126 THE PEACOCK BUTTERFLY. 
face of the Greenland Sea.* Although this observa- 
tion does not belong to the bloody colour of water, 
yet it clearly indicates the abundance of microscopic 
organic beings in water. 
The meteoric substances, which are usually 
colourless,—such as dew, snow, rain, and hail, have 
been said to fall blood-red from the atmosphere. 
In Stowe’s Chronicle, we have two accounts of 
showers of blood; he says, that, in the reign of 
Rivallo, 1766 years before Christ, “ it rained bloud 
three dayes; and then a great mortalitie caused 
almost desolation.” He afterwards writes,t “ Brith- 
ricus, of the blood of Cerdicus, was made king of the 
West Saxons, (about a. p. 793,) and ruled seven- 
teen yeares. In his time it rained blood, which, fall- 
ing on men’s cloathes, appeared like crosses,” + 
There are two passages in Homer, which, however 
poetical, are applicable to rain of this kind ; and the 
accounts of the bloody sweat on some of the statues 
of the gods, mentioned by Livy, must be referred 
to the same phenomena ; as the predilection of those 
ages for marvel, and the want of accurate investi- 
gation in the cases recorded, as well as the rare 
occurrence of these atmospherical depositions in our 
own times, incline us to include them among the 
blood-red drops deposited by insects. 
Many accounts of occurrences of this kind are 
* Scorespy’s Arctic Regions, vol. i. 
+ Page 9. t Page 31. 
