From his home in Cavendish Square, a Mr Crawford pointed out that, in earlier generations, a comet was believed to portend some terrible event. The residents of all ‘civilised countries’ knew better, but might it not be a good idea, he suggested, to publish a simple explanation in the local vernacular for the benefit of those ‘peoples and nations whose education has not advanced as rapidly as with us’, lest ancient superstitions ‘make opportunity for the agitator’?14
