604 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [anNO 1742. 



The last shot, falling so much short, may be ascribed to the damp, it being 

 late in the evening when it was fired. That moisture greatly weakens the effect 

 of powder, is commonly known ; and the committee found by an experiment 

 that powder dried by means of a phial in balneo, and put warm into the cham- 

 ber, threw the ball twice as far as the same quantity of powder taken out of the 

 same barrel, before it was dried. 



Of a Meteor seen near Holkam in Norfolk, August 1741. By the Right Hon. 

 Thomas Lord Lovell, F.R.S. N" 465, p. 183. 



Some of Lord Lovell's ploughmen, being at work, about the middle of 

 August 1741, on a fair day, at 10 o'clock in the morning, saw on a heath about 

 a quarter of a mile from them, a wind like a whirlwind, come gradually towards 

 them, in a straight line from east to west. It passed through the field where they 

 were at plough, tore up the stubble and grass in the ploughed ground,for 2 miles 

 in length, and 30 yards in breadth. When it came to some closes at the top of 

 a rising ground, some men there saw it appear like a great flash or ball of fire. 

 To some others it appeared as a fire, and some saw only a smoke, and heard 

 such a noise as fire makes when a barn is burning, and the wind making a 

 terrible noise, like that of a violent fire, or like carts over stoney ground, which 

 passed by a house, tearing up the stones in the road ; it tore up a rank of pales, 

 sprung several of the posts out of their places and carried a pewter plate that 

 stood on the outside of the window about 40 yards from the house ; also a 

 large box-cover, about an inch and a half thick and 4 feet square and cross- 

 barred, was carried away much farther, and torn all to pieces ; and the gravel 

 and stones flew about like feathers. It also broke down some fences, and 

 frightened the cattle. And, what is very remarkable, every where else but 

 in this place, the weather was clear and fine, and no sign of any storm or 

 disturbance whatever. There was a strong smell of sulphur, both before and 

 after the wind passed, and the noise was heard a great while after seeing the 

 smoke. They said it moved so slowly forward, as to be near 10 minutes in 

 coming from the closes to the house. 



On the Proportions of the English and French Measures and Weights, from the 

 Standards of the same, kept at the Royal Society. N°465, p. 185. 

 Some curious gentlemen, both of the Royal Society of London, and of the 

 Royal Academy of Sciences at Paris, thinking it might be of good use, for the 

 better comparing together the success of experiments made in England and in 

 France, proposed some time since, that accurate standards of the measures and 

 weights of both nations, carefully examined, and made to agree with each 



