Miscellanies. 



385 



electricaly^ and of no uncommon character.^^f In a subsequent pa- 

 per, after reviewing the observations made by Prof. Olmsted, Mr. 

 Twining, and myself in America, and by Mr. White and himself in 

 England, the Rev. Mr. Clark thus concludes,J " one fact is at least 

 established by these seeming contradiqtions, viz. that common dec- 

 trical§ meteors did appear both in England and in America on the 

 same night, whilst there is no direct evidence to show that any others 

 also appeared-^' 



I have considered the opinion of Mr. Clark, of what he saw, as 

 - the more important, because his description of the direction of the 

 meteors is not very precise. He says they were in the direction of 

 a line from Leo to the star Mizar. This may mean that their paths 

 coincided w^ith this line, or merely, that they were parallel to it. 

 Taking the former statement as most favorable to the similarity of 

 this phenomenon to that of 1833, it would still however be very dif- 

 ferent from that, however remarkable in itself. That fifteen meteors 

 should fall precisely in the same line is certainly a curious fact, but 

 as certainly a very different one from the apparent convergence to a 

 single point of the paths of more than two hundred and seven thou- 

 sand, falling in different parts of the heavens. 



The Rev. Mr. Clark further states, that he saw one meteor which 

 appeared to pass to the south of Ursa Major and between Cor Ca- 

 roli and Arcturus, the most northern of these stars, being about 17^ 

 greater in north polar distance than Mizar. If this was one of the 

 fifteen meteors before alluded to, Mr. Clark probably intended his 

 description to apply to the general direction and not to the precise 

 position of their paths. This, however, is not important as far as 

 the inference in regard to the question between Prof. Olmsted ar^d 



ri r 



myself is concerned. 



The greatest number of meteors which Mr. Clark saw was fifteen 

 in fifteen minutes, or else he only observed fifteen minutes: which 

 is the correct supposition, his account leaves doubtful. The portion 

 C)f the heavens which his view embraced is also doubtful, he merely 

 states that he observed from a window. To make the hypothesis as 



• This term, which I used to denote the peculiarity in regard to the paths of 

 the meteors of 1833, has, I find, been misunderstood. I did not mean by its use 

 to express an opinion, that those meteors had a different physical cause from or- 

 dinary " shooting stars." t Loudon's Mag. Nat. Hist. Vol. VII, p. 655. 



t Loudon's Mag. Nat. Hist. Vol. VIII, pp. 420, 431. 



S This term electrical is in allusion to his theor}'. 



Vol. XXIX.— No. 2. 



49 



