404 
misfortune, not our fault, yet we are 
highly culpable, if, being sensible of our 
defects, we do not take the best means 
mm our power to correct them. Under 
such circumstances, do these Societies 
hold out to us their friendly aid; and 
the modest: beginner who. strives after 
improvement, may be confident of re- 
ceiving every attention in his earliest 
and most imperfeet attempts to address 
them, and may learn much as a silent 
hearer. 
- These Societies still present another 
advantage over every species of Scho- 
lJastic Education. In them we stand 
alone, equally responsible for our words 
and actions; neither under the birch 
and guidance of the pedagogue, nor the 
more indulgent guardianship of our re- 
lations and friends. Here we first learn 
to be men.» To ignorance of the vital 
subjects, which form the life and soul of 
such Societies, may we attribute the lax 
morals and still laxer politics of the 
present day, and also that flickering 
brightness in one subject that we fre- 
quently. see individuals possess, while 
they are in profound ignorance of every 
thing else, and which serves, like a 
taper in the gloom, only to make their 
darkness more conspicuous; and even 
the brightness of Genius, unbalanced by 
such principles and knowledge, is little 
better than -the ignis fatuus, whose 
-brilliancy leads its admirers astray. 
; G.* 
eee ae eae 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
Remarkable Phenomena of Lunar and 
Sorar Rarngows. 
T appears by an article in the Edin- 
. burgh Star, and which has been 
copied into some of the London prints, 
that a remarkably fine specimen of that 
rare phenomenon, the lunar rainbow, 
was seen at Middleton, twelve miles 
west of Edinburgh, on Friday the .1st 
of October, about ten o’clock in the 
evening. 
The day and the hour (it is observed) 
determine of course the position of the 
'* We have received another communi- 
cation on this same subject, or nearly so, 
from another correspondent, which it was 
our intention to have inserted till this came 
into our hand. As the quest of. variety 
forbids the insertion of both, we have, con- 
trary to our usual practice, adopted the 
longest: among other reasons, because the 
subject is treated upon more general prin- 
ciples, and affords a better field for discus- 
sion. We should suppose that our corres- 
pondent “ G.” cannot expect that all his 
positiv us should escape controversy.— Eb. 
Remarkable Phenomena of Lunar and Solar Rainbows. 
(Dec. 1, 
moon, as well as that of the rainbow. The 
beautiful meteor, when first observed, was 
fully formed, and the segment of a circle, 
which it described on a rather thick cloudy 
sky, every where distinctly and even 
strongly marked. It began to fade in a 
minute or two after being first seen, and 
had totally vanished in about the space of 
three minutes. The writer has not wit- 
nessed any solar rainbow the formation of 
which was so uniform and regular: but it 
had not the noble expansion of arch which 
distinguishes that meteor; and being of a 
dull sort of white, displayed no where its 
variety and brilliancy of colours. It may 
be observed, ‘however, that owing to the 
surrounding darkness, the lunar rainbow, 
though by no means so striking an object, 
as that produced by the sun, is a far more 
singular, and much more imposing spec- 
tacle. 
The writer then proceeds to observe, 
that “the unfrequency* of this meteoric 
phenomenon has occasioned it to at- 
tract the notice of philosophers :” some 
observations on which have been handed 
down from remote, as well as from 
more recent times. 
Aristotle. is said to have seen two lunar 
rainbows in his time. Several other au- 
thors, such as Gemma, Frisius, Sennert, 
Snellius, and Dr. Plot, are said to have 
witnessed the same phenomenon. It is 
suspected, indeed, that some of these wri- 
ters have been mistaken, and have handed 
down to us, in place of lunar rainbows, 
halos merely, or crowns round the moon, 
spectacles by no means rare. But since 
the beginning of the last century, observa- 
tions much more certain have been made, 
which prove that. the moon sometimes en- 
joys the privileges of the sun. According 
to the Phil. Trans. No. 331, there was 
seen, in 1711, a lunar rainbow, well colour- 
ed and yell defined, in the county of Der- 
by. M. Weidler saw one in 1719, weak 
indeed, and in which the colours could 
hardly be discerned. _M. Muschenbrook 
saw one also in 1729, but no other colour 
except white was discernible. A yellow 
lunar rainbow was seen at Isselstein in 
1736. It is mentioned, in fine, in the 
journal of Trevoux, of the month of Au- 
gust, 1738, that one had recently been seen 
at Dijon, very well coloured, only not pos- 
sessed of the same variety of tint as those 
formed by the sun. 
The publication of the aboye particu- 
lars has occasioned another recent oc- 
currence of this rare phenomenon to 
be also recorded. It occurred, as it 
seems, six days only after that which 
was observed in the neighbourhood of 
- Edinburgh, when the observer was en- 
tering the town of Arras in the diligence 
from 
* T leave the Scotticism as I found it. 
