836 Influence of the Great Lakes on our Autumnal Sunsets. 
On the most favored evenings the sky will be without a cloud ; 
the temperature of the air pleasant ; not a breeze to ruffle a feather, 
and a dim transparent haze tinged of a slight carmine by the sun’s 
light, diffused through the whole atmosphere. At such a time, for 
some minutes both before and after the sun goes below the horizon, — 
the rich hues of gold, and crimson, and scarlet, that seem to float 
upward from the horizon to the zenith, are beyond the power of 
language to describe. As the sun continues to sink, the streams 
of brilliance gradually blend and deepen in one mass of golden 
light, and the splendid reflections remain long after the light of an 
ordinary sunset would have disappeared. We have said that not 
every cloudless sunset exhibits this peculiar brilliance; when the 
air is very clear, the sun goes down in a yellow light it is true, but 
it is comparatively pale and limited ; and when as is sometimes the 
ease in our Indian summers, the atmosphere is filled with the smoky 
vapor rising from a thousand burning prairies in the far west, he 
sinks like an immense red_ ball without a single splendid emanating 
ray. It is our opinion that the peculiar state of the atmosphere ne- 
cessary to produce these gorgeous sunsets in perfection, is in some 
way depending on electrical causes; since it very commonly hap- 
pens, that after the brilliant reflections of, the setting sun have dis- 
appeared, the auroral lights make their appearance in the north, and 
usually the more vivid the reflection, the more beautiful and distinct 
the aurora. ‘This fact the numerous and splendid northern lights 
of last September, succeeding sunsets of unrivalled beauty, must 
have rendered apparent to every observer of these atmospheric 
changes. Connected however with this state of the atmosphere, 
and cooperating with it, is another cause we think not less peculiar 
and efficient, and which we do not remember ever to have seen no- 
ticed in this connection, and that is the influence of the great lakes 
acting as reflecting surfaces. 
Every one is acquainted with the fact that when rays val light im- 
pinge or fall on a reflecting surface, as a common mirror, they slide 
off so to speak, in a corresponding angle of elevation or depression, 
whatever it may be. The great American lakes may in this respect 
be considered as vast mirrors, spread horizontally upon the earth, 
and reflecting the rays of the sun that fall upon them, according to 
the optical laws that govern this phenomenon. The higher the sun 
is above the horizon the less distance the reflected rays would have 
to pass through the atmosphere, and of course the less would be the 
