122 THP PEACOCK BUTTERFLY. 



Rivallo, 766 years before Christ, " it rained bloud 

 three dayes ; and then a great mortalitie caused almost 

 desolation." He afterwards writes,* " Brithricus, of 

 the blood of Cerdicus, w r as made king of the West 

 Saxons, (about A. D. 793,) and ruled seventeen yeares. 

 In his time it rained blood, which, falling on men's 

 cloathes, appeared like crosses." -f- 



There are two passages in Homer, which, however 

 poetical, are applicable to rain of this kind ; and the 

 accounts of the bloody sweat on some of the statues 

 of the gods, mentioned by Livy, must be referred to 

 the same phenomena ; as the predilection of those 

 ages for marvel, and the want of accurate investiga- 

 tion in the cases recorded, as well as the rare 

 occurrence of these atmospherical depositions in our 

 own times, incline us to include them among the 

 bloodred drops deposited by insects. 



Many accounts of occurrences of this kind are 

 recorded, but erroneously investigated, as related in 

 Roman history, prior to the birth of Christ. Dio 

 Cassius, in particular, considered, that the bloodrain 

 which fell in Egypt in the time of Octavian, must be 

 recorded as a thing very remarkable, because it never 

 rained in Egypt. This however is a mistake. 



We are told that, in the year A. D. 65, during the 

 reign of Nero, bloodrain fell, which tinged the rivers 

 with a red colour. Two other instances are recorded 

 in the tenth century ; one in the eleventh ; two in 

 the twelfth ; one in the thirteenth ; two in the 



* Page 9. f Page 31. 



