560 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



After this my third total eclipse, I can confidently say that obser- 

 vations at such a time consist of much hard work and many nerve- 

 racking experiences. One is never on hand sufficiently long beforehand 

 to take things quietly and easily, you must work under conditions you 

 are totally unused to, and over your head hangs the knowledge that 

 everything must be completed by a certain day and a certain hour, for 

 the eclipse can not be postponed, and there is no second trial in case of 

 failure. In addition to working hard all day as carpenter and instru- 

 ment maker, the astronomer must stay up half the night adjusting his 

 instruments on stars, so that during the last few days before the eclipse 

 very few hours of sleep each night are obtained. However, in spite of 

 the many difficulties that were continually cropping up, the mounting 

 and adjusting the instruments were practically completed by August 25, 

 when our observing party was swelled in numbers by the officers and 

 men from the Minneapolis. From then till eclipse day the time was 

 spent in putting the finishing touches on the work of adjustment, and 

 in having frequent drills in order to insure that everything would go 

 without a hitch. 



Eclipse was to occur shortly after noon on August 30, and for many 

 days beforehand we had been carefully scrutinizing the weather in 

 order to see what conditions we might possibly have to expect. As a 

 rule the sky was clear at eclipse time. It would have been dreadfully 

 disappointing to have had a cloudy day, or even to have a stray cloud 

 cover the sun during the important few minutes of the total eclipse. 

 Such a thing happened at the last eclipse in 1901 after traveling half 

 way round the world. Where some of the observers were, the sky was 

 so overcast that it was impossible even to see where the sun was. At 

 the 1905 eclipse darkness lasted for the space of three minutes and 

 forty-five seconds, and it was only during these few minutes, after 

 weeks and months of preparation, that the real work was to be done. 

 August 29 had been cloudy all day so that on eclipse day we had to 

 go to camp early to test our final adjustments, go through drills once 

 more and to be sure that all the apparatus worked smoothly. The 

 skies were clear and our hopes for success were high. Outside the 

 roped-off enclosure, the whole town of Daroca was assembled, for it was 

 naturally thought that nowhere could the eclipse be seen so well as 

 where the astronomers were located. 



At 11.52 a.m. a little shadow was seen on the western limb of the 

 sun, and the eclipse had begun. The skies were clear with the excep- 

 tion of a cloud here and there, and our most ardent wish was that the 

 clouds would leave the sun clear for the next couple of hours. For the 

 first hour that the moon was creeping over the sun there was nothing 

 of very great moment to notice, but for the next twenty minutes till 

 1.12, when the sun was blotted out, we were each of us filled with 

 expectancy, for matters began to take on a weird and unnatural appear- 



