Chap. 60.] 
THE RAINBOW. 
89 
time, a stone would fall from the sun^ And tlie thing ac- 
cordingly happened, in the daytime, in a part of Thrace, at 
the river JEgos. The stone is now to be seen, a waggon- 
load in size and of a burnt appearance ; there was also a 
comet shining in the night at that time^. But to believe 
that this had been predicted would be to admit that the di- 
vining powers of Anaxagoras were still more wonderful, and 
that our knowledge of the nature of things, and indeed every 
thing else, would be thrown into confusion, were we to sup- 
pose either that the sun is itself composed of stone, or that 
there was even a stone in it ; yet there can be no doubt that 
stones have frequently fallen from the atmosphere. There 
is a stone, a small one indeed, at this time, in the Grymna- 
sium of Abydos, which on this account is held in veneration, 
and which the same Anaxagoras predicted would fall in the 
middle of the earth. There is another at Cassandria, formerly 
called Potidsea^, which from this circumstance was built in 
that place. I have myself seen one in the country of the 
Vocontii^, which had been brought from the fields only a 
short time before. 
CHAP. 60. (59.) THE BAIKBOW. 
^ What we name Eainbows frequently occur, and are not 
considered either wonderful or ominous ; for they do not 
predict, with certainty, either rain or fair weather. It is 
obvious, that the rays of the sun, being projected upon a 
hollow cloud, the light is thrown back to the sun and is re- 
^ There is some variation in the exact date assigned by different authors 
to this event ; in the Chronological table in Brewster's Encyc. vi. 420, it 
is said to have occurred 467 B.C. 
2 Aristotle gives us a similar account of this stone ; that it fell in the 
daytime, and that a comet was then visible at night ; Meteor, i. 7. It is 
scarcely necessary to remark, that the authority for this fact must be re- 
ferred entirely to Aristotle, without receiviQg any additional weight feom 
our author. The occurrence of the comet at the same time with the 
aerohte must have been entirely incidental. 
3 " Deductis eo sacri lapidis causa colonis, extructoque oppido, cui 
nomen a colore adusto lapidis, est inditum, Potidsea. Est enim ttotI 
Dorice TTjOos, ad, apud ; Saiofiaif uror." Hardouin, in Lemaire, i. 361. 
It was situated in the peninsula of PaUene, in Macedonia. 
- * The Yocontii were a people of GfaUia Narbonensis, occupying a por- 
tion of the modem Dauphine, 
