PART II (continued 3)

The phenomena associate with an opposition of Mars. Dec. 10, 1896—opposition of Mars.

But we have gone on rather elaborately with perhaps an insufficiency to base upon. We can not say, directly, that all the phenomena of the night of Dec. 16-17, 1896, were shocks from explosions in the sky: only during the greatest of the concussions was something seen, or was something near enough to be seen.

We apply the idea of the diagrams to another series of occurrences in this period. Now draw a diagram relatively to the sky of Florida, and see just what the explanation of coincidence demands or exacts. But then consider the diagram as one of an earth that does not move and of something that is fixed over a point upon its surface. Things can be thought of as coming down 186from somewhere else to one special sky of this earth, as logically as precariously placed objects on one special window sill sometimes come down to a special neighbor.

In the Monthly Weather Review, 23-57, is a report, by the Director of the Florida Weather Service, upon “mysterious sounds” and luminous effects in the sky of Florida. According to investigation, these phenomena did occur in the sky of Florida, about noon, Feb. 7, 1895, again at 5 o’clock in the morning of the 8th, and again between 6 and 10 o’clock, night of the 8th. The Editor of the Review thinks that three meteors may have exploded so in succession in the sky of Florida, and nowhere else, “by coincidence.”

187

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Char me the trunk of a redwood tree. Give me pages of white chalk cliffs to write upon. Magnify me thousands of times, and replace my trifling immodesties with a titanic megalomania—then might I write largely enough for our subjects. Because of accessibility and abundance of data, our accounts deal very much with the relatively insignificant phenomena of Great Britain. But our subjects, if not so restricted, would be the violences that have screamed from the heavens, lapping up villages with tongues of fire. If, because of appearances in the sky, be accepted that some of the so-called earthquakes of Italy and South America represented relations with regions beyond this earth, then is accepted that some of this earth’s greatest catastrophes have been relations with the unknown and the external. We have data that seem to be indications of signalling, but not unless we can think that foreign giants have hurled explosive mountains at this earth can we see such indications in all the data.

Our data do seem to fall into two orders of phenomena: sounds of Melida, Barisal, and Belgium, and nothing falling from the sky, and nothing seen in the sky, and excellently supported observations for accepting a signal-like intent in intervals and grouping of sounds, at least in Barisal and Belgium; and the unregularized phenomena of Worcester-Hereford, Colchester, Comrie, and Birmingham, in which appearances are seen in the sky, or in which substances fall from the sky, and in which effects upon this earth, not noted at all in Belgium and Bengal, are great, and sometimes tremendous. It seems that extra-geography divides into the extra-sociologic and the extra-physical; and in the second type of phenomena, we suppose the data are of physical relations between this earth and other worlds. We think of a difference of potential. There were tremendous detonations in the sky at the times of the falls of the little black stones of Birmingham and Wolverhampton, and the electric manifestations, according to descriptions 188in the newspapers, were extraordinary, and great volumes of water fell. Consequently the events were supposed to be thunderstorms. I suppose, myself, that they were electric storms, but electric storms that represented difference of potential between this earth and some region that was fixed, at least eleven years, over Birmingham and Wolverhampton, bringing down stones and volumes of water from some other world, or bringing down stones, and dislodging intervening volumes of water, such as we have many data for thinking exist in outer space, sometimes in bodies of warm or hot water, and sometimes as great masses, or fields, of ice.

Let two objects be generically similar, but specifically different and a relation that may be known as a difference of potential, though that term is usually confined to electric relations, generates between them. Quite as the Gulf Stream—though there are no reasons to suppose that there is such a Gulf Stream as one reads of—represents a relation between bodies of water heated differently, given any two worlds, alike in general constitution, but differing, say, electrically, and given proximity, we conceive of relations between them other than gravitational.

But this cloistered earth, and its monkish science—shrinking from, denying, or disregarding, all data of external relations, except some one controlling force that was once upon a time known as Jehovah, but that has been re-named Gravitation—

That the electric exchanges that were recognized by the ancients, but that were anthropomorphically explained by them, have poured from the sky and have gushed to the sky, afferently and efferently, between this earth and the nearby planets, or between this mainland and its San Salvadors, and have been recognized by the moderns, or the neo-ancients, but have been meteorologically and seismologically misconstrued by them.

When a village spouts to the sky, it is said to have been caught up in a cyclone: when unknown substances fall from the sky, not much of anything is said upon the subject.

Lost tribes and the nations that have disappeared from the face of this earth—that the skies have reeked with terrestrial civilizations, spreading out in celestial stagnations, where their remains to this day may be. The Mayans—and what became 189of them? Bones of the Mayans, picked white as frost by space-scavengers, regioned to this day in a sterile luxuriance somewhere, spread upon existence like the pseudo-breath of Death, crystallized on a sky-pane. Three times gaps wide and dark the history of Egypt—and that these abysses were gulfed by disappearances—that some of the eliminations from this earth may have been upward translations in functional suctions. We conceive of Supervision upon this earth’s development, but for it the names of Jehovah and Allah seem old-fashioned—that the equivalence of wrath, but like the storms of cells that, in an embryonic thing, invade and destroy cartilage-cells, when they have outlived their usefulness, have devastated this earth’s undesirables. Likely enough, or not quite likely enough, one of these earlier Egypts was populated by sphinxes, if one can suppose that some of the statuary still extant in Egypt were portraitures. This is good, though also not so good, orthodox Evolutionary doctrine—that between types occur transitionals—

That Elimination and Redistribution swept an earlier Egypt with suctions—because it was written, in symbols of embryonic law, that life upon this earth must form onward—and the crouching sphinx on the sands of Egypt, blinking the mysticism of her morphologic mixtures, would perhaps detain forever the less interesting type that was advancing—

That often has Clarification destroyed transitionals, that they shall not hold back development.

One conceives of their remains, to this day, wafting still in the currents of the sky: floating avenues of frozen sphinxes, solemnly dipping in cosmic undulations, down which circulate processions of Egyptian mummies.

An astronomer upon this earth notes that things in parallel lines have crossed the sun.

We offer this contribution as comparing favorably with the works of any other historian. We think that some of the details may need revision, but that what they typify is somewhere nearly acceptable.

Latitudes and longitudes of bones, not in the sky, but upon the surface of this earth. Baron Toll and other explorers have, upon the surface of this earth kicked their way through networks 190of ribs and protrusions of skulls and stacks of vertebræ, as numerous as if from dead land they had sprouted there. Anybody who has read of these tracts of bones upon the northern coast of Siberia, and of some of the outlying islands that are virtually composed of bones cemented with icy sand, will agree with me that there have been cataclysms of which conventionality and standardization tell us nothing. Once upon a time, some unknown force translated, from somewhere, a million animals to Colorado, where their remains now form great bone-quarries. Very largely do we express a reaction against dogmatism, and sometimes we are not dogmatic, ourselves. We don’t know very positively whether at times the animal life of some other world has been swept away from that world, or not, eventually pouring from the sky of Siberia and of Colorado, in some of the shockingest floods of mammoths from which spattered cats and rabbits, in cosmic scenery, or not. All that we can say is that when we turn to conventionality it is to blankness or suppression. Every now and then, to this day, occurs an alleged fall of blood from the sky, and I have notes upon at least one instance in which the microscopically examined substance was identified as blood. But now we conceive of intenser times, when every now and then a red cataract hung in the heavens like the bridal veil of the goddess of murder. But the science of today is a soporific like the idealism of Europe before the War broke out. Science and idealism—wings of a vampire that lulls consciousness that might otherwise foresee catastrophe. Showers of frogs and showers of fishes that occur to this day—that they are the dwindled representatives to this day of the cataclysms of intenser times when the skies of this earth were darkened by afferent clouds of dinosaurs. We conceive of intenser times, but we conceive of all times as being rhythmic times. We are too busy to take up alarmism, but, if Rome, for instance, never was destroyed by terrestrial barbarians, if we can not very well think of Apaches seizing Chicago, extra-mundane vandals may often have swooped down upon this earth, and they may swoop again; and it may be a comfort to us, some day, to mention in our last gasp that we told about this.

History, geology, palæontology, astronomy, meteorology—that 191nothing short of cataclysmic thinking can break down these united walls of Exclusionism.

Unknown monsters sometimes appear in the ocean. When, upon the closed system of normal preoccupations, a story of a sea serpent appears, it is inhospitably treated. To us of the wider cordialities, it has recommendations for kinder reception. I think that we shall be noted in recognitions of good works for our bizarre charities. Far back in the topography of the nineteenth century, Richard Proctor was almost submerged in an ocean of smugness, but now and then he was a little island emerging from the gently alternating doubts and satisfactions of his era, and by means of several papers upon the “sea serpent” he so protruded and gave variety to a dreary uniformity. Proctor reviewed some of the stories of “sea serpents.” He accepted some of them. This will be news to some conventionalists. But the mystery that he could not solve is their conceivable origin. To be sure this earth may not be round, or top-shaped, and may tower away somewhere, perhaps with the great Antarctic plateau as its foothills, to a gigantic existence commensurate throughout with the sea monsters that sometimes reach regions known to us. Judging by our experience in other fields of research, we suspect that this earth never has been traversed except in conventional trade-routes and standard explorations. One supposes that enormous forms of life that have appeared upon the surface of the ocean, did not come from conditions of great pressure below the surface. If there be no habitat of their own, in unknown seas of this earth, the monsters fell from the sky, surviving for a while. In his day, Charles Lyell never said a more preposterous thing than this—however we have no idea that mere preposterousness is a criterion.

Then at times the things have fallen upon land, presumably. To scientific minds in their present anæmia of malnutrition, we offer new nourishment. There are materials for a science of neo-palæontology—as it were—at least a new view of animal-remains upon this earth. Remains of monsters, supposed to have lived geologic ages ago, are sometimes found, not in ancient deposits, but upon, or near, the surface of the ground, sometimes barely covered. I have notes upon a great pile of bones, supposed to be the remains of a whale, out in open view in a western desert.

192In the American Museum of Natural History, New York City, is the mummified body of a monster called a trachodon, found in Converse County, Wyoming. It was not found upon the surface of the ground, which is bad for our attempts to stimulate palæontology. But the striking datum to me is that the only other huge mummy that I know of is another trachodon, now in the Museum of Frankfort. If only extraordinarily would geologic processes mummify remains of a huge animal, doubly extraordinarily would two animals of the same species be so exclusively affected. One at least gives some consideration to the idea that these trachodons are not products of geologic circumstances, but were affected, in common, by other circumstances. By inspiration, or progressive deterioration, one then conceives of the things as having wafted and dried in space, finally falling to this earth. Our swooping vandals are relieved with showering mummies. Life is turning out to be interesting.

Organic substances like life-fluids of living things have rained from the sky. However, it is enough for our general purposes to make acceptable simply that unknown substances have, in large quantities, fallen from the sky. That is neo-ism enough, it seems to me. I consider, myself, all such data relatively to this earth’s stationariness or possible motions. In Ciel et Terre, 22-198, it is said that, about 2 P. M., June 8, 1901, a glue-like substance fell at Sart. The story is told by an investigator, M. Michael, a meteorologist. He says that he saw this substance falling from the sky, but does not give an estimate of duration: he says that he arrived during the last five minutes of the shower. Editors and extra-geographers can’t help trying to explain. The Editor of Ciel et Terre writes that, three days before, there had been, at Antwerp, a great fire, in which, among other substances, a large quantity of sugar had been burned. He asks whether there could be any connection. Antwerp is about 80 miles from Sart.

Sept. 2, 1905—the tragedy of the space-pig:

In the English Mechanic, 86-100, Col. Markwick writes that, according to the Cambrian Natural Observer, something was seen in the sky, at Llangollen, Wales, Sept. 2, 1905. It is described as an intensely black object, about two miles above the earth’s 193surface, moving at the rate of about twenty miles an hour. Col. Markwick writes: “Could it have been a balloon?” We give Col. Markwick good rating as an extra-geographer, but of the early, or differentiating type, a transitional, if not a sphinx: so he was not quite developed enough to publish the details of this object. In the Cambrian Natural Observer, 1905-35—the journal of the Astronomical Society of Wales—it is said that, according to accounts in the newspapers, an object had appeared in the sky, at Llangollen, Wales, Sept. 2, 1905. At the schoolhouse, in Vroncysylite—I think that’s it: with all my credulity, some of these Welsh names look incredible to me, in my notes—the thing in the sky had been examined through powerful field glasses. We are told that it had short wings, and flew, or moved, in a way described as “casually inclining sideways.” It seemed to have four legs, and looked to be about ten feet long. According to several witnesses it looked like a huge, winged pig, with webbed feet. “Much speculation was rife as to what the mysterious object could be.”

Five days later, according to a member of the Astronomical Society of Wales—see Cambrian Observer, 1905-30—a purple-red substance fell from the sky, at Llanelly, Wales.

I don’t know that my own attitude toward these data is understood, and I don’t know that it matters in the least; also from time to time my own attitude changes: but very largely my feeling is that not much can be, or should be, concluded from our meagre accounts, but that so often are these occurrences, in our fields, reported, that several times every year there will be occurrences that one would like to have investigated by someone who believes that we have written nothing but bosh, and by someone who believes in our data almost religiously. It may be that, early in February, 1892, a luminous thing travelled back and forth, exploring for ten hours in the sky of Sweden. The story is copied from a newspaper, and ridiculed, in the English Mechanic, 55-34. Upon March 7, 1893, a luminous object, shaped like an elongated pear was seen in the sky of Val-de-la-Haye, by M. Raimond Coulon (L’Astro., 1893-169). M. Coulon’s suggestion is that the light may have been a signal suspended from a balloon. The signal-idea is interesting.

194In the summer of 1897, several weeks after Prof. Andrée and his two companions had sailed in a balloon, from Amsterdam Island, Spitzbergen, it was reported that a balloon had been seen in British Columbia. There was wide publicity: the report was investigated. It may be that had a terrestrial balloon escaped from somewhere in the United States or Canada, or if there had been a balloon-ascension at this time, the circumstance would have been reported: it may well be that the object was not Andrée’s balloon. President Bell, of the National Geographic Society, heard of this object, and heard that details had been sent to the Swedish Foreign Office, and cabled to the American Minister, at Stockholm, for information. He publishes his account in the National Geographic Magazine, 9-102. He was referred to the Swedish Consul, at San Francisco. In reply to inquiry, the Consul telegraphed the following data, which had been collected by the President of the Geographical Society of the Pacific:

“Statement of a balloon passing over the Horse-Fly Hydraulic Mining Camp, in Caribou, British Columbia, 52°, 20′, and Longitude 120°, 30′—

“From letters of J. B. Robson, manager of the Caribou Mining Co., and of Mrs. Wm. Sullivan, the blacksmith’s wife, there, and a statement of Mr. John J. Newsome, San Francisco, then at camp. About 2 or 3 o’clock, in the afternoon, between fourth and seventh of August last, weather calm and cloudless, Mrs. Sullivan, while looking over the Hydraulic Bank, noticed a round, grayish-looking object in the sky, to the right of the sun. As she watched, it grew larger and was descending. She saw the larger mass of the balloon above, and a smaller mass apparently suspended from the larger. It continued to descend, until she plainly recognized it as a balloon and a large basket hanging thereto. It finally commenced to swing violently back and forth, and move very fast toward the eastward and northward. Mrs. Sullivan called her daughter, aged 18, and about this time Mrs. Robson and her daughter were observing it.”

If someone saw a strange fish in the ocean, we’d like to know—what was it like? Stripes on him—spots—what? It would be unsatisfactory to be told over and over only that a dark body had crossed some waves. In Cosmos, n. s., 39-356, a satisfactory 195correspondent writes that, at Lille, France, Sept. 4, 1898, he saw a red object in the sky. It was like the planet Mars, but was in the position of no known planet. He looked through his telescope, and saw a rectangular object, with a violet-colored band on one side of it, and the rest of it striped with black and red. He watched it ten minutes, during which time it was stationary; then, like the object that was seen at the time of the Powell-mystery, it cast out sparks and disappeared.

In the English Mechanic, 75-417, Col. Markwick writes that, upon May 10, 1902, a friend of his had seen in the sky, in South Devon, a great number of highly colored objects like little suns or toy-balloons. “Altogether beats me,” says Col. Markwick.

Upon March 2, 1899, a luminous object in the sky, from 10 A. M., until 4 P. M., was reported from El Paso, Texas. Mentioned in the Observatory, 22-247—supposed to have been Venus, even though Venus was then two months past secondary maximum brilliance. This seems reasonable enough, in itself, but there are other data for thinking that an unknown, luminous body was at this time in the especial sky of the southwestern states. In the U. S. Weather Bureau Report (Ariz. Sec., March, 1899) it is said that, at Prescott, Arizona, Dr. Warren E. Day had seen a luminous object, upon the 8th of March, “that travelled with the moon” all day, until 2 P. M. It is said that, the day before, this object had been seen close to the moon, by Mr. G. O. Scott, at Tonto, Arizona. Dr. Day and Mr. Scott were voluntary observers for the Weather Review. This association with the moon and this localization of observation are puzzling.

La Nature (Sup.) Nov. 11, 1899—that at Luzarches, France, upon the 28th of October, 1899, M. A. Garrie had seen, at 4.50 P. M., a round, luminous object rising above the horizon. About the size of the moon. He watched it for 15 minutes, as it moved away, diminishing to a point. It may be that something from external regions was for several weeks in the especial sky of France. In La Nature (Sup.) Dec. 16, 1899, someone writes that he had seen, Nov. 15, 1899, 7 P. M., at Dourite (Dordogne) an object like an enormous star, at times white, then red, and sometimes blue, but moving like a kite. It was in the south. He had never seen it before. Someone, in the issue of Dec. 30th, says 196that, without doubt it was the star Fomalhaut, and asks for precise position. Issue of Jan. 20, 1900—the first correspondent says that the object was in the southwest, about 35 degrees above the horizon, but moving so that the precise position could not be stated. The kite-like motion may have been merely seeming motion—object may have been Fomalhaut, though 35 degrees above the horizon seem to me to be too high for Fomalhaut—but, then, like the astronomers, I’m likely at times to expose what I don’t know about astronomy. Fomalhaut is not an enormous star. Seventeen are larger.

May 1, 1908, between 8 and 9 P. M., at Vittel, France—an object, with a nebulosity around it, diameter equal to the moon’s, according to a correspondent to Cosmos, n. s., 58-535. At 9 o’clock a black band appeared upon the object, and moved obliquely across it, then disappearing. The Editor thinks that the object was the planet Venus, under extraordinary meteorologic conditions.

Dark obj., by Prof. Brooks, July 21, 1896 (Eng. Mec., 64-12); dark obj., by Gathmann, Aug. 22, 1896 (Sci. Amer. Sup., 67-363); two luminous objs., by Prof. Swift, evidently in a local sky of California, because unseen elsewhere in California, Sept. 20, and one of them again, Sept. 21, 1896 (Astro. Jour. 17-8, 103); “Waldemath’s second moon,” Feb. 5, 1898 (Eng. Mec., 67-545); unknown obj., March 30, 1908 (Observatory, 31-215); dark obj., Nov. 10, 1908 (Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, 23-74).

197

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Cold Harbor, Hanover Co., Virginia—two men in a field—“an apparently clear sky.” In the Monthly Weather Review, 28-29, it is said that upon Aug. 7, 1900, two men were struck by lightning. The Editor says that the weather map gave no indication of a thunderstorm, nor of rain, in this region at the time.

In July, 1904, a man was killed on the summit of Mt. San Gorgionio, near the Mojave desert. It is said that he was killed by lightning. Two days later, upon the summit of Mt. Whitney, 180 miles away, another man was killed “by lightning” (Ciel et Terre, 29-120).

It is said, in Ciel et Terre, 17-42, that, in the year 1893, nineteen soldiers were marching near Bourges, France, when they were struck by an unknown force. It is said that in known terms there is no explanation. Some of the men were killed, and others were struck insensible. At the inquest it was testified that there had been no storm, and that nothing had been heard.

If there occur upon the surface of this earth pounces from blankness and seizures by nothings, and “sniping” with bullets of unfindable substance, we nevertheless hesitate to bring witchcraft and demonology into our fields. Our general subject now is the existence of a great deal that may be nearby, or temporarily nearby, ordinarily invisible, but occasionally revealed by special circumstances. A background of stars is not to be compared, in our data, with the sun for a background, as a means of revelations. We accept that there are sunspots, but we gather from general experience and special instances that the word “sunspot” is another of the standardizing terms like “auroral” and “meteoric” and “earthquakes.” See Webb’s Celestial Objects for some observations upon large definite obscurations called “sunspots” but which were as evanescent against the sun as would be islands and jungles of space, if intervening only a few moments between this 198earth and the swiftly moving sun. According to Webb, astronomers have looked at great obscurations upon the sun, have turned away, and then looked again, finding no trace of the phenomena. Eclipses are special circumstances, and rather often have large, unknown bulks been revealed by different light-effects during eclipses. For instance, upon Jan. 22, 1898, Lieut. Blackett, R. N., assisting Sir Norman Lockyer, at Viziadrug, India, during the total eclipse of the sun, saw an unknown body between Venus and Mars (Jour. Leeds Astro. Soc., 1906-23). We have had other instances, and I have notes upon still more. The photographic plate is a special condition, or sensitiveness. In Knowledge, 16-234, a correspondent writes that, in August, 1893, in Switzerland, moon-lighted night, he had exposed a photographic plate for one hour. Upon the photograph, when developed, were seen irregular, bright markings, but there had been no lightning to this correspondent’s perceptions.

The details of the sheep-panic of Nov. 3, 1888, are extraordinary. The region affected was much greater than was supposed by the writer whom we quoted in an earlier chapter. It is said in another account in Symons’ Meteorological Magazine, that, in a tract of land twenty-five miles long and eight miles wide, thousands of sheep had, by a simultaneous impulse, burst from their bounds; and had been found the next morning, widely scattered, some of them still panting with terror under hedges, and many crowded into corners of fields. See London Times, Nov. 20, 1888. An idea of the great number of flocks affected is given by one correspondent who says that malicious mischief was out of the question, because a thousand men could not have frightened and released all these sheep. Someone else tries to explain that, given an alarm in one flock, it might spread to the others. But all the sheep so burst from their folds at about eight o’clock in the evening, and one supposes that many folds were far from contiguous, and one thinks of such contagion requiring considerable time spread over 200 square miles. Something of an alarming nature and of a pronounced degree occurred somewhere near, Reading, Berkshire, upon this evening. Also there seems to be something of special localization: the next year another panic occurred in Berkshire not far from Reading.

199I have a datum that looks very much like the revelation of a ghost-moon, though I think of it myself in physical terms of light-effects. In Country Queries and Notes, 1-138, 417, it is said that, in the sky of Gosport, Hampshire, night of Sept. 14, 1908, was seen a light that came as if from an unseen moon. It may be that I can here record that there was a moon-like object in the sky of the Midlands and the south of England, this night, and that, though to human eyesight, this world, island of space, whatever it may have been, was invisible, it was, nevertheless, revealed. Upon this evening of Sept. 14, 1908, David Packer, then in Northfield, Worcestershire, saw a luminous appearance that he supposed was auroral, and photographed it. When the photograph was developed, it was seen that the “auroral” light came from a large, moon-like object. A reproduction of the photograph is published in the English Mechanic, 88-211. It shows an object as bright and as well-defined as the conventionally accepted moon, but only to the camera had it revealed itself, and Mr. Packer had caught upon a film a space-island that had been invisible to his eyes. It seems so, anyway.

In Country Queries and Notes, 1-328, it is said that, upon Aug. 2, 1908, at Ballyconneely, Connemara coast of Ireland, was seen a phantom city of different-sized houses, in different styles of architecture; visible three hours. It is said that no doubt the appearance was a mirage of some city far away—far away, but upon this earth, of course. This apparition is not of the type that we consider so especially of our own data. The so-called mirages that so especially interest us are interesting to us not in themselves, but in that they belong to the one order of phenomena or evidence that unifies so many fields of our data: that is, repetitions in a local sky, signifying the fixed position of something relatively to a small part of this earth’s surface. We can not think that mirages, terrestrial or extra-terrestrial, could so repeat. But if in a local sky of this earth there be a fixed region, perhaps not a city, but something of rugged and featureful outlines, with projections that might look architectural, reflections from it, shadows, or Brocken spectres repeating always in one special sky are thinkable except by the Chinese-minded who regard all our data as “foreign devils.” The writer in Country 200Queries and Notes says—“Circumstantial accounts have even been published of the city of Bristol being distinctly recognized in a mirage seen occasionally in North America.” If we shall accept that anywhere in North America repeated representations of the same city or city-like scene have appeared in the same local sky, I prefer, myself, a foreign devil of a thought, and its significance, whether hellish or not, that this earth is stationary, to such a domestic vagrant of a thought as the idea that mirage could so pick out the city of Bristol, or any other city, over and over, and also invariably pick out for its screen the same local sky, thousands of miles, or five miles, away.

In the English Mechanic, Sept. 10, 1897, a correspondent to the Weekly Times and Echo is quoted. He had just returned from the Yukon. Early in June, 1897, he had seen a city pictured in the sky of Alaska. “Not one of us could form the remotest idea in what part of the world this settlement could be. Some guessed Toronto, others Montreal, and one of us even suggested Pekin. But whether this city exists in some unknown world on the other side of the North Pole, or not, it is a fact that this wonderful mirage occurs from time to time yearly, and we were not the only ones who witnessed the spectacle. Therefore it is evident that it must be the reflection of some place built by the hand of man.” According to this correspondent, the “mirage” did not look like one of the cities named, but like “some immense city of the past.”

In the New York Tribune, Feb. 17, 1901, it is said that Indians of Alaska had told of an occasional appearance, as if of a city, suspended in the sky, and that a prospector, named Willoughby, having heard the stories, had investigated, in the year 1887, and had seen the spectacle. It is said that, having several times attempted to photograph the scene, Willoughby did finally at least show an alleged photograph of an aërial city. In Alaska, p. 140, Miner Bruce says that Willoughby, one of the early pioneers in Alaska, after whom Willoughby Island is named, had told him of the phenomenon, and that, early in 1899, he had accompanied Willoughby to the place over which the mirage was said to repeat. It seems that he saw nothing himself, but he quotes a member of the Duc d’Abruzzi’s expedition to Mt. St. 201Elias, summer of 1897, Mr. C. W. Thornton, of Seattle, who saw the spectacle, and wrote—“It required no effort of the imagination to liken it to a city, but was so distinct that it required, instead, faith to believe that it was not in reality a city.” Bruce publishes a reproduction of Willoughby’s photograph, and says that the city was identified as Bristol, England. So definite, or so un-mirage-like, is this reproduction, trees and many buildings shown in detail, that one supposes that the original was a photograph of a good-sized terrestrial city, perhaps Bristol, England.

In Chapter 10, of his book, Wonders of Alaska, Alexander Badlam tries to explain. He publishes a reproduction of Willoughby’s photograph: it is the same as Bruce’s, except that all buildings are transposed, or are negative in positions. Badlam does not like to accuse Willoughby of fraud: his idea is that some unknown humorist had sold Willoughby a dry plate, picturing part of the city of Bristol. My own idea is that something of this kind did occur, and that this photograph, greatly involved in accounts of the repeating mirages, has nothing to do with the mirages. Badlam then tells of another photograph. He tells that two men, near the Muir Glacier, had, by means of a pan of quicksilver, seen a reflection of an unknown city somewhere, and that their idea was that it was at the bottom of the sea near the glacier, reflecting in the sky, and reflecting back to and from the quicksilver. That’s complicated. A photographer named Taber then announced that he had photographed this scene, as reflected in a pan of quicksilver. Badlam publishes a reproduction of Taber’s photograph, or alleged photograph. This time, for anybody who prefers to think that there is, somewhere in the sky of Alaska, a great, unknown city, we have a most agreeable photograph: exotic-looking city; a structure like a coliseum, and another prominent building like a mosque, and many indefinite, mirage-like buildings. I’d like to think this photograph genuine, myself, but I do conceive that Taber could have taken it by photographing a panorama that he had painted. Badlam’s explanation is that mirages of glaciers are common, in Alaska, and that they look architectural. Some years ago, I read five or six hundred pounds of literature upon the Arctic, and I should say that far-projected mirages are not common in the Arctic: mere 202looming is common. Badlam publishes a photograph of a mirage of Muir Glacier. The looming points of ice do look Gothic, but they are obviously only loomings, extending only short distances from primaries, with no detachment from primaries, and not reflecting in the sky.

For the first identification of the Willoughby photograph as a photograph of part of the city of Bristol, see the New York Times, Oct. 20, 1889. That this photograph was somebody’s hoax seems to be acceptable. But it was not similar to the frequently reported scene in the sky of Alaska, according to descriptions. In the New York Times, Oct. 31, 1889, is an account, by Mr. L. B. French, of Chicago, of the spectral representation, as he saw it, near Mt. Fairweather. “We could see plainly houses, well-defined streets, and trees. Here and there rose tall spires over huge buildings, which appeared to be ancient mosques or cathedrals.... It did not look like a modern city—more like an ancient European City.”

Jour. Roy. Met. Soc., 27-158:

That every year, between June 21 and July 10, a “phantom city” appears in the sky, over a glacier in Alaska; that features of it had been recognized as buildings in the city of Bristol, England, so that the “mirage” was supposed to be a mirage of Bristol. It is said that for generations these repeating representations had been known to the Alaskan Indians, and that, in May, 1901, a scientific expedition from San Francisco would investigate. It is said that, except for slight changes, from year to year, the scene was always the same.

La Nature, 1901-1-303:

That a number of scientists had set out from Victoria, B. C., to Mt. Fairweather, Alaska, to study a repeating mirage of a city in the sky, which had been reported by the Duc d’Abruzzi, who had seen it and had sketched it.

203

CHAPTER TWENTY

Night of Dec. 7, 1900—for seventy minutes a fountain of light played upon the planet Mars.

Prof. Pickering—“absolutely inexplicable” (Sci. Amer., 84-179).

It may have been a geyser of messages. It may be translated some day. If it were expressed in imagery befitting the salutation by a planet to its dominant, it may be known some day as the most heroic oration in the literature of this geo-system. See Lowell’s account in Popular Astronomy, 10-187. Here are published several of the values in a possible code of long flashes and short flashes. Lowell takes a supposed normality for unity, and records variations of two thirds, one and one third, and one and a half. If there be, at Flagstaff, Arizona, records of all the long flashes and short flashes that were seen, for seventy minutes, upon this night of Dec. 7, 1900, it is either that the greetings of an island of space have been hopelessly addressed to a continental stolidity, or there will have to be the descent, upon Flagstaff, Arizona, by all the amateur Champollions of this earth, to concentrate in one deafening buzz of attempted translation.

It was at this time that Tesla announced that he had received, upon his wireless apparatus, vibrations that he attributed to the Martians. They were series of triplets.

It is our expression that, during eclipses and oppositions and other notable celestial events, lunarians try to communicate with this earth, having a notion that at such times the astronomers of this earth may be more nearly alert.

An eclipse of the moon, March 10-11, 1895—not a cloud; no mist—electric flashes like lightning, reported from a ship upon the Atlantic (Eng. Mec., 61-100).

During the eclipse of the sun, July 29, 1897, a strange image 204was taken on a sensitive plate, by Mr. L. E. Martindale, of St. Mary’s, Ohio. It looks like a record of knotted lightning. See Photography, May 26, 1898.

In the Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, 17-205, 315, 447, it is said that upon the first and the third of March, 1903, a light like a little star, flashing intermittently, was seen by M. Rey, in Marseilles, and by Maurice Gheury, in London, in the lunar crater Aristarchus. March 28, 1903—opposition of Mars.

In Cosmos, n. s., 49-259, M. Desmoulins writes, from Argenteuil, that, upon August 9, 1903, at 11 P. M., moving from north to south, he saw a luminous object. The planet Venus was at primary greatest brilliance upon August 13, 1903. In three respects it was like other objects that have been observed upon this earth at times of the nearest approach of Venus: it was a red object; it appeared only in a local sky, and it appeared in the time of the visibility of Venus. With M. Desmoulins were four persons, one of whom had field glasses. The object was watched twenty minutes, during which time it travelled a distance estimated at five or six kilometres. It looked like a light suspended from a balloon, but, through glasses, no outline of a balloon could be seen, and there were no reflections of light as if from the opaque body of a balloon. It was a red body, with greatest luminosity in its nucleus. The Editor of Cosmos writes that, according to other correspondents, this object had been seen, at 11 P. M., July 19th and 26th, at Chatou. Argenteuil and Chatou are 4 or 5 miles apart, and both are about 5 miles from Paris. All three of these dates were Sundays, and even though nothing like a balloon had been seen through glasses, one naturally supposes that somebody near Paris had been amusing himself sending up fire-balloons, Sunday evenings. The one great resistance to all that is known as progress is what one “naturally supposes.”

In the English Mechanic, 81-220, Arthur Mee writes that several persons, in the neighborhood of Cardiff, had, upon the night of March 29, 1905, seen in the sky, “an appearance like a vertical beam of light, which was not due (they say) to a search light, or any such cause.” There were other observations, and they remind us of the observations by Noble and Bradgate, Aug. 28-29, 1883: 205then upon an object that cast a light like a searchlight; this time an association between a light like a searchlight, and a luminosity of definite form. In the Cambrian Natural Observer, 1905-32, are several accounts of a more definite-looking appearance that was seen, this night, in the sky of Wales—“like a long cluster of stars, obscured by a thin film or mist.” It was seen at the time of the visibility of Venus, then an “evening star”—about 10 P. M. It grew brighter, and for about half an hour looked like an incandescent light. It was a conspicuous and definite object, according to another description—“like an iron bar, heated to an orange-colored glow, and suspended vertically.”

Three nights later, something appeared in the sky of Cherbourg, France—L’Astre Cherbourg—the thing that appeared, night after night, in the sky of the city of Cherbourg, at a time when the planet Venus was nearest (inferior conjunction April 26, 1905).

Flammarion, in the Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, 19-243, says that this object was the planet Venus. He therefore denies that it had moved in various directions, saying that the supposed observations to this effect were illusions. In L’Illustration, April 22, 1905, he tells the story in his own way, and says some things that we are not disposed to agree with, but also he says that the ignorance of some persons is inénarrable. In Cosmos, n. s., 42-420, months after the occurrence, it is said that many correspondents had written to inquire as to L’Astre Cherbourg. The Editor gives his opinion that the object was either Jupiter or Venus. Throughout our Venus-visitor expression, the most important point is appearance in a local sky. That unifies this expression with other expressions, all of them converging into our general extra-geographic acceptances. The Editor of Cosmos says that this object, which was reported from Cherbourg, was reported from other towns as well. He probably means to say that it was seen simultaneously in different towns. For all guardians of this earth’s isolation, this is a convenient thing to say: the conclusion then is that the planet Venus, exceptionally bright, was attracting unusual attention generally, and that there was nothing in the especial sky of Cherbourg. But we have learned that standardizing disguisements often obscure our data in later accounts, and we have formed the habit of going to contemporaneous 206sources. We shall find that the newspapers of the time reported a luminous object that appeared, night after night, only over the city of Cherbourg, as the name by which it was known indicates. It was a reddish object. The Editor of Cosmos explains that atmospheric conditions could give this coloration to Venus. I suppose this could be so occasionally: not night after night, I should say. We shall find that this object, or a similar object was reported from other places, but not simultaneously with its appearance over Cherbourg.

In the Journal des Débats, the first news is in the issue of April 4, 1905. It is said that a luminous body was appearing, every evening, between 8 and 10 o’clock, over the city of Cherbourg.

These were about the hours of the visibility of Venus. In this period, Venus set at 9.30 P. M., and Jupiter at 8 P. M. It is enough to make any conventionalist feel most reasonable, though he’d feel that way anyway, in thinking that of course then this object was Venus. In my own earlier speculations upon this subject, this one datum stood out so that had it not been for other data, I’d have abandoned the subject. But then I read of other occurrences: time after time has something been seen in a local sky of this earth, sometimes so definitely seen to move, not like Venus, but in various directions, that one has to think that it was not Venus, though appearing at the time of visibility of Venus. Between these appearances and visibility of Venus there does seem to be relation.

In the Journal, it is said that L’Astre Cherbourg had an apparent diameter of 15 centimetres, and a less definite margin of 75 centimetres—seemed to be about a yard wide—meaningless of course. In the Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, it is said that, according to reports, its form was oval. In the Journal des Débats, we are told that, at first the thing was supposed to be a captive balloon but that this idea was given up because it appeared and disappeared.

Journal des Débats, April 12:

That every evening the luminous object was continuing to appear above Cherbourg; that many explanations had been thought of: by some persons that it was the planet Jupiter, and by others 207that it was a comet but that no one knew what it was. The comet-explanation is of course ruled out. The writer in the Journal expresses regret that neither the Meteorological Bureau nor the Observatory of Paris had sent anybody to investigate, but says that the préfet maritime, of Cherbourg had commissioned a naval officer to investigate. In Le Temps, of the 12th, is published an interview with Flammarion, who complains some more against general inénarrable-ness, and says that of course the object was Venus. The writer in Le Temps says that soon would the matter be settled, because the commander of a war ship had undertaken to decide what the luminous body was.

Le Figaro, April 13:

The report of Commander de Kerillis, of the Chasseloup-Laubut—that the position of L’Astre Cherbourg was not the position of Venus, and that the disc did not look like the crescentic disc of Venus, but that the observations had been made from a vessel, under unfavorable conditions, and that the commander and his colleagues did not offer a final opinion.

I think that there was inénarrable-ness all around. Given visibility, I can’t think what the unfavorable conditions could have been. Given, however, observations upon something that all the astronomers in the world would say could not be, one does think of the dislike of a naval officer, who, though he probably knew right ascension from declination, was himself no astronomer, to commit himself. In Le Temps, and other newspapers published in Paris, it is said that, according to the naval officers, the object might have been a comet, but that they would not positively commit themselves to this opinion, either.

I think that somebody should be brave; so, though not positively, of course, I incline, myself, to relate these appearances over Cherbourg with the observations in Wales, upon March 29th; also I suggest that there is another report that may relate. In Le Temps, April 12, it is said that, at midnight, April 9-10, a luminous body, like L’Astre Cherbourg, was seen in the sky of Tunis. Though it was visible several minutes, it is said that this object was probably a meteor.

Every night, from the first to the eleventh of April, a luminous body appeared in the sky of Cherbourg. Then it was seen no 208longer. It may have been seen sailing away, upon its final departure from the sky of Cherbourg. In Le Figaro, April 15, it is said that, upon the night of the eleventh of April, the guards of La Blanche Lighthouse had seen something like a lighted balloon in the sky. Supposing it was a balloon, they had started to signal to it, but it had disappeared. It is said that the lighthouse had been out of communication with the mainland, and that the guards had not heard of L’Astre Cherbourg.

In the London Times, Nov. 23, 1905, a correspondent writes that, at East Liss, Hants., which is about 40 miles from Reading, he and his gamekeeper had, about 3.30 P. M., Nov. 17th, heard a loud, distant rumbling. According to this hearer, the rumbling seemed to be a composition of triplets of sounds. We shall accept that three sounds were heard, but we have no other assertion that each sound was itself so sub-serialized. This correspondent’s gamekeeper said that he had heard similar sounds at 11.30 A. M., and at 1.30 P. M. It is said that the sounds were not like gunfire, and that the direction from which they seemed to come, and the time in the afternoon, precluded the explanation of artillery-practice at Aldershot or Portsmouth. Aldershot is about 15 miles from East Liss, and Portsmouth about 20.

Times, Nov. 24—that the “quake” had been distinctly felt in Reading, about 3.30 P. M., Nov. 17th. Times, Nov. 25—heard at Reading, at 11.30, 1.30, and 3.30 o’clock, Nov. 17th.

Reading Standard, Nov. 25:

That consternation had been caused in Reading, upon the 17th, by sounds and vibrations of the earth, about 11.30 A. M., 1.30 P. M., and 3.30 P. M. It is said that nothing had been seen, but that the sounds closely resembled those that had been heard during the meteoric shower of 1866.

Mr. H. G. Fordham appears again. In the Times, Dec. 1, he writes that the phenomena pointed clearly to an explosion in the sky, and not to an earthquake of subterranean origin. “The noise and shock experienced are no doubt attributable to the explosion (or to more than one explosion) of a meteorite, or bolide, high up in the atmosphere, and setting up a wave (or waves) of sound and aërial shock. It is probable, indeed, that a good many 209phenomena having this source are wrongly ascribed to slight and local earthshock.”

Mr. Fordham wrote this, but he wrote no more, and I think that somewhere else something else was written, and that, in the year 1905, it had to be obeyed; and that it may be interpreted in these words—“Thou shalt not.” Mr. Fordham did not inquire into the reasonableness of thinking that, only by coincidence, meteors so successively exploded, in a period of four hours, in one local sky of this earth, and nowhere else; and into the inference, then, as to whether this earth is stationary or not.

We have data of a succession occupying far more than four hours.

In the Times, Mrs. Lane, of Petersfield, 20 miles from Portsmouth, writes that, at 11.30 A. M., and at 3.30 P. M., several days before the 17th, she had heard the detonations, then hearing them again, upon the 17th. Mrs. Lane thinks that there must have been artillery-practice at Portsmouth. It seems clear that there was no cannonading anywhere in England, at this time. It seems clear that there was signalling from some other world.

In the English Mechanic, 82-433, Joseph Clark writes that, a few minutes past 3 P. M., upon the 18th a triplet of detonations was heard at Somerset—“as loud as thunder, but not exactly like thunder.”

Reading Observer, Nov. 25—that, according to a correspondent, the sounds had been heard again, at Whitechurch (20 miles from Reading) upon the 21st, at 1.35 P. M., and 3.8 P. M. The sounds had been attributed to artillery-practice at Aldershot, but the correspondent had written to the artillery commandant, at Bulford Camp, and had received word that there had been no heavy firing at the times of his inquiry. The Editor of the Observer says that he, too, had written to the commandant, and had received the same answer.

I have searched widely. I have found record of nobody’s supposition that he had traced these detonations to origin upon this earth.

210

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

In Coconino County, Arizona, is an extraordinary formation. It is known as Coon Butte and as Crater Mountain. Once upon a time, something gouged this part of Arizona. The cavity in the ground is about 3,800 feet in diameter, and it is approximately 600 feet deep, from the rim of the ramparts to the floor of the interior. Out from this cavity had been hurled blocks of limestone, some of them a mile or so away, some of these masses weighing probably 5,000 tons each. And in the formation, and around it, have been found either extraordinary numbers of meteorites, or fragments of one super-meteorite. Barringer, in his report to the Academy of Natural Science of Philadelphia (Proceedings, A. N. S. P., Dec., 1905) says that, of the trafficers in this meteoritic material, he knew of two men who had shipped away fifteen tons of it. But Barringer’s minimum estimate of a body large enough so to gouge the ground is ten million tons.

It was supposed that a main mass of meteoritic material was buried under the floor of the formation, but this floor was drilled, and nothing was found to support this supposition. One drill went down 1020 feet, going through 100 feet of red sandstone, which seems to be the natural, undisturbed sub-structure. The datum that opposes most strongly the idea that this pit was gouged by one super-meteorite is that in it and around it at least three kinds of meteorites have been found: they are irons, masses of iron-shale, and shale-balls that are so rounded and individualized that they can not be thought of as fragments of a greater body, and can not be very well thought of as great drops of molten matter cast from a main, incandescent mass, inasmuch as there is not a trace of igneous rock such as would mark such contact.

There are data for thinking that these three kinds of objects fell at different times, presumably from origin of fixed position relatively to this point in Arizona. Within the formation, shales 211were found, buried at various distances, as if they had fallen at different times, for instance seven of them in a vertical line, the deepest-buried 27 feet down; also shales outside the formation were found buried. But, quite as if they had fallen more recently, the hundreds of irons were found upon the surface of the ground, or partly covered, or wholly covered, but only with superficial soil.

There is no knowing when this great gouge occurred, but cedars upon the rim are said to be about 700 years old.

In terms of our general expression upon differences of potential, and of electric relations between nearby worlds, I think of a blast between this earth and a land somewhere else, and of something that was more than a cyclone that gouged this pit.

Other meteorites have been found in Arizona: the 85-pound iron that was found at Weaver, near Wickenburg, 130 miles from Crater Mountain, in 1898, and the 960-pound mass, now in the National Museum, said to have been found at Peach Springs, 140 miles from Crater Mountain. These two irons indicate nothing in particular; but, if we accept that somewhere else in Arizona there is another deposit of meteorites, also extraordinarily abundant, such abundance gives something of commonness of nature if not of commonness of origin to two deposits. There are several large irons known as the Tucson meteorites, one weighing 632 pounds and another 1514 pounds, now in museums. They came from a place known as Iron Valley, in the Santa Rita Mountains, about 30 miles south of Tucson, and about 200 miles from Crater Mountain. Iron Valley was so named because of the great number of meteorites found in it. According to the people of Tucson, this fall occurred about the year 1660. See Amer. Jour. Sci., 2-13-290.

Upon June 24, 1905, Barringer found, upon the plain, about a mile and a half northwest of Crater Mountain, a meteorite of a fourth kind. It was a meteoritic stone, “as different from all the other specimens as one specimen could be from another.” Barringer thinks that it fell, about the 15th of January, 1904. Upon a night in the middle of January, 1904, two of his employees were awakened by a loud hissing sound, and saw a meteor falling north of the formation. At the same time, two Arizona 212physicians, north of the formation, saw the meteor falling south of them. For analysis and description of this object, see Amer. Jour. Sci., 4-21-353. Barringer, who believes that once upon a time one super-meteorite, of which only a very small part has ever been found, gouged this hole in the ground, writes—“That a small stony meteorite should have fallen on almost exactly the same spot on this earth’s surface as the great Canon Diablo iron meteorite fell many centuries ago, is certainly a most remarkable coincidence. I have stated the facts as accurately as possible, and I have no opinion to offer, as to whether or not these involve anything more than a coincidence.”

Other phenomena in Arizona:

Upon Feb. 24, 1897, a great explosion was heard over the town of Tombstone. It is said that a fragment of a meteor fell at St. David (Monthly Weather Review, 1897-56). Yarnell, Arizona, Sept. 12, 1898—“a loud, deep, thundering noise” that was heard between noon and 1 P. M. “The noise proceeded from the Granite Range, this side of Prescott. From all accounts, a large meteor struck the earth at this time” (U. S. Weather Bureau Rept., Ariz. Section, Sept., 1898).

Upon July 19, 1912, at Holbrook, Arizona, about 50 miles from Crater Mountain, occurred a loud detonation and one of the most remarkable falls of stones recorded. See Amer. Jour. Sci., 4-34-437. Some of the stones are very small. About 14,000 were collected. Only twice, since the year 1800, have stones in greater numbers fallen from the sky to this earth, according to conventional records.

About a month later (Aug. 18) there was another concussion at Holbrook. This was said to be an earthquake (Bull. Seis. Soc. Amer., 1-209).

213

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The climacteric opposition of Mars, of 1909—the last in our records—the next will be in 1924—

Aug. 8, 1909—see Quar. Jour. Met. Soc., n. s., 35-299—flashes in a clear sky that were seen in Epsom, Surrey, and other places in the southeast of England. They could not be attributed to lightning in England. The writer in the Journal finds that there was a storm in France, more than one hundred miles away, For an account of these flashes, tabulated at Epsom—“night fine and starlight”—see Symons’ Met. Mag., 44-148. During each period of five minutes, from 10 to 11.15, P. M., the number of flashes—16-14-20-31-15-26-12-20-30-18-27-22-14-12-10-21-8-5-3-1-0-1-0. With such a time-basis, I can see no possibility of detecting anything of a code-like significance. I do see development. There were similar observations at times in the favorable oppositions of Mars of 1875 and 1877. In 1892, such flashes were noted more particularly. Now we have them noted and tabulated, but upon a basis that could be of interest only to meteorologists. If they shall be seen in 1924, we may have observation, tabulation, and some marvellously different translations of them. After that there will be some intolerably similar translations, suspiciously delayed in publication.

Sept. 23, 1909—opposition of Mars.

Throughout our data, we have noticed successions of appearances in local skies of this earth, that indicate that this earth is stationary, but that also relate to nearest approaches of Mars. Upon the night of Dec. 16-17, 1896, concussion after concussion was felt at Worcester, England; a great “meteor” was seen at the time of the greatest concussion. Mars was seven days past opposition. We thought it likely enough that explosion after explosion had occurred over Worcester, and that something in the sky had been seen only at the time of the greatest, or the nearest, 214explosion. We did not think well of the conventional explanation that only by coincidence had a great meteor exploded over a region where a series of earthquakes was occurring, and exactly at the moment of the greatest of these shocks.

In November, 1911, Mars was completing his cycle of changing proximities of a duration of fifteen years, and was duplicating the relationship of the year 1896. About 10 o’clock, night of Nov. 16, 1911, a concussion that is conventionally said to have been an earthquake occurred in Germany and Switzerland. But plainly there was an explosion in the sky. In the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 3-189, Count Montessus de Ballore writes that he had examined 112 reports upon flashes and other luminous appearances in the sky that had preceded the “earthquake” by a few seconds. He concludes that a great meteor had only happened to explode over a region where, a few seconds later, there was going to be an earthquake. “It therefore seems highly probable that the earthquake coincided with a fall of meteors or of shooting stars.”

The duplication of the circumstances of Dec., 1896, continues. If of course this concussion in Germany and Switzerland was the effect of something that exploded in the sky—of what were the concussions that were felt later, the effects? De Ballore does not mention anything that occurred later. But, a few minutes past midnight, and then again, at 3 o’clock, morning of the 17th, there were other, but slighter, shocks. Only at the time of the greatest shock was something seen in the sky. Nature, 88-117—that this succession of phenomena did occur. We relate the phenomena to the planet Mars, but also we ask—how, if most reasonably, all three of these shocks were concussions from explosions in the sky, if of course one of them was, meteors could ever so hound one small region upon a moving earth, or projectiles be fired with such specialization and preciseness? November 17th, 1911 was seven days before the opposition of Mars. Though the opposition occurred upon the 24th of November, Mars was at minimum distance upon the 17th.

No matter how difficult of acceptance our own notions may be, they are opposed by this barbarism, or puerility, or pill that can’t be digested:

215Seven days from the opposition of Mars, in 1896, a great meteor exploded over a region where there had been a succession of earthquakes—by coincidence.

Seven days from the next similar opposition of Mars, a great meteor exploded over a region where there was going to be a succession of earthquakes—by coincidence.

The Advantagerians of the moon—that is the cult of lunar communicationists, who try to take advantage of such celestial events as oppositions and eclipses, thinking that astronomers, or night watchmen, or policemen of this earth might at such times look up at the sky—

A great luminous object, or a meteor, that was seen at the time of the eclipse of June 28, 1908—“as if to make the date of the eclipse more memorable,” says W. F. Denning (Observatory, 31-288).

Not long before the opposition of Mars, in 1909, the bright spot west of Picard was seen twice: March 26 and May 23 (Jour. B. A. A., 19-376).

Nov. 16, 1910—an eclipse of the moon, and a “meteor” that appeared, almost at the moment of totality (Eng. Mec., 92-430). It is reported, in Nature, 85-118, as seen by Madame de Robeck, at Naas, Ireland, “from an apparent radiant, just below the eclipsed moon.” The thing may have come from the moon. Seemingly with the same origin, it was seen far away in France. In La Nature, Nov. 26, 1910, it is said that, at Besançon, France, during the eclipse, was seen a meteor like a superb rocket, “qui serait partie de la lune.” There may have been something occurring upon the moon at the time. In the Jour. B. A. A., 21-100, it is said that Mrs. Albright had seen a luminous point upon the moon throughout the eclipse.

Our expression is that there is an association between reported objects, like extra-mundane visitors, and nearest approaches by the planet Venus to this earth. Perhaps unfortunately this is our expression, because it makes for more restriction than we intend. The objects, or the voyagers, have often been seen during the few hours of the visibility of Venus, when the planet is nearest. 216“Then such an object is Venus,” say the astronomers. If anybody wonders why, if these seeming navigators can come close to this earth—as they do approach, if they appear only in a local sky—they do not then come all the way to this earth, let him ask a sea captain why said captain never purposely descends to the bottom of the ocean, though travelling often not far away. However, I conceive of a great variety of extra-mundanians, and I am now collecting data for a future expression—that some kinds of beings from outer space can adapt to our conditions, which may be like the bottom of a sea, and have been seen, but have been supposed to be psychic phenomena.

Upon Oct. 31, 1908, the planet Venus was four months past inferior conjunction, and so had moved far from nearest approach, but there are vague stories of strange objects that had been seen in the skies of this earth—localized in New England—back to the time of nearest approach. In the New York Sun, Nov. 1, 1908, is published a dispatch, from Boston, dated Oct. 31. It is said that, near Bridgewater, at four o’clock in the morning of Oct. 31, two men had seen a spectacle in the sky. The men were not astronomers. They were undertakers. There may be a disposition to think that these observers were not in their own field of greatest expertness, and to think that we are not very exacting as to the sources of our data. But we have to depend upon undertakers, for instance: early in our investigations, we learned that the prestige of astronomers has been built upon their high moral character, all of them most excellently going to bed soon after sunset, so as to get up early and write all day upon astronomical subjects. But the exemplary in one respect may not lead to much advancement in some other respect. Our undertakers saw, in the sky, something like a searchlight. It played down upon this earth, as if directed by an investigator, and then it flashed upward. “All of the balloons in which ascensions are made, in this State, were accounted for today, and a search through southeastern Massachusetts failed to reveal any further trace of the supposed airship.” It is said that “mysterious bright lights,” believed to have come from a balloon, had been reported from many places in New England. The week before, persons at Ware had said that they had seen an illuminated balloon passing over the town, early 217in the morning. During the summer such reports had come from Bristol, Conn., and later from Pittsfield, Mass., and from White River Junction, Vt. “In all these cases, however, no balloon could be found, all the known airships being accounted for.” In the New York Sun, Dec. 13, 1909, it is said that, during the autumn of 1908, reports had come from different places in Connecticut, upon a mysterious light that moved rapidly in the sky.

Venus moved on, travelling around the sun, which was revolving around this earth, or travelling any way to suit anybody. In December, 1909, the planet was again approaching this earth. So close was Venus to this earth that, upon the 15th of December, 1909, crowds stood, at noon, in the streets of Rome, watching it, or her (New York Sun, Dec. 16). At 3 o’clock, afternoon of December 24th crowds stood in the streets of New York, watching Venus (New York Tribune, Dec. 25). One supposes that upon these occasions Venus may have been within several thousand miles of this earth. At any rate I have never heard of one fairly good reason for supposing otherwise. If again something appeared in local skies of this earth, or in the skies of New England, and sometimes during the few hours of the visibility of Venus, the object was or was not Venus, all according to the details of various descriptions, and the credibility of the details. The searchlight, for instance; more than one light; directions and motions. Venus, at the time, was for several hours after sunset, slowly descending in the southwest: primary maximum brilliance Jan. 8th, 1910; inferior conjunction Feb. 12th.

There is an amusing befuddlement to clear away first. Upon the night of September 8, 1909, a luminous object had been seen sailing over New England, and sounds from it, like sounds from a motor, had been heard. Then Mr. Wallace Tillinghast, of Worcester, Mass., announced that this light had been a lamp in his “secret aëroplane,” and that upon this night he had travelled, in said “secret aëroplane,” from Boston to New York, and back to Boston. At this time the longest recorded flight, in an aëroplane, was Farman’s, of 111 miles, from Rheims, August, 1909; and, in the United States, according to records, it was not until May 29, 1910, that Curtiss flew from Albany to New York City, making one stop in the 150 miles, however. So this unrecorded 218flight made some stir in the newspapers. Mr. Tillinghast meant his story humorously of course. I mention it because, if anybody should look the matter up, he will find the yarn involved in the newspaper accounts. If nothing else had been seen, Mr. Tillinghast might still tell his story, and explain why he never did anything with his astonishing “secret aëroplane”; but something else was seen, and upon one of the nights in which it appeared, Tillinghast was known to be in his home.

According to the New York Tribune, Dec. 21, 1909, Immigration Inspector Hoe, of Boston, had reported having seen, at one o’clock in the morning of December 20, “a bright light passing over the harbor” and had concluded that he had seen an airship of some kind.

New York Tribune, Dec. 23—that a “mysterious airship” had appeared over the town of Worcester, Mass., “sweeping the heavens with a searchlight of tremendous power.” It had come from the southeast, and travelled northwest, then hovering over the city, disappearing in the direction of Marlboro. Two hours later, it returned. “Thousands thronged the streets, watching the mysterious visitor.” Again it hovered, then moving away, heading first to the south and then to the east.

The next night, something was seen, at 6 o’clock, at Boston. “The searchlights shot across the sky line.” “As it flew away to the north, queries began to pour into the newspaper offices and the police stations, regarding the remarkable visitation.” It is said that an hour and a half later, an object that was supposed to be an airship with a powerful searchlight, appeared in the sky, at Willimantic, Conn., “hovering” over the town about 15 minutes. In the New York Sun, Dec. 24, are more details. It is said that, at Willimantic, had been seen a large searchlight, approaching from the east, and that then dark outlines of something behind the searchlight had been seen. Also, in the Sun, it is said that whatever it may have been that was seen at Boston, it was a dark object, with several red lights and a searchlight, approaching Boston from the west, hovering for 10 minutes, and then moving away westward. From Lynn, Mass., it was described as “a long black object,” moving in the direction of Salem, and then returning, 219“at a high speed.” It is said that the object had been seen at Marlboro, Mass., nine times since Dec. 14.

New York Tribune, Jan. 1, 1910—dispatch from Huntington, West Virginia, Dec. 31, 1909—“Three huge lights of almost uniform dimensions appeared in the early morning sky, in this neighborhood, today. Joseph Green, a farmer, declared that they were meteors, which fell on his farm. An extensive search of his land by others who saw the lights was fruitless, and many persons believe that an airship had sped over the country.”

In the Tribune, Jan. 13, 1910, it is said that, at 9 o’clock, morning of Jan. 12, an airship had been seen at Chattanooga, Tenn. “Thousands saw the craft, and heard the ‘chug’ of its engine.” Later the object was reported from Huntsville, Alabama. New York Tribune, Jan. 15—dispatch from Chattanooga, Jan. 14—“For the third successive day, a mysterious white aircraft passed over Chattanooga, about noon today. It came from the north, and was travelling southeast, disappearing over Missionary Ridge. On Wednesday, it came south, and on Thursday, it returned north.”

In the middle of December, 1909, someone had won a prize for sailing in a dirigible from St. Cyr to the Eiffel Tower and back.

St. Cyr is several miles from Paris.

Huntsville, Alabama, and Chattanooga, Tennessee, are 75 miles apart.

An association between the planet Venus and “mysterious visitors” either illumines or haunts our data. In the New York Tribune, Jan. 29, 1910, it is said that a luminous object, thought to be Winnecke’s comet, had been seen, Jan. 28, near Venus; reported from the Manila Observatory.

I have another datum that perhaps belongs to this series of events. Every night, from the 14th to the 23rd of December, 1909, if we accept the account from Marlboro, a luminous object was seen travelling, or exploring, in the sky of New England. Certainly enough it was no “secret airship” of this earth, unless its navigator went to extremes with the notion that the best way to kept a secret is to announce it with red lights and a searchlight. However, our acceptance depends upon general data as to the development 220of terrestrial aeronautics. But upon the night of December 24th, the object was not seen in New England, and it may have been travelling or exploring somewhere else. Night of the 24th—Venus in the southwest in the early hours of the evening. In the English Mechanic, 104-71, a correspondent, who signs himself “Rigel,” writes that, upon Dec. 24, at 8.30 o’clock in the evening, he saw a luminous object appear above the northeastern horizon and slowly move southward, until 8.50 o’clock, then turning around, retracing, and disappearing whence it came, at two minutes past nine. The correspondent is James Fergusen, Rossbrien, Limerick, Ireland. He writes frequently upon astronomical and meteorological subjects, and is still contributing to the somewhat enlightened columns of the English Mechanic.

Nov. 19, 1912—explosive sounds reported from Sunninghill, Berkshire. No earthquake was recorded at the Kew Observatory, and, in the opinion of W. F. Denning (Nature, 9-363, 417) the explosion was in the sky. It was a terrific explosion, according to the Westminster Gazette (Nov. 19). There was either one great explosion that rumbled and echoed for five minutes, or there were repeated detonations, resembling cannonading—“like a tremendous discharge of big guns” according to reports from Abingdon, Lewes, and Epsom. Sunninghill is about ten miles from Reading, and Abingdon is near Reading, but the sound was heard in London, and down by the English Channel, and even in the island of Alderney. In the Gazette, Nov. 28, Sir George Fordham (H. G. Fordham) writes that, in his opinion, it was an explosion in the sky. He says—“The phenomena of airshock never have, I believe, been very fully investigated.” His admissions and his omissions remain the same as they have been since occurrences of the year 1889. He does not mention that, according to Philip T. Kenway, of Hambledon, near Godalming, about thirty miles southeast of Reading, the sounds were heard again the next day, from 1.45 to 2 P. M. Mr. Kenway thinks that there had been big-gun firing at Portsmouth (West. Gaz., Nov. 21). In the London Standard, a correspondent, writing from Dorking, say that the phenomena of the 19th were like concussions from 221cannonading—“at regular intervals”—“at quick intervals, lasting some seconds each time, for five minutes, by the clock.”

It develops that Reading was the center over which the detonations occurred. In the Westminster Gazette, Nov. 30, it is said that the shocks had been felt in Reading, upon the 19th, 20th, and 21st. Only from Reading have I record of phenomena upon the 21st. Mr. H. L. Hawkins, Lecturer in Geology, of the Reading University, writes that according to his investigations there had been no gun-firing in England, to which the detonations could be attributed. He says that Fordham’s explanation was in accord with his own investigations, or that the detonations had occurred in the sky. He writes that, inasmuch as the detonations had occurred upon three successive days, a shower of meteors, of long duration, would have to be supposed. How he ever visualized that unerring shower, striking one point over this earth’s surface, and nowhere else, day after day, if this earth be a rotating and revolving body, I can not see. If he should say that by coincidence this repetition could occur, then by what coincidence of coincidences could the same repetitions have occurred in this same local sky, centering around Reading, seven years before? The indications are that this earth is stationary, no matter how unreasonable that may sound.

In the Westminster Gazette, Dec. 9, W. F. Denning writes that without doubt the phenomena were “meteoric explosions.” But he alludes to the “airquake and strange noises” that were heard upon the 19th. He does not mention the detonations that were heard upon the following days. Not one of these writers mentions the sounds that were heard in Reading, in November, 1905.

London Standard, Nov. 23, 1912—that, according to Lieut. Col. Trewman, of Reading, the sounds had been heard at Reading, at 9 A. M., upon the 19th; 1.45 P. M., the 20th; 3.30 P. M., the 21st.

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CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

“Unknown Aircraft Over Dover.”

According to the Dover correspondent to the London Times (Jan. 6, 1913) something had been seen, over Dover, heading from the sea.

In the London Standard, Jan. 24, 1913, it is said that, upon the morning of Jan. 4, an unknown airship had been seen, over Dover, and that, about the same time, the lights of an airship had been seen over the Bristol Channel. These places are several hundred miles apart.

London Times, Jan. 21—report by Capt. Lindsay, Chief Constable of Glamorganshire: that, about five o’clock, in the afternoon of Jan. 17, he saw an object in the sky of Cardiff, Wales. He says that he called the attention of a bystander, who agreed with him that it was a large object. “It was much larger than the Willows airship, and left in its trail a dense smoke. It disappeared quickly.”

The next day, according to the Times, there were other reports: people in Cardiff saw something that was lighted or that carried lights, moving rapidly in the sky. In the Times, of the 28th, it is said that an airship that carried a brilliant light had been seen in Liverpool. “It is stated at the Liverpool Aviation School that none of the airmen had been out on Saturday night.” Dispatches from town after town—a travelling thing in the sky, carrying a light, and also a searchlight that swept the ground. It is said that a vessel, of which the outlines had been clearly seen, had appeared in the sky of Cardiff, Newport, Neath, and other places in Wales. In the Standard, Jan. 31, is published a list of cities where the object had been seen. Here a writer tries to conclude that some foreign airship had made half a dozen visits to England and Wales, or had come once, remaining three weeks; but he gives up the attempt, thinking that nothing could have 223reached England and have sailed away half a dozen times without being seen to cross the coast; thinking that the idea of anything having made one journey, and remaining three weeks in the air deserved no consideration.

If the unknown object did carry something like a searchlight, an idea of its powers is given in an account in the Cardiff Evening Express, Jan. 25, 1913—“Last evening brilliant lights were seen, sweeping skyward, and now, this evening, the lights grow bolder. Streets and houses in the locality of Totterdown were suddenly illuminated by a brilliant, piercing light, which, sweeping upward, gave many spectators a fine view of the hills beyond.” In the Express, Feb. 6, is a report upon this light like a searchlight, and the object that flashed it, by the police of Dulais Valley. Also there is an account, by a police sergeant, of a luminous thing that was for a while stationary in the sky, and then moved away.

Still does the conventional explanation, or suggestion, survive. It is said that members of the staff of the Evening Express had gone to the roof of the newspaper building, but had seen only the planet Venus, which was brilliant at this time.

Then writes a correspondent, to the Express, that the object could not have been Venus, because he had seen it travelling at a rate of 20 or 30 miles an hour, and had heard sounds from it. Someone else writes that not possibly could the thing be Venus: he had seen it as “a bright red light, going very fast.” Still someone else says that he had seen the seeming vessel upon the 5th of February, and that it had suddenly disappeared.

There is a hiatus. Between the 5th and the 21st of February, nothing like an airship was seen in the sky of England and Wales. If we can find that somewhere else something similar was seen in the sky, in this period, one supposes that it was the same object, exploring or manœuvring somewhere else. It seems however that there were several of these objects, because of simultaneous observations at places far apart. If we can find that, during the absence from England and Wales, similar objects were seen somewhere else, a great deal of what we try to think upon the subject will depend upon how far from Great Britain they were seen. It seems incredible that the planet Venus should deceive thousands 224of Britons, up to the 5th of February, and stop her deceptions abruptly upon that date, and then abruptly resume deceptions upon the 21st, in places at a distance apart. These circumstances oppose the idea of collective hallucinations, by which some writers in the newspapers tried to explain. If they were hallucinations, the hallucinations renewed collectively, upon the 21st, in towns one hundred miles apart. One extraordinary association is that all appearances, except the first, were in the hours of visibility of Venus, then an “evening star.”

Upon the night of the 21st, a luminous object was reported from towns in Yorkshire and from towns in Warwickshire, two regions about one hundred miles apart; about 10 P. M. All former attempts to explain had been abandoned, and the general supposition was that German airships were manœuvring over England. But not a thing had been seen to cross the coast of England, though guards were patrolling the coasts, especially commissioned to watch for foreign airships. Sailors in the North Sea, and people in Holland and Belgium had seen nothing that could be thought a German airship sailing to or from England. A writer in Flight takes up as especially mysterious the appearance far inland, in Warwickshire. Then came reports from Portsmouth, Ipswich, Hornsea, and Hull, but, one notes, no more, at this time, from Wales. Also in Ipswich, which is more than a hundred miles from the towns in Warwickshire, and more than a hundred miles from the Yorkshire towns, a luminous object was seen upon the night of the 21st. Ipswich Evening Star, Feb. 25—something that carried a searchlight that had been seen upon the nights of the 21st and 24th, moving in various directions, and then “dashing off at lightning speed”—that, at Hunstanton, had been seen three bright lights travelling from the eastern sky, remaining in sight 30 minutes, stationary, or hovering over the town, and then disappearing in the northwest. Portsmouth Evening News, Feb. 25—that soon after 8 P. M., evening of the 24th, had been seen a very bright light, appearing and disappearing, remaining over Portsmouth about one hour, and then moving away. Portsmouth and Ipswich are about 120 miles apart. In the London newspapers, it is said that, upon the evening of the 25th, crowds stood in the streets of Hull, watching something in the 225sky, “the lights of which were easily distinguishable.” Hull is about 190 miles northeast of Portsmouth. Hull Daily Mail, Feb. 26—that a crowd had watched a light high in the air. It is said that the light had been stationary for almost half an hour and had then shot away northward. In the Times, Feb. 28, are published reports upon “the clear outlines of an airship, which was carrying a dazzling searchlight,” from Portland, Burcleaves, St. Alban’s Head, Papplewich, and the Orkneys. The last account, after a long interval, that I know of, is another report from Capt. Lindsay: that, about 9 o’clock, evening of April 8th, he and many other persons had seen, over Cardiff, something that carried a brilliant light and travelled at a rate of sixty or seventy miles an hour.

Upon April 24, 1913, the planet Venus was at inferior conjunction.

In the Times, Feb. 28, it is said that a fire-balloon had been found in Yorkshire, and it is suggested that someone had been sending up fire-balloons.

In the Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, 1913-178, it is said that the people of England were as credulous as the people of Cherbourg, and had permitted themselves to be deceived by the planet Venus.

If German airships were manœuvring over England, without being seen either approaching or departing, appearing sometimes far inland in England without being seen to cross the well-guarded coasts, it was secret manœuvring, inasmuch as the accusation was denied in Germany (Times, Feb. 26 and 27). It was then one of the most brilliantly proclaimed of secrets, or it was concealment under one of the most powerful searchlights ever seen. Possibly an airship from Germany could appear over such a city as Hull, upon the east coast of England, without being seen to arrive or to depart, but so far from Germany is Portsmouth, for instance, that one does feel that something else will have to be thought of. The appearances over Liverpool and over towns in Wales might be attributed to German airships by someone who has not seen a map since he left school. There were more observations upon sudden appearances and disappearances than I have recorded: stationariness often occurred.

226The objects were absent from the sky of Great Britain, from Feb. 5 to Feb. 21.

According to data published by Prof. Chant, in the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, 7-148, the most extraordinary procession in our records was seen, in the sky of Canada, upon the night of Feb. 9, 1913. Either groups of meteors, in one straight line, passed over the city of Toronto, or there was a procession of unknown objects, carrying lights. According to Prof. Chant, the spectacle was seen from the Saskatchewan to Bermuda, but if this long route was traversed, data do not so indicate. The supposed route was diagonally across New York State, from Buffalo, to a point near New York City, but from New York State are recorded no observations other than might have been upon ordinary meteors, this night. A succession of luminous objects passed over Toronto, night of Feb. 9, 1913, occupying from three to five minutes in passing, according to different estimates. If one will think that they were meteors, at least one will have to think that no such meteors had ever been seen before. In the Journal, 7-405, W. F. Denning writes that, though he had been watching the heavens since the year 1865, he had never seen anything like this. In most of the observations, the procession is described as a whole—“like an express train, lighted at night”—“the lights were at different points, one in front, and a rear light, then a succession of lights in the tail.” Almost all of the observations relate to the sky of Toronto and not far from Toronto. It is questionable that the same spectacle was seen in Bermuda, this night. The supposed long flight from the Saskatchewan to Bermuda might indicate something of a meteoric nature, but the meteor-explanation must take into consideration that these objects were so close to this earth that sounds from them were heard, and that, without succumbing to gravitation, they followed the curvature of this earth at a relatively low velocity that can not compare with the velocity of ordinary meteors.

If now be accepted that again, the next day, objects were seen in the sky of Toronto, but objects unlighted, in the daytime—I suppose that to some minds will come the thought that this is extraordinary, and that almost immediately the whole subject will then be forgotten. Prof. Chant says that, according to the 227Toronto Daily Star, unknown objects, but dark objects this time, were seen at Toronto, in the afternoon of the next day—“not seen clearly enough to determine their nature, but they did not seem to be clouds or birds or smoke, and it was suggested that they were airships cruising over the city.” Toronto Daily Star, Feb. 10—“They passed from west to east, in three groups, and then returned west in more scattered formation, about seven or eight in all.”

228

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

August, 1914—this arena-like earth, with its horizon banking high into a Coliseum, when seen from not too far above—faint, rattling sounds of the opening of boundaries—tawny formations slinking into the arena—their crouchings and seizures and crunchings. Aug. 13, 1914—things that were gathering in the sky. They were seen by G. W. Atkins, of Elstree, Herts, and were seen again upon the 16th and the 17th (Observatory, 37-358). Sept. 9, 1914—a host in the sky; watched several hours by W. H. Steavenson (Jour. B. A. A., 25-27). There were round appearances, but some of them were shaped like dumb bells. They were not seeds, snowflakes, insects, nor anything else that they “should” have been, according to Mr. Steavenson. He says that they were large bodies.

Oct. 10, 1914—a ship that was seen in the sky—or “an absolutely black, spindle-shaped object” crossing the sun. It was seen, at Manchester, by Albert Buss (Eng. Mec., 100-236). “Its extraordinarily clear-cut outline was surrounded by a kind of halo, giving the impression of a ship, plowing her way through the sea, throwing up white-foamed waves with her prow.”

Mikkelsen (Lost in the Arctic, p. 345):

“During the last few days (Oct., 1914) we have been much tumbled up and down in our minds, owing to a remarkable occurrence, somewhat in the nature of Robinson Crusoe’s encounter with the footprints in the sand. Our advance load has been attacked—an empty petroleum cask is found, riddled with tiny holes, such as would be made by a charge of shot! Now a charge of shot is scarcely likely to materialize out of nowhere; one is accustomed to associate the phenomenon with the presence of human beings. It is none of our doing—then whose doing is it? We hit upon the wildest theories to account for it, as we sit in the tent, turning the mysterious object over and over. No 229beast of our acquaintance could make all those little round holes: what animal could even open its jaws so wide? And why should anybody take the trouble to make a target of our gear? Are there Eskimos about—Eskimos with guns? There are no footprints to be seen: it could scarcely have been an animal—the whole thing is highly mysterious.”

Jan 31, 1915—a symbolic-looking formation upon the moon—six or seven white spots, in Littrow, arranged like the Greek letter Gamma (Eng. Mec., 101-47).

Feb. 13, 1915—Steep Island, Chusan Archipelago—a light-house-keeper complained to Capt. W. F. Tyler, R. N., that a British warship had fired a projectile at the lighthouse. But no vessel had fired a shot, and it is said that the object must have been a meteor (Nature, 97-17).

In the middle of February, 1915, the planet Venus was about two months and a half past inferior conjunction. If objects like navigating constructions were seen in the sky, at this time, there may be an association, but I am turning against that association, feeling that it is harmful to our wider expression that extra-mundane vessels have been seen in the sky of this earth, and that they come from regions at present unknown. New York Tribune, Feb. 15, 1915—that, at 10 P. M., Feb. 14, three aëroplanes had been seen to cross the St. Lawrence river, near Morristown, N. Y., according to reports, but that, in the opinion of the Dominion police, nothing but fire-balloons had been seen. It is said that two “responsible residents” had seen two of the objects cross the river, between 8 and 8.30 P. M., and then return five hours later. In the Canadian Parliament, Sir Wilfred Laurier had said that, at 9 P. M., he had been called up by the Mayor of Brockwell, telling him that three aëroplanes, with “powerful searchlights” had crossed the St. Lawrence. The story is told in the New York Herald. Here it is said that, according to the Chief of Police, of Ogdensburg, N. Y., a farmer, living five miles from Ogdensburg, had reported having seen an aëroplane, upon the 12th. Then it is said that the mystery had been solved: that, while celebrating the one hundredth anniversary of peace between the United States and Canada, some young men of Morristown had sent up paper balloons, which had exploded 230in the sky, after 9 P. M., night of the 14th. New York Times—that the objects had been seen first at Guananoque, Ontario. Here it is said that the balloon-story is absurd. According to the Dominion Observatory, the wind was, at the time, blowing from the east, and the objects had travelled toward the northeast. It is said that one of the objects had, for several minutes, turned a powerful searchlight upon the town of Brockwell.

Upon Dec. 11, 1915, Bernard Thomas, of Glenorchy, Tasmania, saw a “particularly bright spot upon the moon” (Eng. Mec., 103-10). It was on the north shore of the Mare Crisium, and “looked almost like a star.” In Dr. Thomas’ opinion, it was sunlight reflected from the rim of a small crater. The crater Picard is near the north shore of the Mare Crisium, and most of the illuminations near Picard have occurred several months from an opposition of Mars.

In December, 1915, another new formation upon the moon—reported from the Observatory of Paris—something like a black wall from the center to the ramparts of Aristillus (Bull. Soc. Astro. de France, 30-383).

Jan. 12, 1916—a shock in Cincinnati, Ohio. Buildings were shaken. The quake was from an explosion in the sky. Flashes were seen in the sky. (New York Herald, Jan. 13, 1916).

Feb. 9, 1916—opposition of Mars.

In the English Mechanic, 104-71, James Ferguson writes that someone had seen, at 11 o’clock, night of July 31, 1916, at Ballinasloe, Ireland, just such a moving thing, or just such a sailing, exploring thing as is now familiar in our records. For fifteen minutes it moved in a northwesterly direction. For three quarters of an hour it was stationary. Then it moved back to the point where first it had been seen, remaining visible until four o’clock in the morning. Whatever this object may have been, it left the sky at about the time that Venus appeared, as a “morning star,” in the sky at Ballinasloe, and resembles the occurrence of Sept 11, 1852, reported by Lord Wrottesley. Inferior conjunction of Venus was upon July 3, 1916. We have noticed that all occurrences that we somewhat reluctantly associate with nearness of Venus associate more with times of greatest brilliance, 231five weeks before and after inferior conjunction, than with dates of conjunction. Somebody may demonstrate that at these times Venus comes closest to this earth.