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LI II. An Account of a remarkable Meteor feen 
^/Oxford, March 5, 1764. In a Letter 
to the Rev. fhomas Birch, D. D . Se- 
cretary to the Royal Society , from the Rev. 
John Swinton, B. D . R R. S. Member 
of the Academy degli Apatifti at Florence, 
and of the Etrufcan Academy of Cortona 
m Tufcany. 
Good Sir, 
Read Dec. 6, O M I N G out of Chrift-Church 
176 common-room into the great qua- 
drangle, on Monday, March 5th, 1764, about y h 
30' P. M. I obferved, with fome furprize, a general 
brightnefs in the air, much fuperior to that of the 
full moon^ though the heavens were then in fome 
meafure overcaft, and the moon only three days old. 
This unufual and very remarkable illuftration of the 
atmofphere continued the whole evening, though 
nothing farther meriting any particular regard (at leafl 
nothing that I either faw or heard of) for two or three 
hours occurred. But throwing up my bedchamber 
fafh, a little before eleven o’clock, I unexpectedly 
difeovered a mod glorious and exceedingly refplendent 
white [Tab, XVIIL] column in the fouthern part of 
the hetnifphere, which in luftre furpafled every thing 
of the fame kind that I had ever feen before. The 
bafe of this column feemed to be between twenty 
and thirty degrees diftant from the horizon, and was 
many degrees broad. The meteor afeended gradu- 
ally near thirty degrees, palling to the S. of the 
zenith- 
