After a greater quantity of Rains than ordinary had fallen in the Summer and Autumn, in those places where the Storm was felt, the Winter came on much warmer than usual; so that the Liquor in a Thermometer, of which the 84th Degree notes Frost, never fell below the 100th.[52]
Hence we may very well believe, that the Atmosphere was at that time fill'd with Atoms of Salts and Sulphur, out of the Vapours raised by the Heat from the moist Earth, which being variously combined and agitated, gave that deadly force to the Motion of the Air.
A Proof of this we have not only from the frequent Flashes of Lightning, observed a little before the Storm, but also from what the Country People took notice of the next day, that the Grass
and Twiggs of the Trees, in Fields remote from the Sea, tasted very salt, so that the Cattle wou'd not feed on them.
Our Histories mention another Storm, which if not equal to this last in Violence, is however thought the greatest that had then ever been known and memorable from the time at which it happened, viz. on the 3d of September, 1658. the day on which the Usurper O. Cromwel died.
No Ephemerides that I know of relate the Condition of the Air that Year, but it is sufficient to remark, That whatever other Causes concurr'd, their force was accompanied with a Full Moon, just before the time of the Atumnal Equinox.
Upon the same score it comes to pass, That in those Countries which are Subject to frequent Inundations, these Calamities are observed to happen at the times of the Moon's greatest Influence, so that the Learned Baccius[53] has rightly enough laid the Cause of such Mischiefs upon immoderate Tides of the Ocean, being unhappily accompanied
with the attractive Force of some or other Stars.