176 SIR FRANCIS PALGRAVE ON THE SHOOTING STARS OF 1095 AND 1243. 
The Chronicle of Rheims, giving the same date, describes the appearance as if all 
the stars in heaven were driven like dust before the wind ; and this continued from 
cock-crowing until dawn. 
Ordericus Vitalis, who lived in the monastery of Ouches in Normandy, grounds 
his narrative upon his own observations and those of Gilbert, Bishop of Lisieux, 
who professed medicine and astrology, and, as such, was a diligent observer of the 
courses of the stars. Ordericus gives exactly the same date as the other authorities, 
Wednesday the day before the nones of April ; and says that “ so many shooting stars 
were seen, and so thick were they together, that, if they had not shone, they might 
have been taken for hail.” When Gilbert saw the phenomenon, he called up his 
assistant, Walther of Cormeilles, and explained to him that it portended the changes 
and wanderings of nations from kingdom to kingdom ; and this was the explanation 
which the meteors generally received. 
With respect to the shooting stars of 1293, they have not the same advantage of a 
number of witnesses ; but our single authority, Matthew Paris, the monk of St. 
Albans, is clear and precise. “ 1243. In this year, on the 7th of the Calends of Au« 
gust (26th July), being the 8th day of the new moon,” says he, “the air being most 
pure and calm, so that the milky way was seen as in a clear winter’s night, the stars 
were seen to fall from the heavens, darting this way and that. In one minute thirty 
or forty were seen to fall, two or three following in one track ; so that if they had been 
true stars, not one would have remained in the heavens.” 
