Part 18 (1/2)

These fears and terrors are still extant aht of February 27, 1877, an eclipse of the Moon produced an indescribable panic ahten off the Black Dragon, the natives fired shots at the half-devoured orb, acco yells Dr Hariven on p 269

During the solar eclipse of March 15, 1877, an analogous scene occurred aot their preparations for ith Russia, in order to shoot at the Sun, and deliver hion

The lunar eclipse of December 16, 1880, was not unnoticed at Tackhent (Russian Turkestan), where it was received with a terrific din of saucepans, saain by willing hands that sought to deliver the Moon fro her

In China, eclipses are the object of iularity of the celestial arded as the Son of Heaven, his government must in some sort be a reflection of the immutable order of the sidereal harers as disturbances of the divine order, their appearance indicates soovernly, they are received with all kinds of expiatory cereo, and still in force to-day

In the twentieth century, as in the nineteenth, the eighteenth, or in ancient epochs, the sanorant populations who abound upon the surface of our planet

To return to astronomical realities

We said above that these phenomena were produced when the Full Moon and the New Moon reached the line of intersection, known as the line of nodes, when the plane of the lunar orbit cuts the plane of the ecliptic

As this line turns and comes back in the sahteen years, eleven days, we have only to register the eclipses observed during this period in order to know all that will occur in the future, and to find such as happened in the past

This period was known to the Greeks under the name of the Metonic Cycle, and the Chaldeans eo under the na this cycle, composed of 223 lunations, we see that there can not be more than seven eclipses in one year, nor less than two When there are only two, they are eclipses of the Sun

The totality of a solar eclipse can not last ht seconds at the equator, and six minutes, ten seconds in the latitude of Paris The Moon, on the contrary, may be entirely eclipsed for nearly two hours

Eclipses of the Sun are very rare for a definite spot Thus not one occurred for Paris during the whole of the nineteenth century, the last which happened exactly above the capital of France having been on May 22, 1724 I have calculated all those for the twentieth century, and find that till take place close to Paris, on April 17, 1912, at eighteen juust 11, 1999, at 1028 AM (total for Beauvais, Co: two minutes, seventeen seconds) Paris itself will not be favored before August 12, 2026 In order to witness the phenoo and look for it This the author did on May 28, 1900, in Spain

The progress of the lunar shadow upon the surface of the Earth is traced beforehand on maps that serve to show the favored countries for which our satellite will dispense her epheure shows the trajectory of the total phase of the 1900 eclipse in Portugal, Spain, Algeria, and Tunis

[Illustration: FIG 77--The path of the Eclipse of May 28, 1900]

The immutable splendor of the celestialthe observation of this grandiose phenomenon With the absolute precision of astrono round the Earth, arrived upon the theoretical line drawn froradually, slowly, and exactly, in front of it The eclipse was total, and occurred at the lobe of the Moon pursued its regular course, discovered the radiant orb behind, and gradually and slowly completed its transit in front of him

Here, to all observers, was a double philosophical lesson, a twofold ireatness, the oovern the universe, and that of the inexorable valor ofupon another atoence has arrived at the knowledge of the laws by which he, like the rest of the world, is borne away through space, through tih eternity

The line of centrality passed through Elche, a picturesque city of 30,000 inhabitants, not far from Alicante, and we had chosen this for our station on account of the probability of fine weather

From the terrace of the country house of the hospitable Mayor, a farm transformed into an observatory by our learned friend, Count de la Baume Pluvinel, there were no obstacles between ourselves and any part of the sky or landscape The whole horizon lay before us In front was a town of Arab aspect framed in a lovely oasis of palm-trees; a little farther off, the blue sea beyond the shores of Alicante and Murcia: on the other side a belt of low ardens A Company of the Civic Guard kept order, and prevented the entrance of too many curious visitors, of whom over ten thousand had arrived

At the moment when the first contact of the lunar disk with the solar disk was observed in the telescope, we fired a gun, in order to announce the precise commencement of the occultation to the 40,000 persons ere awaiting the phenomenon, and to discover what difference would exist between this telescopic observation and those made with the unaided eyes (protected silass) of so o at Perpignan in 1842 The verification was almost iht or ten seconds So that the commencement of the eclipse was confirmed almost as promptly for the eye as with the astronomical instruments

The sky was splendidly clear; no cloud, noSun

The first period of the eclipse showed nothing particular It is only from the moment when more than half the solar disk is covered by the lunar disk that the phenorandeur At this phase, I called the attention of the people standing in the court to the visibility of the stars, and indicating the place of Venus in the sky asked if any with long sight could perceive her Eight at once responded in the affirmative It should be said that the planet was at that time at its period of ht, it is always visible to the unaided eye

When soeons which had flown back to the farm huddled into a corner, andthat the fowls had done the sah it had been night, and that the small children (ere very numerous at Elche, where the population is certainly not diames, and came back to their mothers' skirts The birds flew anxiously to their nests

The ants in one garden were excessively agitated, no doubt disconcerted in their strategics The bats came out