STONES THAT SING AND STATUES THAT SPEAK.

Golden Bay Argus, Volume XIII, Issue 48, 28 April 1910, Page 2

STONES THAT SING AND STATUES THAT SPEAK.

SOUNDS .VARYING PROM THE HARP TO THUNDER. 1 , Man’s love of the marvellous and mysterious has been gratified by the discovery of stones and sand from which issued sounds, apparently of supernatural origin. The phenomena exhibit so great a variety that the vocal stones may be separated into a number of distinct classes. , One of the most remarkable of these groups is exemplified by a sand bank about GO feet high, on the south-west coast of the island of Hawaii. According to Mr. W. R. fr*rink, who has been investigating ''the phenomenon, a tone like that of |a melodeon is produced by moving jthe hand in a circle through the i loose sand. If the observer kneels, *with both hands in the sand, and ■elides down the bank, the sound becomes louder and louder until it re'sembJes distant thunder and alarms ■horses tethered near by. The loudest sound was produced when a ■ native lay prone on the sand and another native dragged him by the I heels down the bank, carrying a 'large quantity of sand down with him."

Dr. James Blake discovered, by examining with a microscope thin sections of the grains of sand, which are of volcanic origin, that each grain was perforated .by a narrow canal which, as a rule, was closed at one end. These peculiarly formed grains of sand appear to act as resonators, the air enclosed In them being set into vibration by the mutual friction of the grains. When the sand is damp the sound is not produced, because the friction is diminished, and many of the tubular cavities are filled with water.

The singing sands of Mt. Sinai pro bahly admit of a similar cxplapa tjon. Wellsted describes the sand as yielding beneath .the feet of n Bedouin climbing up tha slope, not fl'owing down In a continuous ream, hut breaking away in large masses. At first, the sound resembled the faint tones of an Aeolian harp stirred by a gentle breeze, but as the motion became more rapid the sound was like that produced by a wet. finger rubbed on the rim of a j wine glass,, and when the sand ar- ' ri' ’ t the foot of the mountain It. i c a noise like thunder, which shook the rock on which the t.ravel-,-at, and so terrified the camels uuu- it was difficult to bold them. founds, of a very different character and origin are emitted by certain rocky cliffs in the Harz Mounains and in the Pyrenees. Two precipitous cliffs in the Harz, Schierke, are called “The Snorers," irons the peculiar sounds which the Bputb-west tvind them. Sfcia faces of these marked by deep gullies, resemble organ pipes open In front,, and occasionally tbe front Is practically closed by a stratum of air held motionless between the cliff and' the trees which graze it, while tbe wind blown freely through tbe jtullles, or organ pipes, behind. 81nging stones are found in various parts of the world. Fraas. journeying frotu the Red Ses. to the Nile, saw a' round, thin fragment an inch In diameter, resembling a shell, split off, with a peculiar sound, from h. Hint which lay baking in the hot sun at his feet. This observation is very remarkable and perhaps unique, lot flints split gradually as a rule, but. the violent and rtolfey rupture nf the last bond under the influence or the sun's rays and In the preBence or an observer does not seem Impossible. Broken rliuls are common ixi the desert.. Many persons have heard the noise caused by similar fractures of hard rocks, and have seen the fragments roll down mountain slopes. Behai writes of the basalt, columns of the Oamangwato hills, iu South Airicu : “hi the evening, after « hot. day, it was not unusual to hear the basalt crack and 'fall wijth a peculiar ringing sound, from which the native inferred that the rock contained m/uch iron.”

; The story of a speaking stone has come down to us from ancient (Egypt. This stone was one of the ■twin colossal statues of Memnon at iThebes. According to the myth, iMemnon was the son of Eos, goddess ! of the dawn. He was turned to j stone, but still continued to greet |bis mother at sunrise. The statue, (however, seems to have extended jits greetings to earthly visitors of high rank. According to Balbilla, ! a literary lady attached to the court, of Hadrian, the statue greeted the emperor three times, the empress twice, and a Roman general once, greeting the emperor at his first visit, but compelling the others to come a second time before it (would condescend to speak. The |voic.e of the statue is described as resembling the sound of a blow struck on bronze.

The conscientious and trustworthy historian. Strabo', visited the statue, which was then partly destroyed, and writes that he heard a sound issuing from the vicinity of the remnant at sunrise, but that he could not positively state whether the sound came from the statue, its pedestal, or one of the attendants. Par.sanias. on the other hand, expresses no doubt that the sound, which be compares to that of a lyre, came from the statue.

HOW TRAVELLERS ARE DE CEIVED

One way in which MemnoD may have. beeD caused ..to speak was sug- • jgested by an experience of Profes!sor George Rosenfeld. He writes: 1 —"I visited the; statue not at sun* | rise,, but towards evening. A fellah asked if we wished to hear the ‘ music.’ We assented, and be clambered up the colossus and vanished in a cranny at the elbow. At once we beard loud sounds of so me- ;: v ■. / . . • v--.:■

tallic a character that I asked my donkey boy if the man was striking a bell. ‘No ; a bar of iron,’ the boy replied. Yet I read in a recent guide book : * Even now the guide’s hammer draws bell-like tones from the hard, resonant stone.’ If the guides can so deceive tbe makers of guide books; what wonder tbat Greek RomaD travellers were still more grossly deceived by the cunning Egyptian priests ? As a matter of fact, the sound produced by striking the stone is not at all metallic.

“My experience also suggests the reason why only one of the twin statues spoke, and why this one, though 1t retained its vocal powers after its upper part had been thrown to the ground by an earthquake in 27 8.C., became silent after its restoration by Septimius Severus about 200 A.D. The lower part of this statue may have possessed crannies like the one occupied by my musician, and these would naturally be filled in the process of restoration." —“Popular Science Siftings."