11. At a quarter-past ten o'clock on the evening of July 13th, 1864, a large fire-ball was seen in New England.[16] The hour of its appearance, it will be observed, was nearly the same with that of the bolide of July 13th, 1846; and it is also worthy of remark that their _directions_ were nearly the same. The meteor of 1864 had a tail three or four degrees in length, and the body, like that of 1846, exploded with a loud report.
12. On the 8th of July, 1186, an aerolite fell at Mons, in Belgium (Quetelet's _Physique du Globe_, p. 320). A forward motion of the node, somewhat less than that observed in the rings of November and August, would give a correspondence of dates between the falls of 1186, 1847, and 1860.
With the exception of the last, which is doubtful, these phenomena all occurred within a period of 67 years.
It has been stated that in different years meteoric stones have fallen about the 29th of November. One of the most recent aerolites which can be assigned to this epoch is that which fell on the 30th of November, 1850, at Shalka, in Bengal. It may be mentioned, as at least a coincidence, that the earth passes the approximate intersection of her orbit with that of Biela's comet at the date of this epoch. Do other bodies besides the two Biela comets move in the same ellipse? It is worthy of remark that two star showers have been observed at this date: one in China, A.D. 930, the other in Europe, 1850 (see Quetelet's Catalogue). It is certainly important that the meteors of this epoch should be carefully studied.
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF METEORIC STONES--DO AEROLITIC FALLS OCCUR MORE FREQUENTLY BY DAY THAN BY NIGHT?--DO METEORITES, BOLIDES, AND THE MATTER OF ORDINARY SHOOTING-STARS, COEXIST IN THE SAME RINGS?
Professor Charles Upham Shepard, of Amherst College, who has devoted special attention to the study of meteoric stones, has designated two districts of country, one in each continent, but both in the northern hemisphere, in which more than nine-tenths of all known aerolites have fallen. He remarks: "The fall of aerolites is confined principally to two zones; the one belonging to America is between 33° and 44° north latitude, and is about 25° in length. Its direction is more or less from northeast to southwest, following the general line of the Atlantic coast. Of all known occurrences of this phenomenon during the last fifty years, 92·8 per cent. have taken place within these limits, and mostly in the neighborhood of the sea. The zone of the Eastern continent--with the exception that it extends ten degrees more to the north--lies between the same degrees of latitude, and follows a similar northeast direction, but is more than twice the length of the American zone. Of all the observed falls of aerolites, 90·9 per cent. have taken place within this area, and were also concentrated in that half of the zone which extends along the Atlantic."