390 JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
rate ice-pendant, which took the form of the article encompassed 
by it—the pendant of the leaf taking the form of the leaf, the 
whole leaf being en¢losed in a body of ice of about equal thickness 
throughout, the pendant of each blade of grass being in the form 
of the blade—the deposit or coat of ice being proportioned to the 
size of the body that bore it, a stout, leafless stem of a tree often 
bearing a pendant of more than a foot in length and an inch or 
more in thickness, whilst the smallest blade or particle of grass 
bore a pendant so minute and fine as to allow of its remaining 
suspended in a bent form without being quite weighed down to 
the ground. . 
In every case the form and colour of each imprisoned leaflet, 
stem, berry, or stick was distinctly visible through its coat of ice. 
The face of the ground on and far down the slopes of the Moor for 
many miles was covered with this strange formation. 
The effect of the sun shining on a group of trees, or on the 
grasses and rushes on the ground, when the glassy pendants on all 
the objects and every projecting portion of every object on which 
the eye could rest gave forth their prismatic colours from myriads 
of centres at the same moment, dancing and sparkling in the breeze, 
was striking and beautiful beyond description. 
There was a holly tree near the road between Princetown and 
Tor Royal full of green leaves and berries, partly red and partly 
green, which presented a spectacle of wondrous beauty, and was 
visited by great numbers of people during the day from miles 
around. 
In one instance the ammil seriously frightened an old lady, Mrs. 
Webb, the occupier of a cottage at Post Bridge. Very early in the 
morning, long before light, she was alarmed by a thumping noise 
against the outside of her house, and made up her mind that it 
would be quickly broken through by thieves, or, perhaps, mur- 
derers. The knocking continued with increased violence till 
daylight came to her relief. On then opening her door and going 
out, she discovered that it was the ammil, which had bent down 
the branches of several tall trees upon the roof of her cottage, and 
drummed the honest woman almost out of her wits. 
The cause of this phenomenon is, of course, to be found in the 
peculiar and very rare, and, perhaps, rapidly varying, conditions of 
the atmosphere at the time; but what those conditions were it-is 
the province of the scientific to determine. 
