REMARKABLE SHOWERS OF STARS. 



On more attentive inspection, it was seen that the meteors 

 exhibited three distinct varieties ; the first consisting of phos- 

 phoric lines, apparently described by a point ; the second of 

 large fire-batts, that at intervals darted along the sky, leaving 

 numerous trains, which occasionally remained in view for a 

 number of minutes, and in some cases for half an hour or more ; 

 the third, of undefined, luminous bodies, which remained nearly 

 stationary for a long time. 



One of the most remarkable circumstances attending this 

 display was, that the meteors all seemed to emanate from one 

 and the same point. They set out at different distances from 

 this point, and proceeded with immense velocity, describing, in 

 some instances, an arc of 30 or 40 in less than four seconds. 

 At Poland, on the Ohio, a meteor (of the third variety) was 

 distinctly visible in the north-east for more than an hour. At 

 Charleston, South Carolina, another of extraordinary size was 

 seen to course the heavens for a great length of time, and then 

 was heard to explode with the noise of a cannon. The point 

 from which the meteors seemed to emanate, was observed by those 

 who fixed its position among the stars to be in the constellation 

 Leo ; and what is very remarkable, this point was stationary 

 among the stars during the whole period of observation ; that 

 is to say, it did not move along with the earth in its diurnal 

 rotation eastward, but accompanied the stars in their apparent 

 progress westward. It is not certain whether the meteors were 

 in general accompanied by any peculiar sound. A few observers 

 reported that they heard a hissing noise, like the rushing of a 

 sky-rocket, and slight explosions, like the bursting of the same 

 bodies. Nor does it appear that any substance reached the 

 ground which could be clearly established to be a residuum or 

 deposit from the meteors. 



18. Attempts were made to obtain at least some approximation 

 to the number of shooting stars which appeared on this occasion. 

 At the time when they were presented in the greatest number, 

 an observer at Boston estimated them at about half the number 

 of the flakes which would be presented by a dense snow-storm. 

 "When they became considerably less dense, so as to allow being 

 distinctly observed, he counted in a vertical zone having the 

 breadth of 36 of azimuth, 650 in fifteen minutes ; but he 

 estimated this as not above two-thirds of the total number 

 which actually appeared in that interval, so that the total 

 number would have been 1000, and supposing them to prevail 

 uniformly throughout the entire hemisphere, the number 

 exhibited every quarter of an hour would be 10,000, being 

 at the rate of 40,000 per hour, and as the phenomenon 



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