BOOK OF THE DAMNED 291 



suspension quite as notably as would icicles. In the Popular Science 

 News, 24-34, it is said that in 1869, near Tiflis, fell large hail- 

 stones with long protuberances. "The most remarkable point in 

 connection with the hailstones is the fact that, judging from our 

 present knowledge, a very long time must have been occupied in 

 their formation." According to the Geological Magazine, 7-27, this 

 fall occurred May 27, 1869. The writer in the Geological Maga- 

 zine says that of all theories that he had ever heard of, not one 

 could give him light as to this occurrence "these growing crystal- 

 line forms must have been suspended a long time" 



Again and again this phenomenon: 



Fourteen days later, at about the same place, more of these 

 hailstones fell. 



Rivers of blood that vein albuminous seas, or an egg-like com- 

 position, in the incubation of which this earth is a local center of 

 development that there are super-arteries of blood in Genesistrine: 

 that sunsets are consciousness of them: that they flush the skies 

 withi northern lights sometimes: super-embryonic reservoirs from 

 which life-forms emanate 



Or that our whole solar system is a living thing: that showers 

 of blood upon this earth are its internal hemorrhages 



Or vast living things in the sky, as there are vast living things in 

 the oceans 



Or some one especial thing: an especial time: an especial place. 

 A thing the size of the Brooklyn Bridge. It's alive in outer space 

 something the size of Central Park kills it 



It drips. 



We think of the ice fields above this earth: which do not, them- 

 selves, fall to this earth, but from which water does fall 



Popular Science News, 35-104: 



That, according to Prof. Luigi Palazzo, head of the Italian 

 Meteorological Bureau, upon May 15, 1890, at Messignadi, Cala- 

 bria, something the color of fresh blood fell from the sky. 



This substance was examined in the public-health laboratories of 

 Rome. 



It was found to be blood. 



"The most probable explanation of this terrifying phenomenon is 

 that migratory birds (quails or swallows) were caught and torn 

 in a violent wind." 



So the substance was identified as birds' blood 



What matters it what the microscopists of Rome said or had 



