1 76 Mr. Howard's Experiments and Observations 
of such phenomena ; my inquiries were therefore chiefly directed 
to the Europeans, who were but thinly dispersed about that part 
of the country. 
The information I obtained was, that on the 19th of Decem- 
ber, 1798, about eight o'clock in the evening, a very luminous 
meteor was observed in the heavens, by the inhabitants of Benares 
and the parts adjacent, in the form of a large ball of fire ; that it 
was accompanied by a loud noise, resembling thunder ; and 
that a number of stones were said to have fallen from it, near 
Krakhut, a village on the north side of the river Goomty, 
about 14 miles from the city of Benares. 
The meteor appeared in the western part of the hemisphere, 
and was but a short time visible: it was observed by several 
Europeans, as well as natives, in different parts of the country. 
In the neighbourhood of Juanpoor, about 12 miles from the 
spot where the stones are said to have fallen, it was very dis- 
tinctly observed by several European gentlemen and ladies; 
who described it as a large ball of fire, accompanied with a loud 
rumbling noise, not unlike an ill discharged platoon of mus- 
quetry. It was also seen, and the noise heard, by various 
persons at Benares. Mr. Davis observed the light come into 
the room where he was, through a glass window, so strongly 
as to project shadows, from the bars between the panes, on a 
dark coloured carpet, very distinctly ; and it appeared to him as 
luminous as the brightest moonlight 
When an account of the fall of the stones reached Benares, 
Mr. Davis, the judge and magistrate of the district, sent an 
intelligent person to make inquiry on the spot, When the person 
arrived at the village near which the stones were said to have 
fallen, the natives, in answer to his inquiries, told him, that they 
