868 Transactions.— Miscellaneous. 
the aqueous vapour theory should be advanced to aecount for the sun-glows; 
as it was brought forward under somewhat similar circumstances, herein- 
after referred to, in the year 1783, by the philosopher Lalande, so it first 
occurred to many eminent astronomers and meteorologists (Mr. Ellery 
amongst the number) of the present day; and although in most cases 
the theory was subsequently abandoned, yet at first it was maintained 
vehemently, and most other theories treated with contempt. With Mr. 
Ellery of Melbourne the aqueous was one of his two admissible theories, and 
that which he strongly advocated. He said—there is unusual moisture in 
the upper air—our exceptionally wet season proves it. The average rain- 
fall for January is 1:60 inches. This year it has been 4:75 inches. Such 
exceptional moisture in the air will account for the sun-glows (Royal 
Society, Melbourne, 15th November). But, unfortunately for this theory, 
as it happened, the season in New South Wales, the neighbouring colony, 
was exceptionally dry, as the squatters there know to their cost. The 
drought was so severe indeed that it brought about a loss to the colony in 
one way or another of £10,000,000, and again in North China (from the 
testimony of a Mr. Sowerby in ** Nature") the winter was remarkably fine. 
Yet in both New South Wales and China the sun-glows were brilliant— 
those in China, in the month of December, being described as gorgeous 
with magnificent rose-pink after-glows. Mr. Ellery, furthermore, says that 
an assistant of his at Port Darwin, in Mareh, 1888, saw several such sunsets 
as we have had with similar after-glows, and that they always came before 
or after rain. Herein the Government Astronomer of Victoria strangely 
loses sight of the fact that before or after rain, as it appears to me, makes 
all the difference in the world, for if the sun-glows continue to appear after 
a rainy season, and during a succeeding dry one, as they have done in Vic- 
toria, it is clear that they must be produced independently of aqueous 
vapour in the air. As far as our experience here in Nelson is concerned, I 
do not think there can be any doubt whatever that our finest sun-glows 
occurred during a spell of dry, keen, and exceptionally cold weather. More- 
over, the air of England is wet enough in all conscience, yet fine sunsets 
are comparatively rare there, and green suns almost an unheard-of pheno- 
menon. Dr. Hector,* again, as I have already quoted, spoke on the 14th 
November, 1888, of the extraordinary coloured glow in the sky, as proving 
the existence at an enormous altitude of vapourous matter capable of 
refracting the sun's light into its prismatic components. Except that 
the expression employed here is * vapourous matter "in the place of 
, “aqueous vapour "—the language is not at all doubtful The context, 
however, states that the vapour must have an unusual altitude, that 
* Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. xvi., p. 556, 
