Nov. 29, 1883] 



NATURE 



but of a tint not familiar to me, in tlie western horizon, extei cl- 

 ing from the north-west to a j) >int near the South Pole. The 

 centre of the mass was about due \\e?t, and was there some 25° 

 above the horizon. There was no wind; there were no cirri. 

 The sKv was clear and the air transparent, and I could not asso- 

 ciate t.ie appearance with anything like a "cloud-glow." It 

 seemed t5 me like the Maze of agre.it conflagration feen through 

 a smo;.y medium, and I expected every moment to .^ee the fire- 

 engines ru>h past me. At dark (6 p.m.) there were long pallid 

 streaks of polar auroral light, proceeding from a centre in the 

 north-west. These presented no .^igns of the flickeriu'^ activity 

 usually accompanying auroral manifestations. Soon after 7 p.m. 

 all traces of polar aurora vanished. It may be mentioned that, 

 while instances of auror.t have been common here throughout the 

 autumn, on one occa;ion only have flashing rays and beams 

 bee.i presenf. 



Every sunset since the 9th, when the condition of the weather 

 permitted — somewhat rarely — the remarkable glow under notice 

 has been visible in the west, ometimes marked and prominent, 

 as on the 17th inst., at others somewhat indistinct, according as 

 the state of the atmosphere served. 



Here to-day, after the storms of yesterday, blue sky prevailed, 

 and the afternoon proved favourable for observation. The sky 

 was clear ; the air, washed by frequent rains, was transparent ; 

 wind south-west and tranquil ; barometer low ; thermometer at 

 2 p.m. 48°. At 4 p.m. a great arc like bank of dusky coloured 

 vapour, extending as befure from north-west to south, was dis 

 cernible. On the sun declining behind the mass, it was suddenly 

 shorn of its beams, and looked like the moon when rising. In 

 a few minutes the vaporous bank .assumed the peculiar vivid 

 ruddy hue distinctive of the phenomenon ; the blue colour of the 

 sky charged to green. The green was s eedily replaced by the 

 ruddy tint before described, which presently suffused the whole 

 hemisphere, tinged the entire landscape, and presented an ap- 

 pearance of w hich I have never seen the like. The colour was 

 deeper round the horizon than at the zenith. The colour 

 gradually faded as the vaporous glowing mass sank in the 

 western horizon, and at 5.30 had left no trace. 



Worcester, November 26 J. Ll. Bozward 



P. S. — The atmospheric effect described as cloud-glow w.as 

 visible here to-night. There was a cloud canopy, but at 4.30 the 

 ruddy light was visible under the canopy over the whole hemi- 

 sphere. The ruddy light was manifest in a marked manner at 

 sunrise on the 24th, and was discernible this morning. Probably 

 the phenomenon is attributable to the aqueou, vapour in sus- 

 pension in the atmosphere. J. Ll. Uoz\v,\rd 



Worcester, November 27 



The remarkable cloud-glow after sunset on November g was 

 seen by me at Sudbury on the southern border of Suffolk. I 

 was struck by the softness ard uniformity as well as brightness 

 of the glow, and by its contrast with the pale greenish hue of 

 the clear sky around, from which it was se] arated by a frame 

 of nearer clouds in shade. When I fir.st noticed it the (upper) 

 margin was about 15" above the horizon (estimated from 

 memory). Presently the glow diminished in brightness and in- 

 creased in extent upward to about 40° above the horizon ; and at 

 the hij^hest (nearest) part the delicate structure of the cirrus was 

 visible. 



Was it noticed at any place further north than Sudbury ? 



Wordbridge, November 25 Hubert Airy 



In travelling up from Leeds on Monday afternoon I was able 

 to watch the whole progre-s of the remarkable sunset sky on 

 that afternoon. The lUnwent down quite clear, and the sky 

 ■was all but cloudless. Shortly after sunset a crimson arch 

 appeared stretching from south-east to norlh-east, with a very 

 clear greenish blue sky beneath it in the east. This crimson 

 arch gradually proceeded westwards over the sky, and at about 

 4.20 was stretching from south-west to north-west. At this 

 time it developed a number of well-defined, pointed rays or 

 streamers radiating from the point where the sun was below the 

 horizon. Between the arch and the western horizon was a sky 

 of a bright silver-white colour, which w as so brilliant that it gave 

 us quite a second daylight. The crimson arch continued to sink 

 towards the western horizon, the streamers still retaining the 

 same relative positions. At about 4.40 it formed simply a bright 

 crimson band along ihe western horiz .n, and the streamers still 

 pointing out from it gave the appearance of some large forest on 



fire in the west. Finally, at 4.50, w'hen we were some twelve 

 miles north-svest of Nottingham the crimson arch had entirely 

 vanished below the horizon. At one ti ue, when the arch was 

 at its brightest, with the silver-white sky beneath it, it had 

 exactly the appearance of the aurora, except that the streamers 

 remained fixed in relative position. In the silver-white sky 

 there seemed to be a very thin cloud layer. A. Tarn 



31, Mornington Road, N.W., November 27 



Optical phenomena of a peculiar nature appeared here on 

 the 25th and 26th inst. On the 25th, shorily before sunset, the 

 atmosphere, which was exceedingly clear except in the west, 

 w as suffused with a brilliant tint of lake. Over and to the left 

 of the sun, which appeared to shine with a remarkably white 

 light, there was a heavy cumulus, the edges of which were 

 tinted with a strange, olive-green colour. After sunset the sky 

 in the east became gradually of a more brilliant rose tint, which 

 continued a long time after the sun's rays ceased to be reflected 

 from a long, curled streak of cii ro-filum, at an altitude of 2600 

 feet. The sky nearer the zenith at 5 p.m. appeared to be of a 

 sea-green tint. A little later, the most brilliant rose-coloured 

 glow covered the western and south-western sky, v>hich con- 

 tinued up to about 5. 45 p.m., and might easily have been 

 mistaken for a red aurora. 



On the 26th a similar phenomenon took place upon a grander 

 and more unusual scale. At 3 p.m., when the sky was totally 

 devoid of higher cloud, the sun, which was shining w ith a re- 

 markably white light like the electric light, was surrounded by 

 a very broad halo of a uniform /a/c /;'«;* colour, whose exterior 

 margin was very ill-defined. This halo was of about 22° radiu-i 

 and was totally dev. id of the usual prismatic tints. A little be- 

 fore sunset the sky, which was clear except in ihe distant south- 

 west, where there was a thin bank of cirriform cloud, becsme of 

 a bright salmon colour. At 4.35 there » as a beautiful display of 

 rayons du cyepuscuh in the east-north-cast, there being six larger 

 and some smaller lake-coloured belts. But the most splendid phe- 

 nomenon was yet to come. From 5' 5 105. 15 P'™- ^ brilliant 

 arc of red light having the position of the sun for its centre, 

 and having an altitude of about 25', illuminated the western 

 heavens. This light was bright enough to cast a vivid red 

 glare on all objects seen in the opposite direction. From this 

 arc throughout the whole of its extent arose bright rays of red 

 light, divergent from the sun's position, the perpendicular one 

 in the centre exlending nearest to ihe zenith. The arc 

 gradually sank towards the horizon, following the sun's wests 

 ward declining course. 



The barometer at the time was very low, the temperature high, 

 and there was marked "visibility." To-night (27th) there is 

 again a red glow, seen feebly through a thick sheet of cirriform 

 cloud. 



Is it possible that particles of ice-dust carried upwards to a great 

 altitude in the extensive cyclonic disturbances now prevalent may 

 have produced these phenomena? In any case it seems clear 

 that the reflecting matter was in the first case very equally 

 diffused, having no tendency to arrange itself in strips or cloud- 

 lets ; in the second place of considerable vertical thickness ; and 

 thirdly, that its greatest altitude was upwards of thirteen English 

 miles. 



I hope that some of the readers of Nature who have wit- 

 nessed the-e phenomena may be able to explain them, and not 

 least of all the pink halo. Annie Ley 



Ashby Parva, Leicestershire, November 27) 



In connection with different singular atmospheric phenomena 

 noticed lately in India, Ceylon, and even in our own country, 1 

 think an extract from a letter received by the last Cape mail 

 may prove of interest to some of your readers. I may premise 

 that my correspondent resides upon an open Karoo plain, where 

 the atmosphere is always clear ; such a " phenomenon " as a foy, 

 being unknown, and where the sunsets generally are of a beauty 

 that I have rot seen surpassed even in the tropics, a beauty, 

 however, very evanescent, for it will be remembered that in 

 those latitudes there is little or no twilight. 



The letter is from about thirty-five miles south of Graaff 

 Reinet, and is dated October 21. "Many of us out here are 

 much interested in a very peculiar light visible in the west nearly 

 every evening about an hour after sunset. It lasts until quite 

 dusk, and throws a sort of lurid glare over everything, ard the 

 sky is angrily red ; I have not seen anything about it in the 



