AEROLITES. 591 



increased with the length of time from midnight, and that the 

 greatest number fell between two and five in the morning. Al- 

 ready, on the occasion of the great fall of meteors at Cumana 

 in the night of the llth and 12th of November, 1799, my 

 fellow-travellers saw the greatest swarm of shooting stars 

 between half- past two and four o'clock. A very meritorious 

 observer of the phenomena of meteors, Coulvier-Gravier, con- 

 tributed an important essay to the Institute at Paris, upon 

 la variation horaire des etoiles filantes. It is difficult to con- 

 jecture the cause of such an hourly variation, an influence 

 of the distance from the hour of midnight. If under different 

 meridians the shooting stars do not become especially visible 

 until a certain early hour, then, in the case of their cosmical 

 origin, we must assume what is still but little probable ; viz. 

 that these night, or rather early morning hours, are especially 

 adapted to the ignition of the shooting stars, while in other 



thousand years, but just that number. This sacred gold the 

 kinijs watch with the greatest care, and annually approach it 

 with magnificent sacrifices to render it propitious. If he who 

 has the sacred gold happens to fall asleep in the open air on 

 the festival, the Scythians say he cannot survive the year, and 

 on this account they give him as much land as he can ride 

 round on horseback in one day. The country being very 

 extensive, Colaxais established three of the kingdoms for his 

 sons, and made that one the largest in which the gold is 

 kept. The parts beyond the north of the inhabited districts 

 the Scythians say can neither be seen nor passed through, by 

 reason of the feathers shed there ; for that the earth and air 

 are i'ull of feathers, and that it is these which intercept the 

 view." Herodotus, \v. 5 and 7; (Translation. Bonn's Classical 

 Library, p. 238.) But is the myth of sacred gold, merely an 

 ethnographical myth ; an allusion to three king's sons, the 

 founders of three races of Scythians ? an allusion to the pro- 

 minent position which the race of the youngest son, the 

 Paralatac. attained? (Brandstatter, Scythica, de aurea caterva, 

 1837, pp. 69 and 81.) 



