Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/259

Rh fox romance began to be current in Europe, the fox, with his thievery, was odious to those peoples which, like the Germans, held brute force in high esteem. To call a man Reynard was regarded among the Franks as a grave offense, to which the Salic law attached a severe penalty. The negroes of Africa, on the other hand, set astuteness away above force. This idea dominates in all their literary production with which we are acquainted; and this confirms the assertions of travelers, who agree in saying that the Africans, when they try to get rid of their enemies, use force only when cunning fails. Herr Olpp cites the following fable of the tribe of the Nama: It came to pass one day that the jackal, having made away with some object, fell into the hands of the white man. He was carefully bound and condemned to death. Then the jackal asked his judges, 'How do white men perform executions?' They answered, 'We beat the culprits to death with clubs.' The jackal replied: 'It is a very poor way of putting people to death; take my advice: when you want to put anybody to death, begin by making him eat tallow and fat; then grease him outside, and make a fire on a rock; take him by the tail and throw him into the fire.' The white men did as the jackal had told them, but their hands slipped on his skin, and he escaped. Thereupon the dogs chased him, and the fugitive had barely time to get into a cave. The white men, who had come up, stuck their hands into the hole, and one of them took the jackal by the tail and called out, 'We have got you, we have got you!' The jackal said, 'Oh no, my friends, you have not got me, but a root.' The white man holding on to the tail answered, 'No, it is you.' The jackal answered: 'I tell you it is not me. Get a sharp stone and then come back and cut what you have in your hand. You will see that it is a root.' The white man ran to get a stone, and the jackal went farther into the cave. So he saved his life."

This very succinct summary of the researches of the students of folklore of the African school may go to show that thought does not abound in the traditions of the negro tribes; the few flowers that are found here and there form only a very poor garland.—Translated for the Popular Science Monthly from Minerva (Rome).

to the London Physical Society his observations on the Peak of Teneriffe, Prof. T. C. Porter g-ave an account of his method for measuring the diameter of the earth. It consists in observing the shadow cast by the peak upon the sea, and measuring the time that elapses between the moment when the apex of the shadow touches the sea horizon and the instant when it is eclipsed by the shadow of night. He observed, further, that the heated air ascending from the peak casts a shadow, seen as a faint prolongation of that of the peak.