In all ages meteoric stones have fallen on the earth. Many of them were
found by persons who were in search of them; they preserved them, and
thus collections were made in private rarity cabinets and in natural
history cabinets. Many learned persons believed in meteoric stones,
but many others were sceptical, and their attacks were so violent,
and their mockery about stones that fell from the atmosphere, or were
thrown by the men in the Moon to the inhabitants of the Earth, so sharp
as to shake the belief of many a collector, and the happy possessor,
fearing the mockery of the so-called learned men, concealed his
treasures, or threw them away on the dust-hill, or in a ditch.
But at last there appeared a firm believer in aerolites, named CHLADNI,
who took the trouble to collect all accounts concerning observations of
meteoric stones from the ancient times up to the nineteenth century.
He showed 1. The immense number of facts. 2. The strikingly concurrent
testimony in all the accounts independent of one another.
In the year 1829 he published his work “Ueber Feuermeteore” (i. e.
on Meteoric Stones) in Vienna, and from that moment the eyes of
unbelievers were opened. Meteoric stones were again found, and were
proved to be quite different from terrestrial stones. From that moment
the belief in the existence of meteoric stones was fixed for ever.
The author of the present Volume has been at the pains to collect all
accounts concerning observations of Sea-Serpents. His work has the same
purpose as CHLADNI’S had in 1829. It is his sincere hope that it may
meet with the same success.