Ottumwa semi-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1899-1903, 1899-11-09
SHOWER s.. OF STARS r. !.
Prof. Young Predicts Brilliant
Display in the Heavens.
on MORNING OF NOVEMBER is.
II Condition. Are Favorable it is Pres
dicted That a Second shower May
Fall on the 2Srd and oath
of This Month.

Next Wednesday morning, Nov. Is,
1T is predicted that display of shoot
ing stars will take place and the peo-
pie who have heard their grandmoth-
ers tell of the great shower some time
in the, fifties will he interested in the
announcement. Prof. c. A. Young, of
Princeton, is authority for the state
ment that the shower will be renlarka-
BILE in Its brilliancy and it is quite pos
sible that there may be second show
er on the evening of the 28d or gath,
due to an encounter with the meteoric
swarm which follows in the wake of
Biela's lost comet. He adds further:
Whether, however, both or either of
these meteoric showers will be visible
IN the United States is something
which can not be positively predicted,
even leaving out all consideration Of
the weather. While it is practically
certain that the earth will pass
through some portion of the Leoilid
swarm on the 18th or 10th of the
] month, the data are not sufficient to
determine the precise hour of Green
witch time when the encounter will
take place, or how long it will last, so
that we can not say in just what part
OF the earth the phenomenon will be
visible-whether in the eastern or
western hemisphere. On the whole,
The calculations thus far published in
dictate that the favored regions are.
likely to be those that border on the
Atlantic.
1T is hardly necessary to say that
the shooting stars are not stars at all,
as the name seems to indicate, and as
people sometimes think. This was the
mistake of q sailor on British naval
vessel, who had been set on watch dur
ing the star shower of 1866 to count all
the meteors he could see in given fif-,
teen minutes. When his time was up
he begged to be allowed minute long
er, because said he, I has my eye on
a star that wiggles awful, and can't
hold on much longer. q
Shooting stars are only little masses
OF matter, bits Of rock or metal, or
cloudlets of dust and gas, which are
hying unresisted through space Just
as planets and comets do, in paths
which, within the limits of our solar
system, are controlled by the attrac-
ton of the sun. They move with a
speed of several miles second far ex.
ceeding that of any military proiectile, l
but are too small to be seen by us ex-
cept when they enter our atmosphere
ana, becoming intensely heated by the
resistanceithey encounter. ligh upand.
burn for moment, for, TO Use Lord
Kelvin's expression, a body rushing
through the air at such an enormous
velocity is, during its flight, virtually
Immersed in blowpipe of fame hay
ing temperature comparable with
that of an electric arc. As rule, they
are completely consumed in the upper
air so that nothing reaches the sur
face OF the earth except perhaps a
little ash, settling slowly as an imper-
ceptible smoke. Occasionally, however.
some mass larger than usual survives
in part the fiery ordeal, and its frag-
ments fall to the ground as specimens
of the material Of other worlds than
ours"