OBSERVATIONS OF LUMINOUS METEORS. 153 



whole earth and heavens wcro lighted up so brightly, that persons could bo 

 distinguished at a distance in the streets almost as plainly as in daylight. 

 The light was such that it gave a subdued green colouring to the earth, trees, 

 buildings, and ever}' other object. From the time the meteor was first seen 

 in the west till it was lost sight of in the east, full twenty seconds must have 

 elapsed. A singular feature of the phenomenon was that, instead of passing 

 in its flight earthward, its path from west to east seemed in an exact hori- 

 zontal direction. Nothing of the kind of such grandeur, brilliancy, and 

 beauty was ever before witnessed here. It was also seen at Burlington, 

 Iowa, St. Louis (Mo.), Laurence (Kansas), and at several places in 

 Indiana." 



Regarding the explosions in the early and middle portion of its flight, 

 Prof. Kirk wood states that, " some observers in Missouri report an explosion 

 of the moteor when passing over the central part of the State. At Blooming- 

 ton, Indiana, Prof. H. B. Boisen, who saw the meteor when duo west, and 

 watched it till it disappeared near the eastern horizon, observed it separate 

 into several parts when nearly north-west, or in the direction of Peoria, 

 Illinois." In his estimation of the meteor's real velocity, although very 

 difficult to arrive at accurately, Prof. Kirkwood very nearly corroborates the 

 value given by Prof. Newton, and considers it to have been about 8 or 12 

 miles per second. 



Notices of other large meteors seen in the United States on January 23, 

 and February 8, 1877, contained in Professor Kirkwood's paper, will pre- 

 sently be given, below, in the order of their dates. 



1877, January 19, 6 h 27™ p.m., England and Ireland. — Besides the descrip- 

 tion at Lisburn, near Belfast (given in the above list), of this large meteor, 

 the following particulars of its appearance at other places were gathered from 

 newspapers and from other sources by Mr. W. H. Wood. 



Wolverhampton. — A meteor of unusual magnitude and brilliancy moved 

 almost perpendicularly in a southerly [south-westerly ?] direction, very slowly, 

 the time occupied in its passage being seveu or eight seconds. It passed 

 behind a cloud for the space of a second, reappearing with equal brilliancy 

 until it vanished. Colour pale blue ; it left no visible streak, although this 

 may have been obscured by clouds. 



Walsall, 6 h 30 m p.m. — A luminous body fell from the heavens, from about 

 tho apparent altitude of the moon at the time, in the direction 8.W. by W. 



Bray, co. Wicklow, Ireland : precisely at 6 h p.m. (Irish time ; or 6 h 2o m 

 r.M., G. M. T.). — A splendid meteor traversed the sky from a point about 

 midway between Orion's Belt and the Pleiades, to a point directly under the 

 moon and about 10° above the horizon. It was pure white and dazzling, 

 and lasted five seconds, emitting no sparks except at the moment of disap- 

 pearance. It was about half of the moon's apparent size at the time. 



Tho long low flight of the meteor in the south at Bray near Dublin, and 

 at Lisburn" near Belfast, 90 miles north of Bray, below the equator, from a 

 little east of the south meridian to an altitude of only 5° or 10° in the south- 

 west (southwards from Saturn, and apparently just below the moon), indi- 

 cates evidently a very distant line of flight from these towns, which the ob- 

 servations there are not sufficiently exact to make it possible to assign pre- 

 cisely. But their combination with the recorded path at Walsall, near Bir- 

 mingham (descending in the S.W. by W. from about the moon's altitude), on 

 a course which the Wolverhampton account describes as " nearly perpen- 

 dicular " towards the horizon, presents a very fair accordance for the point 

 of commencement, and a good determination of tho radiant-point and of the 



