220 



NATURE 



\Jan. 1 8, 1872 



was little surf, and on the morning of the 4th, instru- 

 ments and all were safely landed and carried up to the 

 fort. 



Our voyage in the Glasgow had been uneventful ; but 1 

 cannot take leave of her without speaking of the kind- 

 ness and assistance we received from Captain Jones and 

 all on board, and we were truly sorry that the duties of 

 the station did not allow them to remain and give us that 

 aid, which, with the interest that all took in the work, 

 would have been so invaluable. 



Bekul is an out-of-the-way place, twenty-five miles from 

 Mangalore, from which place all our supplies had to be 

 carried on the backs of coolies ; this did not, however, 

 prevent several gentlemen, interested in our proceedings, 

 coming out to join us. 



Our party consisted of four who came out from 

 England, viz., Mr. Lockyer, Dr. Thomson, Mr. Davis, 

 and Commander Maclear, besides Messrs. Mclvor and 

 Pringle, to whose foresight and care we are very much 

 indebted for our success. It was further strengthened by 

 Mr. Webster, collector at Mangalore, who took some 

 valuable photographs during the eclipse, by General 

 Selby from Cannanore, and several others, making our 

 numbers up altogether to eighteen. Our bungalow was 

 about a mile from the fort, of which the highest bastion 

 in the inner rampart had been selected to mount the 

 equatorials ; it was in a most commanding position about 

 eighty feet above the sea, and overlooking a vast e.xtent 

 of country. Just below us, in a well-sheltered spot, Mr. 

 Davis fixed his camera and dark chamber. 



The day of our landing the heat of the sun was ter- 

 rible, and we had to wait till the cool of the afternoon 

 before wc could proceed to work. That night, however, 

 a great advance was made, the bases of the equatorials 

 were up, and all ready for the tubes, and a " chuppa," or 

 awning of palm leaves erected to protect them from the 

 night dews and midday sun. The next seven days were 

 employed in getting our instruments perfectly adjusted 

 and in practising with them. The weather left nothing to 

 be desired, except that the sun would take his revenge 

 out beforehand and strike down with such force as to 

 render it impossible to work in the middle of the day. 

 Only one morning was cloudy, and then not to an extent 

 that would have interfered with observations. At night 

 the stars shone with great brilliancy, and we had great 

 delight in observing the clusters and nebula;, pity we 

 could not have remained longer to make spectroscopic 

 observations of the latter in such a clear atmosphere. 



The morning of the 12th dawned bright and clear^ 

 only a few small clouds to be seen near the western 

 horizon, a light breeze from the N.E. All were early at 

 their stations watching anxiously the appearance of the 

 sun, which rose over the distant hills about half-an-hour 

 before the commencement of the eclipse. But now I 

 shall speak only of my own observations ; Mr. Lockyer 

 has already given the account of those made by himself 



The instrument I used was a double equatorial of two 

 6-inch refractors mounted on the same base, one at 

 either end of the declination axis. To one was attached 

 a 6-prism spectroscope from Kew, lent by Mr. Spottis- 

 woode, of great dispersive power. To the other was 

 fixed a spindle bar, carrying an erecting eye-piece, 

 and a 7-prism direct vision spectroscope, cither of 



which could be swung at pleasure into the focus of 

 the object glass ; the two tubes had been carefully 

 made parallel, so that the same object was viewed in both 

 telescopes. The 6prism was worked nearly the whole of 

 the time by myself, and the direct vision by Mr. Pringle, 

 who had practised with it constantly during the last few 

 days. I add the observations made by him. At the com- 

 mencement of the eclipse the slit of the 6-pri5m was 

 placed tangential to the point of contact, that of the direct 

 vision radial, width such that the absorption lines were 

 very distinct, but not too fine. No change was observed 

 from the ordinary solar spectrum. Keeping the slit for 

 the next quarter of an hour tangential to the northern 

 cusp, C was very bright the whole length ; F bright, but 

 thin. The slit was then placed radial to the cusp, and 

 four bright lines near C (besides C itself) became visible, 

 one on the direct side within 10 units Kirchhoff, and three 

 on the red side within 20 units, the length of all five vary- 

 ing, but not together the average being about J the height 

 the visible spectrum. 



At 6h. 51m. jM.t., twenty-five minutes after contact, on a 

 large prominence, C lengthened to half height of spec- 

 trum ; nine minutes afterwards cusp was at another 

 prominence, the positions of these must have been about 

 N. 13°, and nearly north. 



At 7h. 8m. M.T. I watched with the direct vision radial 

 and, besides the Hyd. and " near D " lines, observed 

 another bright line a little more refrangible than the air 

 band between b and F. At 1S30 Kirchhoff it was ver)' faint, 

 and soon disappeared ; soon after this I saw F line double 

 about the same height as usual, J spectrum. 



At 7h. 23m. M.T., having returned to the 6-prism radial 

 to the cusp, I observed the Hyd. D, E and b very plain ; 

 several lines then began to come into view, as near as I 

 could judge all the iron lines from halfway between D and E 

 to beyond b. These kept on brightening and more lines 

 coming in. I called Mr. Lockyer to look at the phenomenon, 

 and we watched it together for two or three minutes until 

 it became time to take position to observe totality. During 

 these two or three minutes the cusp must have passed from 

 about N. 38° E. to N. 70' E. or further, and the lines were 

 not lost sight of till I moved the telescope and placed the 

 slit tangential to the point where the light would dis- 

 appear, keeping it there with R.A. movement. On looking 

 through the spectroscope the field was full of bright lines, 

 the light just enough to let me distinguish the positions 

 from the well-known solar lines. 



As totality came on the light decreased, and the lines 

 increased exceedingly, rapidly in number and brightness, 

 until it seemed as if every line in the solar spectrum was 

 reversed ; then they vanished, not instantly, but so quickly 

 that I could not make out the order of their going, except 

 that the Hyd. D, b, and some others between D and b, re- 

 mained last. Then they vanished, and all was darkness. 

 I then undamped, and swept out right and left, but saw 

 nothing ; then went to the direct vision, but saw nothing ; 

 placed the telescope on the moon's limb by the eye-piece, 

 then put in the spectroscope, but the light was not suffi- 

 cient to show any spectrum ; pointed the telescope care- 

 fully, first on the dark moon, and then on a bright part of 

 the corona, but no specti'um. 1 then looked at the 

 corona with the naked eye, saw a bright glory around the 

 moon, stellar form, six-pointed, something like the nimbus 



