Abstract
YESTERDAY morning (December 29), from about 8.30 to 9 o'clock, a number of very brilliantly-coloured clouds were observed here by myself and others. The weather was cold and frosty, and the sky at the time was clear with the exception of a thick haze round the horizon; a few clouds were thinly distributed over the sky, and these were more or less coloured. The clouds in the south-east had colours rivalling those of the rainbow in intensity. The colours were also distributed in bands, though not in the same order as those of the rainbow. The clouds in the opposite quarter of the sky were smaller, and though unusually bright as regards luminosity the colours were paler than on the other side of the sky. Each cloud also had one uniform tint, a pale green or blue or pink. The more brilliant clouds while fading assumed an appearance similar to these others, some of the bands broadening out, while others disappeared. I saw a beautiful iridescent cloud here at the same hour one morning last December. At that time the phenomenon was generally observed throughout the country, as is evident from the letters which appeared in NATURE (vol. xxxi.pp. 148, 192, 264, &c.)
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STEVENSON, J. Iridescent Clouds. Nature 33, 220 (1886). https://doi.org/10.1038/033220b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/033220b0
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