CHAPTER II. 



THE EXPEDITION AT TALNL* 



IT has been the subject of many discussions amongst us since 

 our return as to why it was that the five f of us who made 

 up the first of the two expeditions found ourselves on board 

 RM.S. Ballaarat at Tilbury on 1897, December 8th. It would 

 have saved us a week in time, it would have cost us no more in 

 cash, and, above all, we should have escaped a decidedly severe 

 " bucketing in the Bay," had we taken the course preferred by 

 many of our fellow-passengers, and gone by the overland route 

 to Marseilles. No satisfactory answer has ever been given to 

 the question, but at any rate we gained experience by it, for we 

 encountered one of the most serious storms of the year in the 

 dreaded Bay. But from passing Cape St. Vincent until we 

 reached Bombay, on January 3rd, the weather was never rough 

 enough to interfere with such astronomical observations as 

 circumstances on shipboard permitted us to make. 



Any description of the ordinary incidents of ship life, or of the 

 places at which our vessel touched, would be out of place here, 

 for it would not differ materially from that which might be 

 given by any traveller along the same route. But we may be 

 said to have begun our astronomical work when on December 

 12th we scrutinised the great group of sun-spots, then very 

 near the centre of the disk. Day by day we made independent 

 determinations of our latitude at noon, and were gratified to 

 find that the errors of the ship's officers were inconsiderable. 

 After leaving Marseilles on December 16th. we had the pleasure 

 of recognising Mercury in the evening twilight, and for the 

 next fortnight the search for him immediately after sundown 

 was an unfailing source of interest. After leaving Brindisi, on 

 December 19th, an entirely new object caught our attention. 

 This was the Zodiacal Light, The difference between this broad 

 glowing beam, seen so constantly evening after evening, and its 

 pale uncertain counterfeit which on rare occasions we had seen 

 in England, was most striking, and came quite like a new 

 revelation to those of us who were making their first voyage into 



* By E. Walter Maunder, Secretary. 



f The five were Mr. J. Evershed, Mr. and Mrs. Walter Maunder, Mr. J. P. 

 O. Smith, and Mr. C. Thwaites. Captain P. B. Molesworth, R.E., joined us 

 from Ceylon in the camp at Talni, completing our party. 



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