Red Rain 



RED RAIN 



"The lepidopterous insects in general, soon after they emerge 

 from the pupa state, and commonly during their first flight, dis- 

 charge some drops of a red-colored fluid, more or less intense in 

 different species, which, in some instances, where their num- 

 bers have been considerable, have produced the appearance of 

 a 'shower of blood,' as this natural phenomenon is sometimes 

 called. 



"Showers of blood have been recorded by historians and 

 poets as preternatural— have been considered in the light of prod- 

 igies, and regarded, where they have happened, as fearful prog- 

 nostics of impending evil. 



"There are two passages in Homer, which, however poetical, 

 are applicable to a rain of this kind; and among the prodigies 

 which took place after the death of the great dictator, Ovid par- 

 ticularly mentions a shower of blood : 



" ' Saepe faces visa mediis ardere sub astris, 

 Saepe inter nimbos guttae cecidere cruentae.' 



" (' With threatening signs the lowering skies were fill'd, 

 And sanguine drops from murky clouds distilled.') 



"Among the numerous prodigies reported by Livy to have 

 happened in the year 214 b. c, it is instanced that at Mantua a 

 stagnating piece of water, caused by the overflowing of the river 

 Mincius, appeared as of blood; and in the cattle-market at Rome 

 a shower of blood fell in the Istrian Street. After mentioning 

 several other remarkable phenomena that happened during that 

 year, Livy concludes by saying that these prodigies were expi- 

 ated, conformably to the answers of the aruspices, by victims of 

 the greater kinds, and supplication was ordered to be performed 

 to all the deities who had shrines at Rome. Again, it is stated by 

 Livy that many alarming prodigies were seen at Rome in the 

 year 181 B. c, and others reported from abroad; among which 

 was a shower of blood which fell in the courts of the temples of 

 Vulcan and Concord. After mentioning that the image of Juno 

 Sospita shed tears, and that a pestilence broke out in the country, 

 this writer adds that these prodigies, and the mortality which 



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