Page:A Voyage in Space (1913).djvu/60

40 as having appeared at the siege of Jerusalem. Josephus recorded "a fiery sword hanging over Jerusalem," which foretold its destruction. People were terrified of comets in those days, and generally associated them with disaster: and it was only when Newton and Halley showed that comets obey regular laws that this fear was dissipated. It is seldom very difficult to find some disaster which could be associated with a comet, and we shall find that on several occasions Halley's comet has been associated with some event in our own national history. For instance, it appeared in 1066, at the time of the Norman Conquest, and it is represented on the tapestry that Queen Matilda made the Bayeux tapestry to celebrate her husband's victory. The English were frightened, and the Normans inspirited, by this wonderful sign in the heavens, and these two different effects may perhaps have decided the battle.

There is one other thing about comets that is