And this theory allows us to infer that the heat of the solar disc is fed by a hail of meteors falling incessantly on its surface.
Consequently I affirm that, if our projectile had struck the meteor, its speed thus suddenly checked would have raised a heat great enough to turn it into vapor instantaneously."
"They have even calculated," continued the imperturbable Barbicane, "that the shock of each meteor on the sun ought to produce a heat equal to that of 4,000 masses of coal of an equal bulk."
It was doubtless caused by one of those meteors, which the night-watcher may so often observe burning out to waste, in the vacant regions of the atmosphere So powerful was its radiance, that it thoroughly illuminated the dense medium of cloud betwixt the sky and earth.
Not but the meteor may have shown itself at that point, burning duskily through a veil of cloud, but with no such shape as his guilty imagination gave it, or, at least, with so little definiteness, that another's guilt might have seen another symbol in it.
"Patience, monseigneur, for you do not know what Colbert is -- study him quickly; it is with this dark financier as it is with
meteors, which the eye never sees completely before their disastrous invasion; when we feel them we are dead."
Last night cloud-shadows gloomed the path that winds to my abode, And the torches of the river-boats like angry
meteors glowed.
By excluding men under thirty-five from the first office, and those under thirty from the second, it confines the electors to men of whom the people have had time to form a judgment, and with respect to whom they will not be liable to be deceived by those brilliant appearances of genius and patriotism, which, like transient
meteors, sometimes mislead as well as dazzle.
He speaks of high towers wherein people watched "winds, rain, snow, hail and some of the fiery
meteors also." To-day we have observatories.
This immense canopy of fire was perceived at a distance of one hundred miles out at sea, and more than one ship's captain entered in his log the appearance of this gigantic
meteor.
The nearer moon of Mars makes a complete revolution around the planet in a little over seven and one-half hours, so that she may be seen hurtling through the sky like some huge
meteor two or three times each night, revealing all her phases during each transit of the heavens.
Meantime the nearest bridge had been illuminated, and from several rafts anchored in the river,
meteor showers of rockets, Roman candles, bombs, serpents, and Catharine wheels were being discharged in wasteful profusion into the sky--a marvelous sight indeed to a person as little used to such spectacles as I was.