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128 in all probability by chemical degradation—these and other causes have been appealed to as the most probable. One highly remarkable fact is that volcanic and earthquake-shaken regions are almost always adjacent to areas of depression. The greatest area of depression in the world is the Pacific basin; and accordingly round its borders, from Kamchatka through the Kuriles to Japan, thence through a line of small islands to the Philippines and to Java, then eastward to New Zealand, and right up the western coast of South America, is grouped the mightiest array of volcanoes that the world contains. Another fact of interest is the greater occurrence of earthquakes during the winter months, This has been explained by Dr. Knott as the result of "the annual periodicity of two well-known meteorological phenomena namely, snow accumulations over continental areas, and barometric gradients."

Japanese history is a concatenation of earthquake disasters, exceeded only by those which have desolated South America. But the Japanese people had perforce submitted to these ravages, without attempting to investigate the causes of earthquakes scientifically. All they had done was to record anecdotes and superstitions connected with the subject, one of the most popular of which latter (popular indeed in many parts of the world besides Japan) is that earthquakes are due to a large subterranean fish, which wriggles about whenever it wakes up. Another notion commonly entertained, and embodied in the following doggerel verse, is that certain other occurrences can be foreknown from the hour at which a shock takes place: