Loremen Podcast - Loremen S6Ep32 - The Black Rains of Slains

Episode Date: September 11, 2025

Storm's comin', and it is quite literally "mucky out". Alasdair forecasts peculiar precipitation with spells of weird science. The black rains that fell on one small Scottish parish in the 1860s have a variety of explanations, ranging from the odd (squids) to the really odd (Italy). Plus, we have a doozy of a theory from the man himself: Charles Fort. This episode was edited by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Joseph Burrows - Audio Editor⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Join the LoreFolk at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patreon.com/loremenpod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ko-fi.com/loremen⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Check the sweet, sweet merch here... ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.teepublic.com/stores/loremen-podcast?ref_id=24631⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @loremenpod ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/loremenpodcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/loremenpod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/loremenpod⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting at 17 grams per medium latte, Tim's new protein lattes, protein without all the work, at participating restaurants in Canada. Welcome to Lawman, a podcast of our local legends and obscure. Your curiosities from days of yore. I'm Alastair Beckett King. And I'm James Shakeshaft. And James, I hope you've got a brolly there. An umbrella.

Yeah. Some kind of appropriate headgear. An umbrella hat. A little umbrella hat, which is a cap where it spins around. I'm not. I'm thinking of a propeller cap. Or a propeller. You're thinking of a propeller hat. Would the propeller cap repel the rain?

We can only help, James, because I'm about to take you to Aberdeenshire. Hmm. For a story about the Black Raines of slain's storms come in James Shakesh I've got a warning for you James I'm shirtless

What? Yeah, I'm sorry, it's very warm It's very warm in the flat I've got the windows closed for sound reasons the, my neighbour who was learning the trombone, if you recall. Yes, Jonathan Briggs. Has that guy gone out yet? The Johnny Briggs, the Johnny Briggs theme tune.

I don't know whether that made it into the podcast proper, if it was bonus only. Anyway, he's moved on to the trumpet. He, she or they have moved on to the trumpet. They, and they in this sense is not only being trans-friendly, but also they could be. It could be, yeah. We're not just being non-binary inclusive. it might be that it's like a hot five, but they're practicing the instruments one at a time.

Yeah, they're literally a, or they are the personification of a theme tune. Oh, yeah, exactly. And you would use non-binary pronouns for the Johnny Briggs theme tune. Yes. So basically I'm shirtless, and I just wanted you to know

and the listener to know in case it affects the episode and people are like, oh, no, it's a shirtless one, I'm not listening to this, or whatever, going forwards. James. Let me take you to the panace,

of Slanes. Slanes. If you had to guess, where would you say Slanes is? Is it near Staines? It's not near Staines. But Staines may be part of the story I'm about to tell you. So, very good guess. A stain on your soul?

Slanes is a coastal parish, some way north of Aberdeen. Oh, Scottish. Scottish, exactly. Sleensh. Is that offensive? To... I don't know. To Sean Connery or to Scottish people in general?

But, yeah, Scottish people in general. I was hoping it wasn't. I suppose it has got two S's in there, yeah. Schlinge. Not a huge place, not particularly notable. J.G. Bartholomew's survey gazetteer of the British Isles 1904, I'm sure you're familiar with it. It doesn't have much to say about Slains,

but it mentions that the ruins of Slain's castle, ancient stronghold of the earls of Errol, demolished in 1594 by James the Sixth Crowns a lofty peninsulated rock on the coast. Wait? The Watts of Errol. The Earls of Errol. The Earls of Errol, yeah.

That's too much. That's too, that's confusing. Just a Scottish aristocratic lineage, the Errols. This is their manor, the Errols. And Old Slain's Castle is a ruin. You can look for it. It is there. Great.

But it's basically just a thumb. the sticking out of the rock. There's not much there. So if you imagine that the the peninsulated rock is a fist, it's just a little, just a little thumb. Thumbs up?

Yeah, oh yeah. Yeah, thumbs up. It's just encouraging you, like, keep going because if you keep going further north along the coast, you'll get to New Slains Castle. Ooh. Also a ruin.

There's a new slain. Oh. Yeah, too late. Yeah, it was new. And now it's a ruin. New Slains, New Slains. So New Slains Castle, I think it was abandoned

in the 1930s and for some reason they took the roof off which really accelerates a building becoming a ruin in my unexpert opinion

supposedly it's haunted I don't it's weird to say that I don't think it's really haunted and what I mean

is I don't think there are really legends about it being haunted I think people just say that there are do you know what I mean? Right, yes

because it looks like it should be exactly yeah and I think one of the one of the errol Vincent Hayes wrote a book

about a ghost and a story has come about that he haunts it. And I think from what I was reading, it's a confusion between him writing a book about a ghost and him being a ghost. Right. Yep. That's that often, that's like with us in this podcast, but some people confuse us.

They sometimes think that we're... With being a podcast. A ghost. Sometimes they think we're a ghost and a big foot. Check the bonus to understand that. Or maybe it'll make it into the podcast. We don't know. Or a time traveling vampire.

Or time traveling vampire. Well, what are you then? Just a normal guy, just the handsome one. A giant. Hello. With a heart of gold. I was born too big for this world. I love it when he does his normal voice.

We've got a pitch shift on James the whole time. Except when he goes into fall giant. Sometimes the facade slips. So, again, supposedly the castle was the inspiration for Bram Stoker's novel. Right. But it probably wasn't. He did visit it, though. Ramstock was in the area and he did visit the castle, so maybe it had some influence. But there's just not much evidence, really, that it was the basis for it. But the coast around this area, just to give you a bit of atmosphere, definitely inspired one of his other novels, which was the mystery of the sea. Oh, the sea, the sea. Yeah, a book, I've never read that book, but it starts with a poem in Gallic and then translated into English. And then it has a code, like all numbers, like a cryptogram. of some kind. And then it has a mysterious, like, medieval document. So it seems like a pretty cool mystery book. And in that book, the narrator gives a description of the Slane's area,

which I will read. Can I just backtrack and just confirm it is the mystery of the sea, as in the body of water, not C, dash. It's a swear word or something. Yes, S-E-A, correct. Thank you for checking. Or someone's identities try to be. Behind Slains, he means the castle, I think. Behind Slane's, runs in a long narrow inlet with beetling cliffs sheer on either side and at its entrance

a wild turmoil of rocks are hurled together in titanic confusion oh, ambosphere just building a picture for you James just could be a titanic confusion yeah that's what the lady exhibits

at the end when she drops the Coorda de la mare back in the sea I think well there probably was a bit of confusion on the boat they'd just spent ages getting that out mate the Coord de la Mir

part of the the ocean, the heart of the ocean. I mean, you're asking for trouble calling it that. We should just throw it back in. That's where it wants to be. Confused me like one of your French girls. It's just what? Swirling onions.

A miasma of... In the fabled coast, Kings Hill and Westwood does a pretty nasty account of a fisherman's superstition from this area. Apparently, if somebody drowned... while fishing, the boat would then become taboo and nobody would use that boat again. It wouldn't even be fit for kindling, apparently. Oh, wow. Yeah, they wouldn't even burn it.

Apparently, when a boat washed up in Colliston, which is a fishing village in the parish of Slains, it was in perfect condition, but all the hands had been lost, and the villagers wouldn't even dare sell it. That's how superstitious they were. And that, James, is just background. That's just colour. That's just background. Those were just the trailers.

Now it's time for the main feature. If you liked New Slane's Castle, you might also like stories about boats. Cool. Yes, they were right. The algorithm was correct. I hope you're ready, James, for the main feature. The Black Rains of Slains.

The Rains of Slains fall mainly on one guy. The Earl of Errol. You won't believe this, but the Rains of Slains fall mainly on a James. What? Yeah, not you, but your namesake.

Wow. Get ready. I didn't even realise that rhyme, James. Wow. Until this very moment. Yikes. Okay, it's 1862. It's Tuesday the 14th of January.

Yeah, your boys got dates. Yeah. 1862? Tuesday, the 14th of January. Correct. Nice. The parish priest, Reverend James Rust. Jimmy Rust.

Jimmy, Rusty Jim. Reverend Jimmy Rust He spent the last couple of weeks So what's it What are you doing in there Reverend James West? I'm just looking at noises I'm looking at bikes

You know Pass me my star wipes He had spent the last couple of weeks recording the direction that the wind was blowing in Because it was 1862 And every vicar had a side hustle in those days really. You know, we've done enough vickers on this,

and they've all got a hobby, haven't they? A special interest, like catching butterflies or classifying fungi or something. Yeah, or building-scale models of towns. Building-scale models of towns. Building a massive fence around your vicarage and naming a dog, Gandhi. Yeah.

They're odd people, and they've all got a special area that intrigues them, and his was meteorology. They're like Pokemon's. You've got to collect every 19th century vicar. Yeah, they've all got a different skill. We'd know where the wind came from two weeks ago. Well, James Rust was about to evolve into a flipping legend, James, because... Oh, his ultimate form?

He was a weather guy. And let me tell you, James, that is exactly the kind of guy you're going to want to have in play when an unexplained weather phenomenon kicks off. My starting point for this story was... There's a really good article by Michael Cox in The Fourteen Times, all about the Black Rains of Slains and James Rust. And it gives this quote from Rust. At nine it became overcast, threatening rain,

and at 9.30, a large, dense, black, smoky, fearful-looking cloud, more resembling, accepting as to its immense size, the heavy dark smoke issuing from a steamer's funnel than anything I have ever seen, came driving and tumbling along the sea in fearful majesty, and instantaneously twilighted the whole atmosphere, and sent forth a heavy shower of rain, A large proportion of the drops of which

resembled dark ink or sooty water. Mucky rain. I thought I sensed you bridling there at rain in Scotland being unusual. But this wasn't any ordinary rainfall, James. Yeah. It was a freak weather occurrence.

Black ink-like drops fell on the parish of Slains. Wow. Do you think that would happen more than once? Or do you think it happened once? No, I think there's a one-off phenomenon where maybe some maybe some squids got caught in a cloud

squid's going to cloud a squid cloud situation yeah you got a squid you got a squid ink cloud situation is your basic squid ink cloud situation guys don't panic

what we want to do pop out there with your risotto and you can charge twice as much do people put risotto on squid ink no the other way around

do people put squid ink on risotto yeah it's like a thing in certain like Italian pasta dishes yeah and risotto those. Well, you would not want these raindrops on your risotto, James. Oh, no. Because they

flipping stank. Oh, no. They smell very, very bad. To be honest, squid ink doesn't smell great. I mean, if you've squeezed it out of a squid, I don't want to eat it. I'm sorry, I'm sorry if that is, yeah, does that reflect badly upon me? I suppose it wouldn't be vegan if you've squeezed it out of a squid. It would be, yeah, I can't imagine a situation where you could get a squids ink and it be adhering to any sort of vegan, like, mind view. Well, but if the squid, yeah, because the squid does it defensively, so it might donate it, but only if it were afraid, and that wouldn't be very vegan, wouldn't be vegan to scare a squid. Unless you were a squid psychologist or psychiatrist, and you were trying to do squid aversion therapy.

Well, James, if you said that you thought this was a one-off, you would be wrong, although, to be fair, I did set you up to make that mistake. So, as you might have guessed, six to 19 more rains fell, maybe even more over the next few years. Most notably... So many squids. On May the 1st, oh, it probably wasn't squids, but, you know, we don't know. It is unexplained, so it could have been squids. It would be arrogant of me to pretend to know.

On May the 1st in 1862, there was another black rain 40 miles away at Carleuk. On May the 20th, 1862, there were rains again in slains. and again on October 28th in 1863 in Slanes and several more over the subsequent years most mysteriously of all James the first and third of those rainfalls were accompanied by a load of pumice stones washing up on the beach and what I think is called a raft

you know the way pumice floats yes yeah so you have it in the bath yeah a bit of fun yeah because it's like a hard sponge So it's got air inside it. Yes. So it's either pumice stone or maybe slag from smelting, which apparently is... I don't know if it is actually the same thing, but accounts of this story treats pumice and slag as if they're basically the same thing.

Well, I guess it's rock that's cooled quick enough to just have some air in it still. Also, this will have been cut out and this will be a reference to the bonus bit. As we learned earlier, it's Wilma's maiden name. It is Wilmer's maiden name. Does it mean the same in America? I think that probably, it is the stone because presumably it doesn't have the rude meaning. It's just got the, it's just got the sort of stone meaning.

Good. According to Rust, the pumice stones were not water worn. They were evidently new from a laboratory. I don't know what he means, when he means laboratory. I think he means where they were created. I don't think he means from a lab like we imagine a lab. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The freshness of their color, the sharpness of their angles of fracture,

and the strength and peculiarity of their odour proved this. Stinky, stinky stones washed up on the beach. No. Nobody saw them falling from the sky. I imagine it's just a, I'm imagining a cockney describing them, and that might be where the other name came from. Possibly. Don't want to repeat it.

Yeah, bunch of them upets, these stones. These smelly stones. This smelly pumice. So Reverend Rust, as you can imagine, was quite animated by the, weird event. And he wrote to the Aberdeen Journal and he published his observations in pamph form. Yes. He wrote the puncherly titled The Scottish Black Rain Showers and Pummers Stone Sholes of 1862 and 1863. I appreciate his SEO, but hold something back. Come on. It's ironic that you should say that because it's generally referred to as Scottish showers,

which is extraordinarily difficult to search for using an internet search engine because it just brings up bathroom fitters in Scotland, whatever you do. And you're like black rain shout, black showers Scotland. And they just bring up like black marble showers. Oh. Not to get too excited about the names, but Brimblecombe Davis and Tranta. Three guys, not one guy. What of them is carrying the most of the weight there? It is mostly on Brimblecom's shoulders there. They were three academics from the University of East Anglia. They may still be. but in the 1980s they published an article about the Scottish showers and they described several odd details about the first shower.

Apparently a friend of James Rust was in a habit of shaving with pure rainwater. I'm reading from their article now. The following morning, the lather from a soap curdled into a mottled black and uninviting compound. The water had an unpleasant sulphurous smell and a local doctor noted that it would be terrible on a risotto. I'm just kidding you. I'm kidding you.

He noted that a smell accompanied the shower. Oh. Now, you might say, Alastair, is there any photographic evidence of these showers? Alistair, is any photographic evidence of these showers? No, but for an interesting reason, because there was a photographer on the scene. It is quite difficult to shoot rain, though, isn't it? Well, in those days, yeah, because you have to get it to sit still for about 10 minutes in the 1860s. Sit still with its dead nan.

Yeah. There was a photographer, and I don't know if you took any. pictures of the rains or the aftermath, but he made a big mistake. He made the mistake of developing his pictures using contaminated water. The black water? He used some of the, yeah, some of the black water to develop his pictures and all of his pictures faded in the developing process. They were all ruined. I'm quoting from Brimblecombe Davis and Tranta again. Yeah. Other evidence that sulphur compounds were involved was the observation of a local amateur photographer that gold was precipitated from his toning bath and his prints were ruined. I guess I don't know, but I think

maybe sepia involved gold, because I would have expected silver. But anyway, it had a weird chemical reaction and yeah, and his prints were all ruined. Did they all predict his friend's death? Yeah, it just had pictures of clouds for really alarming, angry clouds. And I had to mention this, the blog, old weirdscotland.com. Oh, OWS? Yeah, it has two short paragraphs, very short paragraphs about the black rains and concludes thus. The true cause was hotly debated in the papers but never settled. Needless to say, parishioners in slain's lost their shit. We can have to bleep that and that's going to sound very confusing. That is what it says on old weirdscotland.com. But it's true, you know, nobody really knows what caused the reins,

but there are three main theories. Squids. There are four main theories in play. I've got another one. one, which, and I think it might be the actual one. I'm going to hold back and keep that. No, I, okay. Pumice dry, unless you want me to... I'd like to hear it now before I come up with the other ones. A volcano. Is it, is it Iceland?

I'm blaming Iceland. Very... James. You and your namesake are like two guys in a pod. Two jimmies... Two jimmies in a little pod of jimmies. Two jimies in a little pod of jimmies. Oh, I've just come up with a new podcast idea.

Two jameses. I am deadweight on this podcast. You want to get a James in. here. Isn't your middle name, James? It is actually, yeah, yeah. One and a half James' is, yes. It is, honestly. Yeah, well, that is James' theory, James Rust. The boring theory, and therefore probably the correct one, I reckon, is pollution, probably from Aberdeen. Oh, all those bloomin' Aberdeen shares. Well, Brimblecum Davis and Tranta note that at the same time as the Black

grains were falling, the word more grime started to appear in Yorkshire and Lancashire. More grime? More grime. Sounds like they were less grime. Well, it's M-O-R grime, thank you. Oh, mouth grime. Mouth muck. No, not M-A-W crime.

Oh, as in on the moor? Yeah, Moore Grime. On the moor. Described sooty black stains that Shepherds had started to find on their sheep. Oh, no. So, you know, there was a lot of, obviously, we've got a lot of pollution now, but they had a lot lot of coal-based pollution, and the cities were very dirty places. And it was, you know, obviously some of it was travelling outside of the cities and landing in more rural areas.

So the sheep, in essence, your nostrils after going on the London Underground a few times. Quite, even though I think these days the underground doesn't... I haven't seen a black... You know, you know, you don't see a black bogey. You don't get them anymore. You don't get black bogeys anymore. And that is what reform stands for. Bring back black bogeys. B, B, B, B, B, B.

Bring back. Bring back Black bogey's and white dog poo. Yes, do it. We used to be a real country. Yeah, you and Rust, two Jameses in a James sack. Immediately started thinking if volcano was involved. It's Iceland. It's got to be.

Is it the creation of Iceland? James, you're forgetting... Pretty new. Iceland did exist at this time, but you're forgetting one key detail, which is the rain was blowing from the south, south. East. That's the opposite. The South Southeast.

Wiki-Wiki South Southeast. Exactly, as it was known in those days. As Will Smith sang. The words of Will Smith. The wind is coming from the South-South-East. The wind is coming from the South-South-East. And... So, after the first rain, he borrowed a rain-stained shirt from a local man.

And immediately was struck by the thought that Vesuvius in Italy was to blame. Down that way, yeah. And he said it to the guy, but... But, of course, at that time, Vesuvius had been lying low, very, very quiet as far as he knew. Then two weeks later, two weeks later, news reached the parish that there had been an eruption that corresponded with the first fall. Could have been. And over the time... But I think some Italians might have noticed.

They can't have just gone straight over to their, all that pubmiss and no one said anything. It does seem a little bit unlikely that the pummis could have just flown through the air the whole way. It's light than water, but it's a long way. I'd not have dropped anywhere else all the way along. I'd say it wasn't Italy at the time, but whatever became Italy. James, you are prefiguring an argument made by a big, big, big, big player who has not yet entered the tail. A BBP? A big, big, a big, big, a big, big, a big, big, p.

Whoa. Get ready. A big, big, big, big, be. A big pig. A big pig. One of the biggest peas in the game. What? Uh-oh.

Sticking with Russ just for a second, he demonstrated that several of his blanks. rains corresponded with volcanic eruptions, either from Vesuvius or Etna, also... Yes, Etna. Every time they were accompanied by wind from the south-southeast. Ah, what can make it what? So people often talk about there being seven rains, but the 14 times points out that by November 1886, Rust had recorded 14, which he said were all of them connected by contemporaneousness with Versuvius or Etna.

he was a scientifically minded guy just like you James so he sent the stained shirt he'd collected in a piece of pumice stone to the meteorologist Admiral Robert Fitzroy I would have choked a squid in there but yeah go on

just pop a squid in that's yes for you just shake his hand and slip in a squid while you're at it yeah don't tell you mum you don't need to count the tentacles you can trust each other

that's why they call him a tenor and weirdly Robert Fitzroy Admiral Robert Fitzroy, apparently couldn't see any marks on the shirt. But he said the pumice could have come from a volcano, but equally it could have come from a furnace at an ironworks. So it was an object, is really all we gained from that. It was one of the things we thought it could be. But generally speaking, the scientific establishment didn't pay an awful lot of attention to Rust's theories about it being volcanic.

Yeah, that's got to be frustrating for you, James, considering that those are also your theories. That was my second theory after Squid. Apart from Squid, yeah. And that, James, might be one of the reasons his book caught the attention of a BVP. A little known writer by the name of Charles Hoy Fort. Hoy. That's Charles Fort's middle name. Wait a minute.

I know this Charles Fort fella. Yeah, you've heard of Charles Fort? Yeah. He started the Fourteen times, right? Well, I think it's named after him, yeah. The All Things Fortian take their name from Charles. Fort. I didn't know what he looked like until I did some research for this. He looks like... I don't know what he looks like. Okay. Have you seen arsenic and old lace? No.

Oh, it's really good. It's Carrie Grant's black comedy about a guy whose family are all sort of lunatic murderers. Yeah. And his brother thinks he's Theodore Roosevelt. And that he's exactly what Charles Ford looks like. To put that other way, he looks like Theodore Roosevelt. But more specifically, he looks like a guy who thinks he's Fyodor Roosevelt in the film Arsenic and Old Lace with a big mustache, sort of little spectacles. Very funny, the guy, every time he goes upstairs in that film, he points a sword and shouts charge and then

runs upstairs. Very, very good film. It's a really good film. And Fort is, well, have you ever read? I'd never actually read any Charles Fort. Have you ever read any thing that he wrote? No, not actually him, no. I read the 14 times, of course. For me, it's the only FT. It is the FTT.

we take in this house. Fort included the story of the Black Rains of Slames in what I think is his most famous book, The Book of the Damned, which is a book all about the people and the theories who have been ignored by so-called mainstream science. And I was shocked because he is such a bad writer. He's just the worst writer. It's like a rambling conspiracy theory blog. There's no structure. He just jumps from one subject to the next all the time. It's full of weird asides and like he contradicts himself. He just uses m-dashes to go like, I know, actually, that isn't true, but you get my point. It's like really, it's like listening to a podcast. That's how bad it is. It's podcast bad. This sounds like he should be one of the first guests on the James's

pod. If you can get him, James, if you can get him. The other thing he does that really reminds me of like conspiracy theorist, YouTube, a podcaster types, is he's kind of joking a lot. You can't tell quite how serious he is about his own theories. He's very vague about what he actually thinks, but what he's good at is poking holes in other people's theories or ideas. And he really sympathizes with Rust for being, you know, not exactly ridiculed, but not taken seriously by the scientific establishment. But he doesn't buy the volcanic explanation for exactly the same reason you don't buy it. James. What? Because Iceland's already there? Oh, Italians would have noticed. The old Italians would have noticed line is exactly what he took. I'm going to read you what he had to say about it

as best I can and try and make it make sense. The fate of all explanations is to close one door only to have another fly wide open. I should say that my own notions upon this subject will be considered irrational, but at least my gregariousness is satisfied in associating here with the preposterous. Or this writer and those who think in his rut have to say that they can think of four discharges from one far-distant volcano passing over a great part of Europe, precipitating nowhere else, discharging precisely over one small northern parish, but also of three other discharges from another far-distant volcano showing the same precise preference, if not marksmanship, for one small parish in Scotland. Nor would orthodoxy

be any better off in thinking of exploding meteorites in their debris, preciseness, and recurrence would be just as difficult to explain. So, he's thinking, squids. He's saying it's squids. James, you are not going to guess what he thinks. And he's very vague about it there. He's like, oh, well, if I told you what I thought, you would be, but, you know, maybe I will in a few paragraphs time

tell you what I think. Is it the devil themselves? It's not the devil. It's not the devil. Although he does talk about the devil's hoof prints in this book. He's being a little bit unfair there, because as Michael Cox points out in the 14th times, the falls weren't all in exactly the,

same place. You can't sort of say, oh, they all fell in exactly the same place, give or take a little bit of marksmanship, because that means they didn't fall all in the same place. Like, sometimes they were 40 miles out. So he's exaggerating a little bit. But also, they were all clustered around James Rust because he was the guy who was writing them down. You know, like the fact that the fact that they did fall in Scotland doesn't mean they didn't fall somewhere else. We just know that they did fall here. So he's being a little bit cheeky there. But his theory, It's going to blow your squids out of the water. Well, that's how it started, I think.

Imagine a small island, James, on an oceanic trade route. Yeah. Debris might wash up on that island from time to time from the passing vessels, right? Yes. Well, James, what if that island was the planet Earth and that ocean was space? Huh. Yeah. Maybe.

Space muck. It was space muck all along. It was space quids. Do you remember, James, the day in lockdown when the sky turned yellow? Like a deep orangey yellow. You don't remember that? No.

You don't remember that? No. It's not just happened to me. Maybe. It definitely happened in London. In the middle of the day, it went dark and orange because of apparently sand, desert sand being blown over. Oh, I remember that sand was all on everyone's cars,

and the sunsets were a bit weird. Oh, during the day, it was overcast where I was, and it got dark, really dusky and orange. Very, very weird. Sodium yellow. It was the best of times. It was the end of times. It really was.

I bring that look because desert sand is an explanation for various red rains that have fallen. Because after he talks about black rains, he moves on to red rains, which he believes, of course, are blood. Or very finely minced animal parts.

He's open-minded. Could be squid. Could be squids. Of course, the loser scientists say that it's sand because they tested it apparently and it turned out to be sand. But he says, sorry, did you use?

use chemical analysis to work that out? And the scientists like, yeah, and they're like, well, that means you're wrong because chemical elements don't exist. So yeah, didn't think of that, did you, chemistry boy? Did you use sand to detect this? No. Hmm. He says, if there were real elements, there could be a real science of chemistry. Ouch. His explanation for the red rains It's quite reasonable. Debris from interplanetary disasters. Aerial battles. Food supplies from cargoes of supervessels wrecked in interplanetary traffic.

When was he saying this? The Book of the Damned was published in 1919. So he was way ahead of the UFO. Yeah. Fair enough. Fair play. Or perhaps, to put that another way, influential on perhaps later science fiction writers and conspiracy theorists and UFO-

You oophologists? Yeah. Euphologists. Euphologists. Uphologists. Uphologists. But his thing was, he was an intermediatist. The name makes me think of those guys who are like neither left wing nor right wing.

Oh, right. But I think what he actually means is that he believes that everything exists on a spectrum between real and unreal. Oh. Which I don't really get. But to be fair, I'll put, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, sum up by giving you his conclusion on the black reins

of slains. Our intermediateist principle of pseudologic or our principle of continuity is, of course, that nothing is unique or individual, that all phenomena merge away into all other phenomena, that for instance, suppose there should be vast celestial super-oceanic or interplanetary

vessels that come near this earth and discharge volumes of smoke at times. We're only supposing such a thing as that now, because conventionally we are beginning modestly and tentatively. But if it were so, there would necessarily be some phenomenon upon this earth with which that phenomenon would merge. Extra mundane smoke and smoke from cities merge, or both would manifest in black precipitations in rain. In continuity, it is impossible to distinguish phenomena at their merging points, so we look for them at their extremes. Impossible to distinguish between animal,

impossible to distinguish between animal and vegetable in some infusoria. But hippopotamus and violet? For all practical purposes, they're distinguishable enough. No one but a Barnum or a bailey would send one a bunch of hippopotamai as a token of regard. Ah? Yeah, he's made a point. Take that, James. How did it's your logic deal with that compelling argument?

I got so confused. There's a difference between hippopotamuses and violets. That's true. but there's a difference between space muck and factory muck? There is, but is there kind of? I don't, I genuinely have no idea what he's talking about. Just, just the worst writer. No, I don't know what the point is, yeah.

Yeah. But I don't want to be a hater, James. I don't want to just, I don't want to just be a hater. Good. And I noticed that the 14 Times article ends by quoting Rust's prediction that even though nobody was paying that much attention to the Black Rains at the time, they shall, in the end, obtain worldwide theme.

And now they have, James, on our podcast. Oh. The James one, James. The James pod. The James' pod. The James' is pod. You could get the theme tune done by that band James. Yes.

Yes. Oh, sit down, like and subscribe. Send to a friend. So James, that was the story of the Black Rains of Slains, what fell mainly on a James. Are you ready to score this tale, James? Big time. In that case, my first category is names.

Okay. Or naming, if you prefer. I'm liking the name James, of course. Yeah, yeah, there were a lot of good Jameses. Well, you and James, there was Brimblecum, Davis, and Tranta. Bombercombe, David, a trip, yep. Sorry, there's Slains, the place, the reigns of slains. That's a trackliest castle.

The earls of Errol. The Earl of Errol? Yeah. Okay. All right. And there's Michael Cox, who presumably doesn't go by Mike? No, I think, I think we might meet Michael Cox one day, so we should probably... Okay, we can cut that out if you want. I think we've bicked him up with your impression of his voice, unless that is an accurate impression of his voice. That was my impression of James Rust. Oh, I thought that was Michael... Oh, so it was Michael Cox reporting Jimmy Rust.

That was, yes. Because I, yeah, because I couldn't find the brilliantly named the Scottish black rain showers and pumice stone shoals of 1862 and 1863. So I had to quote it from the 14 Times article. I see. Okay. It's a hefty three. Okay. A hefty three. Ah, well, if that was only three, then I'm not optimistic about the next category, which is supernatural. Well, can it really be supernatural if it's squids?

That's a fair question. Can it be supernatural if it's... Squids. The supernatural, yeah. I mean, it was pretty standard and it was sinister and would have been very scary to the people at the time. And if it happened nowadays, it would still be scary. Well, yeah, when it went in the sky went orange. Everyone was flipping out. Yeah.

Turning over cars. That didn't happen. That I'm exaggerating. I do know, Fortyans explanations are Charles Ford's, Charles Hoyfort's explanation. The four, the 40 and, yes, the 40. explanations are definitely not natural. Space muck? He thinks it's space muck, yeah.

So I think that's also a three. Okay, another three. Because it would be uncanny and weird if it happened. It was certainly uncanny. Yeah. Or I need to recover some points here. My next category is really good theories. Ah, yes.

Because, James, you can't score this lowly without condemning your own theory that it's squids. That's an excellent theory, isn't it? Oh. A very excellent theory, yes. Squids or Iceland. Or Iceland, yeah. Well, if we regard Iceland as a separate theory, then we've got five different theories.

We've got the Vesuvius-Etna theory, the Italy theory. We've got the Iceland theory, basemok from spaceships just pooping out space muck. And squids and general, yeah, general pollution. The one that is clearly correct, pollution. And then, of course, we've got squids. Yeah, that's five.

It's got to be five for really great theory. I knew that would work. You got me. You got me. Final category. Let the squids decide. Let the squids decide. Well, Alistair, I'm going to try and switch to video recording for a sec for this.

Have you got a camera? I'm not because I'm still shirtless. You're still beshirted. I'm still ben-no-shirted. That's funny that beshirted would mean wearing a shirt, but beheaded means not wearing a head. Yes. Sod? Yeah.

Can you see the screen if I were to turn my camera on? I can see. Not wearing a shirt hasn't stopped me being able to see you. That's good. Okay. My vision isn't based on shirt. Okay. Well, I would say for reasons that will become very obvious, let the squids decide it's got to be five.

Listener, James Shakeshaft of this parish, is wearing some kind of, I'm going to guess, Nintendo themed squid head dress, it looks like you could kill a plumber with that. Is that what that is? The little guys that chase Mario in the water levels? I think it's just, I think it's actually technically an octopus. It's just some Japanese head. Just a normal, cool Japanese hat that Velcro's under the chin. My head's a bit bigger than the average. I don't know if necessarily designed for a fully grown giant man. No, I'm too big for. for this octopus balaclava. Because it's basically a balaclava

in the format of a cartoon octopus. Yeah, I think it's a balaclavas are so associated with the IRA, I feel like this is quite a different thing. Yeah, they really would, they would either got their point across a lot quicker or a lot slower. It's impossible to know.

Instead of been wearing these. So, yes, Alistair, log and shot of it, it's five out of five for Let the Squids Decide. Nice. That was rainy. Thank you, James. If the listener wants to hear some of the outtakes from that episode, which may relate to a film that was nominated for the 2000 Stinkers Bad Movie Awards in the categories of worst supporting actor, worst song, worst on-screen hairstyle,

and most unfunny comic relief. Fair enough. Yes, if you want to hear those, go to patreon.com forward slash lawman. and join us. Thank you for everyone who already does that, as in have joined us. And thank you very much to Joe for editing this episode. And thank you very much for listening to this episode. Please give us a review on a place where you review your podcasts. Just as I'm going to allow the listeners a peek behind the curtain, which is a bad choice of Outrageous, James. I'm shirtless in here.

We've just been chatting for 10 minutes, and I didn't know you were unshirted. I know I saved it for on the record. Yikes. Now, James, I don't know. I knew I was going to do the shirtless, and I started to think, I could be wrong. I've never seen you without a shirt, but I imagine that you're so hairy, it's basically the same. I imagine if you take a T-shirt off, it's like putting a jumper on. That's how I imagine it.

Is that true? Yeah, a woolen hair jumper. it was definitely the case. Like a sort of a Neanderphal who looks at a Willie Mammoth and thinks we're not so different. That's how I imagine. I should accessorize with some tusks.