Chapter II: Part 2

‘At five o’clock a telegram was received at the Alliance Bank: “De Vriespan, four thirty. Case just arrived. On being opened, found to contain nothing but lead-sheeting to exact weight of gold expected. Clerk in charge denies all knowledge. Wire any instructions.” A cab dashed furiously to the docks, its occupant the head-cashier, who, as he turned the corner towards the quay, was just able to descry the smoke of the vanishing steamer now four or five miles on her way. “Too late!” shouted the Steam Company’s agent as he passed on foot. “Ship sailed sharp at four thirty!”

‘The above incident will most probably give a sharp impetus to the movement, already initiated in Cape commercial circles, for the establishment of ocean cable communication with Great Britain direct, the importance of which, from an imperial as well as a colonial point of view, has long been recognised.’

* * * * *

A keen east wind was blowing in my teeth as I hurried along the Strand towards Temple Bar one morning in March, and as I bent my head to meet a more than usually piercing gust, I came against a passer-by, who answered my apology with a smile of recognition. ‘Mr Rodd, I think?’

It was no other than the polite detective, more polite than ever, because of the whirling dust and biting wind, against which the best of good-humour is so rarely proof.

‘Ah, sir,’ he went on, as we drew into a low archway for a moment’s talk, ‘you would be astonished to hear the story of the wildgoose chase we had after Mr Percival Royston last summer and autumn. If you would care to call in at my quarters any day after four o’clock, I should be very pleased to tell you about it.’

‘Thank you,’ I replied; ‘I will see. Meanwhile, how did it end?’

‘All wrong for _us_, I am sorry to say. He got clean away from us; and I don’t suppose we shall ever hear of him again.’

The sun shone out for a moment, and the wind seemed to have lost something of its bitter chill as I wished Detective Elms good-morning and passed on my way eastward.

THE MONTH:

SCIENCE AND ARTS.

The abnormally mild winter—if winter it can be called—which has been experienced this year, has once more raised hopes in the minds of farmers that brighter times are in store for them. The extreme mildness of the season has not only been favourable for all field operations, but it has been most beneficial for stock. Lambs have never been so numerous as they are this year in many of the southern counties, for not only have they had the climate in their favour during the most critical time of their lives, but there has been a wonderful number of twins. Indeed, the proportion of these latter to single births has on some farms been as high as sixteen out of twenty.

A silver lining to the dark cloud which has so long overshadowed the British farmer may also perhaps be discerned in certain operations which are now being pushed forward at Lavenham, in Suffolk. A private Company has been formed to recommence, under the more favourable conditions which the progress of scientific agriculture has rendered possible, the making of beet-sugar in this country. Between the years 1869 and 1873, Mr James Duncan tried a similar experiment, and the present Company has acquired his works at Lavenham, to take up once more the industry which he tried to establish. The recently devised methods of extracting sugar from the beet are much easier and simpler, and far less costly, than the processes employed by Mr Duncan; and the promoters of the enterprise are sanguine of success, if they can only induce the farmers to grow sufficient beetroot for them to operate upon. The Company has arranged favourable terms of transport with the railway authorities; for instance, a truck-load of roots can be brought to Lavenham from Bury—a distance of eleven miles—for eighteenpence a ton. For the same distance, Mr Duncan formerly paid four shillings and twopence a ton. The experiment will be watched with extreme interest by all agriculturists.

Mr Wood’s lecture to the Institute of Agriculture on the subject of Ensilage gave some valuable particulars of experiments he had made with the object of ascertaining which are the crops that can be most profitably cultivated for that method of preservation. He first of all took the value of ensilage at twenty-six shillings and eightpence, or about one-third the value of hay. An acre of heavy meadow-grass produced twelve tons of compressed food; and the same quantity dried into hay weighed only two tons seven hundredweight. After allowing for the cost of producing each, the lecturer showed a balance in favour of the ensilage over hay of nearly five pounds sterling an acre. Buckwheat cultivated for treatment as ensilage, against the same valued as a seed-crop, showed a gain in favour of the silo of two pounds eight shillings and threepence per acre. Oats compared in like manner show a balance of five pounds per acre; and here there is a further gain, for oats cut in the green state have not had the time to exhaust the soil as if they had been left to mature. There is still a further gain in favour of ensilage, when it is remembered that the ground is cleared before the usual time, and is therefore ready very early for new crops. The lecturer concluded by throwing out a useful hint that dairymen and cowkeepers in towns could be with great advantage supplied with the new form of fodder in casks, a sixty-gallon cask holding about thirty-one stone-weight of the compressed material.

Mr W. F. Petrie, whose recently published book upon the Pyramids of Gezeh we noticed two months ago, has just undertaken some excavations in another part of Egypt, which are likely to bear fruitful results. Amidst a desolation of mud and marsh, there lies, in the north-eastern delta of the Nile, a place far from the track of tourists, and which is therefore seldom visited. This now remote spot, Sàn-el-Hagar (that is, Sàn of the Stones), was once a splendid city, in the midst of the cornlands and pasturage which formed part of the biblical ‘field of Zoan.’ Excavations were begun here in 1861 by Mariette Pasha, and he unearthed the site of the principal temple; but lack of funds and want of support generally, caused him to give up the work, though not before several treasures had found their way from his diggings to the Boulak Museum at Cairo, and to the Louvre. Mr Petrie, under the auspices of the newly formed Egypt Exploration Fund, commences the work anew in this promising field of research; and before long we may possibly have very important finds to chronicle.

At the recent meeting of the Scottish Meteorological Society, held in Edinburgh, an interesting account was given of the daily work which has been carried on in the Ben Nevis Observatory since its first occupation in November last, and which is telegraphed daily from the summit of the mountain. Several new instruments have been added since that date, and improvements in the buildings costing a thousand pounds will shortly be commenced. Referring to the new marine station at Granton, near Edinburgh, Mr Murray of the _Challenger_ expedition gave an interesting account of the work going on there. The laboratory is now in working order, and there is accommodation for five or six naturalists. It is intended to offer this accommodation free of expense to any British or foreign naturalist having a definite object of study in view.

The French Academy of Sciences has just received an interesting account of a meteorite which fell not long ago near Odessa. A bright serpentine trail of fire was seen one morning to pass over that town; and the editor of one of the papers, surmising that a meteoric mass might have fallen from the sky, offered a reward to any one who would bring it to him. A peasant, who had been terribly frightened by the stone falling close to him as he worked in the fields, and burying itself in the ground, answered this appeal. He had dug the stone out of the soil, and preserved it, keeping the matter quite secret from his neighbours, as he feared ridicule. This stone was found to be a shapeless mass weighing nearly eighteen pounds. The fall of another meteorite, which in its descent near the same town wounded a man, was also reported; but it had been broken into fragments and distributed among the peasants, who preserved them as talismans.

The visitors to Cliff House, San Francisco, had recently the rare opportunity of viewing a marvellous mirage, during which the headland of North Farallon, which is under ordinary circumstances quite out of sight, indeed absolutely below the horizon, not only came into view, but appeared to be only a few miles from the shore. The strange sight fascinated the onlookers for many hours, and marine glasses and telescopes were brought to bear upon these veritable castles in the air.

It seems strange that Samuel Pepys, whose famous Diary is known to all English readers, should have been left without a monument in the old London church where his remains repose, until one hundred and eighty years after his death. This may be partly explained by the circumstance that Pepys’ Diary was not published until the year 1825. It was originally written in cipher, and the key to it, strange to say, was not made use of until that time. Although Pepys was a well-known man in his day, and occupied a good official position as ‘Clerk of the Acts’ and Secretary to the Admiralty, his fame is due to his unique Diary. At last, however, Pepys has a monument to his honour, which was unveiled the other day in the ancient city church of St Olave’s, near the Tower of London. The question has been raised whether Pepys, in using a cipher alphabet, did not intend his Diary as a private document. But still he left the key behind him, which he might have easily destroyed. However this may be, the book has delighted thousands of readers, giving as it does in a very quaint style a picture, and a true picture too, of London life two hundred years ago.

A curious record of the year 1478 is quoted in the _Builder_, which points to an early case of water being laid on to a town-house. The ingenious individual who thus tapped the conduit or watercourse running along the street, seems to have paid more dearly for the privilege than even a London water-consumer has to pay to the Companies in the present day. The man was a tradesman in Fleet Street, and is thus referred to: ‘A wex-chandler in Flete-strete had by crafte perced a pipe of the condit withynne the ground, and so conveied the water into his selar; wherefore he was judged to ride through the citie with a condit uppon his hedde.’ This poor man was nevertheless only adapting to his own purposes a system of water-conveyance that had been known and practised in many countries ages before his time.

It is expected that nearly one thousand members and associates of the British Association will cross the Atlantic in August next to take part in the meeting which is to be held this year at Montreal. All visitors to the Dominion know well that the Canadians understand the meaning of the word hospitality in its broadest sense, and they are, according to all reports, taking measures which will cause their British cousins to long remember the welcome which they will receive. The Association is taking good care that the members shall be seen at their best, and no new members will be allowed to join the party except under stringent conditions. This will very rightly prevent an influx of people who will take a sudden interest in scientific research for the sake of getting a cheap trip to Canada. The names of the representative men under whose care the various sections are placed, are sufficient guarantee that plenty of good work will be done. We may mention that special attention will be paid in section D, under Professor Ray Lankester, to the vexed question of the supposed connection between sun-spot periods and terrestrial phenomena. This question has long been a bone of contention among scientific men, one side bringing forward figures giving remarkable points of agreement, the other side disclaiming them with the assertion that statistics can be made to prove anything. Perhaps this meeting of the Association may guide us to a right solution of the problems involved.

‘The Mineral Wealth of Queensland,’ the title of a paper recently read before the Royal Colonial Institute by Mr C. S. Dicken, was full of matter which should be interesting to those who are seeking an outlay for their capital. Queensland is five and a half times larger in area than the United Kingdom. Its gold-fields are estimated to cover a space of seven thousand square miles, and it produces large quantities of silver, copper, and tin. According to the official Reports of geologists, coal crops out on the surface over some twenty-four thousand square miles. Hitherto, these vast resources have been comparatively untouched. Men and capital are required for their development; and as the climate is a healthy one, and the laws administered by capable and impartial men, there is every incentive to Europeans to turn their attention to the country.

A Bill now before the House of Commons is of extreme interest and importance to students of natural history, to artists, and many others. We allude to Mr Bryce’s ‘Access to Mountains (Scotland) Bill.’ In the preamble to this proposed measure, it is set forth that many large tracts of uncultivated mountain and moorland, which have in past times been covered with sheep and cattle, are now stocked with deer, and in many cases the rights which have hitherto been enjoyed by artists and others of visiting such lands, have been stopped by the owners. It is now proposed that it should be henceforward illegal for owners of such property to exclude any one who wishes to go there ‘for the purposes of recreation, or scientific or artistic study.’ At the same time the Bill clearly provides that any one committing any kind of poaching or damage is to be regarded as a trespasser, and dealt with accordingly. Parks and pleasure-grounds attached to a dwelling-house are of course excepted from the operation of the Act.

Mr Johnston’s book upon _The River Congo_ is full of interesting particulars of his wanderings through that part of Africa and his meeting with Stanley. He certainly throws some new light upon the climate of the country; for whereas previous travellers have described it as fever-breeding, and full of terrors to the white man, Mr Johnston tells us that the climate of the interior table-land is as healthy as possible, and that any European taking ordinary precautions as to temperate eating and drinking, need never have a day’s illness there. This is perhaps a matter of personal constitution and physique. Because one man has had such a pleasant experience of African climate, it is no reason why every one else should expect the same exemption from illness. Still, we trust that Mr Johnston’s deductions may prove correct.

We are all of us now and then astonished by the report of some sale in which a fancy price, as it is called, has been paid for something of no intrinsic value, and very often of no artistic value either. Hundreds of pounds have been paid within recent years for a single teacup, provided that the happy purchaser can be sure that it is unique. Even thousands have been paid for a vase a few inches high simply because it was rare. The mania for collecting curiosities which prompts people to pay these large sums, is by no means confined to articles of virtu. Natural history claims a large army of such collectors. A single orchid was sold only the other day for a small fortune. At the time of the Cochin-China fowl mania, which John Leech helped to caricature out of existence, a single rooster fetched five hundred pounds. Only last month, in London, some enormous prices were obtained under the hammer for a collection of Lepidoptera, vulgarly known as moths and butterflies. Single specimens fetched three and four pounds apiece, and even more; whilst a common white butterfly, apparently having a particular value because it was caught in the Hebrides, was actually knocked down for the sum of thirteen guineas. It would be extremely interesting to ascertain the exact nature of the pleasurable sensations with which the owner of this butterfly doubtless regards his purchase. The export of a few white butterflies to the Hebrides might prove a profitable venture, if not overdone.

It may be that the age of big prices for little teacups and vases is on the eve of passing away, for it would seem that the secret processes by which the old workers could endow the china with a depth of colour and richness of tone impossible to achieve by more modern hands, have been rediscovered. It is reported that M. Lauth, the Director of the Sèvres state porcelain manufactory, has attained this result. Moreover, his discovery does not, like too many others, resolve itself into a mere laboratory experiment, but represents a manufacturing success. The results, too, can be looked for with certainty, whereas there is little doubt that the old workers had many a failure as well as successes.

The recent opinion of Mr Justice Stephen that cremation, if properly conducted, is not illegal, has again opened up a subject, which, although of a somewhat delicate, and to some people actually repulsive nature, is bound sooner or later to force its importance upon public attention. There is every reason to believe that public opinion is fast undergoing a very great change, as the subject becomes better understood. A like alteration of public feeling is also observable in other European countries. Sir Spencer Wells has lately published an account of the public cemetery in Rome, where, in the four months previous to his visit, no fewer than forty bodies had been submitted to the new form of sepulture. Dr Cameron’s Bill for the regulation of the practice of cremation will possibly come before the House of Commons before these lines appear in print, and we shall then have an opportunity of gauging the feeling for and against a practice which, after all, is not new, but very old indeed.

Lovers of nature will be glad to hear that otters are yet extant in the Thames; but unless possessed of that unfortunate instinct which causes the average Briton to kill and slay anything alive which is not actually a domestic animal, they will be disgusted to learn that these interesting creatures are no sooner discovered than they are shot and stuffed. In January 1880, an otter weighing twenty-six pounds was shot at Hampton Court; another shared the same fate at Thames-Ditton in January last; and one more has recently been slaughtered at Cookham.

We have recently had an opportunity of visiting the steep-grade tramway which is being laid, and is now on the point of being finished, on that same quiet Highgate Hill where tradition tells us Dick Whittington heard the bells prophesying his future good-fortune. This tramway is the first of its kind in this country, and will probably prove the pioneer line of many others in situations where the hilly nature of the ground forbids horse-traction. Briefly described, it consists of an endless cable, a steel rope kept constantly moving at the rate of six miles an hour by means of a stationary engine. This cable moves in a pipe buried in the ground midway between the rails; but the pipe has an opening above. Through this opening—a narrow slit about an inch wide—passes from the car a kind of grip-bar, which by the turn of a handle in the car is made to take hold of the travelling-rope below, or to release its hold, as required. This system has been in successful operation in San Francisco for many years, and there is no reason why it should not succeed in this country. The only question seems to be whether the traffic up and down Highgate Hill is sufficient to make the enterprise pay.

The profits of the International Fisheries Exhibition amount to fifteen thousand pounds. Two-thirds of this sum will be devoted to the benefit of the widows and orphans of fishermen, presumably through the instrumentality of some Society or Insurance Association to be formed for the purpose; three thousand pounds will go to form a Royal Fisheries Society for scientific work in connection with the harvest of the sea; whilst the balance remains in hand, at present unappropriated.

THE PROGRESS OF PISCICULTURE.

Of late years, no feature of fishery economy has excited more attention than the progress we have been making in what is called ‘Pisciculture.’ Fish-eggs are now a common article of commerce—the sales of which, and the prices at which they can be purchased, being as regularly advertised as any other kind of goods. This is a fact which, a century ago, might have been looked upon by our forefathers as something more than wonderful. Such commerce in all probability would have been stigmatised as impious, as a something ‘flying in the face of Providence.’

But in another country there was buying and selling of fish-eggs more than a thousand years ago. The ingenious Chinese people had discovered the philosophy which underlies fish-culture, as well as the best modes of increasing their supplies of fish, long before any European nation had dreamt of taking action in the matter. A few years ago, a party of fisher-folks from the Celestial Empire, on a visit to Europe, were exceedingly astonished at the prices they had to pay for the fish they were so fond of eating. They explained that in China any person might purchase for a very small sum as much as might serve a family for a week’s food. They also mentioned that some fishes which we reject, such as the octopus, were much esteemed by the Chinese, who cooked them carefully, and partook of them with great relish. The capture of the octopus, indeed, forms one of the chief fishing industries of China, these sea-monsters being taken in enormous numbers at some of the Chinese fishing stations, notably at Swatow. They are preserved by being dried in the sun; and then, after being packed in tubs, they are distributed to the consuming centres of the country. In the inland districts of China there are also to be found numerous fishponds, where supplies of the more popular sorts of fish are kept, and fed for the market. These are grown from ova generally bought from dealers, who procure supplies of eggs from some of the large rivers of the country. The infant fish, it may be mentioned, are as carefully tended and fed as if they were a flock of turkeys in the yard of a Norfolk farmer. In the opinion of the Chinese fishermen, who were interviewed by the industrious Frank Buckland, hundreds of thousands of fish annually die of starvation; and if means could be adopted for the feeding of tender fry, fish of all kinds would become more plentiful than at present, and we would obtain them at a cheaper rate. In China, the yolks of hens’ eggs are thrown into the rivers and ponds, that kind of food being greedily devoured by the young fish.

It has long been known to those interested in the economy of our fisheries, that only a very small percentage of the ova of our chief food-fishes comes to maturity, while of the fish actually hatched, a very small percentage reaches our tables for food-uses; hence the desire which has arisen to augment the supplies by means of pisciculture. In the case of a fish like the salmon, every individual of that species (_Salmo salar_) which can be brought to market is certain, even when prices are low, of a ready sale at something like a shilling per pound-weight; and it is not, therefore, to be wondered at that the proprietor of a stretch of salmon-water should be zealous about the increase of his stock of fish. A quarter of a century since, the salmon-fishery owners of the river Tay in Scotland, impressed with the possibilities of pisciculture, had a suite of salmon-nurseries constructed at Stormontfield, where they have annually hatched a very large number of eggs, and where they feed and protect the young fish till they are ready to migrate to the sea, able to fight their own battle of life. This may be said to be the earliest and longest sustained piscicultural effort of a commercial kind made in Great Britain, an example which was followed on other rivers. The chief salmon-fisheries of Scotland being held as private property, are, of course, more favourably situated, in regard to fish-culture, than salmon-fisheries which are open to the public, and which, in a sense, are the property of no person in particular. These latter must be left in the hands of mother Nature. The salmon, however, being an animal of great commercial value, is so coveted at all seasons of the year, both by persons who have a legal right to such property, and by persons who have no right, that such fisheries have a tendency to become barren of breeding-stock; for although each female yields on the average as many as twenty thousand eggs, extremely few of these ever reach maturity; hence, it has come about that many proprietors are resorting to the piscicultural process of increasing their supplies.

But the chief feature of the pisciculture of the period is that ‘fisheries’ are now being worked quite independently of any particular river. There is, for example, the Howietoun fishery, near Stirling, which has been ‘invented,’ as we may say, by that piscatorial giant, Sir James Gibson-Maitland. From this establishment, the eggs of fish, particularly trout, and more especially Loch Leven trout, are annually distributed in hundreds of thousands. From Howietoun, and from some other places as well, gentlemen can stock their ponds or other ornamental water with fecundated ova in a certain state of forwardness; or they can procure, for a definite sum of money, fish of all ages from tiny fry to active yearlings, or well grown two-year olds! Sporting-waters which have been overfished can be easily replenished by procuring a few thousand eggs or yearlings; while angling clubs which rent a loch or important stream can, at a very small cost, keep up the supplies, whether of trout or salmon. In the course of the last three summers, several Scottish lakes have had their fish-stores replenished by means of drafts on the piscicultural bank, which is always open at the Howietoun ‘fishery.’ The distance to which ova or tender young fish require to be transported offers no obstacle to this new development of fish-commerce; thousands of infantile fish were brought from Russia to Edinburgh with perfect safety on the occasion of the Fishery Exhibition held in that city. The loss in transit was not more, we believe, than two per cent.

It may prove interesting to state the prices which are charged usually for ova and young fish. A sample lot of eyed ova of the American brook trout, to the extent of one thousand, may be obtained for thirty shillings; and for ten shillings less, a thousand eggs of the Loch Leven trout, or the common trout of the country, may be purchased. For stock supplies, a box containing fifteen thousand partially eyed ova of _S. fontinalis_ (American) may be had for ten pounds. The other varieties mentioned are cheaper by fifty shillings for the same number. Fry of the same, in lots of not fewer than five thousand, range from seven pounds ten shillings to five pounds. Yearlings are of course dearer, and cost from fifteen and ten pounds respectively per thousand. Ten millions of trout ova are now hatched every year at the Howietoun fishery.

The fecundity of all kinds of fish is enormous. A very small trout will be found to contain one thousand eggs; a female salmon will yield on the average eight hundred ova for each pound of her weight; and if even a fifth part of the eggs of our food-fishes were destined to arrive at maturity, there would be no necessity for resorting to pisciculture in order to augment our fish commissariat. But even in America, where most kinds of fish were at one period almost over-abundant, artificial breeding is now necessary in order to keep up the supplies. In the United States, fish-culture has been resorted to on a gigantic scale, not only as regards the salmon, but also in connection with various sea-fishes, many hundred millions of eggs of which are annually collected and hatched; the young fry being forwarded to waters which require to be restocked. Apparatus of a proper description for the hatching of sea-fish has been constructed, and is found to work admirably. Some of these inventions were shown last year in the American department of the International Fishery Exhibition, where they were much admired by persons who feel interested in the proper development of our fishery resources. In the United States, the art of pisciculture has been studied with rare patience and industry, the fish-breeders thinking it no out-of-the-way feat to transplant three or four millions of young salmon in the course of a season. In dealing with the shad, the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries have been able to distribute the young of that fish by tens of millions per annum; the loss in the hatching of eggs and in the transmission of the animal being very small.

Some writers and lecturers on the natural and economic history of our food-fishes have asserted that no possible demand can lead to their extermination or to any permanent falling-off in the supplies; but the economy of the American fisheries tends to disprove that theory. In the seas which surround the United States, certain fishes would soon become very scarce, were the supplies not augmented each season by the aid of the pisciculturists. The fruitfulness of the cod is really wonderful, individuals of that family having been taken with from five to nine millions of eggs in their ovaries. The fecundity of the common herring, too, has often proved a theme of wonder. That an animal only weighing a few ounces should be able to perpetuate its kind at the rate of thirty thousand, is indeed remarkable. But fruitful in reproductive power as these and other fishes undoubtedly are, it has been prophesied by cautious writers, that by over-fishing, the supplies may in time become so exhausted as to require the aid of the pisciculturist. If so, we believe the mode of action which has been found to work so well in the American seas will be the best to follow. No plan of inclosed sea-ponds, however large they might be, will meet the case; the fish-eggs will require to be hatched in floating cylinders specially constructed for the purpose, so as to admit of the eggs being always under the influence of the sea-water, and at the same time exposed to the eye of skilled watchers. It is believed by persons well qualified to judge, that the eggs of our more valuable sea-fishes may in the way indicated be dealt with in almost incredible numbers. We have only to remember that twenty females of the cod family will yield at least one hundred millions of eggs, to see that the possibilities of pisciculture might extend far beyond anything indicated in the foregoing remarks.

In resuscitating their exhausted oyster-beds, the French people have during the last twenty years worked wonders; they have been able to reproduce that favourite shell-fish year after year in quantities that would appear fabulous if they could be enumerated in figures. Pisciculture was understood in France long before it was thought of as a means of aiding natural production in America; but our children of the States—to use a favourite phrase of their own—now ‘lick all creation’ in the ways and means of replenishing river and sea with their finny denizens.

A PLEA FOR THE WATER-OUSEL.

In a paper which appeared in this _Journal_, in June 1883, on the Salmon, a few words were said in defence of the water-ousel against a _fama_ which had found vent in newspaper correspondence, accusing that most interesting bird of destroying salmon spawn. An English gentleman, after reading those remarks, has written to us, giving a sad illustration of misdirected zeal, which had arisen from the reading of such newspaper letters.

During the previous winter, he was one of a party that spent a few days on the banks of a favourite salmon river in Wales. The party were all enthusiastic anglers; and, fired by the recent outcry against the ousel, they made a raid upon these birds, killing thirty in one day. Like the ‘Jeddart justices’ of old, the party then proceeded to convict the slain; when, lo! on examination by one of their number—a well-known English analyst—not a grain of salmon roe could be found in all the thirty crops examined, though it was then the height of the salmon spawning season. Like Llewelyn, after slaying Gelert, they had time to repent, ‘For now the truth was clear.’ They had slain the innocent, which feed upon insects that prey on salmon ova. They had therefore killed one of the salmon’s best protectors.

No better instance could be adduced of the caution with which popular theories in natural history should be received. But besides branding the innocent little ousel as a salmon-destroyer, some writers went so far as to assert that the bird had no song, and was not worth listening to. The best observers fortunately have defended the bird against the charge of being songless; and in respect to its alleged crime of eating salmon-roe, the evidence above given is surely conclusive in favour of its innocence.

The water-ousel is one of our most unique birds. It is a wader and a diver, and though not web-footed, by using its wings it can propel itself under water. Its habits are always a delightful study to the observer. The domed nest, with its snow-white eggs, is a wonderful structure; and there is a fascination in watching the bird tripping in and out of the water in pursuit of its food, popping overhead ever and again, and reappearing for a moment, only to dive and reappear elsewhere. When rivers are largely frozen over, it is interesting to see how boldly the little bird dives from the edge of an ice-sheet into a stream two feet or more in depth, how long it can remain under water, and how often it rises to breathe and dive again without leaving the stream. The singing of the water-ousel is low, but remarkably sweet, and long-continued in the winter-time of the year, when no other bird but the redbreast is heard; and when trilled out, as the notes frequently are in the clear frosty air, as the bird sits perched on a rocky projection, or takes its rapid flight up or down the stream, they sound clear and melodious.

THE WATER-OUSEL’S SONG.

Whitter! whitter! where the water
Leaps among the rocks,
And the din of the linn
Swelling thunder mocks,
Cheerily and merrily
I sing my roundelay,
Whitter! whitter! bright or bitter
Be the winter day!

Whitter! whitter! down the water
Speeding with the stream,
Snow around wraps the ground
In a silent dream!
Wood and hill, all are still,
Birds as mute as clay,
Whitter! whitter! what is fitter
For a winter day?

Whitter! whitter! in the water
Busily I ply;
Ice and snow come and go,
Nought a care have I.
Mountain waters flee their fetters,
So I feed and play,
Whitter! whitter! pitter! pitter!
All the winter day.

Whitter! whitter! o’er the water
Still and smooth and deep,
Round the pool, clear and cool,
Where the shadows sleep,
Snowy breast, shadow-kissed,
Whirring on its way,
Whitter! whitter! titter! titter!
Ho! the winter day!

Whitter! whitter! through the water,
By the miller’s wheel,
Where the strong water’s song
Rings a merry peal;
Wet or dry, what care I,
Sporting in the spray?
Whitter! whitter! twitter! twitter!
Flies the winter day.

Whitter! whitter! with the water
Where the burnies run,
’Mong the hills, where the rills
Dance unto the sun,
In the nooks, where the brooks
Ripple on for aye,
Whitter! whitter! bright or bitter
Be the winter day!

J. H. P.

BOOK GOSSIP.

We have on more than one occasion drawn attention in these pages to the good work which Miss Ormerod is accomplishing by the dissemination of knowledge on the subject of insect life as it affects agriculture. She has now published a _Guide to Methods of Insect Life, and Prevention and Remedy of Insect Ravage_ (London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.), which cannot fail greatly to advance the object she has in view. The _Guide_ was written at the request of the Institute of Agriculture, and its chief purpose is to give some information on the habits, and means of prevention, of crop insects. The book is written in a style which will render it useful to agriculturists, gardeners, and others, even although they happen to have no scientific knowledge whatever of entomology. The various insects, their eggs and larvæ, are described in terms as free from scientific terminology as is possible; and such scientific terms as must occasionally be used are explained in a glossary at the end of the book. The illustrations are numerous; and between these and the verbal descriptions given, no difficulty should at any time be felt in identifying any particular insect pest, and applying to it the treatment which the author suggests. The methods of prevention are mainly taken from the reports which Miss Ormerod has been in the habit of receiving annually from a large number of agriculturists, so that the reader has here, in one little book, the united experience and observations of a large body of practical men.

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Last year we had the pleasure of publishing in this _Journal_ two papers on the subject of Shetland and its Industries, by Sheriff Rampini, of Lerwick. Since then, the same gentleman has delivered two lectures before the Philosophical Institution, Edinburgh, which lectures are now published in a neat little volume, under the title of _Shetland and the Shetlanders_ (Kirkwall: William Peace and Son). In the papers which appeared in our pages, the author confined himself to the industries of the island, its agriculture and fisheries; in these lectures, however, he gives himself greater scope, and treats of the history, traditions, and language of the people, introducing many anecdotes characteristic of them and of their habits.

OCCASIONAL NOTES.

AMERICAN LITERARY PIRACY.

In the _London Figaro_, the editor thus writes: Those literary men who are agitating for a copyright convention with the United States have doubtless suffered in the following way, which seems to me particularly hard on some of the authors of this country. I am, let it be assumed, then, the writer of a number of short stories, which, at anyrate, for the purposes of my statement, I will conclude to have been good enough to earn sufficient popularity to bring them within the purview of the American book pirates. Very well—my stories are taken as quickly as they appear and published in the States, not only in a book-form, but in all the principal newspapers which devote some of their columns to fiction.

For this honour I, of course, receive never a cent, and that is a distinct hardship, I take it. But that is not all. My stories having appeared in the States, slightly altered to suit American tastes, and without my name attached, are read and admired by the editors of English provincial journals, who straightway proceed to cut out the fictions in question, and alter them back again, to suit the idiosyncrasies of their British readers. Thus my handiwork appears a second time in this country; and in not one, but possibly a dozen or a score of provincial newspapers.

The result is this. When I go, a month or two after, and offer a collection of my short stories to a London publisher, he reads them, and replies in effect: ‘Yes, I like your stories very well; but what is the use of my publishing them, when they have appeared in half the country papers in the kingdom?’ It is in vain I explain. The injury has been done; and an apology from the country editors is but a slight and unsatisfactory atonement for an act which has kept me out of scores or hundreds of pounds.

Besides this, there are other publishers who, seeing that my fiction appears in the _Little Pedlington Mirror_ or the _Mudborough Gazette_, mentally determine that my calibre as a writer cannot be very great if I am reduced to dispose of my copy to such papers as these. And therefore, through no fault of my own, but, as a matter of fact, in actual consequence of my success, my reputation as a writer is positively injured in quarters in which it is most important to me it should be sustained. I have been describing incidents which have really occurred, I may add; and I think that the grievance is one that needs serious attention, with a view to its redress.

[The editor of _Figaro_ has our fullest sympathy. We, too, are
the victims of American malpractices. Many of the short stories
which appear in _Chambers’s Journal_ are copied into the
American newspapers without leave, and _without acknowledgment
of the source whence taken_. These papers reach Great Britain
with the purloined material, which our provincial press in
turn transfers to its pages. Expostulation is of no avail:
the British journalist sees a story in an American newspaper
which will suit his purpose, and at once takes possession of
property, which of course he believes to be American (and
therefore legitimate spoil), but which has in reality been paid
for and previously published by ourselves. We thus doubtless
lose many subscribers, who, finding our Tales and Stories given
at full length in the penny papers, are pleased to have them at
a slightly cheaper rate than the original.—_ED. Ch. Jl._]

SOWING AND HARVESTING.

Farmers, besides being subject to the risks incurred by all engaged in commercial enterprises, are in addition peculiarly dependent on the very variable weather of our climate. In 1877, Professor Tanner was deputed by the Science and Art Department to make an inquiry into the conditions regulating the growth of barley, wheat, and oats. He found that on a certain farm the portion of the barley-crop which was harvested in fine harvest-weather yielded per acre forty bushels, each of which weighed fifty-six pounds; while on the same farm the part harvested after some rain had fallen—in bad harvest-weather—also yielded forty bushels per acre; but in this case each bushel weighed only forty pounds—thus showing that there was a loss of six hundred and forty pounds of food on each acre. Barley is also peculiarly sensitive to the condition of its seed-bed. Two parts of the same field were sown with similar seed; but in one case the seed was got down in good spring-weather, and in the other, after heavy rain; and the result was that the former grew freely, and yielded per acre forty bushels, weighing fifty-eight and a half pounds each; while in the latter case the seed never grew freely, and yielded per acre only twenty-four bushels, weighing fifty-four pounds per bushel—thus showing a loss of one thousand and forty-four pounds of grain per acre.

In the case of wheat, and particularly of the finer varieties, the losses arising from bad harvest-weather tell very materially on the prices. Of the same crop of fine white wheat grown in 1877 under similar conditions, the part harvested in good weather yielded per acre forty bushels, each weighing sixty-six pounds; while the part which could not be harvested before being damaged by rain yielded an equal number of bushels; but the weight of each bushel was decreased by five pounds, and this latter was sold at two-and-sixpence per bushel lower than the former. Besides this, if ungenial weather should prevent the farmer sowing his wheat in good time, the yield is still further lessened, if indeed he does not deem it expedient to sow barley instead.

One would think that oats—the hardiest of our cereals—would suffer little from the effects of bad weather; but in a case in which two portions of oats grown under similar conditions were examined, it was found that the portion harvested in good weather produced thirty-three bushels, each weighing forty-one and a half pounds; while that stacked after some rain had fallen was found to give thirty-two bushels, weighing thirty-nine and a half pounds each.

RUSSIAN LONGEVITY.

From a correspondent, who has passed some years in Russia, we learn that in the village of Velkotti, in the St Petersburg government, an old woman is living who has just attained her one hundred and thirtieth birthday! The old lady is in the enjoyment of good health, but complains of her deafness (and no wonder). Her hair is still long and plentiful, considering her age. She spent her youth in great poverty, but is now pretty well off. She has outlived three husbands; and has had a family of nineteen children, all of whom have been married, and are now dead, the last one to die being a daughter of ninety-three. She lives with one of her great-grandchildren, a man of fifty.

Our correspondent also informs us that a few months ago an unusually curious wedding took place in Ekaterinoslav, in Russia. The bridegroom was sixty-five years old, the bride sixty-seven. By former marriages, each of them have children and grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren, living in the same town. The bridegroom’s father, now in his one hundred and third year, and the bride’s mother, in her ninety-sixth year, are still alive, and were at the wedding.

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The Conductor of CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL begs to direct the attention of CONTRIBUTORS to the following notice:

_1st._ All communications should be addressed to the ‘Editor, 339
High Street, Edinburgh.’

_2d._ For its return in case of ineligibility, postage-stamps
should accompany every manuscript.

_3d._ MANUSCRIPTS should bear the author’s full _Christian_ name,
Surname, and Address, legibly written; and should be written on
white (not blue) paper, and on one side of the leaf only.

_4th._ Offerings of Verse should invariably be accompanied by a
stamped and directed envelope.

_If the above rules are complied with, the Editor will do his best to insure the safe return of ineligible papers._

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Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON, and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.

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_All Rights Reserved._