Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1883-05-02

METEoRs.-It is known that in our
solar system thre are vast meteor streams,
made up of loosely aggregated bodies of
various sizes (but generally small,) and
stretching in length from fifty to ninety
millions of miles, and each stream is
sweeping around the sun, like our own
world, in distinct and regular orbit of
its own. 1t is thought (but not actually
known) that these so called "mcteors," !"
| which SO suddenly vanish. flashing silently
and beautifully through the sky on almost
any clear night, are captured from some
of these great meteor streams. OF these,
our planet grazes the fringes of two-one
in August, and the other in November. 1t
was the latter stream which gave US that
transcendent and unspeakably sublime
spectacle which in the still dark hours of
the early morning of the 18th of Novem-
ber. 1888. seemed to cover the Atlantic
slope of the United States with rain of
| fire.
Occasionally bigger meteorolite is
drawn in. 1t is too big to be all consumed
in our atmosphere, and comes down with
such stunning rush as that which fell
few years ago, in the northeastern part
Of Nebraska, cutting off the limb of an oak
tree in its oblique descent, and cutting
almost in two the body of a herdsman-
whose fate, unparalleled in history, may
perhaps have suggested their story to the
perpetrators of this Texas hoax. But none
Of them approach, or begin to approach,
the fabulous proportions of that fraud.
| The largest one known to be in existence
was obtained from an enormous mass on
the west coast of Greenland, which,
whether it consists of separate bodies or
single one, is by all odds the biggest
meteoric visitation of which there is any
knowledge, and probably by far the great
est that ever fell on our globe. A piece of
it which we have examined seems to be
decidedly metallic. and that is the charac.
ter of gigantic mass of it, weighing
| twenty-five tons, now in the museum al
Stockholm. Another fragment from the
same astonishing mass on the Greenland
coast, and now in the museum at Copen-
hagen, weighs ten tons. These aeroltes
seem to be nearly two thirds iron, and
the rest mostly nickel-a compound never
found on earth. Other great meteoric
masses may have existed, in various parts
of the globe. and, becoming disintegrated
by the action of air and water-for meteor
olites are very oxidable-slowly mixed,
as rocks or soil, with our terrestrial mat.
ter. On the moon such visitors may exist
unchanged, for that body seems to possess
little, if any, of either air or water. Its
numerous cup.like hollows, which so
thickly indent the illuminated surface,
may have been caused, as Mr.. Proctor
suggests, by the impact of these plunging
bodies, in ages when our satellite was in a
more plastic condition. The largest of
these specimens at Yale weighs, we
believe, less than q ton. There is still
more curious one at the Smithsonian
institution-an annular specimen, weigh.
ing 400 pounds. 1t is the theory of one
geologist that vast mass of metallic
meteoric matter once struck that part of
the globe lying for dozen degrees along
the Greenland coast and the regions
reaching far west, of such enormous size,
and coming with such force, that it tilted
back the plane of the earth, from It's
original position in relation to the ecliptic!
thus causing the existing climates and
seasons.-H7rgoTd Tines.