WHERE METEORS COME FROM.

Clutha Leader, Volume XX, Issue 1026, 23 March 1894, Page 7

WHERE METEORS COME FROM.

If, about 200 years ago, a witness had stated that he had seen a witch riding through the air on a broomstick, he would have been believed ;, but if he had stated that he had heard a loud explosion, and found a large hole in the ground, and, upon thrusting his hand in, had touched a stone that was warm, his veracity would have been doubted. Meteors must have fallen. in the olden times, but it is only in later days that these cases have br.en reported. Until 1794" it was the belief that meteors were visitations of God. The best known meteor is one of 1874, which fell in the town of Wolverhampton. A butcher saw a hole in the ground, and an examination showed -the ground to be warm, and a meteor was finally unearthed, which weighed about 7001 b. Being polished, it resembles solid iron, and is now stored in the British Museum. In falling, meteors start from above the atmosphere, where there is little resistance, and come down with a velocity 20 times greater than that of a bullet. Coming in contact with the atmosphere, great heat is generated, and the meteor is usually broken in pieces. The most common meteors, are stone, and cannot be found because they resemble stones on the earth's surface. In Siberia and Bouth America the most are found. Where they come from has caused much discussion. One theory is that meteors originally came from the earth, and were due to stupendous volcanic eruptions of ages gone, when the meteors were thrown beyond the attraction of the earth, and accordingly sent revolving around the sun. When the earth in its orbit comes near one of these wandering meteors it is attracted, and plunges into the earth. Any stone thrown at the rate of six miles a second would not return to the earth again, but would be thrown .outside of its attractive power. —Pearson's Weekly.