METEORIC RIVERS OR WATERFALLS. 399 



except that he could barely distinguish the poles. He par- 

 ticularly noticed that he could see no drops of rain, but the 

 water seemed to descend in streams and sheets. The rain 

 was most copious between a quarter before six and a quarter 

 after six. In this half hour, he estimates the descent of 

 water to have exceeded twelve inches upon a level. At an 

 inn, thirty rods northward, the family were unable to see a 

 sloop, lying in the creek at the distance of twenty rods. 

 At another inn, close by, a man who stood for some time 

 at the door, could not see any part of a barn only four rods 

 distant. 



Some time after the clouds met, two persons observed a 

 water spont rising up from the river, and nearly opposite, 

 with a broad bottom. It ascended with a whirling motion 

 to the clouds, in the form of a pretty regular cone. The 

 innkeeper noticed, some time in the afternoon, two other 

 water spouts, from three fourths of a mile to a mile, up 

 stream. They rose up in like manner, with broad bottoms, 

 and terminated in points as they reached the clouds. They 

 could not recollect at what time these phenomena took 

 place. 



The whole quantity of water which fell at the Point is 

 estimated to have exceeded 15| inches, on a level. I am 

 persuaded this estimate is not too large. The rain extended 

 with equal or greater violence, eight miles west from the 

 Point, about three miles north, and seven miles south. On 

 the east side of the Hudson, at a little distance, it' did not 

 descend with peculiar violence, or in an unusual quantity. 

 At Athens, four miles north, it was far less severe than in 

 Catskill ; and at Cairo, ten miles west, it was light. Should 

 we, then, estimate the whole tract on which the rain de- 

 scended with peculiar violence, and in quantities never be- 

 fore known in that section since its first settlement, at eighty 

 square miles, we should not, probably, be very far from the 

 truth : and on this tract, I am persuaded } the water was 



