drainage of the continents as far
as it extended. To the rising of these waters must be ascribed the
destruction of palæolithic man, the mammoth, and the woolly rhinoceros.
This lake was once suddenly and torrentially discharged through the
breaking away of the Atlantic ice-dam, but was formed again and
ultimately drained by the cutting through of the channel of the
Bosphorus.' It is perhaps well to remark that these views are not as
yet implicitly accepted.
In the Eocene deposits of New Mexico a fossil bone of a gigantic bird
has been found, which, according to the description, had 'feet twice
the bulk of those of the ostrich.' This discovery proves that huge
birds formed part of the primeval fauna of North America, and that they
were not confined exclusively to the southern hemisphere.
Professor Kirkwood states, in a paper on the relative ages of the sun
and certain fixed stars read to the American Philosophical Society,
that the history of the solar system is comprised within twenty or
thirty millions of years; that our solar system is more advanced in its
history than the constellation of the Centaur, and that the companion
of Sirius appears to have reached a stage of greater maturity than the
sun, while the contrary seems to be true in regard to the principal
star.
The annual report on the great trigonometrical survey of India contains
particulars which shew that surveying in India is by no means holiday
pastime. Colonel Montgomerie, who has just retired after twenty-five
years' service, was engaged during nine of those years in a survey
of the dominions of the Maharaja of Kashmir, comprising about 77,000
square miles. Within this extensive area rise stupendous mountain
ranges and peaks, the highest of which is more than 28,000 feet, and
the Indus, Jhelum, Kishanganga, and other great rivers, flow through
the valleys. To fix the position of heights and places in such a
country requires a combination of courage, skill, and endurance rarely
to be met with, but which happily for geographical science has been
forthcoming ever since the Indian survey was commenced. The annual
reports contain many accounts of adventurous journeys, and hazardous
exploits which few readers would think of looking for among the dry
details of a scientific triangulation. Sometimes on resuming work
after the rainy season, the 'rays' or lanes which had been cut through
the forest to clear a way for taking distant sights, would be found
so choked by the shoots from tree-stumps and young bamboos which had
grown to an 'astonishing height,' that more than thirty miles of such
rays had to be cleared over again before the work could proceed. On
extending the survey into Burmah it was only by cutting tracks through
the dense forest that communications could be effected from station
to station, and whenever an existing road could be made available it
was regarded as a luxury. At Kamákabo it became necessary to carry the
great theodolite to the top of a rocky hill: the sharp projecting rocks
'jutted out in every direction,' and as they could not be removed,
ladders were stretched from rock to rock, and thus a most perilous
ascent and descent was accomplished. The labour and risk may be judged
of from the fact that the theodolite weighed more than six hundred
pounds, and we can appreciate the satisfaction with which the observer
wrote in his journal, 'it was a day of rejoicing when the instrument
was brought down in safety.' At times a region of sand-hills was
traversed where vision was not obstructed, but where not more than
three wells of drinkable water were found in a distance of seventy
miles. And once the observer waded through a mile of mud and water
under a burning sun to an old lighthouse whence it was essential to
take angles to fix the position of the new one five miles distant. A
consequence of this exploit was an attack of malarious fever.
It seems likely that trigonometrical surveying may be carried on
with less difficulty in future; for an Italian officer of engineers,
Lieutenant Manzi, has proved that the triangulations can be
photographed. It is possible to construct a camera geometrically
arranged, and if the rays of light converging from distant points of
view are intercepted, and marked on a diaphragm, it is evident that the
angular readings obtained to such points would be identical in their
bearings with the objects themselves. By such a camera, negative views
of inaccessible ground can be faithfully taken, and the angles can be
either plotted or calculated. Photography thus offers itself as a means
whereby a difficult mountain country can be surveyed without risk,
while for purposes of military recognisance its advantages are obvious.
For some time past attention has been directed towards steel-wire
cables; and experiments recently made in Portsmouth Dockyard have
clearly demonstrated their superiority over hemp and iron. Steel, as
is well known, is more and more used in the building of ships, and,
because of its tenacity and lightness, in their rigging; and now
it seems likely to supersede the unwieldy hawsers and chain cables
everywhere in use. With a chain the safety of the ship depends on the
weakest welding; and when a single link parts, either from inherent
defect or from a sudden jerk, everything parts, and the vessel drifts.
A wire cable, on the contrary, gives notice, so to speak, of an
approach to the breaking point. First one strand, then another, gives
way, and still the cable holds, and it may happen that it will hold
long enough to save the ship. Now that experiment has proved that a
steel-wire cable is as flexible as the best hemp, that it is three
times as strong, and does not cost more, the change from one to the
other may be made with confidence. Another advantage is the lightness,
for by making use of steel, about two-thirds of the usual weight of
the cable is got rid of. Evidence of the strength is seen in the fact
that a three-inch steel hawser did not break until the strain exceeded
twenty-two tons, and that a strain of more than a hundred tons was
required to break the six-inch.
Lieutenant Totten of the United States Army, in writing about
explosives and big guns, discusses carefully the question as to the
best kind of explosive for actual service; that which will expend its
entire force in driving out the projectile. With the large-grained
gunpowder now in use about half of the charge is wasted, while
gun-cotton and dynamite exert an injurious strain upon the gun. As
a way out of the difficulty, he recommends a 'compensating powder,'
each grain of which contains a core of gun-cotton, and he points out
that forty pounds of this powder would be sixty pounds stronger than
a hundred-pound charge of gunpowder. The explanation is that by the
time forty pounds of the hundred are burned, the shot has left the
gun; consequently, sixty pounds are of no help to the shot. But if the
forty pounds contain fifteen pounds of gun-cotton, then this cotton,
when fired, acts on the already moving shot under the most favourable
circumstances as a pure accelerator, and does not injure the gun. In
this way, writes Lieutenant Totten, 'we eliminate the great waste of
the one, curb the straining action of both, and obtain a true artillery
powder, lighter, and four and a half times more effective, charge for
charge, than our best gunpowder.'
An address 'On Light in some of its Relations to Disease,' delivered
to the Albany Institute (State of New York) by Dr Stevens, sets forth
views and facts which are worth consideration. Light, as we know, is
on the whole beneficial; but may there not be cases in which it is
harmful when passing through the transparent media of the human eye? Dr
Stevens is clearly of opinion that many nervous diseases are aggravated
if not produced by defective vision. The strain on the muscles of
the eye, when long continued, sets up an irritability which tells
injuriously on the nervous system, and neuralgic affections. St Vitus's
dance and severe periodical headaches are the consequence. Rectify the
imperfection of the sight, says Dr Stevens, by proper spectacles, and
the nervous disease will be either mitigated or cured. It is of no use
to buy glasses at hazard because they seem to suit the eye; for none
but a scientific oculist can really decide, after careful experiment,
on what is proper. In many cases the focus of the two eyes is not
the same, and each must have its proper glass. Professor Donders of
Utrecht was the first to point out that the so-called 'cylindrical
glasses' were generally the most efficient; and since then 'the science
of correcting anomalous refractions of the eye has been brought to a
perfection which is truly wonderful.'
Dr Poumeau of Guadeloupe has published a series of tables, based on the
changes of the moon, by which, as he believes, it is possible to tell
the sex of a child before birth. He intends to draw up similar tables
for the use of horse and cattle breeders; and if any one should test
his calculations by observation, the doctor would like to be informed
of the result.
The _Journal_ of the Chemical Society contains an account by Mr Hight,
of the Indian Forest Department, of experiments made with a view to
ascertain the practical nature of a proposed method of determining the
mineral strength of soils by means of water-culture. It is explained
that the usual object of water-culture experiments is to find what
particular salts are congenial or necessary to the growth of any
particular plant. When a plant is grown in an artificially prepared
solution, so that it can obtain its nourishment solely from the salts
contained in that solution, the exact effect of any salt upon the
growth of the plant can be easily observed by adding that salt to,
or abstracting it from the solution. In carrying out this method,
specimens of soil were taken from five different forests in India;
solutions of these specimens were made; seedlings of _Acacia arabica_
were, with proper precautions, placed in each, and the results of
growth, such as increase in weight, number of leaves, and length of
roots, were carefully noted. These results are published in a numerical
table, and allowing for the difficulties of a preliminary experiment,
may be regarded as satisfactory.
The question is frequently asked--Why is there no School of Forestry
in England, while in almost all other countries of Europe schools
of forest science are either established by the government, or are
associated with a university or a polytechnic institution? Sir Joseph
Hooker, President of the Royal Society, and Director of the Royal
Gardens, Kew, says in one of his reports, that the subject is so
neglected in this country, that when our government are in want of a
forest inspector for India, they have first to send him to France or
Germany to learn the theory and practice of taking care of a forest. On
the continent, as Sir Joseph remarks, 'forestry holds a distinguished
place among the branches of a liberal education. In the estimation of
an average Briton, forests are of infinitely less importance than the
game they shelter, and it is not long since the wanton destruction of
a fine young tree was considered a venial offence compared with the
snaring of a pheasant or rabbit. Wherever the English rule extends,
with the exception of India, the same apathy, or at least inaction,
prevails. In South Africa, according to the colonial botanist's report,
millions of acres have been made desert, and more are being made
desert annually, through the destruction of the indigenous forests; in
Demarara the useful timber trees have all been removed from accessible
regions, and no care or thought is given to planting others; from
Trinidad we have the same story; in New Zealand there is not now a
good Kauri pine to be found near the coast, and I believe that the
annals of almost every English colony would repeat the tale of wilful
wanton waste and improvidence. On the other hand in France, Germany,
Switzerland, Austria, and Russia, the forests and waste lands are
the subjects of devoted attention on the part of the government, and
colleges, provided with a complete staff of accomplished professors,
train youths of good birth and education to the duties of state
foresters. Nor, in the case of France, is this practice confined to
the mother country: the Algerian forests are worked with scrupulous
solicitude, and the collections of vegetable produce from the French
colonies in the permanent museum at Paris contain specimens which
abundantly testify that their forests are all diligently explored.'
This is a long quotation; but it is justified by the importance of
the subject, and it is quite clear that we cannot go on much longer
without a School of Forestry. Diligent students can hardly fail to be
forthcoming, and when once they shall have proved themselves efficient
inspectors, the question of 'good' birth may be left to take care of
itself.
THE DESERTED GARDEN.
Beyond the woods, yet half by woods inclosed,
A tangled wilderness of fair growth lay;
A spot where dreaming poet might have dosed
Into the dawning of a fairy day;
For in its desolation wild reposed
Something that pointed to a past more gay,
Since here and there one found the lingering trace
Of caresome hands in the neglected place.
The once trim walks were coated thick with moss;
Dwarfed were the garden roses, and their glow
From vivid crimson paled to fainter gloss
Nigh broken sun-dial; and the water's flow
Had ceased to murmur in the ancient foss,
Whose slopes were now with purple thyme a-blow;
And on the fragments of the crumbled wall
The golden wall-flower stood like seneschal.
The nut-trees made an archway overgrown,
And midst the boughs the timid squirrel leapt;
At eve the nightingale with mellow tone
Sang with the mourning wind a dirge that crept
Into all hearts--until one heart more lone
Than others, gathered up the strain and wept;
Nor knew if 'twere half joy or wholly grief
That in the sympathetic chord had found relief.
The clouds sent flickering shadows o'er the grass,
As though some spectral life were there upstirred;
And as the fitful breezes onward pass,
A murmur of strange voices might be heard,
As though some unseen quire were chanting mass,
Echoed throughout the grove by plaintive bird;
And still the wanderer listening, asks for whom
The wild Amen!--For whom the flowers did bloom?
The ancient summer-house with broken vane,
And rotting pillars where the woodbines twine;
And on a cobwebbed solitary pane
In casement, that with colours once did shine,
And shewed the seasons through each differing stain,
Was writ in jaggèd-wise a Latin line,
'_Sic transit gloria mundi_;' and below,
'My Ursula! the world is full of woe.'
It read as epitaph above the grave
Of human hopes, all blighted as the space
Around, whose wreck no hand was stretched to save;
Yet that with tender melancholy grace,
A sermon in that blooming desert gave
To him whose soul had power enough to trace
In the lone scene, so desolate, so lone,
Though man upbuilds, God shapes the crowning stone.
I spake the name a score of times aloud,
'Sweet Ursula,' a source of joy and woe!
The glory of a life, the light allowed
To make all nature flush with deeper glow.
Then light put out--then darkness--then a cloud
And agony that nought but love can know--
The bitter memory of a sweetness past,
A gleam of sunshine all too bright to last.
The lazy lilies gleamed with petals white
Upon the pool o'errun with weeds and sedges,
That once shone clear and fair as mirror bright,
With blue forget-me-nots on shelving ledges,
Where water-flags upreared their banners light,
And the marsh-mallow crept along its edges--
But in the water face to face no more
Smiled back as in the happier days of yore.
Ah! could the olden stones a story tell,
How sweet a love-tale might they not reveal
Of mystic Ursula, and what befell
In the fond hopes and doubts that lovers feel,
Till blighted by that sorrowful farewell
That all the beauty of the world did steal;
Shattered the rainbow in fresh gathered cloud,
And changed the bridal robe to funeral shroud.
Perchance her monument this wildered spot,
Tended by Nature's pitying hand alone,
For one by generations now forgot,
To whom _he_ reared no proud sepulchral stone;
But with love's jealousy he willed that not
Another o'er her grave should make his moan--
But he alone through hieroglyphic bloom,
Should haunt the precincts of the loved one's tomb.