March 1, 1898.] 



KNOWLEDGE 



49 



Founded in i88i by RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 



LONDON : MARCH 1, 1898. 



CONTENTS. 



By 



The Total Solar Eclipse, January 22, 1898. 

 K. Waitbe Maunder, f.r.a.s. {Illustrated) 



British Bees.— I. Bv Feed. Enock, f.i.s., s.e.s., etc. 



(Ilhistrated) ... ' 



The Vinegar Eel, By C. Ainswobth Mitchhli, b.a.., f.i.c. 

 Botanical Studies.— II. Coleochsete. By A. Vaitohan 



Je.vninOS, f.l.s., f.G.S, (Illustrated) 

 Cloud Belts. By Wii, Shacklbtox, f.r.a.s. (Plate) 

 A New Theory of the Milky Way. By C. Easton 

 Letters :— David Flanbrt ; W. H. S. Moxck ; W. Sid- 



QKEATKS ; L. HeUSLKT ; S. H. WeIOHT 



The Masses and Distances of Binary Stars. 



J. E. GOEE, F.B.A.S ... 



Science Notes 



Notices of Books 



Short Xoiices 



Books Received 



Bv 



Conducted bv Haebt F. 



British Ornithological Notes. 



WiTHBEBT, F.Z.S., M B.O.r 



Obituary 



The Karkinokosm, or World of Crustacea.— II. By 



the Eev. Thomas K. R. Stebbixo, M.A., f.e.s., f.l.s. 

 (Illustrated) 



Notes on Comets and Meteors. By W. F. DBNyiNO, 



F.B.A.S. ... 



The Face of the Sky for March. By Herbert Sadleb, 



F.R.A.S. . ... ... 



Chess Column. Bv C. D. Locock, b.a 



THE TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE, JANUARY 22, 1898. 



By E. Walter Maunder, f.r.a.s. 



THERE could hardly be a greater difference than 

 between the eclipse of 1896 and 1898. The 

 shadow track in the former case ran through a 

 vast extent of country which offered, however, but 

 few suitable sites. These were clustered together 

 at two or three main points, and in almost every case the 

 intending observers were disappointed of the spectacle 

 which they had come to see. In 1898 the eclipse track 

 lay chiefly in one single country which offered a large 

 number of easily accessible sites, nearly all of which were 

 occupied, and all were favoured with the most perfect 

 weather. Up to the present time it certainly is the record 

 eclipse, either as regards the number of observers, the 

 character of their equipment, or the unchequered favour 

 which they experienced from the weather. 



" A victory all along the line," is what we have to 

 record. The full significance of that victory and what 

 results may accrue from it, it will take us many months to 

 learn. 



As a sensation the eclipse did not fulfil the popular 

 descriptions. Whether, as has been asserted, the corona 

 was unusually large and bright, or from the special 

 atmospheric conditions prevailing in India at the time, the 

 darkness was much less than is usual in any ecUpse of two 

 minutes' duration, and the general effects in colour, light, 

 and the appearance of the landscape were very much 

 those which were brought about more slowly some four 

 and a half hours later some thirty-five or forty minutes 

 after the sun had set. At any rate, the light at mid- 

 totality was certainly greater, considerably greater, thin 

 we ordinarily get at night at the full of the moon. 



The fall of temperature was, however, considerable, 

 amounting to some twelve degi-ees ; and it was noticed by 

 some of those who had taken part in the Norway expedition 

 of 1896 that, whereas on that occasion the darkness of the 

 eclipse was felt to be a sensible relief from the unceasing 

 sunlight, so now the coolness of the eclipse was a relief 

 from the too powerful heat of the sun. 



Consistently with the small amount of darkness of the 

 eclipse the approach of the shadow at the beginning of 

 totality was less marked than usual, and in some places, 

 though watched for, escaped notice. The only record 

 that has yet reached me of its approach having been 

 distinctly observed is from Dr. Robertson, of Nagpur. 

 The shadow-bands were also looked for at some stations 

 without success, though they were caught at both .Jeur 

 and Nagpur. At the latter place Miss Henderson, m.d., 

 describes them as having been faint dusky ripples some 

 two inches in breadth, and separated from each other by 

 about the same mterval, and in appearance and speed of 

 motion resembling the ripples seen on the ceiling of a 

 cabin in an ocean steamer as they are deflected through 

 the porthole from the water outside. 



Of the stars visible during the eclipse one caught every 

 attention, and was, indeed, seen after totality had passed. 

 This was the planet Venus, some six degrees south-west of 

 the sun at the time. Mars, though very small and further 

 from the sun, was also glimpsed, and some two or three 

 other stars were noted. 



The shape of the corona recalled at once that of 1896, 

 and with it the two earlier years 1868 and 188C, which it 

 had resembled. To the south-west a long ray nearly in 

 the solar equator was easily traceable for two, if not three, 

 solar diameters from the dark limb of the moon. On the 

 east side a pair of broader and less-extended streamers 

 formed a single connected structure in which the charac- 

 teristic coronal curves were repeatedly seen. 



Bearing in mind that these four years all fell at the time 

 of small but not of minimum sunspot activity, it appears 

 clear that we have here brought out a third coronal type as 

 distinct and definite — perhaps even more so than those 

 which have been already recognized as appropriate to the 

 times of actual maximum and minimum ; and it may be 

 hoped that we have now material enough to enable us to 

 trace the course of change which the corona undergoes in 

 its passage from one extreme form to the other. 



It may be opportune here to correct a widespread mis- 

 apprehension, that minimum coronaj are small and faint 

 except for the two great equatorial rays. The reverse 

 would seem to be the case, except in the immediate 

 neighbourhood of the sun's pole. The corona, for instance, 

 of 1878, so far from being small and faint, was unusually 

 large and bright ; and the present one, though we have not 

 yet reached the actual minimum, possessed the same 

 characteristics. 



The feathery structure round the solar poles, which was 

 so plainly seen in the eclipse of 1878, and which has been 

 recognized more or less clearly at so many eclipses since — 



