35J 



Mr. William J. S. Lockyer 



[March 1, 



early, for first contact would occur at 8h. 46m. 37s. a.m., and totality 

 would commence at 9h. 37m. l"7s. a.m., and there were certain 

 preparations still to be made. These stations were four in number, 

 namely (1) on board, (2) eclipse camp, (3) Muikilekila Hill and (4) 

 Talau Hill. 



The moment of first contact was seen between breaks in the 

 clouds. After this the cirrus cloud not only seemed to grow more 

 dense, but to cover a larger area of the sky. To the south (the eclipse 

 was in the north-east) the sky was perfectly clear and blue, not a 

 cloud to be seen there. The crescent sun could still be easily ob- 

 served through the cirrus, but a dense black billowy cumulo-nimbus 

 was working its way from the east. Just before second contact its 

 outliers had already passed in front of the crescent, and the main 

 cloud soon blotted out the whole region of the sun's position. For 

 the first portion of totality I was busy with my instrument, but 

 during an exposure of 78 seconds for one of my plates, when I went 

 outside my tent, I could not even see any sign of the eclipsed sun. It 

 was only towards the end of totality, when I was exposing a plate for 

 63 seconds, that the cloud was sufficiently thin to allow one to catch a 

 glimpse of the greater portion of the corona and make a sketch of it. 

 I knew that under these circumstances little, if anything, would be 

 gleaned by our large-scale instruments, and nothing very useful by 

 those of smaller aperture. 



I may explain here that as it seemed very probable that a heavy 

 downfall of rain would occur, I did not take the cover olT my tent 

 for the eclipse as I usually do on such occasions. As my programme 

 of work necessitated me making some exposures for the chromosphere 

 at second and third contacts, I could not look at the eclipsed sun 

 about those times. After the eclipse was over, however, I soon 

 became acquainted with the facts that totality began and ended 

 before the actual calculated times. The following table shows the 

 observed and calculated times, and it will be seen that second con- 

 tact occurred about 23 seconds before the expected time, and the 

 duration of totality was nearly five seconds shorter than was antici- 

 pated. 



