<62 ST. JAGO.
years ago, as it is mentioned by Pliny to be a fact indisputably
established long before his time.
For wise and good purposes, and no doubt with a beneficial
design, though not comprehended and on that account too
often arraigned by weak presumptuous man, the same system
of mutual destruction prevails among the animals of the deep
as among those of the land. The dorado, the bonetta, and
the albecor, are prey for the all-devouring shark; and these,
in their turn, are the determined enemies of the flying fish;
and though nature has bountifully supplied the latter with a
pair of wing-like fins, which, by enabling it to spring into the
air, sometimes assist its escape from its hungry pursuers,
yet there are so many enemies among the feathered race
ready to souse upon it in it's new element, as the phaeton,
the pelican, the procellaria, diomedea, and a number of
others, that in taking this flight it may justly be said
« Incidit in Syllam cupiens vitare Charybdim.”
The flying fish seems not to be endued with the discretionary
power of altering the direction of its flight from that of a
straight line, nor of continuing many seconds of time out of
the water- Sometimes a whole shoal will fly against a ship,
and many of them drop upon the deck ! which led a pious
missionary to observe, that Providence had created flying fish
for the support of those of the holy brotherhood who might
have occasion to cross the ocean during Lent
S T. J A G O. 63
The fine weather and smooth water in this part of the voyage
gave us an opportunity of ascertaining a fact, which, though
well known to philosophers and to most seamen and satisfactorily
explained on natural principles, is not by any means
in general belief. I allude to the experiment of sinking, to a
certain depth, an empty bottle corked as tightly as possible;
when the cork, on drawing up the bottle, will invariably be
found to have been forced into the inside. We let down, to
the depth of forty fathoms or 240 feet, a large earthen bottle
firmly stopped with a tapering cork, so that the diameter of
that part of it out of the bottle greatly exceeded the widest
part of the neck; round this, was laid a coating of melted
pitch, and the whole covered with canvas. On drawing up
the bottle the cork was in the inside. In tropical climates
the diminution of temperature, at so considerable a depth below
the surface, condensing the inclosed air, takes oil all
reaction against the weight of the superincumbent column of
water pressing on the cork, and thus aids the experiment;
but in high latitudes, where the air when corked up is probably
at the freezing temperature, whilst that below the surface
of the sea is warmer by eight, ten, or twelve degrees, the
increased elasticity, acting against the cork within, must require
the bottle to be sunk to a greater depth than m the
former case, before the experiment can succeed.
We were followed into Praya bay on the island of St. Jago
by four ships which had sailed from Dunkirk under French
colours, and an American from Nantucket, all bound for the
Southern Whale Fishery on the coasts of Lima and P e ru ;
h a v i n g also cargoes of clothing and other articles on board,