Abstract
The August Meteors seen at Breslau ON August 14, 1839, the German astronomer Boguslawski wrote an account of his observations at Breslau of the August meteors, popularly known as “the tears of St. Lawrence”; the account being published in the Prussian State Gazette. “The sky,” he said, “has been again particularly propitious for observing another fall of stars. On many days and nights preceding the 10th the heavens have been so covered that we could not observe when the uncommonly frequent fall of stars commenced. On Aug. 10, however, our hopes of seeing the phenomena increased owing to the clearness of the weather… It was not, however, sufficient to count the numbers that fell; it was desirable also to measure the time of their appearance, and of the continuance of their fall, according to Franzmann's instrument, which beats thirds of seconds, and moreover to ascertain their relative height and apparent course in the heavens and all these observations could commence only at 26 minutes past 9 when all the observers, 15 in number, were assembled, occupying six windows of the observatory. Four gentlemen took care to observe and register the times of each appearance, according to two clocks. Till 14 minutes past 3, when dawn put a stop to the observations, they noticed 1008 falling stars, not including numbers which must have been overlooked because the numbers of observers was insufficient”. Other meteors were seen on August 11 and 12 and “therefore,” wrote Boguslawski, “the annual periodical return of an uncommon fall of stars towards the 10th of August is once more confirmed”.
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Science News a Century Ago. Nature 144, 301 (1939). https://doi.org/10.1038/144301a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/144301a0