SHORTER ARTICLES AND DISCUSSION 



187 



SHORTER ARTICLES AND DISCUSSION, 



AN UNUSUAL AURORA. 



In the October number of the Pop- 

 TJLAE Science Monthly, Mr. A. F. A. 

 King has called attention to the re- 

 markable display of aurora borealis 

 on August 21 and has figured it as 

 seen at York Harbor, Maine. I had 

 the privilege of witnessing this aurora 

 from Intervale, New Hampshire, and 

 it corresponded very closely to the de- 

 scription given by Mr. King with a 

 single exception, so remarkable that it 

 seems to me worthy of note. At York 

 Harbor the western half of the arch 

 was made up of the comet-like pen- 

 nants while the eastern half of the 

 arch was continuous. This is clear, 

 both from Mr. King's description and 

 from the accompanying cut. As seen 

 from Intervale this was reversed, the 

 western half of the arch being continu- 

 ous and the eastern broken. When I 

 first saw the display, perhaps a little 

 after half-past nine, the top of the 

 arch was about ten degrees south of 

 the zenith, and it slowly descended till 

 about thirty degrees south. This was 

 about half -past ten, and at this time 

 the arch had so faded as to be hardly 

 distinguishable. 



Jas. Lewis Howe. 



Washington and Lee Univer- 

 sity, Lexington, Va., 

 October 7, 1903. 



To the Editok: I was much inter- 

 ested in the account of the ' Auroral 

 Arch,' given by Dr. A. F. A. King in 

 the October number of Popular Sci- 

 ence Monthly, owing to the facts 

 that I observed the phenomenon and 

 wondered what it was, and that Dr. 

 King's observations differed somewhat 

 from mine. 



It was about 8 p.m. that I first saw 

 the aurora. To me and others who 

 observed it, it seemed in no way un- 

 usual save that we had not seen the 

 ■ northern lights ' for several years, and 

 we thought it was rather a poor dis- 

 play. No more notice was taken of it 

 at this time. It was about nine o'clock 

 that we were called out to see ' a pe- 

 culiar appearance in the sky.' It was 

 a band of nebulous light extending 

 from the eastern to the western ho- 

 rizon, and it seemed to be about three 

 feet wide (to me wider than the ap- 

 parent diameter of the full moon). It 

 was of nearly uniform width and in- 

 ; tensity throughout its extent. 



At nine o'clock I took the direction 

 of the band with a pocket compass and 

 I the time by my watch. At this time 

 the band had begvui to break up at 

 the zenith and eastern end into the 

 ' comet-like,' slowly wavering bodies as 

 described by Dr. King. The band con- 

 tinued to break from the east to a little 

 west of the zenith until the whole 

 eastern arc was composed of these 

 bodies, which was at about 10 P.M., 

 when I returned to the house. Then 

 the western arc was intact save that 

 it seemed to have faded somewhat. 



The phenomenon as described here 

 was seen by five others at the time and 

 place that I saw it. I was ignorant of 

 the nature of the display, but thought 

 it could not be the aurora borealis, so 

 watched the papers for the next few 

 days to ascertain if others who might 

 explain the phenomenon had observed 

 it, but found nothing satisfactory until 

 I received the Octooer Popular Sci- 

 i ENCE Monthly. 



W. C. Kendall. 



