BOOK OF THE DAMNED 231 



Lias: the phenomenon was seen by him, at Pernambuco, April n, 

 1860. 



Comptes Rendus, 50-1197: 



It was about noon sky cloudless suddenly the light of the sun 

 was diminished. The darkness increased, and, . to illustrate its in- 

 tensity, we are told that the planet Venus shone brilliant. But 

 Venus was of low visibility at this time. The observation that burns 

 incense to the New Dominant is: 



That around the sun appeared a corona. 



There are many other instances that indicate proximity of other 

 worlds during earthquakes. I note a few quake and an object in 

 the sky, called "a large, luminous meteor" (Quar. Jour. Roy. Inst., 

 5-132); luminous body in the sky, earthquake, and fall of sand, 

 Italy, Feb. 12 and 13, 1870 (La Science Pour Tous, 15-159); many 

 reports upon luminous object in the sky and earthquake, Connecti- 

 cut, Feb. 27, 1883 (Monthly Weather Review, Feb., 1883); lu- 

 minous object, or meteor, in the sky, fall of stones from the sky, 

 and earthquake, Italy, Jan. 20, 1891 (L'Astronomie, 1891-154); 

 earthquake and prodigious number of luminous bodies, or globes, in 

 the air, Boulogne, France, June 7, 1779 (Sestier, "La Foudre" 

 1-169) ; earthquake at Manila, 1863, and "curious luminous appear- 

 ance in the sky," (Ponton, "Earthquakes," p. 124). 



The most notable appearance of fishes during an earthquake is 

 that of Riobamba. Humboldt sketched one of them, and it's an 

 uncanny-looking thing. Thousands of them appeared upon the 

 ground during this tremendous earthquake. Humboldt says that 

 they were cast up from subterranean sources. I think not myself, 

 and have data for thinking not, but there'd be such a row arguing 

 back and forth that it's simpler to consider a clearer instance of the 

 fall of living fishes from the sky, during an earthquake. I can't 

 quite accept, myself, whether a large lake, and all the fishes in it, 

 was torn down from some other world, or a lake in the Super- 

 Sargasso Sea, distracted between two pulling worlds, was dragged 

 down to this earth 



Here are the data: 



La Science Pour Tous, 6-191: 



Feb. 1 6, 1 86 1. An earthquake at Singapore. Then came an 

 extraordinary downpour of rain or as much water as any good- 

 sized lake would consist of. For three days this rain or this fall of 

 water came down in torrents. In pools on the ground, formed by 

 this deluge, great numbers of fishes were found. The writer says 



