60 LIGHT SCIENCE FOR LEISURE HOURS. 



* these " things " had been " settled." ' Little more 

 could be hoped, as respects these objects, from eclipse 

 observations, however skilfully conducted. But so far 

 the corona had baffled their efforts. Enough had 

 been done to afford tolerably sure evidence as to the 

 general nature and position of the solar corona, yet of 

 its actual structure and constitution very little had 

 been certainly learned. Our knowledge respecting it 

 may be compared to that which astronomers possessed 

 respecting the coloured prominences in 1842. We 

 could be assured that it really is a solar appendage of 

 some sort although, precisely as Faye and others had 

 expressed doubts respecting the real existence of the 

 coloured prominences in 1842, so in 1870 there were 

 those (and, strangely enough, Faye was their leader) 

 who questioned the real existence of the corona, or 

 regarded it as a phenomenon of our own atmosphere. 

 Yet in the opinion of all who were competent to judge, 

 this point was justly regarded as determined. But 

 what the actual nature of the corona might be 

 whether its light was reflected solar light, or came 

 from incandescent solid matter, or, lastly, was due to 

 glowing vapour remained unknown. 



Yet the doubts thus entertained respecting the 

 constitution of the corona were due rather to the 

 seemingly contradictory nature of the evidence which 

 the spectroscope had thus far supplied than to the 

 absolute want of evidence. Briefly to sum up the 

 results which had been obtained before the eclipse of 

 last December: In 1868, Tennant had found that the 



