of August over Lincolnshire, have been determined by its approach towards the fens, and an attraction produced by that large body of moisture?

3. A further argument for the electric origin of meteors is deduced from their connection with the northern lights, and the resemblance they bear to these electrical phænomena, as they are now almost universally allowed to be, in several particulars. Instances are recorded, where northern lights have been seen to join and form luminous balls, darting about with great velocity, and even leaving a train behind like the common fire-balls. This train I take to be nothing but the rare air left in such a highly electrified state as to be luminous; and some streams of the northern lights are very much like it. The aurora borealis appears to occupy as high, if not a higher, region above the surface of the earth; as may be judged from the very distant countries to which it has been visible at the same time; indeed, the great accumulation of electric matter seems to lie beyond the verge of our atmosphere, as estimated by the cessation of twilight. Also with the northern lights a hissing noise is said to be heard in some very cold climates; Gmelin speaks of it in the most pointed terms, as frequent and very loud in the northeastern parts of Siberia; and other travellers have related similar facts.

But, in my opinion, the most remarkable analogy of all, and that which tends most to elucidate the origin of these meteors, is the direction of their course; which seems, in the very large ones, at least, to be constantly from or toward the north or north-west quar. ter of the heavens, and indeed to approach very nearly to the present magnetical meridian. This is particularly observable in those meteors of late years whose tracks have been ascertained with most exactness; as that of November 26, 1758, described by Sir John Pringle; that of July 17, 1771, treated of by M. Le Roy; and this of the 18th of last August. The largest proportion of the other accounts of meteors confirm the same observation, even those of a more early period; nay, I think, some traces of it are perceivable in the writings of the ancients. Whether their motion shall be from the northern quarter of the heavens or towards it, seems nearly indifferent, as the numbers of those going each way are not very unequal; I consider them in the former case as masses of the electric fluid repelled or bursting from the great collected body of it in the

north; and in the latter case, as masses attracted to that accumulation; a distinction probably much the same in effect, as that of positive and negative electricity near the surface of the earth.

This tendency toward the magnetic meridian, however, seems to hold good only with regard to the largest sort of fire-balls; the smaller ones move more irregularly; perhaps because they become farther within the verge of our atmosphere, and are thus more exposed to the action of extraneous causes. That the smaller sort of meteors, such as shooting stars, are really lower down in the at. mosphere, is rendered very probable by their swifter apparent mo. tion; perhaps it is this very circumstance which occasions them to be smaller, the electric fluid being more divided in more resisting air. But as those masses of electricity, which move where there is scarcely any resistance, so generally affect the direction of the magnetic meridian, the ideas which have been entertained of some analogy between these obscure powers of nature, seem not altogether without foundation.

If the foregoing conjectures be just, distinct regions are allotted to the electrical phænomena of our atmosphere. Here below, we have thunder and lightning, from the unequal distribution of the electric fluid among the clouds; in the loftier regions, whither the clouds never reach, we have the various gradations of falling stars; till, beyond the limits of our crepuscular atmosphere, the fluid is put into motion in sufficient masses to hold a determined course, and exhibit the different appearances of what we call fire-balls; and probably at a still greater elevation above the earth, the electricity accumulates in a lighter less condensed form, to produce the won. derfully diversified streams and corruscations of the aurora borealis. [Phil. Trans. Abr. vol. xv. year 1784.

SECTION VII.

Fiery Meteors, with Balls that have descended to the Earth *.

1. Account of a fiery Meteor seen, at Jamaica, to strike into the Earth.

By Mr. Henry Barham, F.R.S.

ABOUT the year 1700, as I was riding one morning about three miles north-west from St. Jago de la Vega, I saw a ball of fire, appearing to me of the size of a bomb-shell, swiftly falling down with a great blaze. When I arrived where it fell, I found the people wondering at the ground being broken in by a ball of fire, which they said fell down there. I observed there were many holes in the ground; one in the middle, of the size of a man's head, and five or six smaller holes round about it, of the size of a man's fist; and so deep, especially the largest, as not to be fathomed by what long sticks they had at hand. It was observed, that the green grass was perfectly burnt near the holes, and a strong smell of sulphur remained thereabouts for a good while after.

We had a very rainy night before, with much lightning and thunder, which is frequent in Jamaica, often killing cattle in the fields. These claps are much louder and stronger than any in Europe, and our showers of rain are also more violent. We have lightning all the year round; but our great rains are in the nonths of May, August, and October.

Our island is full of mines, and, I question not, very rich. It is very subject to earthquakes; several happening every year, especially after great rains, which fill up all the great cracks in the surface of the earth for in a very dry time, they are so very large, deep, and gaping so open and wide, that it is dangerous to ride over some parts of the Savannas, for fear a horse should get his legs into them. Our earthquakes make a noise or rumbling in the earth, before we feel the shake; and seem to run swiftly to the westward.

[Phil. Trans. 1718.

See for other instances, chap. xliii. sect. iv.

2. Ball of Sulphur supposed to be generated in the Air.

By Mr. Benjamin Cooke, F.R.S.

The great heats we have lately suffered were ushered in by a very gloomy night, of almost continual lightning, accompanied with very loud claps of thunder; which, as usual, were towards the morning followed by very heavy showers of rain. Early next day, in a meadow near the sea-shore, far from any house, and where it has not been known that any improvement has been carried on, a husbandman found a beautiful yellow ball lying on the turf. It proved to be of sulphur, of which it smelt uncommonly strong. It was frosted, as it were, all over with an efflorescence of fine, shining, yellowish crystals, which soon fell off with the lightest touch.

It has on one side a deep hole, admitting the end of a middlesized knitting-needle; and on the opposite side a deep depression, which would induce one almost to think its form had been at first nearly spheroidal, formed by a revolution round a supposed axis connecting those two parts. It has several other holes scattered irregularly up and down its whole surface, some fit to admit a hog's bristle, others a hair; as if it had been made of a fine powder, and some liquid, and after mixing had suffered some fermentation; but those parts of it which are solid, seem more compact than those of the common roll brimstone of the shops, and the powder of it burns with a whiter flame, and less acid fumes. Its longest diameter is between eight and niue, and its shortest betwixt six and seven tenths of an inch; its weight is 108 grains.

We find frequent mention, in the description of thunder-storms in hot climates, that there fails often a flaming bituminous matter to the ground, which sometimes burns not to be soon extinguished; but more frequently spatters into an infinite number of fiery sparks, doing great damage where they strike, always attended with a sulphurous suffocating smell, commonly compared to that of gunpowder.

Whether this sulphurous ball was intended for one of these, but by some accident missed firing, it is now time to consider. Had it been formed in the earth, how should it get to the surface, without losing that most elegant frosty covering of fine shining crystals, and

appear not in the least sullied, or its pores filled with earth, or other terrestrial matter? on the contrary, not the least adhesion of any thing of that kind can be observed: besides, brimstone made the ordinary way seems to have a different texture of its internal parts, from this ball. From these observations Mr. Cooke concludes it not formed in the earth.

[ld. 1738.

3. Fire-ball accompanied with a shower of Stones from the

Atmosphere.

C. Bior, member of the National Institute, in a letter to the French Minister of the Interior, dated July 20, 1813, gives a detailed account of his inquiries, &c. respecting a fire-ball which exploded in the neighbourhood of Laigle.

On Tuesday, April 26, 1812, about one in the afternoon, the weather being serene, there was observed from Caen, Pont Aude. mer, and the environs of Al nçon, Falaise, and Verneuil, a fiery globe of a very brilliant splendour, which moved in the atmosphere with great rapidity.

Some moments after there was heard at Laigle, and in the envi virons of that city, in the extent of more than thirty leagues in every direction, a violent explosion, which lasted five or six minutes.

At first there were three or four reports like those of a cannon, followed by a kind of discharge which resembled a firing of mus. ketry; after which there was heard a dreadful rumbling, like the beating of a drum. The air was calm and the sky serene, except a few clouds, such as are frequently observed.

The noise proceeded from a small cloud which had a rectangular form, the largest side being in a direction from east to west. It appeared motionless all the time that the phenomenon lasted. But the vapour of which it was composed was projected momentarily from the different sides by the effect of the successive explosions. This cloud was about half a league to the north-north-east of the town of Laigle; it was at a great elevation in the atmosphere, for the inhabitants of two hamlets, a league distant from each other, saw it at the same time above their heads. In the whole canton over which this cloud hovered, a hissing noise like that of a stone