388 Transactions. — Astronomy. 



record of them. I also saw, before totality, bright rays crossing 

 like St. Andrew's cross." 



Dr. James Hudson remarks, with regard to the corona : " I 

 can only speak certainly of the long projection, which I estimated 

 at the time to extend three-fourths of the moon's diameter from 

 the surface of the disc. This long projection appeared to me to 

 be bifurcated at its extremity." 



V. — The Bands ok Eays of Light, immediately before and 



after Totality. 



Mr. Meeson says, " This was a wonderful and unexpected 

 phenomenon. While sun-gazing, perhaps a minute or two 

 before totality, one of my party called out, ' Look ! look at 

 the waves of light behmd us!' I turned, and was surprised 

 to see a most beautiful effect, how produced, I cannot tell. 

 It was as if streamers of light shot out from the quarter 

 of the heavens where the eclipse was taking place, like the 

 slender spokes of an enormous wheel of light, neither the 

 nave nor the tire of which could be seen. All the time, 

 too, the ' wheel ' seemed to be rotating towards the west. 

 The bands, as they stretched and quivered across the Waimea 

 Plains, far as the eye could see, appeared to be about six or 

 nine inches broad, and about the same space apart. Their 

 direction was undoubtedly from north-east to south-west, and 

 their colour was that of ordinary sunlight, only considerably 

 subdued. During totality they disappeared, but on the sun's 

 reappearance they were again visible, and riveted attention. 

 Surely, thought I, the old fable is right, after all. There is a 

 chariot of the sun ! Phoebus, the son of Latona, guides it, and 

 these bands are the light from his glorious wheels, as he drives 

 majestically through the heavens. Yet, why visible now, and 

 now only ? And how is it that they do not seem to have 

 attracted attention before now, when eclipses have occurred ? 

 You all saw what I am referring to. "What were those quivering, 

 mysterious, illimitable rays? Were they atmospheric, meteoric, 

 spectroscopic, lunar, or coronal in origin ? 



" I could almost fancy that they were in the direction of the 

 strongest coronal light, and might be produced by the coronal 

 rays, which, before now, have been said to actually rotate. 

 (Proctor's ' Sun,' p. 338.) The coincidence in point of time of 

 the appearance of the two things is worth noting, as is also the 

 coincidence of disappearance. But then it must be remem- 

 bered that during totality, when the corona was most vivid, the 

 bands of light were either absent altogether or exceedingly faint ; 

 at least that is my impression, though I cannot be positive about 

 the fact, for at the time of total eclipse, my whole attention was 



