Read Dec: 2: 85
Enter'd LB 10: 221
Trin: coll: Sept: the 16th 85
Honoured Sir
My going to the country soon after the receipt of your letter & continuing there some time, has occasioned me to be thus long rude; while I was there happen'd a thing very remarkable the relation of which perhaps may be worth communicating to you. August the 14th & the night before, a continued rain fell in most parts of Ireland (& the French Gazette gives an account of a violent tempest much about the same time in the Dutchy of Mecklenburg) which caused so great floods the next day, that the like have not been known in the memory of the oldest men, destroying an exceedingly great quantity of hay which lay near any rivers; At Athlone especially upon the borders of the counties of Westmeath & Roscommon the following accident happened, the River Shannon which runs there with considerable force, altho above an hundred miles from the sea, & over which a bridge of 8 large arches is laid, was observed for near 24 hours time to flow backward towards its head, & to carry boats & cotts with violence up the bridge against the wind & the former stream; This unexpected unnatural motion much surprised the inhabitants, but the reason thereof I conceive to be this: A league above the bridge is a very broad Lough or Lake, the ground about which is plain & level; below it is a contracted & much narrower channell with high banks, wherein too the water of severall small brooks is received, this passage being on a sudden fill'd & overcharg'd, coud not readily convey its water by the straitned Alvens below, & therefore the flood fell naturally & overflood where the river was much broader & the ground more level, & so continued to run till the lower passage which by the sudden flux & rising of the water was before chook'd up, became more free & open. Another accidental reason may be, that the stream carrying away hay with it, that might much retard its course.
Another history no less strange, tho of a different kind, I can also relate upon my own knowledge, concerning one Robt. Edgeworth my pupil in the colledge, who for many years had a regular periodicall tertian squint, that is, one day his eyes look'd strait & right, the next allways they squinted; this difference he observed, that on his ill day his eyes were very weak & woud not endure much reading; thus he continued, till about 3 years ago, at which time it chang'd to a constant dayly squint.
The Right Revd. the Bishop of Ferns our late provost has sent up the contrivance of a lamp, which shall illuminate a vast space, as the whole body of a church or the like, sufficiently to read in any part thereof; the experiment is now amaking, & you shall know its success.
Dr Mullen has made severall experiments on dogs by injecting liquors into their veins & arteries; one infusion put a dog into an Apoplexy, of which he died in 2 minutes, the same liquor poured down another dogs throat, fluxed him.
Mr Keogh a member of our society has invented a new Philosophicall character, of which he promises great matters, a specimen thereof is soon to be examined, which (if it be thought worth the while) shall be communicated to you.
I had lately a letter from Sr. Rich: Bulkeley, which gives account of a brook on his land that has in a plain levell place forced a deep subterranean passage under a large wood & a high road, beyond which it again rises; & of 2 persons bit by mad dogs, who died without any Hydrophobia.
We had a girle brought to us, who has severall horns growing out of divers parts of her body, an account of which I promised Mr. Musgrave, & will soon transmitt it.
I am ordered to return the thanks of our society to you for your present of Hevelius's book, which be pleased to deliver to this Bearer, who will send it safely to us.
I am
(Honoured Sir)
your most humble servant
St. George Ashe.
Addressed on reverse 'To Francis Aston esqr. secretary of the Royal Society at Gresham College London'.