In the beginning of July, 1608, an extensive shower of blood took place at Aix, in France, which threw the people of that place into the utmost consternation, and, which is a much more important fact, led to the first satisfactory and philosophical explanation of this phenomenon, but too late, alas! to save the Jews of Frankfort. This explanation was given by M. Peiresc, a celebrated philosopher of that place, and is thus referred to by his biographer, Gassendi: “Nothing in the whole year 1608 did more please him than that he observed and philosophized about, the bloody rain, which
was commonly reported to have fallen about the beginning of July; great drops thereof were plainly to be seen, both in the city itself, upon the walls of the church-yard of the church, which is near the city wall, and upon the city walls themselves; also upon the walls of villages, hamlets, and towns, for some miles round about; for in the first place, he went himself to see those wherewith the stones were colored, and did what he could to come to speak with those husbandmen, who, beyond Lambesk, were reported to have been affrighted at the falling of said rain, that they left their work, and ran as fast as their legs could carry them into the adjacent houses. Whereupon, he found that it was a fable that was reported, touching those husbandmen. Nor was he pleased that naturalists should refer this kind of rain to vapours drawn up out of red earth aloft in the air, which congealing afterwards into liquor, fall down in this form; because such vapours as are drawne aloft by heat, ascend without color, as we may know by the alone example of red roses, out of which the vapours that arise by heat are congealed into transparent water. He was less pleased with the common people, and some divines, who judged that it was the work of the devils and witches who had killed innocent young children; for this he counted a mere conjecture, possibly also injurious to the goodness and providence of God.
“In the mean while an accident happened, out of which he conceived he had collected the true cause thereof. For, some months before, he shut up in a box a certain palmer-worm which he had found, rare for its bigness and form; which, when he had forgotten, he heard a buzzing in the box, and when he opened it, found the palmer-worm, having cast its coat, to be turned into a beautiful Butterfly, which presently flew away, leaving in the bottom of the box a red drop as broad as an ordinary sous or shilling; and because this happened about the beginning of the same month, and about the same time an incredible multitude of Butterflies were observed flying in the air, he was therefore of opinion that such kind of Butterflies resting on the walls had there shed such like drops, and of the same bigness. Whereupon, he went the second time, and found, by experience, that those drops were not to be found on the house-tops, nor upon the round sides of the stones which stuck out, as it would have happened, if blood had fallen from the sky, but rather where the stones were somewhat hollowed, and in holes, where
such small creatures might shroud and nestle themselves. Moreover, the walls which were so spotted, were not in the middle of towns, but they were such as bordered upon the fields, nor were they on the highest parts, but only so moderately high as Butterflies are commonly wont to fly.
“Thus, therefore, he interpreted that which Gregory of Tours relates, touching a bloody rain seen at Paris in divers places, in the days of Childebert, and on a certain house in the territory of Seulis; also that which is storied, touching raining of blood about the end of June, in the days of King Robert; so that the blood which fell upon flesh, garments, or stones could not be washed out, but that which fell on wood might; for it was the same season of Butterflies, and experience hath taught us, that no water will wash these spots out of the stones, while they are fresh and new. When he had said these and such like things to various, a great company of auditors being present, it was agreed that they should go together and search out the matter, and as they went up and down, here and there, through the fields, they found many drops upon stones and rocks; but they were only on the hollow and under parts of the stones, but not upon those which lay most open to the skies.”[753]
This memorable shower of blood was produced by the Vanessa urticæ, or V. polychloros, most probably, since these species of Butterflies are said to have been uncommonly plentiful at the time when, and in the particular district where, the phenomenon was observed.[754][755]
Nicoll, in his Diary, p. 8, informs us that on the 28th of May, 1650, “there rained blood the space of three miles in the Earl of Buccleuch’s bounds (Scotland), near the English border, which was verefied in presence of the Committee of State.”[756]
We learn from Fountainhall that on Sunday, May 1st, 1687, a young woman of noted piety, Janet Fraser by name, the daughter of a weaver in the parish of Closeburn, Dumfriesshire, went out to the fields with a young female companion, and sat down to read the Bible not far from her father’s house. Feeling thirsty, she went to the river-side (the Nith) to get a drink, leaving her Bible open at the place where she had been reading, which presented the verses of the 34th chapter of Isaiah, beginning—“My sword shall be bathed in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment,” etc. On returning, she found a patch of something like blood covering this very text. In great surprise, she carried the book home, where a young man tasted the substance with his tongue, and found it of a saltless or insipid flavor. On the two succeeding Sundays, while the same girl was reading the Bible in the open air, similar blotches of matter, like blood, fell upon the leaves. She did not perceive it in the act of falling till it was about an inch from the book. “It is not blood,” our informant adds, “for it is as tough as
glue, and will not be scraped off by a knife, as blood will; but it is so like blood, as none can discern any difference by the colour.”[757]
On Tuesday, Oct. 9th, 1764, “a kind of rain of a red color, resembling blood, fell in many parts of the Duchy of Cleves, which caused great consternation. M. Bouman sent a bottle of it to Dr. Schutte, to know if it contained anything pernicious to health. Something of the like kind fell also at Rhenen, in the Province of Utrecht.”[758]