THE STORY OF THE NOVEMBER METEORS. 447 



in this way without obstruction through the depths of space, are ready 

 to yield at once the due amount of obedience to the attraction of the 

 sun. Accordingly, each meteor which traverses the elliptic orbit 

 represented in the diagram, mends its pace so long as it is gliding 

 along that half of its course in which it is approaching the sun, because 

 here the sun is drawing it forward as well as sideways ; and the for- 

 ward attraction increases its velocity, while the sideward attraction 

 bends its path into the oval form. The meteor takes upward of six- 

 teen years to traverse this part of its orbit, and all this time its 

 velocity is on the increase. It has attained its greatest speed when it 

 reaches the point of its orbit which is closest to the sun, near to which 

 is the place where it crosses the earth's path. As it passes this point 

 its velocity is twenty-seven miles a second. The earth moves at the 

 rate of nineteen miles a second in very nearly the opposite direction, 

 so that if the meteor happen to strike the earth, the velocity of its 

 approach is the sum of these two numbers, or forty-six miles a second; 

 and it is at this enormous speed that it plunges into our atmosphere. 



