343 



can we conceive why the whole stratum of those 

 fluids does not at once take fire, but that the 

 gaseous emanations, like the clouds, occupy 

 only limited spaces ? How can we suppose an 

 electrical explosion without some vapours col- 

 lected together, capable of containing unequal 

 charges of electricity, in air, the mean tempera- 

 ture of which is perhaps 25° below the freezing 

 point of the centigrade thermometer, and the 

 rarefaction of which is so considerable, that 

 the compression of the electrical shock could 

 scarcely disengage any heat* ? These difficul- 

 ties would in great part be removed, if the 

 direction of the motion of falling stars allowed 

 us to consider them as bodies with a solid nu- 

 cleus, as cosmic phenomena (belonging to space 

 beyond the limits of our atmosphere), and not 

 as telluric phenomena (belonging to our planet 

 only). 



Supposing that the meteors of Cumana were 

 only at the usual height, at which falling stars 

 in general move, the same meteors were seen 

 above the horizon in places more than 310 

 leagues distant from each other -f-. tfow what 



* See an explanation of the heat produced by the electr ical 

 shock given by Mr. Gay-Lussac, in the year 1805, in a 

 Paper which I published jointly with him in the Journal de 

 Phys. vol. lx. 



t It was this circumstance that induced Lambert to pro- 

 pose the observation of falling stars for the determination of 



