'2 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1755. 



hard, entire, and pellucid, and some particles being received on a pencil, were 

 placed on a plane glass plate under the object glass of the best microscopes : the 

 greatest care was taken that the smallest particles might not be dissolved, either 

 bv the breath or perspiration of the hands, lest the little angles might by the 

 least degree of warmth disappear. And thus, with this apparatus and these pre- 

 cautions, the extreme exactness and equality of the figures of their most minute 

 particles might be observed and delineated. 



Some consisted of long round spiculae ; others approached to a round figure 

 made up of small globules ; but these were observed to be opaque, as the air was 

 disposed to thaw ; but when the air was frosty, many slender hexangular figures 

 appeared, some of equal, others of unequal sides ; such as are exhibited by 

 Scheuchzer in his Herbarium Diluvianum, and by Swedenburg in his Prodromus 

 Principiorum, p. 2 1 ; and such as I have seen in a pitcher, which was covered, in which 

 the water was frozen ; and such figures of the concretions of vitriol, salts, &c. as 

 may be seen in the works of Leuwhenhoek, whom I find to be the most faithful 

 and expert in delineating and describing the minutest natural bodies ; and also 

 such as are published by Capellar in his Prodromus Crystallographiae. 



Several little stars seemed to consist of 6 oblong, round, hexangular lamellae, 

 or indeed of 6 rays terminating in points ; which little stars appeared to be 

 formed of 6 plane rhomboidal particles. Several plane hexangular particles of 

 equal sides, or oblong hexangulars, adhered to several of these stars, either at 

 their extremities, or at each side of every ray. Some hexangular lamellae of 

 equal sides were adorned all round with 6 other lamellae of the same figure and 

 size, or with hexangular oblong lamellae, and to these sometimes adhered several 

 others, more or less. Many of these hexangulars were ornamented with 6 rays ; 

 and to these were fixed the most slender lamellae, which were also hexangular, of 

 equal or unequal sides : but of equal angles of 6o degrees ; and to these lamellae 

 others like them adhered, some greater and some less, but most of the latter ; 

 and various others like the fortifir^ations of cities appeared to be joined to long 

 hexangular spiculae, and plane hexangles of equal sides. In one day and night 

 he found 15, 20, or more particles of snow differently formed; such as Olaus 

 Magnus mentions; and in the year 1740, on the 11th, 12th, 13th, 21st, and 

 23d of January, and also on the 6th, 23d, and 24th of February, he had an 

 opportunity of delineating 80 different admirable figures of snow, and of observ- 

 ing their numberless varieties. 



And though a vast variety of these configurations of snow may fail or vanish 

 in the same moment, yet the smaller particles, from their various combinations 

 with each other, constituting this wonderful variety of configurations of the 

 snow, were observed by him to be comprehended under these following forms ; 

 viz. of parallelograms, or oblong, straight, or oblique quadrangles, rhombs, 

 rho mboids, trapezia, or of hexangular forms of equal or unequal sides, whose 



