ON COMETS. 115 



too, the astronomers were not beaten by the farmers. 

 Their telescopes were from day to day pointed right on 

 the spot where it would be sure to appear which was 

 advertised all over the world in the almanacs; and it 

 was caught at the earliest possible moment, and pursued 

 till it faded away into a dim mist. 



(26.) When lost to European astronomers (for, like 

 those of 1858 and 1861, it ran southwards), Mr Maclear 

 and myself received it in the southern hemisphere ; and 

 it was fortunate we did so; for, extraordinary as were the 

 appearances it presented on its approach to the sun, they 

 were if possible surpassed by those it exhibited after- 

 wards ; and the whole series of its phaenomena has given 

 us more insight into the interior economy of a comet and 

 the forces developed in it by the sun's action, than any- 

 thing before or since. 



(27.) When first it was seen, it presented the usual aspect 

 of a round misty spot, and by degrees threw out a tail, 

 which was never very long or brilliant, and which to the 

 naked eye or in a low-magnifying telescope appeared 

 like a narrow, straight streak of light, terminating in a 

 bright head; which in a telescope of small power ap- 

 peared capped with a kind of crescent; but in one of 

 great power exhibited the appearance of jets, as it were, 

 of flame, or rather of luminous smoke, like a gas fan- 

 light. These varied from day to day, as if wavering 

 backwards and forwards, and as if they were thrown out 

 of particular parts of the internal nucleus or kernel, 

 which shifted round, or to and fro, by their recoil, like a 

 squib not held fast. The bright smoke of these jets, how- 



