394 Miscellanies. 



meteoric showers which have, on two occasions, at least,* occurred 

 near the last of April, — a time distant about half a year from 

 November, and therefore sustaining a like relation to the opposite 

 point of its orbit. In such a case, meteoric showers would occur 

 in April and November, for the same reason that the Transits of 

 Mercury take place in May and November exclusively. The greater 

 frequency of meteors in November than in April, naturally results from 

 the greater proximity of the earth to the sun at the former than at the 

 latter period; to which, perhaps, may be added, the effect of the ec- 

 centricity of the orbit of the meteoric body, the aphelion being on 

 the side of November. In the present state of our knowledge on 

 this subject, I regard it as a point open for inquiry, whether it will best 

 accord with all the phenomena of shooting stars, to give to the mete- 

 oric body a period of nearly one year, or of half a year. 



I have been somewhat disappointed, that astronomers should have 

 paid so little attention to the remarkable changes which take place 

 in the Zodiacal Light, about the 13th of November, as has been re- 

 peatedly mentioned in this Journal. It appears to me a fact deserv- 

 ing their attention, that the Zodiacal Light, which for weeks before 

 the 13th of November, appears in the morning sky, with a western 

 elongation of from 60 to 90 degrees from the sun, (while up to that 

 time not a glimpse of it can be caught in the evening sky,) should 

 immediately afterwards appear after the evening twilight in the west, 

 and rapidly rise through the constellations Capricornus and Aqua- 

 rius, to an elongation of more than 90 degrees eastward of the sun, 

 while it as rapidly withdraws itself from the morning sky, and within 

 a few days vanishes entirely from the western side of the sun. For 

 three years jaast I have observed these changes with much interest, 

 and feel warranted in asserting, that they have been repeated with 

 uniform regularity. The present year, the light was very feeble in 

 the morning sky, an effect partly owing to the presence and peculiar 

 splendor of the planet Venus; but as soon after the 1 3th of November 

 as the absence of the moon would permit observations, the light ap-r 

 peared in the west immediately after twilight, crossing the Milky 

 Way, and rising in a pyramid almost as bright as that, the triangular 

 space between it and the Galaxy, embracing the Dolphin, appear- 

 ing, by contrast, strikingly darker. 



* In Virginia, and various other parts of the United States, in 1803, and in 

 France in 1095. Making suitable allowances for the more rapid progress of the 

 earth through the winter signs, and for the change of style, and the Meteoric 

 shower of the 25th of April, 1095, occurred a! very nearly the opposite point of 

 the earth's orbit. 



