300 SHOOTING-STARS. 



Phenomena electrical phenomenon, they would in all probability have 

 stars°aud 8 tiie resumed tne mention of them, and of other undisputed electric 

 means of phenomena occurring at or near to the same time with them, in 

 observing their subsequent and valuable papers or reports, in order to 

 shew such their concurrence in Mr. S.'s opinion. 



I have expressly mentioned, on different occasions, that it is 

 the largest class of bursting meteors, or those having trains of 

 stars after them, which are accompanied by falling meteoric 

 stones, and not the shooting-stars j " falling- stars" I conceive 

 to be an improper name for any of these phenomena. 



The great comparative scarcity of meteors, and of the stars 

 falling obliquely from them, indicative of their approaching 

 dispersion and end, are sufficiently consistent, and prove 

 nothing against my alleged connection of them with shooting- 

 stars, an extremely frequent, and as I conceive, a periodical 

 phenomenon. And here I would remark, that nearly all the 

 meteors which I or my friends have seen, as well as the shoot- 

 ing stars, have vanished, or ceased to appear, almost at once, in 

 clear parts of the sky, where they passed out of the atmosphere, 

 as I conceive, and have not passed behind clouds, as has very 

 commonly been said, in newspaper and other accounts. I 

 have not " travelled" far enough, even in theory, to have said, 

 or even conjectured, where the satellitulce, more than the moon 

 or large satellite of our planet, came from ; but by no means 

 can I admit the reasonings, that they came recently from the 

 moon's volcanos, or more anciently from a burst planet, con- 

 jectured by some, to have given rise to Ceres, Pallas, and Juno. 

 I entirely dissent from Mr. S.'s 4th alleged fact, at page 3(5, 

 and from the 4th, 5th, and 6th of those at page 37, as applied 

 tp shooting-stars. Mine is not a "planetary hypothesis," nor 

 is it opposed, I believe, to either the facts or analogy of these, 

 or other parts of the system of the universe, as now explained 

 on the principles of the universal gravitation of masses, whose 

 motions and present states are within the scope of our cogni- 

 zance, but not their origins. 



I remain, Sir, 



Your obedient Servant, 



JOHN FAREY, Sen. 

 12, Upper Crown Street, Westminster, 

 February 22d, 1813. 



