themselves into smoke. No report of any kind was observed, although we listened attentively.

"Beside the foregoing distinct concretions, or individual bodies, the atmosphere exhibited phosphoric lines, following in the train of minute points, that shot off in the greatest abundance in a north-westerly direction. These did not so fully copy the figure of the sky, but moved in paths more nearly rectilinear, and appeared to be much nearer the spectator than the fire-balls. The light of their trains was also of a paler hue, not unlike that produced by writing with a stick of phosphorus on the walls of a dark room. The number of these luminous trains increased and diminished alternately, now and then crossing the field of view, like snow drifted before the wind, although, in fact, their course was towards the wind.

"From these two varieties, we were presented with meteors of various sizes and degrees of splendour; some were mere points, while others were larger and brighter than Jupiter or Venus; and one, seen by a credible witness at an earlier hour, was judged to be nearly as large as the moon. The flashes of light, although less intense than lightning, were so bright as to awaken people in their beds. One ball that shot off in the north-west direction, and exploded a little northward of the star Capella, left just behind the place of explosion a phosphorescent train of peculiar beauty. This train was at first nearly straight, but it shortly began to contract in length, to dilate in breadth, and to assume the figure of a serpent drawing itself up, until it appeared like a small luminous cloud of vapour. This cloud was borne eastward (by the wind, as was supposed, and which was blowing gently in that direc

n

tion), opposite to the direction in which the meteor itself had moved, remaining in sight several minutes. The point from which the meteors seemed to radiate kept a fixed position among the stars, being constantly near a star in Leo, called Gamma Leonis."

Several theories have been started respecting the source or nature of these wondrous bodies; and the one most generally received supposes them to be portions of some gaseous group or mass revolving round the sun, and coming at certain periods within the reach of the earth's attraction. But even if this theory were proved, "perhaps," to quote Professor Olmsted once more, "ages may roll away before the world will be again surprised and delighted with a display of celestial fire-works equal to that of the morning of November 13, 1833."

The conditions of local atmosphere which constitute what is called climate, rank high among the wonders of nature, but are too many and intricate to be unravelled within our narrow limits. They comprise position with regard to the equator and the poles, altitude of the ground above sea-level, exposure and configuration of surface, relation to neighbouring seas or lands, character of prevailing winds, nature of the soil, presence or absence of forests or morasses, and all things else which affect temperature, humidity, and foreign admixture with the air; and these make such a compound of influences, or rather of co-operations and antagonisms, as cannot possibly be described in a few sentences. There is one thought about them, however, which deserves to be dragged into prominencethat, in their grand result, in the character which they

give to local climate, particularly in regard to its salubriousness, they are, in a large portion of the world, powerfully controlled, for good or for evil, by the care or the carelessness of the cultivators of land.

When excessive quantities of vapour arise from the marshiness or moistness of a district, they rarefy the superincumbent air, decrease its capacity for heat, and, in consequence, render the local climate humid, cold, and chilly. But, by a beautiful law of the all-beneficent God, these can be promptly and permanently diminished throughout even so small a tract as a single farm, by means of the simple, and otherwise eminently profitable, operation of draining. That not much cold air and damp air shall accumulate in any one place, is provided for by a decrease in the atmosphere's capacity for watery vapour, proportionately to the fall of its temperature; and that chilliness and dampness shall be driven from the climate of a district by thorough cultivation, is provided for by the disappearance of the stagnant waters and the bibulous and spongy surfaces whence the local atmosphere was formerly charged with vapour. When all the land of a district has been thoroughly drained, and all its ascending and accumulating waters either drawn off to a river-course, or gathered into such small deep pools as present comparatively trivial scope for evaporation, the local atmosphere receives less vapour, acquires increase of capacity for direct solar heat, and obtains a larger amount of radiated heat from the ground; so that, though the same quantity of rain fell annually as before, the stratum of air immediately over the soil, or the actual climate of the district, will possess a far higher degree of both dryness and heat. Hence the