METEORS. 141 



rescue, and demonstrated that the period of 33|- 

 years was alone possible, and that the others 

 were untenable. These investigations, completed 

 in March 1867, proved the existence of a great 

 meteoric orbit extending to the orbit of Uranus. 

 Meanwhile Newton had predicted a meteoric 

 shower on the evening of November 13 and 

 morning of November 14, 1866. His prediction 

 was fulfilled. The shower was inferior to that of 

 1833, but was still a magnificent spectacle. Sir 

 Robert Ball, then employed at Lord Rosse's 

 Observatory, observed the shower, and records 

 the impossibility of counting the meteors. This 

 great shower attracted the attention of astron- 

 omers all over the world to the study of meteors. 

 Meanwhile Schiaparelli had been working at 

 the subject for some time, and in four letters 

 addressed to Secchi, towards the end of 1866, he 

 showed that meteors were members of the Solar 

 System, possessed of a greater velocity than that 

 of the Earth, and travelling in orbits resembling 

 those of comets, in the fact that they moved in no 

 particular plane, and that their motion was both 

 direct and retrograde. Schiaparelli computed 

 the orbit of the Perseids or August meteors, 

 and was astonished to find it identical with the 

 comet of August 1862. This was a proof of the 

 connection between these two apparently widely 



