Ifth A HISTORY OF 



wished for by the husbandman, to clear the air, and to kill number- 

 less insects that are noxious to vegetation. Hail is the most injurious 

 meteor that is known in our climate ; but it seldom visits us with vio- 

 lence, and then its fury is but transient. 



One of the most dreadful storms we hear of,* was that of Hert- 

 fordshire, in the year 1697- It began by thunder and lightning, which 

 continued for some hours, when suddenly a black cloud came forward, 

 against the wind, and marked its passage with devastation. The hail- 

 stones which it poured down, being measured, were found to be many 

 of them fourteen inches round, and, consequently, as large as a bowl- 

 ing-green ball. Wherever it came, every plantation fell before it ; it 

 tore up the ground, split great oaks, and other trees, without number; 

 the fields of rye were cut down, as if levelled with a scythe ; wheat, 

 oats, and barley, suffered the same damage. The inhabitants found 

 but a precarious shelter, .even in their houses, their tiles and windows 

 being broke by the violence of the hailstones, which, by the force 

 with which they came, seemed to have descended from a great height. 

 The birds, in this universal wreck, vainly tried to escape by flight ; 

 pigeons, crows, rooks, and many more of the smaller and feebler 

 kinds, were brought down. An unhappy young man, who had not 

 time to take shelter, was killed ; one of his eyes was struck out of his 

 head, and his body was all over black with the bruises ; another had 

 just time to escape, but not without the most imminent danger, his 

 body being bruised all over. But what is most extraordinary, all this 

 fell within the compass of a mile 



Mezeray, in his history of France, tells us of a shower of hail much 

 more terrible, which happened in the year 1510, when the French 

 monarch invaded Italy. There was, for a time, a horrid darkness, 

 thicker than that of midnight, which continued till the terrors of man- 

 kind were changed to still more terrible objects, by thunder and 

 lightning breaking the gloom, and bringing on such a shower of hail, 

 as no history of human calamities could equal. These hailstones were 

 of a bluish colour ; and some of them weighed not less than a hun- 

 dred pounds. A noisome vapour of sulphur attended the storm. All 

 the birds and beasts of tho country were entirely destroyed. Num- 

 bers of the human race suffered the same fate. But what is still more 

 extraordinary, the fishes found no protection from their native ele- 

 ment ; but were equal sufferers in the general calamity. 



These, however, are terrors that are seldom exerted in our mild 

 climates. They only serve to mark the page of history with wonder : 

 and stand as admonitions to mankind, of the various stores of punish- 

 ment in the hands of the Deity, which his power can treasure up, and 

 his mercy can suspend. 



In the temperate zones, therefore, meteors are rarely found thus 

 terrible ; but between the tropics, and near the poles, they assume 

 very dreadful and various appearances. In those inclement regions, 

 where cold and heat exert their chief power, meteors seem peculiarly 

 to have fixed their residence. They are seen there in a thousand 

 ferrifying forms, astonishing to Europeans, yet disregarded by the na- 



PhiL Trans, vol. ii. p 147. 



