to unite what is solid with what is agreeable. The first of these reminds us of the sages of Greece, whom he himself has so admirably described in his Young Anacharsis. He never expected that that work would have become so popular; that Encyclopedia of Greece, that composition of simplicity and elegance appeared to him scarcely to rise above mediocrity; his modesty is equally rare and affecting.

"As to the bulk of the people here, as every where else, the middle class is the best; among them the names of father, son, and wife, are still uttered with respect. It is far otherwise in the fashionable world. My lord and my lady inhabit the two extremities of the house, treat each other like strangers, abandon the sons to the tuition of a mercenary preceptor, and place the daughters in a convent, whence they never come forth, unless to receive husbands from the hand of a parent, actuated by avarice and ambition.

"A certain air of study and affection has for some time occupied the beau monde, and even taken possession of the theatres. The new comedies are replete with a sentimental jargon, and the dialogue of ten aims at being epigrammatick; the art of Moliere seems entirely lost; no more droll incidents, pleas

ing situations, or original characters.

"The age of great actors is past. La Dumesnil has retired on account of old age; Mademoiselle Clairon no longer makes her appearance in a theatre; Le Kain is dead; Aufrene is in Russia; and Brizard and La Rive have quitted the French theatre. I ought, however, to do justice to the talents of those two great actresses, Mlle. de Raucourt and Mlle. de Gariens. I have seen the former in the characters of Leontina and Aggrippina; in that of Cleopatra she chilled me with affright when she exclaimed:

'Epargne moi l'horreur de mourir à ses yeux!

"Besides the French theatre, there are six other spectacles. The Parisians, like the Romans of old, seem to demand nothing so much as bread and shows. The Opera is the most perfect representation ever witnessed by me. Edipe a Colonne,' accompanied by the musick of Sacchini, made me fancy myself at Athens, and I actually began to think I was listening to a Greek tragedy. As to dancing, all the world knows to what perfection it is carried here, and that too, by a vain creature, who, pluming himself on his art, exclaims, • that there never were and never will be but one Frederick, one Voltaire, and one Vestris,!' Adieu."

2. Of the correspondence between atmospherick stones and a certain description of fire-balls.

It may be useful, as a preliminary to this examination, to enumerate some of the chief of the luminous meteors

seen in the New England States, and in Western Europe; excluding those dependent on the sun and moon, and those attributable to elec. tricity or volcanos; as well as those whose connection with the earth or its waters, is close and local. A subject is often illustrated by means of the things from which it differs, as well as those with which it agrees.

The first article in this enumeration, will be shooting or falling stars, these being the most frequent among our meteors. They are free from noise; perhaps always descend; are of small comparative elevation; move by day, as well as by night; but are much more frequent in the warm and temperate, than in the cold states of the atmosphere. Small luminous globes are next to be mentioned; having a pure and mild white light, with a moderate, downward motion; commonly leaving behind them (like shooting stars, to which they seem much allied,) a faint and transient spotted trace, appearing al. ways to be within a moderate distance, yet never seeming to produce a sound, nor, perhaps, ever depositing any visible remains. Great streams, or bodies of fire, also, are sometimes seen by day, as well as by night, without observable sound, a portion, at least, of each of them, being elevated to a considerable height. They inflame at first with rapidity, but seem afterwards devoid of extensive motion. They lie in various directions; the conflagration usually seeming to begin from above, but occasionally, also, from below. They die away gradually, being often observable for a considerable number of minutes by night, though they are necessarily sooner effaced by day. Fiery whirlwinds are affirmed to have had existence, by good authorities; and Boscovich speaks of one with a sulphureous smell,

which travelled with great swiftness from Ostia to and beyond Rome. Wandering combustible vapours also have been noticed, which, having no attachment to the place where they originate, move near the earth or water, apparently at times guided by the wind, and if they explode, leave no discoverable traces of themselves, though by the violence of their explosion, or by their inflammable qualities, they sometimes cause serious mischief. But, as it will appear, that neither these wandering combustible vapours, near the surface of the ground or water, nor falling stars, nor small luminous dropping globes, nor greater streams or bodies of fire, nor fiery whirlwinds, (to omit the meteors expressly excluded from our account ;) I say, as it will appear, that none of the preceding phenomena bear any relation to our atmospherick stones, it remains, in the last place, to inquire what resemblance to these stones can be found in fire-balls. That we may conduct this inquiry impartially, an entire section on this subject will be translated from Musschenbroek; though it will be found full of he terogeneous matter and uncertain principles. It is entitled by him, though perhaps erroneously, De bolide. The authorities cited by him, will be seen upon a reference to his work.

"Of the Fire-Ball.

"A fire-ball (bolis) is a large burning ball, inclining often to a red colour, moving with very great swiftness through the air, and hav ing commonly a tail, four or five times as long as the diameter of the globe, and as thick as the globe itself, at its commencement, but decreasing gradually till it terminates in a point, Aristotle calls this meteor Capra.

"These globes are sometimes large, but they may be of various sizes. Sometimes their diameter seems one quarter of that of the moon, and sometimes (according both to ancients and moderns) it equals that of the moon. Gassendi even says, that he has seen one (which he calls fax) more than twice as large as that of the moon. When close to the spectator, the diameter has seemed as large as that of a mill-stone. Kirch saw one by night, at Leipsick, in 1686, with a diameter equal to half of that of the moon; whose light was sufficient to admit of reading by it, and expired gradually. It was noticed also eleven German miles from Leipsick, and had it been seen in both places at the same moment, its elevation must have been six Dutch miles, and its diameter 335 feet. But this is unlikely, for it cannot be depended upon, that the observations were made at the same instant, and the explosion, resembling thunder, would not be noticeable in such case, thunder itself being scarcely heard more than three Dutch miles. The meteor seen by Balbi, in 1719, at Bologna, in Italy, of the apparent size of the full moon and of the colour of burning camphor, was much larger, and spread a brightness, equal to that of the rising sun, so as to render visible the smallest objects lying on the ground. It had four holes from which smoke issued; many little flames also rose from it, and its tail was longer than seven of its diameters. Upon a comparison of its apparent altitude, as seen from different places, its elevation from the earth must have been not less than 16,000, nor more than 20,000 paces, which makes its diameter 3,560 feet. In the quarters, over which it passed, it left a strong sul. phureous smell, and it exploded

with noise. Similar effects attended one seen April 8, 1676, by Monterchi, though its height was less considerable, since a noise was heard from its tail, like that from red-hot iron passing through cold water, and it is even said to have burned the branches of trees. But, in truth, these meteors are not always very high, for that which was seen in 1749, in the middle of the ocean, ran above the surface of the water, towards a vessel, and burst at the distance of 40 or 50 ells from it, with a noise like that of 100 pieces of ordnance, and with so strong a smell of sulphur, that the vessel seemed enveloped with it. Part of one of the masts was shivered into several hundred pieces, and another mast was shattered. Of the crew also one was burned, and five others were thrown off their feet.* It of ten happens, that these bodies separating with a violent noise, completely vanish, without leaving any vestige of themselves. The explosion of all of them is commonly equal to that of great guns. That on February 9, 1750, at Breslaw, was not only accompanied with such a noise, but was remarkable for turning round on its axis. Among those which appeared with explosions, in 1753, one was extinguished by falling into a marsh.

"In some places, these meteors are frequent, so that several have appeared on the same night; and Ulloa tells us, that this is the case in the city of Santa Maria de la Parillat but it is not general.

"It sometimes happens, when these bodies finish their career, without noise, that they leave behind them a little cloud or smoke, like the remnant of burned matter, being of an ash colour.

"As to the motion of these bodies, it is sometimes extremely rapid. The meteor seen by Gassendi traversed a tract of the visible horizon, answering to not less than twenty Italian miles, during the time that he counted fifty pulsations at his wrist. Others again move more moderately, as for example, that in Holland, on August 2, 1750. Some even stand still, or seem to do so, for some time in the same quarter of the atmosphere, as Kirch and Wolfe have noticed. In France, (at Ivoy in Berry) Nov. 4, 1753, one appeared* having a long tail, of which the end was not to be seen, and remained suspended twenty five feet above the ground, for some seconds, and then threw out dense smoke, followed by two reports as loud as from a

"As a meteor of this kind spreads a sulphureous smell, it is probably a cloud, composed chiefly of sulphureous and other inflammable exhalations, proceeding sometimes from volcanos, when in the act of opening new mouths, or of emitting sulphureous smoke, previous to an eruption, or from an earthquake, which gives vent to some great deposite of sulphur, and puts it in the way of being agitated and carried about by winds. This sulphureous cloud, by effervescing with other exhalations, or from some other cause,

The memoirs of the French Academy, from which this account is taken, say, that the appearance was during the afternoon, the sun being bright and warm.

takes fire, and the burning matter, when fluid, finding itself in an atmosphere which yields to it, is generally seen to assume a globular form, and the quantity of this matter, which is at last suddenly exploded in an inflamed state, occasions a report like that of a bomb.

"The apparent want of motion in some of these bodies, seems to arise from a tranquil state of the air, or because their course is immediately directed towards the spectator. Others of them have their motion made more or less rapid, from being affected by the wind.

"The appearance of a tail, may arise, in part, from the remains of combustible materials, which shine in the track where they are left, till they grow cool, or from the immense celerity of the meteor, whose whole path is judged to be luminous, because the eye cannot discriminate the separate points of its appearance, but sees only the sum total of them.

"The vividness of the light indicates the substantial nature of the fuel, which feeds the meteor, and it is such as might be expected from sulphur and vegetable oils, mixed with matters from the earth, and perhaps with salts; for the colour of the flame evidently shews that some other substance is concerned besides sulphur.

"The great light, which Ravina described as seen at Faenza, and which Montanari (a mathematician living at Bologna) observed March 31, 1676, most probably arose from a ball of fire. It seemed to the latter to come from Dalmatia over the Adriatick.

While crossing Italy,

When a body moves directly towards the spectator, its centre will appear stationary, when across him, its velocity will seem greatest, and between these extremes, there will be every intervening gradation, according to the case.

its course was marked by powerful cracking sounds; over Leghorn its report was like that of ordnance; and when it approached Corsica, it was like that of carriages rattling over a stony surface. It moved at the excessively swift rate of 160 miles in one minute; which, as it surpasses the speed of the wind, must depend on a cause as yet unknown. It was seen in other places. "The possibility of sulphur becoming volatilized, and yielding a powerful and lasting flame, may be collected from what was noticed by Hallman in Nericia, where sulphureous little hills went into spontaneous inflammation, and emitted flashes and fire.

"Many fire-balls have been seen and described by more recent observers; and none have occurred without some peculiarity worthy of notice."*

His

Thus far Musschenbroek. collection of facts is useful; though, like the state of knowledge which prevailed on these subjects at the time of his writing, it is imperfect and confused. Of the defectiveness of his own collection we are bound to give an example in the case which he states as having happened in the middle of the ocean. The incident occur red on Nov. 4, 1749, at no very immense distance from Cape Finisterre. Mr. Chalmers, an eye-witness of it, relates, that a ball of blue fire, at noon day was seen on board the Montague, an English man of war, at the distance of three miles, rolling on the surface of the sea, having come from the quarter of the land, and nearly also from the quarter in which the wind had been blow ing hard for two days preceding, ac

See Musschenbroek's Introductio ad Philosophiam Naturalem. Tom. 2. pp. 1065, 1068. Quarto. Leyden, 1762.

companied with rain, hail, and a large sea. The motion was not so rapid, as to prevent the lowering of the top-sails of the vessel, or an attempt afterwards to hawl up its courses. When the ball arrived within forty or fifty yards, it seemed of the size of a large mill-stone, and rising from the water, struck the main-top-mast of this large vessel; which it shattered into above one hundred pieces, rending the mainmast, which supported it, down to its heel. The colour and smell of the meteor bespoke sulphur; but no solid materials are known to have entered into its composition. Perhaps we may explain a part of this phenomenon, by supposing that the meteor, while travelling with the wind, became elevated somewhat by the obstruction which the vessel offered to the air in which it floated, and thus ascended, till it struck the mast and parts adjacent. A more intimate mixture of the ingredients of the meteor which was produced by this shock, the effect upon it of the fires then lighted to prepare the dinners of some hundreds of persons, the neighbourhood of pitch and tar with other combustible materials, some electrical operation performed either upon the ball or upon the vessel, or some other unknown circumstance, may have caused, or contributed to cause the explosion. But whatever may be thought of this explanation of the catastrophe, it is clear that Musschenbroek had no right to rank this meteor with fireballs with tails, since it is evident, that it more naturally belonged to the class of wandering combustible vapours.t

Before we proceed to draw any general conclusion on the subject of the present section, it is proper to

+ See Phil. Trans. for 1750, No. 494.