84 



horses, as far as the water or dirt had touched them, all in a kind 

 of faint flame, much like that, as he described it, of burnt brandy, 

 which continued upon them for a mile's riding*/' 



The foregoing account, exactly agrees with a curious history of 

 the same phenomenon, contained in the collection of manuscript 

 communications, to the Royal Society, in the library of the British 

 Museum. It is entitled, " A Relation of a fiery Appearance in the 

 Impress of Mens' and Horses' Feet," and was given in these words, 

 by Dr. Croon, about the year 1665 : 



" Being Monday, on my return with Sir John Courton, bait, and 

 his clerk, William Stephens, from the Lord Bishop's visitation at 

 Launceston, about an hour, in a misty dewy night, on Hinxon, 

 about a mile beyond Kellington, in Devonshire, in Launceston 

 road, in a moorish place of some forty feet in length, the impress of 

 our horses and our own feet upon the ground, appeared fiery, much 

 more shining than glow-worms ; the grass we gathered in those 

 places where we or our horses trod, reserved the lustre in our hands 

 when we came to the waters within a quarter of a mile from Kel- 

 lington ; where watering our horses, we observed it, but almost ex- 

 tinguished only a spark here and there. At Newton, two miles 

 thence, we viewed it by candle-light that night, as also the next 

 day, and found it coarse spiry grass, of an inch, or little more, in 

 length, such as ordinarily grows on downsf. 



That this phenomenon, as well as that of the Ignis fatuus, depends 

 on some peculiar modification of phosphorus, there seems to be no 

 difficulty of admitting. Nor can there exist any doubt, as to the 

 source whence volatile alkali, and even the phosphorus itself, is de- 

 rived, when it is recollected, that, with this crust of mould, a consi- 

 derable quantity of animal matter must be blended, proceeding from 

 the myriads of insects which had fed on the vegetables. From the 



* The Natural History of Staffordshire, by Dr. Plott, p. 115. 

 t Mr. Ayscough's Catalogue, 698, p, 47, 



