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stile rain. It may rise from various causes. Some- 

 times cold alone condenses a warm cloud. But it is 

 generally wind which presses the cloud so close together, 

 that the particles of water unite in large drops, which 

 being speciiicaliy heavier than the air, can no longer be 

 suspended by it. 



But by what power are the drops of rain so equally 

 dispersed ? This may he shewn by an easy experiment. 

 Put a quantity of brass-dust into an electric phial. 

 When this is charged, invert it, and throw some of the 

 dust out. This will be spread over a flat surface, with 

 exact uniformity, and wiii fall just like rain or snow. It 

 is highly probable this is the case with the clouds, 

 Being highly electrified, they of course spread their con 

 tents equally over the surface of the earth. 



Again ; how comes it to pass, that we have not con- 

 stantly either too much or too little rain in any one 

 place 1 It is not chance, which can never steer clear of 

 extremes. It is the hand of Providence. There is no 

 other rational way of accounting for such an economy 

 in the clouds. Such a just and necessary distillation and 

 distribution of water from the grand alembic of the at- 

 mosphere, could never proceed, but from the superin- 

 tendance and direction of that Omnipotent Chymist, in 

 whose hands are "all the secondary powers of nature, to 

 vary their operations, as he sees most conducive to the 

 general good of mankind. 



Bloody rains, as they have been sometimes called, seem 

 to be only the excrements of insects. ' Accordingly Gas- 

 sendus gives us an account of a bloody rain in France, 

 which much ter/ified the people. But upon enquiry, it 

 was found only to be red drops, coming from a sort of 

 butterflies, which flew about in great numbers. 



During a scarcity in Silesia, a rumour was spread, 

 of its raining millet-seed. But it was 'soon found to-be 



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