Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/681

Rh The tapering ray marked No. 1 was the first seen by him. He says he saw it on his first glance at the corona. It then seemed to extend about three times the diameter of the sun; but in a minute or so, as the observer's eyes became accustomed to the sight, he was able to trace its tapering end to a distance of six diameters of the sun's disk. "Its sides were straight lines, its axis passing slightly below the sun's center. Its light was an exceedingly faint and delicate white, apparently overlaid or intermingled with the blue of the atmosphere. I saw no striation, texture, or variation of light. There was no decided increase of brightness in that part of the ray near the sun's edge, nor in the axis of the beam, the delicate light continuing uniform up to the corona, in whose glare it was lost." We must note here two points. In all probability the words "in a minute or so" are used in their colloquial sense for presently, because the whole totality did not last two minutes and a half, and in the course of that time Professor Abbe noted all the features of the corona six several times. Secondly, we find that, both in the "Daily News" and in "Nature," Professor Abbe is described as tracing the rays to a distance of six degrees from the eclipsed sun, not six diameters only; so that, as the sun's apparent diameter is little more than half a degree, these accounts would suggest that he saw the rays to double the distance described in the "Colorado Daily Gazette." But there seems little reason to doubt that the accounts given in the "Daily News" and "Nature," which constitute in reality but one account, seeing that they both came from the same source, are incorrect; for the account sent to the Colorado paper was written by Professor Abbe himself. It contains an illustration from a drawing of his own (reproduced above), which agrees with his description. Moreover, we received the paper directly from Professor Abbe; and unquestionably he would have struck out the word "diameters" and substituted "degrees" if he had really seen the ray extending to the greater distance. Note also that the word "diameter" is used throughout the descriptions of other rays.

The ray marked 2 was seen as soon as 1. Its bounding edges, diverging from each other, but not from the sun's center, produced a somewhat fan-shaped ray. "When first seen," says Abbe, "I estimated its outer limit at one diameter, but subsequently traced it to a diameter and a half from the sun. Its left-hand edge appeared somewhat sharper and brighter than the right-hand edge. With this exception the light was very uniformly distributed throughout its surface, fading away rapidly at its outer end. It also remained changeless throughout the totality."

No. 3 was also seen at the same time as No. 1. "It was narrower and shorter than No. 1: its estimated length, three diameters. It broadened at its base, like No. 1, and had the same uniform tint and intensity."

No. 4 "was not noticed at all until the totality was half over. Its