AEEOLITES. 123 



and at another to a black cloud produced by sooty exhalations 

 from the solar orb. Obscurations of less duration, which took 

 place in 1090 and 1203, and lasted, one for three, and the 

 other for six hours, were ascribed by Chladni and Schnurrer 

 to the intervention of meteoric masses. Since the common 

 direction of their paths has led us to regard the streams of 

 shooting stars as forming a continuous ring, the epochs of 

 yet unexplained celestial phenomena have been brought into 

 remarkable connection with the regularly recurring epochs 

 of the meteoric displays. Adolph Erman, with much acute- 

 ness, and after a careful analysis of all the facts hitherto 

 collected, has called attention in this respect to the times of 

 conjunction with the sun of the August asteroids (the 7th 

 of February), and of the November asteroids (the 12th of 

 May) ; and has pointed out a remarkable coincidence 

 between the conjunction of the November asteroids, and : 

 the celebrated cold, days of the Saints Mamertus, Pan- 

 cratius, and Servatius ( 86 ). 



The Greek natural philosophers, generally little disposed 

 to observation, but most persevering and inexhaustible in 

 conjectural interpretations of half-perceived facts, have left 

 on record speculations respecting shooting stars and me- 

 teoric stones, which greatly resemble some of the views of the 

 cosmical nature of these phsenomena now commonly received. 

 " Shooting stars," says Plutarch ( 8 ?), in the Life of Lysander, 

 "according to some naturalists, are not emanations from 

 the ethereal fire, which become extinguished in the air 

 immediately after being kindled ; nor are they an ignition 

 and combustion of air which may have been dissolved in 

 quantity in the upper region; they are rather celestial 

 bodies which fall in consequence of an interruption of the 



