Rrixawoop.—On Red Sunsets. 897 
in that continent, the weather was fine, clear, hot without rain, giving me 
the idea that the sun had less power than usual, consequently the north- 
west monsoon was very feeble, not penetrating far inland, the result being 
that the interior of Australia has undergone one of the most disastrous 
droughts on record. But now that, as we may suppose, the equatorial regions 
of the atmosphere have parted with the greater part of their dust, if not 
all, the sun has regained his usual power, and the north-west monsoon 
its usual strength, penetrating the heart of Australia with refreshing rains 
and thunderstorms. So we have here an instance of a most terrific pheno- 
menon that not only brought death and destruction to thousands at the 
time, but that indirectly caused the death of thousands and thousands of 
cattle through drought ; and it would be most interesting and instructive to 
learn whether or not such consequences were experienced in other parts of 
the southern hemisphere. 
It would be beyond the province of this paper to enter on a history of the 
tidal and atmospheric waves that resulted from this eruption, but I will state 
two facts to finally clinch your mind of its magnitude. When the earth opened 
her mouth and swallowed that vast quantity of water the down-rush that ac- 
companied the closing-in of the surrounding crust was so much as to produce 
a tidal wave that passed and repassed twice, I believe, round the globe. The 
other fact is, that the tremendous explosion that accompanied the final erup- 
tion produced such a vacuum as to cause atmospheric waves to start, and 
which traversed and retraversed the earth to the antipodes of Java no less than 
four times. Some astronomers have thought that the whole phenomenon 
may be accounted for by supposing the earth to be passing through a dense 
meteoric track. To my mind, however, the greatest difficulties brought to 
bear against the voleanic theory are child’s play when compared with the 
possibility, about ten thousand millions to one, of a meteoric track so 
formed as to have its path, either at perihelion or aphelion, so remarkably 
co-incident with that of the earth as to keep company with her for seven 
or eight months. Besides, if it were either meteoric or cosmic dust it 
would have been seen all over the earth at the same time and would be 
visible all night. No, the only extra-terrestrial argument that would bear 
investigation is that of its belonging to the phenomenon of the zodiacal 
light, which argument, I believe, was adopted by my friend Charles Todd, 
of Adelaide, at first; but, as time goes on and more information is gathered, 
the voleanic theory, I believe, will be finally accepted. 
