140 



REPORT— 1877. 



1T0 Dover ■ 



DeaV y 



Observer® 

 Jiiuffsdow. 

 Dover '. ' 



°BouIo^ne sur Ifer 



scription by a sketch (and an ac- 

 companying outline map) of the 

 general direction, from his position, 

 of the meteor's apparent course, 

 near Walrner on the coast of Kent, 

 as it descended directly before him 

 nearly to the sea. From this de- 

 scription, the meteor was visible 

 nearly in the east from Deal or 

 Walmer (descending to a small al- 

 titude ; and this direction is also 

 given near Folkestone, by Mr. C. 

 J. W. Valpy at Burniarsh, at 

 Broadstairs by " T. W. H." in 

 'The Standard,' and at Hawk- 

 hurst, in Kent). The coast-line of 

 France and Belgium is here added 

 to Mr. Bole's map, with the calcu- 

 lated position over the latter coast 

 of the meteor's real course. 



At Walton-on-the-jSTaze ('The 

 Times ") the meteor descended ver- 

 tically in a south-east by east direction; and this agrees almost exactly with 

 Mr. Plummer's view of it near Ipswich, from which, with combination of these 

 observations and of that at Hull, and from the traveller's note of its bright 

 streak, on the railway between Dunkirk and Calais, marking the sky vciti- 

 calby in the "north-north-west,'' this approximate place of explosion and dis- 

 appearance of the meteor over the German ocean is arrived at. The direction 

 of its downward descent, though nearly vertical, is inclined from south to 

 north in all the accounts recorded in the south, while this is less observable 

 in those reported from the neighbourhood of Ipswich. In Paris also the ap- 

 parent line of motion was " almost perpendicularly " downwards; and a 

 general comparison of these particulars proves the true place of the radiant- 

 point to have been about 15° or 20° from the zenith on its S.S.E. side, at a 

 point then nearly occupied by c Lyras, in lt.A. 285°, N. Deck +35°, as is re- 

 presented in the Table. If it is exact, this position differs sensibly from the 

 point, at 311° +52°, from which, as found by Captain Tupman*, a meteor 

 very similar to this, and almost as strikingly brilliant, fell, off the coast of 

 Sussex, on the 3rd of September, 1875. The latter radiant-point, a little 

 west of the zenith, disagrees with the notes of several observers of the fireball 

 of September 24th, 1876, in the south and west of England, that its falling 

 path in the east, from their points of view, declined northwards very visibly 

 from a vertical direction. 



'The Galignani's Messenger' of Paris thus describes the appearance of 

 the meteor in that town : — " It emerged from the dark storm-clouds at 30° 

 above the horizon in the northern sky, and descended slowly towards the 

 earth, emitting showers of sparks and a scintillating train. It fell almost 

 perpendicularly, and grew elongated in falling ; it disappeared behind houses, 

 and thereafter illumined the whole northern sky with two successive blazes of 

 fire like lightning, by which the surrounding clouds were tinged as with gold." 



* These Reports, vol. for 1876, p. 14-) ; and 'Monthly Notices of the Astronomical 

 Society,' vol. xxxvi. p. 216. The traveller on the Dunkirk railway must be assumed to have 

 rnisest iniated the bearing of the luminous streak left by the meteor by a few points west- 

 wards from its above assigned position. 



