a firm adhesion, but a loose one, like that of a drop of water to the end of an icicle before freezing. The firm adhesion is after it is frozen. I conceive that the original constituent particles o water are perfectly hard, round, and smooth. If so, there must be interstices, and yet the mass incompressible. A box filled with small shot has many interstices, and the shot may be compressed because they are not perfectly hard. If they were, the interstices would remain the same, notwithstanding the greatest pressure, and would admit sand, as water admits salt. Our vessel, named the Argo, is gone for the northwest passage; and the captain has borrowed my Journals of the last voyage, except one volume of a broken set, which I send you. I enclose a letter from our friend, Mr. Collinson, and am promised some speltz, which I shall send per next post. The originals were then despatched to Quebec. To the translation, which was printed and distributed by Franklin, was prefixed a long and interesting letter from Mr. Alexander on the subject of the transit. He also communicated a copy of all the papers to Cadwallader Colden. In a letter to Franklin, which accompanied the manuscripts, Mr. Alexander said; "It would be a great honor to our young colleges in America, if they should forthwith prepare themselves for the observation, and make it, which I doubt not they will do, if they are put in mind of it, and of its great importance to astronomy. The missing of that one ebservation cannot be retrieved for two hundred and fifty years. You have on so many occasions demonstrated your love of literature and the good of mankind in general, that I thought no person so proper as yourself to think of the ways and means of persuading these colleges to prepare themselves, and in order thereto you may make what use you please of the papers herewith sent." Mr. Bowdoin said, in reply to the letter in the text; "By the post I received your favor, enclosing several printed letters relating to the transit of Mercury over the sun. A gentleman here, who is provided with the proper instruments, and well skilled in astronomy, intends to make the necessary observations; to whom, as well as to several others, I shall communicate said letters. The rarity of the appearance, and the improvement in geography and astronomy to be expected from it, will induce them, I hope, to make their observations with such accuracy as shal answer the end proposed." — EDItor. The Tatler tells us of a girl, who was observed to grow suddenly proud, and none could guess the reason, till it came to be known that she had got on a pair of new silk garters. Lest you should be puzzled to guess the cause, when you observe any thing of the kind in me, I think I will not hide my new garters under my petticoats, but take the freedom to show them to you, in a paragraph of our friend Collinson's last letter, viz. — But I ought to mortify, and not indulge, this vanity; I will not transcribe the paragraph, yet I cannot forbear. "If any of thy friends," says Peter, "should take notice that thy head is held a little higher up than formerly, let them know; when the grand monarch of France strictly commands the Abbé Mazéas to write a letter in the politest terms to the Royal Society, to return the King's thanks and compliments in an express manner to Mr. Franklin of Pennsylvania, for his useful discoveries in electricity, and application of the pointed. rods to prevent the terrible effects of thunder-storms, I say, after all this, is not some allowance to be made, if thy crest is a little elevated? There are four letters containing very curious experiments on thy doctrine of points, and its verification, which will be printed in the new Transactions. I think, now I have stuck a feather in thy cap, I may be allowed to conclude in wishing thee long to wear it. Thine, P. COLLINSON." On reconsidering this paragraph, I fear I have not so much reason to be proud as the girl had; for a feather in the cap is not so useful a thing, or so serviceable to the wearer, as a pair of good silk garters. The pride of man is very differently gratified; and, had his Majesty sent me a marshal's staff, I think I should scarce have been so proud of it, as I am of your esteem, and of subscribing myself, with sincerity, dear Sir, Your affectionate friend and humble servant, FROM JOHN PERKINS TO B. FRANKLIN, SIR, Shooting Stars. READ AT THE ROYAL SOCIETY, JULY 8TH, 1756. Boston, 14 May, 1753. I received your letter of April last, and thank you for it. Several things in it make me at a loss which side the truth lies on, and determine me to wait for farther evidence. As to shooting stars, as they are called, I know very little, and hardly know what to say. I imagine them to be passes of electric fire from place to place in the atmosphere, perhaps occasioned by accidental pressures of a non-electric, circumambient fluid, and so by propulsion, or allicited by the circumstance of a distant quantity minus electrified, which it shoots to supply, and becomes apparent by its contracted passage through a non-electric medium. Electric fire in our globe is always in action, sometimes ascending, descending, or passing from region to region. I suppose it avoids too dry air, and therefore we never see these shoots ascend. It always has freedom enough to pass down unobserved, but, I imagine, not always so, to pass to distant climes and meridians less stored with it. The shoots are sometimes all one way, which, in the last case, they should be. Possibly there may be collections of particles in our atmosphere, which gradually form, by attraction, either similar ones per se, or dissimilar particles, by the intervention of others. But, then, whether they shoot or explode of themselves, or by the approach of some suitable foreign collection, accidentally brought near by the usual commotions and interchanges of our atmosphere, especially when the higher and lower regions intermix, before change of winds and weather, I leave. I believe I have now said enough of what I know nothing about. If it should serve for your amusement, or any way oblige you, it is all I aim at; and I shall, at your desire, be always ready to say what I think, as I am sure of your candor. I am, &c. J. PERKINS. FROM JOHN PERKINS TO B. FRANKLIN. Water-Spouts and Whirlwinds. READ AT THE ROYAL SOCIETY, JULY 8TH, 1756. SPOUTS have been generally believed ascents of water from below to the region of the clouds, and whirlwinds the means of conveyance. The world has been very well satisfied with these opinions, and prejudiced with respect to any observations about them. Men of learning and capacity have had many opportunities in passing those regions where these phenomena were most frequent, but seem industriously to have declined. any notice of them, unless to escape danger, as a matter of mere impertinence in a case so clear and certain as their nature and manner of operation are taken to be. Hence it has been very difficult to get any tolerable accounts of them. None, but those they fell near, can inform us any thing to be depended on; three or four such instances follow, where the vessels were so near, that their crews could not avoid knowing something remarkable with respect to the matters in question. Captain John Wakefield, junior, passing the Straits of Gibraltar, had one fall by the side of his ship; it came down of a sudden, as they think, and all agree the descent was certain. Captain Langstaff, on a voyage to the West Indies, had one come across the stern of his vessel, and pass away from him. The water came down in such quantity, that the present Captain Melling, who was then a common sailor at helm, says it almost drowned him, running into his mouth, nose, ears, &c., and adds, that it tasted perfectly fresh. One passed by the side of Captain Howland's ship, so near that it appeared pretty plain that the water descended from first to last. Mr. Robert Spring was so near one, in the Straits of Malacca, that he could perceive it to be a small very thick rain. All these assure me, that there was no wind drawing towards them, nor have I found any others that have observed such a wind. It seems plain, by these few instances, that whirlwinds do not always attend spouts; and that the water really descends in some of them. But the following consideration, in confirmation of this opinion, may, perhaps, render it probable that all the spouts are descents. It seems unlikely that there should be two sorts of spouts, one ascending and the other descending. It has not yet been proved, that any one spout ever ascended. A specious appearance is all that can be produced in favor of this; and those, who have been most positive about it, were at more than a league's distance when they observed, as Stuart and others, if I am not mistaken. However, I believe it impossible to be certain whether water ascends or descends at half the distance. It may not be amiss to consider the places where they happen most. These are such as are liable to calms from departing winds on both sides, as on the borders of the equinoctial trade, calms on the coast of |