1882.1 
IV ill’ o'" -the -Wisp again. 
533 
V. WILL-O’-THE-WISP AGAIN. 
By W. Mattieu Williams. 
HE article on “ Will-o’-the-Wisp ” in last month’s 
“ Journal of Science ” (p. 447) reminds me of my own 
experience, which, although by no means recent, is 
clearly impressed on my memory, and the impressions 
confirmed by reference to the diary which I very scrupulously 
kept in those days. 
In the course of a walk from Genoa to Florence, long 
before there was any railway communication, I started on 
the morning of November 30th from Carrara, walked on 
through Massa to Pietra Santa. Here, as my diary states, 
I went on towards Lucca, and as it was late I enquired for 
an inn, and was told that I should find one on the roadside 
a mile distant. I walked on 4 or 5 miles farther, until it 
was quite dark, and found no inn or any other human 
habitation, the road being on a dead level with rice-fields 
covered with water on each side. 
At last I saw what appeared to be the lights of a village 
in the distance, and after another half-hour’s walking was 
surprised to find them still as distant as ever. I pushed on 
nevertheless, but got no nearer to the village. The idea of 
Will-o’-the-Wisp had not suggested itself ; I merely regarded 
this as an instance of deceptive distance, until at last it 
became quite incomprehensible. Then I stopped and deli- 
berately examined these lights, found that they were curiously 
flickering, and quite unlike the lights from house windows : 
further scrutiny showed that the idea of great distance was 
a delusion, — that they were faint, ghostly lights, at only a 
moderate distance, but which was very difficult to estimate. 
Then their true charadter suggested itself, and I turned round 
and found them behind me as well as in front. I walked on, 
and they preceded and followed me in a circle broken only 
by the road. I had already noticed this, which strengthened 
the first delusion, as they appeared like lights from houses 
on each side of the road. 
Their brilliancy was less than is indicated by the descrip- 
tions I have read, less than that of the flame of a spirit-lamp 
at 20 yards distance. There was a multitude of them, all 
about 5 feet from the ground. I now suspedt that the height 
