The Fairy-Land of Science

"Sometimes it fell Among the moss with hollow harmony, Dark and profound; now on the polished stones It danced; like childhood laughing as it went." The broad deep river, on the contrary, makes none of these cascades and commotions. The only places against which it rubs are the banks and the bottom; and here you can sometimes hear it grating the particles of sand against each other if you listen very carefully. But there is another reason why falling water makes a sound, and often even a loud roaring noise in the cataract and in the breaking waves of the sea. You do not only hear the water dashing against the rocky ledges or on the beach, you also hear the bursting of innumerable little bladders of air which are contained in the water. As each of these bladders is dashed on the ground, it explodes and sends sound-waves to your ear. Listen to the sea some day when the waves are high and stormy, and you cannot fail to be struck by the irregular bursts of sound. The waves, however, do not only roar as they dash on the ground; have you never noticed how they seem to scream as they draw back down the beach? Tennyson calls it, "The scream of the madden'd beach dragged down by the wave;" and it is caused by the stones grating against each other as the waves drag them down. Dr. Tyndall tells us that it is possible to know the size of the stones by the kind of noise they make. If they are large, it is a confused noise, when smaller, a kind of scream; while a gravelly beach will produce a mere hiss.