BO^ Bowditch on the Meteor which 'pa&sed over Wilmington 



that direction was 1° 30', it must have been hid by the land a frac- 



tiou of a s^ecoud of time before its actual disappearances at other 

 places. 



From these assumed places of the meteor, it would follow that 

 its apjmrent direction over the earth''s surface (neglecting the aijnu- 

 al and diurnal motion of the earth} teas nearly S. 44° W. The dis- 

 tance of the extreme points of its path was ii7T mil^s^ the length 

 of its curvilinear path while visible being greater than this quan^ 

 tity. Its height above the eart¥s surface decreased from 38 io '1% 

 miles while it continued visible. The duration of its appearancCf 

 hi/ tjie mean of all the observations^ teas about 16 seconds, conse^ 

 quently Us velocity teas about 7y miles per second^ which is con- 



-ft 



siderahly greater than would be required to make a body move 



T 



like a satellite about the earth in a circular orbit. It is also a 

 greater velocity than a body would acquire, by the force of gravi- 

 ty, in falling to the earth from an infinite distance, and if a body 

 were projected vertically with that velocity, and the resistance of 

 the air to cease, it would never fall back again to the earth. 



With the mean distance of the meteor from Danvers and its 

 apparent diameter by observation 6' 24/^, the real diameter would 

 be S966 feet. The distance at its first appearance at Wilmington 

 under the angle 16', would make its real diameter 1887 feet. 

 The mean distance from Baltimore and the apparent angle under 



■ 



vvhichit appeared (by the mean of both observations made there) 

 13', would make its real diameter 3iJ71 feet. The mean of these 

 three estimates makes the actual diameter of the meteor equal to 

 2710 feetj or about half a mile. The oblong form observed at 

 Danvers was, without doubt, produced by the tail of the meteor, 

 which m\ist have appeared very short at that place on account of 

 the oblique position in which it was viewed. When the tail was 



