Meteors. 113 



panics a fall of hail. But the globes of 

 ice, or hail-stones, in a fall of hail, some- 

 times far exceed the usual size of the 

 'drops of rain ; which shews that by the 

 action of the wind, the congealed parti- 

 cles must be forced to adhere to each oth- 

 er ; and, in fact, though the small hail- 

 stones are more uniformly solid and glo- 

 bular, the large ones almost always con- 

 sist of a harder nucleus, which is sur- 

 rounded by a softer substance, and some- 

 times by various distinct pieces of ice t 

 just agglutinated. Their shape is sel- 

 dom perfectly globular. 



The phenomena of dew and hoar-frost 

 seem to proceed from a quantity of aque- 

 ous and undecomposed vapour which 

 always exists in the atmosphere ; and 

 which, being raised by mere heat, is con- 

 densed by mere cold, without undergo- 

 ing that process by which water is chan- 

 ged into air. 



If the cold be very intense, hoar-frost 

 appears instead of dew ; which is nothing 

 more than the dew frozen after it falls 

 upon the ground, in the same manner 

 that the vapour in a warm room congeals 

 on the inside of the windpws in a frosty 

 night. K 



