THE GREAT BOMBARDMENT. 511 



This visitor created the greatest alarm and apprehension along 

 its path, the blaze of light being accompanied by repeated explosions 

 and detonations which sounded like the rumble and roar of cannonad- 

 ing. To some it appeared like the rattling of heavy teams over a 

 rough, rocky road; others believed subterranean explosions accom- 

 panied the fall. Horses ran away, stock hurried bellowing to cover, 

 and men, women, and children crouched in fear or fled before the 

 fiery visitor whose roar was distinctly heard several minutes after 

 it had disappeared. As the meteor crossed the Mississippi River the 

 noise of the explosions increased in severity, and were distinctly heard 

 sixty or seventy miles from its path, or a distance of one hundred 

 and forty miles apart. The great ball of flame remained intact as it 

 crossed five or six States, but as it passed over central Illinois loud 

 detonations were heard and the light spread out like an exploding 

 rocket with flashing points. This was the death and destruction of 

 the monster, and from here it dashed on, a stream or shower of count- 

 less meteors instead of a solid body, forming over Indiana and Ohio 

 a cluster over forty miles long and five in breadth, showing that while 



Coon Butte, on Slope of which Ten Tons of Meteoric Iron has been found, and 

 which was supposed to have been made by a meteor. 



the meteor had broken up it was still moving with great velocity. 

 How far it traveled is not known, as it was not seen to strike. Ob- 

 servers in Pennsylvania saw it rushing in the direction of ISTew York, 

 and people in that State, where the day was cloudy, heard strange 

 rumblings and detonations. Houses rattled, and the inhabitants 

 along the line the meteor was supposed to have passed accredited the 

 phenomena to an earthquake. Somewhere, perhaps in the forest 

 region of the Adirondacks, or in the Atlantic, lies the wreck of this 

 meteor. But one fragment was 'found. A farmer in Indiana, while 

 watching its passage heard the thud of a falling object, and going to 

 the spot the following morning found a small meteorite weighing two 

 thirds of a pound. 



This marvelous body was first observed in all probability in the 

 northwestern corner of the Indian Territory, possibly sixty or 

 seventy miles above the earth, and from here it dashed along with 

 repeated explosions, almost parallel to the earth's surface, disap- 

 pearing over New York. 



