Flying creatures. Russia

On one of the September days of 1864, the sexton of the cathedral, in Staraya Ladoga, was returning home tipsy. A fine autumn rain was falling. From time to time, the silence was broken by the whistling of the wings of ducks flying from Volkhov. The ducks scared Theodore. He crossed himself and remembered that nearby, in the dark, there was a high cliff to the river. Wouldn't fall...

And suddenly — the power of the cross is with us!— the "unclean" who appeared from nowhere ran right into him. He glowed and flapped his wings like a bird... In the morning, when he came to himself after a night meeting, the sexton told that the evil spirits tried to throw him from the high bank into the water. They believed him and did not believe him, knowing that it is a sin for a clergyman to "pawn too much."

But a few days have passed, and already other, quite sober people have testified: "evil spirits" have appeared in the district. She flies over the village on dark nights and glows all over. Rumors began to spread, one more ridiculous than the other. The old men spoke with apprehension about a possible war...

The unprecedented "firebird" inspired fear in the superstitious, until the first cold weather came and the ducks nesting on Volkhov flew south.

The reason for the unusual phenomenon was, as in all such cases, quite natural, although rare - microorganisms with bioluminescence living in animal feathers.