292 A NOTABLE AURORA 



heron's speed is moderate, but far greater than might be 

 imagined. One morning lately I started before sunrise in 

 a motor to catch a main-line train at a station twenty 

 miles distant. The air was perfectly still, my' road lay 

 level close along the shore, and not a human being was 

 stirring on it. As we crossed a bridge over a little burn, 

 a heron rose in the dusk, much agitated, and flew out to 

 sea. After holding its course for half a mile or so, the 

 bird turned to the right, and flew parallel with the road 

 and with my car. Presently a bend in the shore brought 

 the heron immediately in front of me, at a distance of 

 about one hundred yards. We were running about up to 

 speed limit twenty miles an hour yet the heron held 

 easily ahead of us, and finally flew out of sight behind a 

 hill. Now I am convinced that most people, viewing this 

 bird's apparently leisurely flight, would have estimated its 

 velocity at less than half the actual speed. 



LXXIII 



Those who were lucky enough to look abroad on the 

 A Notable night of November 15, 1905, beheld the first 

 Aurora display of rosy red aurora borealis which has 

 been seen in this country since October 1870. At least I 

 have neither seen, nor heard of anybody seeing, a red 

 aurora since that year. The date is well impressed upon 

 my mind by a remark I overheard in the street of a 

 Scottish village where I was staying for salmon-fishing. 

 All the inhabitants were at their doors or in the street, 

 gazing awestruck at the heavens, across which shot 

 quivering tongues, arcs, and rays of soft rosy light, reflected 

 in the puddles of the wet road and pavement. ' That '11 



