BOOK OF THE DAMNED 199 



it looked like a star passing over the moon "which, on the next 

 moment's consideration I knew to be impossible." "It was a fixed, 

 steady light upon the dark part of the moon." I suppose "fixed" 

 applies to luster. 



In the Report of the Brit. Assoc., 1847-18, there is an observation 

 by Rankin, upon luminous points seen on the shaded part of the 

 moon, during an eclipse. They seemed to this observer like reflec- 

 tions of stars. That's not very reasonable: however, we have, in 

 the Annual Register, 1821-687, a light not referable to a star 

 because it moved with the moon: was seen three nights in succes- 

 sion; reported by Capt. Kater. See Quart. Jour. Roy. Inst., 12-133. 



Phil. Trans., 112-237: 



Report from the Cape Town Observatory: a whitish spot on the 

 dark part of the moon's limb. Three smaller lights were seen. 



The call of positiveness, in its aspects of singleness, or homo- 

 geneity, or oneness, or completeness. In data now coming, I feel 

 it myself. A Leverrier studies more than twenty observations. The 

 inclination is irresistible to think that they all relate to one phe- 

 nomenon. It is an expression of cosmic inclination. Most of the 

 observations are so irreconcilable with any acceptance other than 

 of orbitless, dirigible worlds that he shuts his eyes to more than 

 two- thirds of them; he picks out six that can give him the illusion 

 of completeness, or of all relating to one planet. 



Or let it be that we have data of many dark bodies still do we 

 incline almost irresistibly to think of one of them as the dark-body- 

 in-chief. Dark bodies, floating, or navigating, in inter-planetary 

 space and I conceive of one that's the Prince of Dark Bodies: 



Melanicus. 



Vast dark thing with the wings of a super-bat, or jet-black super- 

 construction; most likely one of the spores of the Evil One. 



The extraordinary year, 1883: 



London Times, Dec. 17, 1883: 



Extract from a letter by Hicks Pashaw: that, in Egypt, Sept. 24, 

 1883, he had seen, through glasses, "an immense black spot upon 

 the lower part of the sun." 



Sun spot, may be. 



One night an astronomer was looking up at the sky, when some- 

 thing obscured a star, for three and a half seconds. A meteor had 

 been seen nearby, but its train had been only momentarily visible. 

 Dr. Wolf was the astronomer (Nature, 86-528). 



The next datum is one of the most sensational we have, except 



