Page:The Book of the Damned (Fort, 1919).djvu/285

Rh have been racked off, and have fallen, exploding like the things called "ball lightning." May have been objects of stone or metal with inscriptions upon them, for all we know, at present. In all instances, estimates of dimensions are valueless, but ratios of dimensions are more acceptable. A thing said to have been six feet long may have been six hundred feet long; but shape is not so subject to the illusions of distance.

Nature, 40-415:

That, Aug. 5, 1889, during a violent storm, an object that looked to be about 15 inches long and 5 inches wide, fell, rather slowly, at East Twickenham, England. It exploded. No substance from it was found.

L'Année Scientifique, 1864-54:

That, Oct. 10, 1864, M. Leverrier had sent to the Academy three letters from witnesses of a long luminous body, tapering at both ends, that had been seen in the sky.

In Thunder and Lightning, p. 87, Flammarion says that on Aug. 20, 1880, during a rather violent storm, M. A. Trécul, of the French Academy, saw a very brilliant yellowish-white body, apparently 35 to 40 centimeters long, and about 25 centimeters wide. Torpedo-shaped. Or a cylindrical body, "with slightly conical ends." It dropped something, and disappeared in the clouds. Whatever it may have been that was dropped, it fell vertically, like a heavy object, and left a luminous train. The scene of this occurrence may have been far from the observer. No sound was heard. For M. Trécul's account, see Comptes Rendus, 103-849.

Monthly Weather Review, 1907-310:

That, July 2, 1907, in the town of Burlington, Vermont, a terrific explosion had been heard throughout the city. A ball of light, or a luminous object, had been seen to fall from the sky—or from a torpedo-shaped thing, or construction, in the sky. No one had seen this thing that had exploded fall from a larger body that was in the sky—but if we accept that at the same time there was a larger body in the sky My own acceptance is that a dirigible in the sky, or a construction that showed every sign of disrupting, had barely time to drop—whatever it did drop—and to speed away to safety above.

The following story is told, in the Review, by Bishop John S. Michaud:

"I was standing on the corner of Church and College Streets, just in front of the Howard Bank, and facing east, engaged in