The Geography of the Heavens; And Class-Book of Astronomy - Accompanied by a Celestial Atlas (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1873 Excerpt: ...quotation f 294. What said of the number of shooting st?rs? What instance iif "m jtcorlc showers" cited r phanes relates, "the sky appeared to be on fire," with the corn cations of the flying meteors. A shower of stars exactly similar took place in Canada, between the 8d and 4th oi July, 1814, and another at Montreal, in November, 1S19. In all these cases, a residuum ir black dust, was deposited upon the surface of the waters, and upoi. the roofs of build ings, and other objects. In the year 1810, "inflamed substances," it is said, fell into, and around lake Van, in Armenia, which stained the water of a blood color, and clefl the eai th in various places. On the 5th of September, 1S19, a like phenomenon was sew La Moravia. History furnishes many more instances of meteoric showers, depositing a red dust in some places, so plentiful as to admit of chemical analysis. 295. The commissioner (Mr. Andrew Ellicott), who was sent out by our government to fix the boundary between the Spanish possessions in North America and the United States, witnessed a very extraordinary flight of shooting stars, which filled the whole atmosphere from Cape Florida to the West India Islands. This grand phenomenon took place the 12th of November, 1799, and is thus described: --" I was called up," says Mr. Ellicott, "about 8 o'clock in the morning, to see the shooting stars, as they are called. The phenomenon was grand and awful. The whole heavens appeared as if illuminated with sky-rockets, which disappeared only by-the light of the snn, after daybreak. The meteors, which at any one instant of time appeared as numerous as the stars, flew in all possible directions except from the earth, toward which they all inclined more or less, and some ...