Summer SboottncHStare 171 



drawn-out as almost to lag superfluous on the celestial 

 stage. How different in that respect from the 

 November shooting-stars ! How different, too, from 

 the Andromedids ! These showers are meteoric 

 indeed, mere flash-in-the-pan-like displays compared 

 with those dallying Perseids. Of course, over the 

 Perseid period the radiant does not remain fixed. It 

 moves about one degree every day towards the east- 

 nor'-east, and when the display reaches its maximum, 

 the radiant is on the border of Cassiopeia. 



St. Lawrence has truly an impressive perpetuation 

 of his tears in these patriarchal Perseids. What 

 matters it whether the tears were the result of his 

 slow grilling to death on a gridiron, or of chagrin at 

 the cowardice of others ! Sufficient that the martyr's 

 tears were shed, for are they not declared to be seen 

 dropping on the hot embers on his festival day ! 



The tears of St. Lawrence ! A strange name for the 

 August meteors, in truth ! But, be it remembered, 

 only those meteors from the Perseus quarter in the 

 nor '-nor '-east heavens. There are meteors, with an 

 occasional fireball, pretty well all around the month 

 of August. But not all of them are " tears." 



How glorious was the close of the summer meteor 

 season of the year one thousand nine hundred and 

 eight ! Thanks to the presence of a favouring anti- 

 cyclone in this region of Western Europe, our night- 

 skies were brilliantly clear, though the southern heavens 

 were illumined by the moon. Yet what mattered it 

 when first and second magnitude meteors were flashing 



