56 



NATURE 



\_Nov. 15, I < 



when it swerved, and came towards the ground in a different 

 direction, alighting as though it were in possession of its natural 

 powers, some hundreds of yards from the place whence it rose. 

 On giing to the spot where it had settled, it was found to be 

 alive and crouching in the long grass. The keeper ran in and 

 placed his hand on it, when the bird struggled and tried to get 

 away ; he killed it seeing that it was wounded. On exa'Jiining 

 the bird immediately after I found that it had been strack by two 

 pellet 1 of No. 6 .'-hot, one of which had penetrated the pectoral 

 muscles hut had not injured the cavity ; the lungs and other 

 viscera were uninjured. The other pellet had entered beliind 

 and below tlie left eyeball, and, passing forward, had emerged 

 ou the other side, passing above the upper mandible. The brain 

 was uninjured, but the lower part of the left eyeball was cut and 

 distended with blocjd. There was no other injury. No doubt 

 the shock had confused the bird, and caused its strange flight, 

 which, though upward, was very different in its character from 

 that of ordinary towering where the lungs are perforated, and 

 unconsciousness is the result of the circulation of non-aerated 

 blood. J. Fayrer 



Meteors 



Permit n.e to point out to Mr. J. M. Hayward (Nature, 

 Nov. 8, p. 30) that his observation of the large meteor of Novem- 

 ber 4 posses-ses no scientific value, inasmuch as he has omitted 

 to mention the important features of its appearance. The 

 time is g'ven as "just now" (or November 4), and the broad 

 path of fire which this fine meteor di^charged upon its course 

 must have been situated somewhere in the south-east, for your 

 correspondent states he saw it "on turning to the south-east." 



I had endeavoured to show in Nature of the preceding week 

 (Nov. I, p. 6) that these delightfully vague forms of expression 

 as applied to meteors are wholly inadequate, and, as such, can- 

 not receive any attention at the hands of those who investigate 

 these phenomena. 



Had Mr. Hayward given us the essential details of his obser- 

 vation, it might have proved very valuable, for a large meteor 

 (perhaps identical with the one lie refers 1 1) was observed at 

 many places on the night of November 4. As recorded at 

 Chelmsford, Bath, and Bristol the paths were : — 





Mag. 



Observer. 



Nov. 4. ..10 14,.. = 9 ... 8 S. 20 .355 S. 30. ..H. Corder, 



Chelmsford. 



Nov. 4... 10 12. ..6x I!. ..33 S. 6 ... 9 S. 23. ..J. L. Stothert, 



Bath. 



IMov. 4 ..10 12... >Z!...36N. \\.. 16 S. l9...W.F.Denning, 



Bristol. 



The several estimates of brilliancy aie very discordant, but 

 the time and paths agree so closely that there is little doubt the 

 observations refer to the same meteor. 



Another fine meteor was seen here on October 26 at 9h. 17m. 

 It gave a succession of fi5ur lightning-like flashes. Path 

 from a. 28S 5 56° -H to a 333" S 59° + . This was not the 

 only fireball visible that night, for I see by Nature (No- 

 vember 8, p. 44) that " On October 26 at about 7 p.m. a splendid 

 meteor was seen in the district of Herno and, Sweden." It 

 appeared "with a blinding white lustre in the zenith and tra- 

 velling very rapidly down to the horizon." In this case again 

 we have to deplore the extremely vague manner of the descrip- 

 tion. Had the precise direction of flight been given, it would 

 have been in'eresting to determine uhether this fireball belonged 

 to the same stream as the equally fine one recorded at Bristol on 

 the same night. W. F. Denning 



Bri>toI, November 10 



The meteors during October have been numerous, and the 

 most of them proceeded from some point in Auriga. With the 

 exception of about nine days of unfavourable weather, I have seen 

 several meteors night and morning throughout October, but they 

 were generally small and transient. I have counted fifty-two 

 from 10 p.m. of October 3 to 4-30 a.m. of the 4th, many of them 

 large and of^ several -econds' duration. The largest of these 

 passed slow ly from the fir^t bright star on the left of Capella, in 

 Auriga, to a point about 1° below o Cygni. The smallest 

 of them blinked rapidly before the eye in the zenith over the 

 Milky Way, which, this night, was the principal theatre of their 

 display. From 3.30 to 4.30 a.m. I counted forty of the fifty- 



two meteors. From I a.m. to 4 of October 8 I observed very 

 brilliant meteors. One at 2.25 a.m. darted from about 1° above 

 Capella and disappeared at a point J" from Phad in the Plough, 

 witliout exploding and without leaving any trace of light behind. 

 It was as large as Venus. At 2.40 a.m. a very large and bril- 

 liant meteor dashed out from a point midway between Capella 

 and the first bright star to its right in Auriga, and sped along above 

 the Pleiades and Aries through the Square of Pegasus, and ex- 

 ploded 3° beyond it, leaving no fire in its wake. October 15, 

 11.3S p m., a very unusual meteor sailed slowly from 6 Ceti 

 to « iihin 1° of Betelgueux, in the right shoulder of Orion. After 

 liavelling two-thirds of its journey, it exploded into four, 

 three of which formed the head of an arrow, and the fourth 

 adorned its tail, all the four sending out bright nebulous light 

 behind them. At 2.50 a.m., October 26, a large ball of fire 

 (bolide), apparently seven inches in diameter, illumined the 

 heavens with great brilliancy as it descended from about midway 

 between the third and fourth bright stars on the left of Capella, 

 exploding twice during the last half of its journey, and disap- 

 pearing just as it reached the moon. It had no tail. It was 

 seen by some of the Paisley night police, and one of them was 

 frightened that it would dash tfie moon out of the heavens. This 

 bolide had no detona.ion in either of its two explosions, and the 

 last of it was only about the size of Jupiter. One policeman de- 

 .scribes it as a large fiery ball of the size of the full moon, but 

 this is an exaggeration. The extraordinary meteor of October 

 15, after its explosion, was described by an ob erver as a well- 

 formed arrow of flaming fire, followed by a ball of fire with a 

 tail. To me it appeared to resemble the head and body of a fish, 

 as well as the form of an arrow. DONALD CAMERON 



Mossvale, Paisley, November 6 



On the evening of Saturday last, at 10.12 p.m., a remarkable 

 meteorite was ob.served close to Trinity College, Glenalmond, 

 in Perthshire. It presented the appearance of a bright spherical 

 ball, which moved horizontally from eastnorth-east to we>t- 

 southwest at a height roughly estimated at 300 feet. When it 

 began to curve downwards it disappeared from view, but it left 

 behind it a luminous trail of great brilliancy, which was seen for 

 fully forty second.s, its brilliancy gradu.ally diminishing till it 

 entirely faded away. W. Besant Lowe 



Trinity College, Glenalmond, Perth, November 12 



"Anatomy for Artists" 



I AM quite unable to do as your correspondent "An Art 

 Student" suggests, for the second edition of the above-named 

 book has been just issued. I may add, however, that the 

 reasons which led me deliberately to adopt the plan alluded to 

 in regard to the illustrations of the bones still remain, in my 

 opinion, sound, and I trust that the majority of my readers of 

 the past, present, and future editions have not been and will not 

 be " discouraged " by the effort which I desire them, for their 

 own sakes as students, to make. JOHN MARSHALL 



10, Savile Row, W., November 12 



P.S. — It seems that / ought to have two "letters of refer- 

 ence" attached to myself, for I am not "Dr." but "Mr." 

 Marshall. 



Earthquake 

 Nature on October 25 contained notices of shocks of 

 earthquake which were felt at a quarter to one o'clock on the 

 night of October 19 (iih. 20m. Greenwich M.T.) at Cadiz and 

 other places on the coast of Andalusia. I have information that 

 about I7h. 45m. later these shocks, which were travelling from 

 east to west, had apparently ie,ached Bermudas. In a letter just 

 received from ex- Chief Justice Darrell, dated October 22, he 

 remarks : — "A very unu ual event occurred here on the 20th of 

 this month, in a shock of an earthquake, which however was 

 slight ; no life uas lost, nor serious damage done to buildings ; 

 but the shock, which lasted less than a minute, at about a quarter 

 past one p.m. was universally and unmistakably felt tbroughont 

 the colony. It is said to be only the third time that any earlli- 

 qnake has been experienced in Bermuda in the last forty years." 

 A quarter past one in Bermuda would be about four and a half 

 minutes past five at Greenw ich, requiring, if the shocks originated 

 in the same wave, a rate of transmission of about 158 geographi- 



