( 4°<* ) 
V. An Account of the late fur pricing Appearance of 
the Lights feen in the Air, on the Jixth of March 
lajl^ with an Attempt to explain the Principal Phe- 
nomena thereof $ As it was laid before the 
Royal Society by Edmund Halley, J. V. D. 
Savilian Profeffor of Geom. Oxon, and Reg, 
Soc. Seer. 
T H E Royal Society , having received Accounts from 
very many Parts of Great Britain, of the unufual 
Lights which have of late appeared in the Heavens ; were 
pleafed to fignify their Defires to me, that I fhould draw 
up a general Relation of the Fatt, and explain more at 
large fome Conceptions of mine 1 had propofed to them 
about it, as teeming to fome of them to render a tollera- 
ble Solution of the very ffrange and furprizing Phenomena 
thereof. The Defires of the Society having with me the 
force of Commands, I (hall not decline the Task : only 
premifing that if, in delivering the Etiology of a Mat- 
ter fo uncommon, never before feen by my felf, nor ful- 
ly deferibed by any either of the Ancients or Moderns, 
I fail to anfwer their Expe&ation or my own Defires ; 
yet *tis hoped a good Hiftory of the Fatf deduced partly 
from our o\yn Obfervations, and partly collected from 
the uniform Relations of credible Perfons, or from the 
Letters of fuch, may not be unacceptable to the Curious ; 
and may perhaps excite the Genius of fome more able 
Meteorologift to a more facisfa&ory Enquiry. The Ac- 
count of this Appearance take as follows. 
On 
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