Ixxvi 
Terrace, Falmouth ; a “reversed” image, high in air, of a ship far 
out in the bay, and a “reversal,” in less perfect form, of the houses 
in Flushing (situated two-thirds of a mile from the Terrace and 
100 feet beneath it). These reversed images being, as I should 
fancy, at the observer's eye, 140° apart, and the objects seen re- 
versed being some miles asunder, there must have been, widely 
spread, an abnormal state of the atmosphere ; whether the effect 
was rendered by an unusual reflection at reflecting strata floating 
in the air above the objects reversed, as is conceivable from the 
information supplied to us; or, as is more likely, perhaps, and as 
the Editor seems to think, from unusual refraction,—in which case, 
they would be examples of simple vertical refraction. 
Familiar as I have been with the coast about Falmouth, it has 
never been my good fortune to witness a mirage there—nor indeed 
have I seen one anywhere ; but the notice of these mirages has 
brought to my recollection that at one of our Annual Meetings 
(See Journal, No. I, 1864, p. 58) there was read an account of a 
very remarkable mirage seen from those shores under very 
different meteorological conditions ; and I take the liberty of re- 
ferring to it, in connection with the instances just spoken of, on 
account of the interest attaching to the mode of production of 
such phenomena, whether in these regions or else-where; and ~ 
because, I believe, it can be shown, conclusively, that this mirage 
was due to asingular combination of vertical and lateral refraction. 
About 6 o’clock one evening in the middle of July, 1863, the 
air was oppressively warm and close, and no sky could be seen 
anywhere, for compact clouds concealed it, and covered with a 
brassy hue the setting sun. At this time, as Mr. Nicholas Michell 
(the author of many poems) relates, he and his wife were standing 
oa the hill on the Falmouth side of Swanpool, looking (eastward— 
away from the sun) into the bay towards Pendennis Castle, when 
there appeared to rise from the surface of the water, commencing 
about a quarter of a mile from where they stood, and through an ex- 
tent of about half a mile in length and a quarter of a mile in 
breadth, a portion of Truro and Calenick Rivers (an every-day scene 
to him in his boyhood). The slopes of Park fields were depicted, 
and, as the tide was low, the mudbanks and tortuous channels in 
Truro and Calenick Creeks were depicted as a ‘“ perfect landscape.” 
At low tide, Swanpool Hill is about 100 feet above the sea 
level. The landscape was translated seven miles due south, over 
hills, in the parishes of Kea, Feock, and Mylor, of (say) 270 feet 
above that level, (unless, stranger still, it was carried along the 
sinuosities of the river and round Pendennis) and dropped behind 
Pendennis Castle, which, at its highest point, is fully 250 feet 
above low water. It is not conceivable, as the account suggests, 
