286 NATURAL HISTORY 



into his sight, and twinkling like stars as they turned 

 their sides towards the sun. 



How far this wonderful shower extended would be 

 difficult to say; but we know that it reached Bradley, 

 Selborne, and Alresford, three places which lie in a sort 

 of a triangle, the shortest of whose sides is about eight 

 miles in extent. 



At the second of those places there was a gentleman 

 (for whose veracity and intelligent turn we have the 

 greatest veneration) who observed it the moment he 

 got abroad; but concluded that, as soon as he came 

 upon the hill above his house, where he took his morn- 

 ing rides, he should be higher than this meteor, which 

 he imagined might have been blown, like thistle-down, 

 from the common above: but, to his great astonishment, 

 when he rode to the most elevated part of the down, 

 three hundred feet above his fields, he found the webs 

 in appearance still as much above him as before ; still 

 descending into sight in a constant succession, and 

 twinkling in the sun, so as to draw the attention of the 

 most incurious. 



Neither before nor after was any such fall observed ; 

 but on this day the flakes hung in the trees and hedges 

 so thick, that a diligent person sent out might have 

 gathered baskets full. 



The remark that I shall make on these cobwebliko 

 appearances, called gossamer, is, that, strange and 

 superstitious as the notions about them were formerly, 

 nobody in these days doubts but that they are the real 

 production of small spiders, which swarm in the fields 

 in fine weather in autumn, and have a power of shoot- 

 ing out webs from their tails so as to render themselves 

 buoyant and lighter than air. But why these apterous 

 insects should that day take such a wonderful aerial 

 excursion, and why their webs should at once become 

 so gross and material as to be considerably more weighty 

 than air, and to descend with precipitation, is a matter 

 beyond my skill. If I might be allowed to hazard a 



