ECLIPSES. 



Dorieffeld mountains were seen still illuminated by the sun, 

 while we were in utter darkness. Never before have we observed 

 all the lights of heaven and earth so entirely confined to one 

 narrow stripe along the horizon, never that peculiar greenish 

 hue, and never that appearance of outer darkness in the place of 

 observation, and of excessive distance in the verge of the horizon, 

 caused in this case by the hills there being more highly illumi- 

 nated as they receded, by a less and less eclipsed sun." 



Mr. Hind says, that during the obscuration " the entire laud- 

 scape was overspread with an unnatural gloom ; persons around 

 him assumed an unearthly cadaverous aspect ; the distant sea 

 appeared of a lurid red ; the southern heavens had a sombre 

 purple hue, the place of the sun being indicated only by the 

 COEONA; the northern heavens had an intense violet hue, and 

 appeared very near. On the east and west of the northern 

 meridian, bands of light of a yellowish crimson colour were 

 seen, which gradually faded away into the unnatural purple of 

 the sky at greater altitudes, producing an effect that can never 

 be effaced from the memory, though no description could give a 

 just idea of its awful grandeur." 



At several places in Prussia, where the heavens were unclouded 

 during the total obscuration, a great number of the more con- 

 spicuous stars, as well as the planets Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury, 

 were visible. Several flowering plants were observed to close their 

 blossoms, birds which had been previously flying about disap- 

 peared, and domestic fowls went to roost. 



37. Many of the phenomena attending total solar eclipses afford 

 strong corroboratory evidence of the existence of a solar atmo- 

 sphere, extending to a vast height above the luminous coating of 

 the sun. 



The corona, or bright ray or glory, surrounding the dark disc of 

 the moon where it covers the sun, is observed to be concentric with 

 the moon only at the moment when the latter is concentric with 

 the sun. In other positions of the moon's disc, it appears to be 

 concentric with the sun. This would be the effect produced by a 

 solar non-luminous atmosphere faintly reflecting the sun's light. 



38. It appears to be agreed generally among astronomers that 

 the red emanations above described are solar, and not lunar. 

 If they be admitted then to be solar, it is scarcely possible to 

 imagine them to be solid matter, notwithstanding the apparent 

 constancy of their form in the brief interval during which at any 

 one time they are visible, for the entire duration of their visibility 

 has never yet been so much as four minutes. To admit the 

 possibility of their being solar mountains projecting above the 

 luminous atmosphere surrounding the sun, and rising to the height 



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