Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 28.djvu/147

Rh pines. The Humberg is more than twenty miles from the nearest Alpine summit, yet the plants appropriate to such a situation are represented, not by individuals, but by a large mass of plants that appear to be perfectly acclimated. The mystery is heightened by the fact that in a neighboring mountain district of considerable higher altitude, which borders on a really Alpine region, only a small number of Alpine plants are found. Similar anomalies have been remarked in the Pyrenees. Many Alpine plants can and doubtless do live and thrive in lower situations than their habitual ones, and their general absence from such places is probably rather due to their being crowded out, and the ground possessed by the species more peculiarly fitted to the locality than to any positive unfitness of their own. But if a mountain is suddenly raised up or depressed, the entire vegetation growing upon it is transported to a new region. It will then offer a long and sturdy resistenceresistance [sic] to the rival species that may come in to dispute with it for occupancy; and this resistance may in the end last long enough for the species to become acclimated to the new conditions, when they will reproduce themselves, and the phenomena under consideration will be manifested.

Metal-Working Art in Cashmere.—Herr Carl von Ujfalvy, who has been exploring in the western Himalayas, asserts that the Cashmereans must be regarded as the noblest of the Indian races. "At least," he says, "it must be admitted that a people that prepares its food in handsome kettles of beaten and carved copper, adorned with tasteful engravings, drinks its tea and coffee from elegantly shaped pots, and uses showily decorated pitchers and cups, and beaten and enameled dishes, vases, pipes, candlesticks, lamps, tea-vessels, and plates, and engraved spittoons, must have a peculiar artistic gift. What is more remarkable is that objects of such character are in daily use, not only in the mansions of the rich, but also in the peasants' huts; and any one who takes this fact into consideration must say that we have to do with a particularly endowed race of Aryans, who, too small in numbers and too weak to contend with the barbarians, have found satisfaction in devoting themselves to art. When we reflect," adds Herr von Ujfalvy, "that all the household utensils in High Asia, Persia, and India, and the innumerable idols in the latter country are made of beaten or cast metal, we may be able to form an approximate idea of the importance and extension of this industry in all those countries." Copper is the basis of these industries, either pure, in hammered, beaten, and carved forms, or alloyed or set off with gold, silver, steel, tin, lead, or zinc. In Turkistan a yellow, in Kashgar a red, in Cashmere an ornamented red metal is worked. Yellow metal is here of very ancient origin. The metal industry is most extensively developed and most flourishing in Cashmere and there no difference is recognized between art-work and mechanical work, and it is therefore not strange that we should so frequently meet with real masterpieces of art.

Blind Men's Dreams.—How do the blind dream? is discussed by Mr. B. G. Jones, in the (English) "National Review." In nearly all ordinary dreams we imagine we see something—persons or things, or both. This can not happen with the blind, who have no conception of things that are seen; or, if they were not born blind, of things that they had not seen before they lost their sight. The blind man may recall a person or a place, but his recollection can only be commensurate with what he has obtained by the senses of touch, hearing, or smell. A blind boy dreamed of his brother who was dead. He knew him by his voice, and he also knew he was in the fields with him, for he felt himself treading upon the grass and smelling the fresh air. His idea of a field could not possibly roach much beyond this. Another person dreamed he was in his workshop; he knew this by sitting on a box, and by the tools which were in it. A blind tramp paid when he dreamed it was just the same as when he was awake—he dreamed of hearing and touching. A blind man is mentioned who dreamed of a ghost, and this is the way he told his story: "I heard n voice at the door, and I said, 'Bless me, if that ain't John!' and I took him by the sleeve; it was his shirt-sleeve I felt; and I was half-afeared of him, and surprised he was out weeks before his time.