EXPLOSIVE OR BOOMING NOISES IN CENTRAL AUSTRALIA. 189 



distinctly heard a report as of a great gun discharged to 

 the westward, at the distance of half a mile. On the follow- 

 ing morning, nearly at the same hour, we again heard the 

 sound; but it now came from a greater distance, and con- 

 sequently was not so clear. When I was on the Darling, 

 in Lat. 30°, in 1828, (a mistake, in 1829), I was roused from 

 my work by a similar report ; but neither on that occasion 

 or on this, could I solve the mystery in which it was 

 involved. It might, indeed, have been some gaseous 

 explosion, but I never, in the interior, saw any indication 

 of such phenomena." 



William Howitt, in his work 4 The History of Discovery 

 in Australia ' — a book with many errors of transcription — 

 attributes these reports to the bursting of meteors, and 

 refers to Sir Thomas Mitchell (incorrectly given by him as 

 Kennedy) who, on August 20, 1846, when on the Belyando, 

 was startled about 10 at night by a very extraordinary 

 meteor. "First a rushing wind from the west shook the 

 tents ; next, a blaze of light from the same quarter drew 

 attention to a whirling mass, or revolving ball of red light, 

 passing to the southward. A low booming sound accom- 

 panied it, until it seemed to reach the horizon, after which 

 a sound like the report of a cannon was heard, and the con- 

 cussion was such that some tin pots, standing reversed on 

 a cart-wheel, fell to the ground, and the boat on the dray 

 vibrated for some minutes." 1 



In 1889, F. D. Johnson 2 wrote a paper entitled 'Notes 

 on some Rumbling Sounds heard at Gill's Bluff." In this 

 article he records no less than seven instances in which he 

 heard these sounds in that locality. They are as follows : — 

 " July 9, 1888, 10*30 p.m.—Rumbling sound like blowing off 

 of steam from a large boiler, lasting about forty seconds. 



1 Mitchell's Tropical Australia, p. 280. 



z Trans. Proc. and Eep. Roy. Soc. S.A., Vol. xn, 1889, p. 157. 



