118 THE INDIAN ECLIPSE, 1898. 



of these synclinal curves is therefore not apparent only, as being 

 due to some effect of perspective, nor accidental, but is of the 

 very nature of their structure. And we may reasonably infer 

 from this present evidence that in other eclipses we should 

 have found had photographs of sufficient exposure been taken 

 that each of the synclinal groups then observed would have 

 found their completion in similar long rod-like rays. 



Turning, for example, to the eclipse of 1871, December 12, 

 represented by the beautiful photographs taken by Mr. Davis, 

 at Baikul, and by Mr. Hennessey and Captain Waterhouse at 

 Dodabetta, we see a number of these synclinal groups distributed 

 indifferently round the sun, except just at the poles ; and in 

 one of these groups that at 140 position angle we notice 

 the beautiful double curvature which is perhaps the most truly 

 characteristic of all coronal forms, and which appears again so 



COMPOSITE SKETCH FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE, 



1878, JULY 29. 



unmistakably in the two groups on the east in the 1898 eclipse. 

 Mr. Brothers' photograph, taken at Syracuse the preceding year, 

 shows less distinctly, but to a greater distance from the sun, 

 a large number of synclinal structures distributed with the 

 same irregularity as in 1871. We have but to suppose these 

 terminating in straight rays to understand that to the naked 

 eye the corona of these two years must have had the strikingly 

 stellate appearance typical of the solar maximum which so 

 many of the drawings ascribe to it. 



Turning to the great eclipse of 1878, at the sun-spot 

 minimum, we have an altogether different condition of affairs. 

 Here w r e have three synclinal groups, and three only, and these 

 lie very near the solar equator. The two on the west like the 

 two on the east in 1898 form together a fishtail structure, 

 and the more southerly seems to be projected by the effect of 

 perspective upon its companion. 



