5 MECHANICAL FUNCTIONS. 



subject ; for it was generally believed that such showers 

 undoubtedly prognosticated some direful event, and 

 hence they were received as miraculous warnings, or 

 special interpositions of providence in the affairs of 

 men. Under such a belief, we can hardly wonder that 

 few or none could be found, who were so bold, or per- 

 haps wicked, as to attempt to account for such occurren- 

 ces on natural principles. Such conduct would have 

 been a virtual denial of the miracle itself, or at least a 

 fool hardy attempt to explain the acknowledged special 

 communications of heaven by a reference to the ordi- 

 nary laws of nature. 



It is true that in the time of Hippocrates, a learned 

 doctor named Garceus, declared it as his opinion, that 

 blood-rain, was common rain boiled by the heat of the 

 sun, but with this exception, we find no expressions of 

 doubt with respect to the miracle, or at least no attempt 

 to solve the mystery, from the time of Cicero to that of 

 the celebrated naturalist Reaumur, in the beginning of 

 the seventeenth century. 



Before we proceed to the explanation, it may be 

 proper to remark, that so far as we know, all the ancient 

 accounts of bloody rain, fail entirely with respect to 

 the detail of attending circumstances. We are not in- 

 formed whether such showers fell from thick clouds, ac- 

 companied with lightning and thunder. Whether they 

 fell by night or by day, or indeed whether the red drops 

 were ever seen to descend, or whether they were first 

 discovered on the leaves of plants, and on stones and 

 fences. Hence we may fairly conclude that the fall of 

 bloody showers have only been inferred from appear- 

 ances on, or near the ground. 



It is now known that there are several species of But- 

 terfly which emit red drops, immediately after their emer- 

 gence from the chrysalis, as the Papilio Io,or the peacock 

 Butterfly ; the Papilio urticse, and several others. 



The report of Reaumur to which we have before al- 

 luded, and which accounts satisfactorily for these bloody 

 showers, is as follows. In the beginning of July 1608, 

 the people of Aix la Chapelle, w r ere in the utmost alarm 

 from what they thought a shower of blood, that had 

 fjajlen in, the suburbs, and some miles around the place. 



