Feb. 20, 1873] 
! 
picked up on her way from Genoa certain members of the 
expedition, with their instruments, and on the 27th they 
ot under weigh again and proceeded to the east coast of 
fhe island, where they admired the scenery, and where 
their ctherwise considerate and polite captain, 11 Cavaliere 
Foscolo, strangely neglected the opportunity of running 
them ashore.* 
Arriving thus at their citadel, nearly a month in ad- 
vance, and finding that ample preparations had already 
been made, they were now in a position to devote them- 
selves quietly to their own particular pursuits, and to 
carry on their experiments with reference to the important 
occasion. However, they were no soorer comfortably 
settled than their troubles began, somewhat after the 
fashion of Job’s—“a great wind from the wilderness 
smote the four corners” of the fortress, and threatened to 
leave poor Cacciatore alone to tell the tale ; and he seems 
to have had to put up with not a little “chaff” from his 
comforters as to his selection of a site; but he consoles 
himself with the thought that it would have been all the 
same if he had settled anywhere else. 
Then follows a little paragraph about the English, 
which I may as wall translate :—“ Meantime the most 
enlightened Prof. Adams, together with several of the 
numerous English Commission—others having remained 
in Catania—escaped from the misfortune of the Psyche, 
a magnificent steamer of the British Navy, stranded 
-amongst the coasts of Acireale, arrived in Augusta for 
the observatior. of the phenomenon. Colonel Porter, of 
the Engineers, accompanied by soldiers of the same 
arm, having preceded them, visited our temporary esta- 
blishment, passed graceful encomiums on the organisation, 
and planted tents and barracks (huts) at the foot of our 
fortress, and at the extremity of the open space which 
divided it from the town. With these distinguished 
gentlemen we maintained such friendly and cordial rela- 
tions as are becoming between the citizens of cultivated 
and free nations.” 
The incidents of the three or four days preceding the 
eclipse, and the anxieties caused by the weather, are 
told with a graphic vividness that will cause those of us 
who were there to live over again through that period of 
painful suspense, a suspense only less felt by the English 
because of the demands made on their energies by the 
hurry and hard work of preparation. For we had to do 
in a five days’ encampment in a foreign country what 
they very reasonably employed more than a month to do 
in theirown. After describing the fitful changes of the 
wind, clouds, and barometer, which kept them oscil- 
lating between hope and dread up to the very beginning 
of the eclipse, he says : “And just then the sun appeared 
radiant and luminous, so as to provoke a cry of joy from as 
manyas stood intent to observe him. Soit went on until the 
moment of totality ; but then some clouds began to tra- 
verse the obscured disc, and so rapid was their movement 
and their succession one after another, that they in- 
fluenced the degree of visibility to each one of the 
observers in a different sense, and in such a fashion that 
there were some of them more fortunate and others less 
so.” This admirably careful description corresponds 
perfectly with our own experience, and should be duly 
taken into account when the value of the observations 
comes to be considered. Cacciatore’s own estimate of 
the work done, an estimate formed on the spot imme- 
diately after the eclipse, when he came to review his 
company, is expressed in reserved and general terms as 
follows :—“I was able to satisfy myself that alhough the 
sky was not largely propitious, it nevertheless conceded 
to us a certain interval, the fruits of which had been 
reaped to the utmost; and that if in general the ob- 
* When it came to the knowledge of this gentleman (through the ever 
attentive Secchi) that our military escort, in consequence of ‘‘ superior 
orders,” had taken away our tents, and left us without shelter upon the open 
glacis at Augusta, he sent us a polite message, placing his ship at our service 
in the handsomest manner, 
NATURE 
399 
servations of the eclipse of 1870 turned out unfortunate, 
the Augusta division would be able to supply facts which 
would not be without importance in the present state 
of science.” 
He then proceeds to summarise the results as follows :— 
“Padre Secchi had assumed the photographic depart- 
ment, and the spectroscopic determination of the protu- 
berances previous to the eclipse, with the view of being 
able to compare them with those which should be seen 
during the totality. The position and the shape of these 
were obtained on the morning of the same day, favoured 
by a fine serene sky. Ten photographs were made during 
the phases, and at the moment of totality photographs of 
the protuberances were obtained, in spite of the obstacle 
of acloud. At the same time their forms were directly 
noted, and immediately afterwards were confronted with 
the spectroscopic figures. The spectrum of the most 
acute cusps of the sun was studied, and photographs of 
the later phases were taken until the end of the eclipse. 
“Prof. Denza made spectroscopic observations of the 
corona, which discovered two bright lines, one near the 
E, the other probably of nitrogen (de//’ azofo). Together 
with Signor De Lisa they obscrved and drew the protu- 
berances. 
“ Prof. Donati in the time of totality was able to see 
the bright lines of one protuberance already studied 
before the eclipse. He saw the lines of hydrogen and 
one line in the yellow more refrangible than the sodium, 
but did not see any of the iron lines. 
“Prof. Blaserna examined whether the corona con- 
tained polarised light. Employing a Savart polariscope 
applied to a refracting telescope of moderate magnifying 
power, he was able to examine three points situated at 
45° from each other. The polarisation was most pro- 
nounced, and very nearly of the same intensity as the 
atmospheric polarisation seen recently on clear days at 
about 50° fromthesun. At the distance of a degree and 
a half from the moon not a trace of polarisation was seen, 
the influence of the air, therefore, in the observed pheno- 
menon remains eliminated. The plane of polarisation 
was found in all the points radial or tangential to the 
sun’s limb, It remains then established that the corona is 
polarised, and hence contains reflected light sent out 
from the photosphere. 
“ The purely astronomical part assigned to me (the di- 
rector) was, as far as the variable condition of the heavens 
admitted, fulfilled to the best of my ability. I was 
able, in fact, to note with some precision the instants of 
first contact, and the beginning of totality and the end of 
it (although the last through the clouds), besides some 
other observations which I shall refer to afterwards.” 
’ This summary concludes with a mention of the mag- 
netic and meteorological observations, and the Professor 
goes on to remark concerning the station at Terranova, 
that the circumstances there were not dissimilar to those 
at Augusta—the same strong wind and clouds interfered 
as at the latter place. 
Thus ends the general account of the operations de- 
scribed by the leader of the expedition—a most interest- 
ing introduction, and well worthy of the seven independent 
papers from Augusta which follow it, to which are added 
about the same number from Terranova, and some dozen 
more abridged accounts by outsiders, which form an 
appendix. 
The leading place is accorded to that most accom- 
plished of ecclesiastics, Father Secchi, who, in his ringing 
and trenchant style, gives a vivid picture of the whole 
experience, from the ordering of the instruments to the 
ultimate effect of the phenomenon. Next follows Donati, 
“in a speech curt tuscan, sober, expurgate, spare of an 
‘issimo,’” as Robert Browning says, in which the blunt 
but attractive manners of that genial soul are nearly as 
appreciable by the reader as if he were present in the 
flesh. After him Cacciatore details his own observations 
