Abstract
I THUS name the phenomenon I am about to describe, but without regard to scientific accuracy. Last evening, a little before sunset, I observed a dark bank of clouds couched on the horizon, just beneath the sun, and a long mass of cirro-stratus above him. A band of light, of about half his width, stretched up and down to the clouds. This remained visible, with remarkable changes, till 25 min. afrer the sun's total immersion. On his disappearance the band gradually widened (or seemed to do so), and assumed the form of a table flower-vase, i.e., bulged at the base and cylindrical above. At ten minutes after sundown the band, which had been about 10° in lengtn, stretched to 20°, being superposed on the cirro-stratus, where it was rose-coloured, the bulged portion being orange. At twenty minutes after sundown a slight collapse occurred, and the band almost disappeared, the bulged portion becoming an orange disc, just like a second sun setting in fog. Soon afterwards this became elongated, and the band reappeared, stretching over an arc of 40°. A few minutes later all disappeared. I witnessed this beautiful phenomenon from a carriage on the L. and N. W. Railway, on both sides of Blisworth.
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01 February 1872
ERRATA.—P. 243, col. 2, line 6 from top, prefix “vertical”to “band;”line 10, for “table” read “tall.”
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INGLEBY, C. Mock Sun. Nature 5, 243 (1872). https://doi.org/10.1038/005243c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/005243c0
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