The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1900-09-19

stables for her. The, hired horse SEEM
ed as timid and weak as her own. The
driver then said that all the animals
were "off their feed" A monkey and
other pets at a. villa near Villefranche
on the day before the shock which de-
stroyed much life and property, re-
fused to enter the house where they
were generally anxious to come. They
were all spiritless, dull and scared. A
small lapdog which usually sat on the
arm OF the masters chair at meals re-
fused to occupy its usual seat. But per-
hapS the most strikin gevidence that
the animals We're in a state of fear was
that the cows in the dairies supplying.
the coast resorts seemed terrified and
the quantity and quality of milk suf-
| fered
On the chalk range which overhangs
tShirburn and extends along the Thames
one of the most extraordinary and uni
versAl panics ever known among do
mestic animals in this country occurred
quite recently, panic which can only
be explained on the superstition that
they felt the premonition of an earth
quake or one of those subterranean
sounds which sometimes precede earth
quakes. These bills are a series of
sheep farms, the flocks being part of
the regular local system of agriculture
That no earthquake shock was felt does
not make it impossible that the sheep
felt or heard some of the common pre-
monitions of earthquake. Nothing is
more probable than that the whisper
ings of earth and air, to which we are
deaf, are heard by the keener animal
! ears. The supposition that they have
a sixth sense" by hypothesis which
arouseS degree of irritation difficult
to account for in some minds, need not
be raised in this case any more than
in the instances in which animals are
obviously conscious of coming storms
If many human beings are uneasy at
such times and declare that they feel
: a thunder storm coming, there need be
, no doubt whatever that many animals
, are far longer, earlier, and more acute
l ly alive to the heat and electric tension
before a soming cyclone.
The almost simultaneous appearance
!. of birds migrating to northern regions
E from distant ATTITUDES when the frost
has given in the far north is now
known to be due to their sensitiveness
e to the rise of temperature which oc-
fcurs over great areas, and which they
: instantly read as a summons Mean
s time, We have as yet nothing more
i than conjecture to account for the
power of direction when birds are mi
e grating If they made their journeys
J. by daylight the great height at which
n they are able to fly might account for
t their performances. They could posi-
, DlS see Lar enough 10 SulQe them IRON
:. point to point or watch others flying
$ as the vultures watch other vultures
. moving to their prey from high plane:
:. of air. But while they fly by night ant
: often at only a little height above the
surface of the water, we can hardly
believe that sight is used. Moreover
pigeons, even when trained over Ger
tain spaces of land and sea, can onl,
fly and use this acquired knowledge a.
q long as daylight lasts
II we are to fall back on the hypothe
sis of the sixth sense we must emplo,
j. it not to account for animal prescienc
y of disturbances of earth and air, blu
y to explain the means by which a tiny
II golden-crested wren will fly across tn
" North sea on a winter night and com
. fiickering in at daybreak over the bill
e lows at that particular point of sand
II hills or Single which che other an
/ swift-Hying birds have always selecte
d as their most suitable alighting place.
N London Spectator.