Wonders in the Sky (97 page)

 

Source:
Philosophical Transactions
281 (1702):1248, and 284 (1702): 1331.

24 March 1718, Island of Lethy, India Globe of fire with residue

A globe of fire appeared to drop a load of gelatinous substance. The strange object came out of the sky and touched the ground on Lethy Island in the East Indies. Witnesses who approached the site found a “jelly-like mass, silvery and scaly.”

Until the nature of “shooting stars” was understood in the 19th century, people thought that any blobs of jelly-like material found in their fields were related to meteors.

 

Source:
A Catalogue of Meteorites and Fireballs, from A.D. 2 to A.D. 1860
, compiled by R. P. Greg, Esq., F. G. S, for the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1860.

19 October 1726, Ath and Liège, Belgium Circles of light

Large glowing clouds collide: fireballs and circles of light: “About 7:30 at night that Saturday, large clouds of fire arose from our horizon, pushed by the southern wind towards the north. They seemed to collide in an extraordinary manner, yet soundlessly. The sky, although calm, was all afire. Among these volumes of fire one could notice large luminous circles, open at the bottom, pushing one another like the waters of an agitated sea. About 11 o'clock these phenomena passed over the city, continuing long into the night, creating panic and wonder everywhere.”

This case and the next one are part of a local “wave” of terrifying observations probably caused by a spectacular auroral display over Northern Europe.

 

Source: Gilles Joseph de Boussu,
L'histoire de la ville de Ath
(Mons, 1750).

19 October 1726, Echilleuses, France
“Pyramids” in the sky and unexplained rays of color

Pyramids in formation in the sky, with red and blue rays, seen in Echilleuses and at Villefranche du Rouergue.

The incident was recorded by a witness as follows: “About 8 hours of the evening an extraordinary sign in the stars; it looked like sorts of pyramids that made spears sometimes red, sometimes blue in color, and seemed to move in ranks like an army in the air.” The spectacle, probably caused by the same aurora noted above, seemed so horrible that parishes in the region rang their bells. It lasted until 11 P.M.

 

Source: Departmental archives of Loiret, courtesy of Merrs. Franck Marie and Pierre-Valéry Archassal.

1743, Holyhead near Peibio, Anglesey, Wales
Ships in the sky

Mr. Morris, an experienced mining engineer, master of many languages and eminent antiquarian, had a report from Anglesey. This was made by a farmer named William John Lewis whose steading lay near Peibio, a little place only a stone's throw from Holyhead.

“Plowing” (as it was written) “with his servant boy in ye fields”, he saw bearing down upon him a ship of 90 tons, rigged like a ketch, with its fore-tack at the cat-head and its pennant and antient flying. The day was described as indifferent and cloudy, but the detail of the ship could be clearly seen. It was “coming from ye mountains of Snowdon”, not by sailing on the waves around Holy Island, but moving “about a Quarter of a mile High from ye Ground”.

The farmer called his wife. She ran from the farmhouse in time to see the ship in the sky retreating, its pennant lowered to the deck and all sails furled. It was steering stern foremost, making for whence it had come, the mountains of Snowdonia.

Mr. Morris hastened to Holyhead and interviewed first the wife and then the husband, separately. Neither had any doubt about the circumstances. The wife had not acquaintance with sea terms, but was quite sure of what she had seen; her only doubt was what the neighbours might think if she allowed Mr. Morris to publish the affair. He found the husband at an inn, visiting Holyhead on farm business. He had no doubt that the man was sober and sincere, with no trace of the “melancolick” disposition that might have led him to exaggerate or imagine.

The ship had been plain to see, exact in every detail; the keel could be observed from below; the sails were distended with the wind; when the foresail was lowered it hung in a natural way over bow. In the end a cloud hid the vessel from sight, but not before the farmer, his wife, and his boy had had their observation supported by a flock of birds that assembled to examine the phenomenon and flew round it from all directions. When the vessel began its backward journey, the birds with one accord flew from it northwards in the opposite direction.

What finally persuaded Mr. Morris was the way in which the farmer – William John Lewis – assured him that he had seen another such ship exactly ten years earlier in much the same place, and that, ten years before then again, he had seen just such another. The ships were in each case very like the old packet-boats that plied between Holyhead and Ireland; the very ropes of the rigging could be counted one by one.

He concluded: “Since the hill at Holyhead is the only height in Anglesey to face the distant loftiness of Snowdon, some trick of refraction may have been responsible for picking up vessels plying the Menai Straits and setting them, pennant and antient and all, to steer the skies above Peibio.”

 

Source: Wynford Vaughan-Thomas and Alun Llewellyn,
The Shell Guide to Wales
(Michael Joseph Ltd, 1969). The account is found under ‘Holyhead' in the Gazetteer section of the book.

31 August 1743, Castel Nuovo, Italy A light follows Casanova

Casanova saw a “pyramid-shaped flame” 50 cm high, 1.2 m above ground, 3 meters away. It followed him all day:

“An hour after I had left Castel Nuovo, the atmosphere being calm and the sky clear, I perceived on my right, and within ten paces of me, a pyramidal flame about two feet long and four or five feet above the ground. This apparition surprised me, because it seemed to accompany me. Anxious to examine it, I endeavoured to get nearer to it, but the more I advanced towards if, the further it went from me. It would stop when I stood still, and when the road along which I was travelling happened to be lined with trees, I no longer saw it, but it was sure to reappear as soon as I reached a portion of the road without trees. I several times retraced my steps purposely, but, every time I did so, the flame disappeared, and would not shew itself again until I proceeded towards Rome. This extraordinary beacon left me when daylight chased darkness from the sky.”

Casanova's reaction is interesting. First he dismisses the event as a skeptical scientist: “What a splendid field for ignorant superstition, if there had been any witnesses to that phenomenon, and if I had chanced to make a great name in Rome! History is full of such trifles, and the world is full of people who attach great importance to them in spite of the so-called light of science.” But then he adds, more humbly:

“I must candidly confess that, although somewhat versed in physics, the sight of that small meteor gave me singular ideas.” And he concludes with the same words as so many witnesses of unusual phenomena: “I was prudent enough not to mention the circumstances to anyone.”

Fig. 55: Giacomo Casanova

Source: Giacomo Casanova,
The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
, trans. Arthur Machen (New York: Putnam's, 1959), Vol. I, 222.