Aurora Borealis. 429 
as I learn by an obliging communication from Ira Sayles, Esq., Pre- 
ceptor of Rushford Academy, the appearances of the aurora were 
equally remarkable and splendid as those already described, commen- 
cing, as elsewhere, at 7 o’clock. At some of the telegraph stations, 
the wires were strikingly affected dbring the presence of t 
ome I have not been able to obtain’ any very precise laainitha of the 
acts 
I have rensived from my friend, the Rev. Sylvester Cowles, of 
Olean, N. Y., the following statement respecting the faepnine aurora 
as observed by him, which I think ought not to be w — 
the public, although possibly the peculiar appearances ioe a 
scribes may be thou ught to have arisen from a mass of fog ecuaan 
by an aurora behind it. Yet it is difficult to account for the apparent - 
emission of sparks or scintillations on any such supposition. Mr, 
Cowles remarks :— 
“I state the facts as they appeared at Olean, Cattaraugus Co., N. Y., 
in reference to the aurora borealis of the 19th of February last. -As 
the sun set, the pi was perfectly clear. 1 was returning with 
my wife from out of town, and was about three miles east of our vil- 
pillar (cloud in appearance) I should judge two feet square at the base, 
and six feet high, near a dry pine tree,* say sixty feet from the ground. 
Ata short distance west of it, was another small spar-like cloud of 
r the 
similar appear In seeing them so near the earth I instantly 
directed the attention of Mrs to them, and immediately, as we 
looked, auroral light began to beam «ut o e were riding 
due west, and as there was-nothing in the appearance of a cloud, or 
vapor in the west or northwest, I turned and looked east, and saw auro- 
ral vapor coming from the east to the west across the valley i in which 
we were. It was very remarkable to us in consequence of its being so 
near ne earth. When it came against us, apparently not over thirty 
ro om us, it was wabin half the length of several pine trees which 
sabe. in the field, from the ground. There were several of these trees, 
re on this side of it, and others were just beyond ee which we 
could dainty see, and upon which we remarked at the There 
were no streamers proceeding from it, but a curtain of arorst light 
seat passing across the valley, at the distance above stated from the 
ea as due west, but at the same time receding to the 
nie It must tive been ten ‘minutes from the time we first noticed 
it, before it seemed to strike the hill on the west side of the valley. 
From the base of this sheet, or oe of light, the most beautiful, 
brilliant appearance was seen. Masses of auroral light, liké off-shoots 
rom a sky-rocket, would fall rowiayely +h earth, scattering ett in the 
— -“ — particles of which would not disappear tll they were 
I state he phenomena \ just as it appeared to us, The pillar and the cloud 
both sated off in the auroral sheet of light as they passed westward. nt was 
tiful to off as ee appearance: of cloud: ox: pillar 
