Abstract
THE phenomenon mentioned by Prof. Tyndall as recently occurring at the Bel Alp is not infrequent at the coast. At Folkestone in the month of June last, we saw several more or less striking instances. Some years since I witnessed, while driving, on a summer's evening, between Guildford and Godalming, an equally beautiful though different effect. The evening was stormy, and the sun, still some distance above the western horizon, threw its sheaf of rays downwards from behind a light cloud. In the eastern horizon was a dense, dark thunder-cloud, and upon this was seen a reflection of the opposite horizon, the shadows being absorbed by the dark background, while the intervening spaces or rays shone out with a brilliancy considerably exceeding that of those in the west. The whole of the circumstances were different from those described by Prof. Tyndall, there being, as far as I can recollect, no upward rays from the sun, and the rays seen on the cloud being neither convergent nor divergent, but merely parallel, and apparently a complete reflection of those which shot from the sun to the horizon. Their wonderful brightness, as contrasted with the rays of which they were the image, was, no doubt, the effect of contrast upon the almost blank screen on which they were seen. This latter, however, was lighted up to a certain extent by a sort of golden haze, in which the rays shone. The whole phenomenon was one of great beauty, and was witnessed by some friends of mine at Guildford at about the same time as I saw it from a point near to Godalming.
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CAPRON, J. Atmospheric Effect. Nature 6, 279 (1872). https://doi.org/10.1038/006279d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/006279d0
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