I 



PHENOMENA MANIFESTED IN TELEGRAPHIC LINES, ETC. 309 



dnctive action analogous to attraction in the instantaneonsuess of its 

 action at a distance. 



A similar hypothesis has been proposed by Professor Nevv'ton, of Yale 

 College. According to this the corona is made up of matter in the act 

 of streaming off from the sun, instead of being a permanent solar at- 

 mosphere, or a mass of revolving meteors. The explosive actions, which 

 are the most probable causes of the spots, may, perhaps, furnish the 

 luminary matter, which, dispersed at intervals by reason of the varying 

 action of the planets as it flows away into space, forms the corona,, 

 with its accompanying radiations and streamers, visible in the total 

 eclipses. The zodiacal light is also made of the streams of particles flow- 

 ing away from the sun under the operation of solar repulsion. 



In the Americau Journal of Science, (March and July, 1855,) Profes- 

 sor Newton explains the irregular perturbations of the magnetic needle 

 by electric currents developed in the upper atmosphere (or photosphere) 

 of the earth by the arrival of the solar matter, which is probably the 

 substance of terrestrial auroras. 



Whatever truth may be in these speculations, they indicate a tendency 

 in the scientitic mind of the day to adopt the conclusion that many of 

 the phenomena which have heretofore been considered entirely of a ter- 

 restrial character really belong to the solar system ; that not only are 

 disturbances of the magnetism of the earth connected with commotions 

 in the sun, but that cyclones and other violent movements of our atmos- 

 phere have a similar relation to the central luminary. — J. H. 



