Eight-Year Cycle in Relation to Physical Cause 123 



only of the influence of electrical changes which take 

 place upon the Sun. Now these changes at the Sun 

 make themselves felt upon the Earth; we may 

 then well suppose, with a high degree of probability, 

 that the Earth, and especially the near planets Venus 

 and Mercury exert an influence on the electrified 

 and attenuated matter of the corona." "We know 

 nothing of the electric distribution on Venus and 

 Mercury, but it seems more than probable that these 

 bodies as well as the meteor swaims nearer the Sun 

 have an influence in determining the mode of out- 

 flow of the electrified coronal matter in the direction 

 in which they happen to be. The influence may be 

 one of attraction, giving rise to coronal extension or 

 rays from the corona, or to repulsion, in which case 

 we might have what appears to us a rift directed 

 towards the body. 



"We have not sufficient data to furnish certain 

 information on this point, but it may be of interest 

 to quote the following sentence from Mr. Trouvelot's 

 Report of the Eclipse of 1878: — 'There is a fact con- 

 nected with this eclipse, which, if not due to a sin- 

 gular coincidence, would seem to point to some 

 attractive action of the planets on the solar atmos- 

 phere (corona). On the day of the eclipse Mercury 

 and Venus were in ahiiost opposite points of their 

 orbits, with the Sun between them and ahnost on a 

 line with them, while the Earth on the same day was 

 in a part of its orbit which formed the apex of an 

 equilateral triangle having for base the line joining 

 Mercury and Venus. Knowing this, it is perhaps 

 singular, and anyhow very remarkable, to see that 



