172 Star anfr KHeatbet (Bossip 



out in the north ? One felt at such times that the old 

 moon was very far indeed secluded in the chambers of 

 the south ; so far secluded that she scarce could show 

 her envious visage above the ridge of houses immedi- 

 ately interposing in the line of vision. No, the glimmer- 

 ing moonlight offered not the least obstacle to northern 

 observations of these August meteors ; and I, for one, 

 indeed, had never expected that it would do so. For 

 all that, I have had just a little misgiving about 

 having, perhaps, missed a fine meteor or two in the 

 moonlit region of the south. 



But what a spectacular feast I had in the circum- 

 polar heavens and their immediate vicinity ! So away 

 with vain regrets that savour of selfishness. It has 

 often struck me how favourable to meteor observation 

 is that portion of the night which fringes the midnight 

 hour. To be more precise, I will fix the time from 

 eleven o'clock to one. And that is a time when, in the 

 deep silence of the night, there is something inexpres- 

 sibly solemn and grand about these celestial pyro- 

 technics, so silent themselves, yet so ideally suggestive 

 of irresistible power. For never once have I heard 

 the slightest sound come from any meteor, though the 

 heavens might be aglow with its light. To me the 

 maximum display was on the night of August 10th 

 but not of Perseids, watch the Cassiopeia region as I 

 would. No, the most numerous and beautiful meteors 

 were from the Great and Lesser Bears, and from 

 Corona Borealis, the beautiful Northern Crown. 



Poor old Bear ! Not since the Leonid shower of 

 five years before had I seen him so bombarded by these 

 aerial missiles as was the case on August 10th- llth. 

 One of them, at 11.40, dropped glowing red, orange, 



