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thoroughly wet; the dog did not seem very uneasy; his nose only swelled a little; he ate soon after; his nose was bathed once more that evening; he was found very well next morning; but his nose was bathed again, to make sure of his cure; he remained perfectly well without any symptoms ensuing, and was alive and well a year after.

A pigeon was likewise bitten under the wing at the same time as the dog, but by a fresh viper. The oil was immediately applied hot, and rubbed well in, and the feathers of the wing were thoroughly wetted with it. This bird did not seem at all disordered with the venom, but ate soon after, and was found well the next morning, without any remarkable inflammation or swelling about the part. The hot oil was rubbed in again for two or three days, twice a day, and the bird continued well, so that the viper-catchers carried it with them out of town in triumph, having never before experienced the efficacy of their remedy on so small an animal; which, as it receives the same quantity of venom by a bite as a larger one, is more liable to die under it; and they kept it alive above three months, when they killed it and ate it.

They said that they had experienced their remedy to take effect on cows, horses, and dogs, 10 hours after being bitten; but that for themselves, who were frequently bitten in the fields, as they caught the vipers, they always carried a phial of salad oil along with them, that as soon as they perceived themselves wounded, they without any loss of time bathed the part with it; and if it was the heel, they wet the stocking thoroughly with it; if the finger, which happened oftenest, they poured some of it into the finger of their glove, which they immediately put on again, and thus never felt any further inconvenience from the accident, not even so much as from the sting of a common bee.

An Attempt to explain the Phenomenon of the Horizontal Moon appearing larger than when elevated several Degrees above the Horizon. By Dr. DESAGUliers. -[1736.]

THIS apparent increase of the moon's diameter, which a telescope with a micrometer shows to be only apparent, is owing to the following early prejudice. When we look at the sky towards the zenith, we imagine it to be much nearer to us, than when we look at it towards the horizon: so that it does not appear spherical, according to the vertical section EFGHI, but elliptical, according to the section e Fg hi.

The sky thus seen strikes the eye in the same manner as the long arched roof

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sider the eye at C, on the surface of the earth; and imagine C at the surface to coincide with K at the centre; to avoid taking into consideration that the moon is really farther from the eye when in the horizon, than when it is some degrees high. Now when the moon is at G, we consider it as at g, not much farther than G; but when it is at H, we imagine it to be at h, almost as far again. Therefore, while it subtends nearly the same angle as it did before, we imagine it to be so much larger, as the distance seems to us to be increased.

Dr. D. contrived the following experiment to illustrate this: he took two candles of equal height and size, and having placed one at the distance of six or eight feet from the eye, he placed the other at double that distance; then causing any unprejudiced person to look at the candles, he asked which was largest? and the spectator said they were both of a size; and that they appeared so, because he allowed for the greater distance. Then desiring him to shut his eyes for a time, Dr. D. took away the furthest candle, and placed another candle close by the first candle, and though it was as short again as the others, and as little again in diameter, the spectator, when he opened his eyes, thought he saw the same candles as before. Whence it is to be concluded, that when an object is thought to be twice as far from the eye as it was before, we think it to be twice as large, though it subtends but the same angle. And this is the case of the moon, which appears to us as large again, when we suppose it as far again, though it subtends only the same angle.

Concerning a violent Hurricane in Huntingdonshire, Sept. 8. 1741. By Mr. STEPHEN FULLER.-[1741.]

THIS was the most violent hurricane of wind in these parts in the memory of man. Mr. F. happened to be at Bluntsham in Huntingdonshire, about 10 miles north-west of Cambridge. They were there in the midst of the hurricane. The morning, till half an hour after 11, was still, with very hard showers of rain. At half after 11 it began to clear up in the south,

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with a brisk air, so that they expected a fine afternoon. south-west cleared up too, and the sun shining warm drew them out into the garden. They had not been out above 10 minutes before the storm was seen coming from the southwest: it seemed not to be 30 yards high from the ground, bringing along with it a mist, rolling along with such incredi ble swiftness, that it ran about a mile and a half in half a minute. It began exactly at 12 o'clock, and lasted about 13 minutes, eight minutes in full violence: it presently uncovered the house; and some of the tiles, falling down to windward, were blown in at the sashes, and against the wainscot on the other side of the room; the broken glass was blown all over the room; the chimneys all escaped; but the statues on the top of the house, and the the balustrades from one end to the other, were all blown down. The stabling was all blown down, except two little stalls. A the barns in the parish, except those that were full of corn quite up to the top, were blown flat on the ground, to the number of about 60. The dwellinghouses escaped best; there was not above 12 blown down, out of near 100. The people all left their houses, and carried their children out to the windward side, and laid them down on the ground, and laid themselves down by them; and by that means all escaped, except one poor miller, who went into his mill to secure it against the storm, which was blown over, and he was crushed to death between the stones and one of the large beams. All the mills in the country are blown down.

Hay-stacks and corn-stacks are some of them blown away; others into the opposite corner of the field. The pigeons that were caught in it were dashed to pieces. Wherever it met with any boarded houses, it scattered their wrecks above a quarter of a mile to the north-east in a line: Mr. F. followed one of these wrecks; and about 150 yards from the building, he found a piece of a rafter many feet long, and about six inches by four, stuck upright two feet deep in the ground; and at the distance of 400 paces from the same building was an inch board, nine inches broad, and 14 feet long: these boards were carried up into the air; and some were carried over a pond above 30 yards; and a row of pales, as much as two men could lift, were carried two rods from their places, and set upright against an apple-tree.

Pales, in general, were all blown down, some posts were broken off close to the ground, others torn up by the stumps. The whole air was full of straw: gravel-stones, as large as the top of the little finger, were blown off the ground in at the

windows; and the very grass was blown quite flat on the ground. After the storm was over, he went out into the town, and such a miserable sight he never saw the havoc above described, the women and children crying, the farmers all dejected. Two people, that were out in it all the time, said, that they heard it coming about half a minute before they saw it; and that it made a noise resembling thunder, more continued, and continually increasing. A man came from St. Ives, who says, the spire of the steeple, one of the finest in England, was blown down, as was the spire of Hemmingford, the towns having received as much damage as Bluntsham. There was neither thunder nor lightning with it, as there was at Cambridge, where it lasted above half an hour, and was not so violent.

Of a Fire-ball seen in the Air, on Dec. 11. 1741. By Lord BEAUCHAMP. — [1741.]

BEING then on the mount in Kensington Gardens, at a quarter past 10 o'clock, the sun shining bright, in a serene sky, Lord B. saw, towards the south, a ball of fire, of about eight inches diameter, and somewhat oval, which enlarged to. the size of about a yard and a half diameter. It seemed to descend from above, and at the distance of about half a mile from the earth took its course to the east, and seemed to drop over Westminster. In its course it assumed a tail of 80 yards in length; and before it disappeared, it divided into two heads. It left a train of smoke all the way as it went; and from the place where it seemed to drop there arose a smoke, which continued ascending for 20 minutes, and at length formed into a cloud, which assumed different colours.

Concerning the Fire-ball in the Air, Dec. 11. 1741. By Mr. CHRISTOPHER MASON. [1742.]

On that day, at Bucksteep, Sussex, about a quarter before one o'clock in the afternoon, Mr. M. observed a very dark uncommon appearance in the north, and at the same time the sun shone bright at his back; when, on a sudden, there was an explosion as violent as the report of a mortar-piece, attended with a rumbling echo, which ran eastward; and he judges it came from about 40° elevation. Several people saw a ball of fire, which ran nearly eastward, leaving a train of light, which continued some time. The ball of fire was seen, and the report heard very loud, at Sompting, beyond Shoreham.

Of the Fire-ball seen Dec. 11. 1741. By Mr. BENJ. COOKE, F.R.S. Dated Newport, in the Isle of Wight. —[1742.] `·

A GENTLEMAN was on a hill about three miles west of that town, and had a very advantageous view of the fire-ball. He says, that the brightness of the sun was a little obscured by the interposition of some thin clouds, when he saw it pass by to the eastward, at about the distance of a quarter of a mile, and an apparent height of 30 feet above the level of the place where he stood. Its colour was that of a burning coal; its figure a cone, whose length might be eight feet, and diameter at the base 18 inches. From about its apex, which was its hinder part, issued several bright streams sparkling with fiery drops, to the length of about four or five feet. Its motion was nearly parallel to the plane of the horizon, and its direction about from south-west-by-south to north-east-by-north, without any noise, wind, or motion of the earth attending it.

Account of the Fire-ball seen Dec. 11. 1741. By Capt. WILLIAM GORDON.-[1742.]

On Friday the 11th of December, 1741, about one P. M. coming by water from the city to Whitehall, and near to Hungerford Stairs, there appeared to Capt. G., between Vauxhall and Lambeth, a body of fire: it sprung upwards in its ascent almost perpendicular to the horizon, to the height of about 35°, in the space of a few seconds, and nearly in form of a large paper kite, projecting a long tail towards the north-west, not unlike those of slips of paper set on fire; in this state it continued so long, that he made the waterman lay his oars in, that he might the more easily observe whether it was the work of art or nature, as he was in some doubt. It had, from its first appearance, expanded itself considerably, so that the extreme breadth was seemingly equal to the diameter of a full moon arising from a dusky horizon. In this form it continued ascending for the space of two minutes, gently shooting to the north-east, till it arose to about 45°; then suddenly quitting its tail, which vanished, colouring the neighbouring clouds with a yellow on their separation, it formed itself first into a ball of fire; then shooting quickly to the south-east in a stream of light, disappeared, making a noise like a clap of thunder at some distance, and leaving behind it a smoky substance in its track.

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