Miscellanies. 173 
Multiplying this number by four, and the resulting quantity by two, we 
obtain for the entire number which might have been at that place, 
had-the moon been absent, 440, or about nine times the average. It is 
unnecessary here to reduce the other reports in this way, as any one who 
chooses can do it for. himself. 
The observations on the position of the radiant point of this shower 
are not altogether satisfactory, and it will probably be advisable to wait 
for the better opportunity of determining this point which the meteoric 
shower of August 1839 will present, rather than to attempt to reconcile 
the accounts which have been already made public. Enough is known 
to prove that this radiant (as seen in this latitude) lies fifty degrees north 
of the point towards which the earth is at the time tending. This fact 
may perhaps intimate that the meteoric zone does not lie in the plane of 
the ecliptic. 
Neither‘can we yet decide on what day between the 8th and 12th of 
August the shower arrives at its maximum. The determination of this 
and other important features of the phenomenon must be italia to the 
coming year. 
robably still unacquainted with all those periods of the year at 
_stars occur in unusual numbers. It cannot be concealed, 
tof the sixth of December, 1798, Brandes alone saw these 
rate of 100 an hour for four hours. This display must 
ly. or quite equal to any August or November shower 
2n witnessed since 1833. It isa highly interestmg question, 
whether shooting stars do not now oceur im unusual numbers on or about 
this day of the year, and it is earnestly to be hoped that none of our ob- 
servers will suffer this period of the present year to pass without the most 
attentive inspection of the heavens. 
To the facts heretofore adduced in this Journal (Vol. xxxm1, p: 176— 
180 ; 354—364; 401, and Vol. xxx1v, p. 180—182) in proof of the oc- 
currence of «meteori shower in August, I add the testimony, 
h although not of the most satisfactory character, seems to merit 
per 
1. In Miss Harriet Martineau’s Retrospect of Western Travel, “yee 
ed. 2 vols. 12mo. N. Y. 1838,) Vol. 2, p..87, is the annexed account, 
pertaining to the evening of August 8, 1835 :—“ While the bright glow 
was still lingering in the valley, and the sky was beginning to melt from 
crimson to the pale seagreen of evening, I saw something sailing in the 
air like a glistening golden balloon. * * * It burst in a broad flash and 
shower of green fire. It was the most splendid meteor I ever saw. * * 
I saw an unusual number of falling-stars before we reached home.” 
2% in Capt. J. E. Alexander’s Transatlantic Sketches, (Amer. ed. 8vo. 
1833,) p. 102, in an account of the tremendous hurricane which 
