The Sun.
London, England, 1833-10-10 00:00:00

METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS.

EXTRACT OF A METEOROLOGICAL JOURNAL FOR SEP.
TEMBER, 533, KEPT AT DR. BURNEYS OBSERVATORY
OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY, GOSPORT.
" On the Ist instant an unusual depression of
temperature occurred, with a N. and N.W. wind, it
being the coldest day arid night in the month, but
when the wind veered round to the W. and S.W.
the thermometer again rose. The mean temperature
of the external air in September for a series of years
is about four degrees less than that of August.
Spring water, however, does not come to its maxi-
mum temperature till about the 20th, and its de-
crease the remainder of the month is inappreciable.
The earth, too, in this latitude radiates heat consi-
derably during the month, yet we find that with
more than the average quantity of rain (which tends
to keep down the heat), the temperature of the air,
as before-mentioned, decreases, the cause of which
can only be inferred from the sun's position, that is,
his southward declination from us. The equinoctial
gales unquestionably arise from the sun's influence as
he becomes more vertical to the equator, where the
heat increases and rarifies the atmosphere to such
a heat as to generate strong currents of wind in
almost every direction towards the poles of the
earth. In the afternoon of the 4th a faint rainbow
appeared without rain, its northt.4n side was in an
apparently-cloudless sky, the other part was brighter
from its being in a turbid zjoud, from which, though
it had no cirrose crown, some light rain must have
fallen at a distance to have produced the prismatic
colours by reflection. In the mornings of the Ist
and sth light hoar frost appeared in the grass fields
for the first time after the summer season, since
Which time the nights have been comparatively
warm. In the afternoon of the 11th a shower
passed over, with lightning and thunder, and thun-
der also occurred at noon of the 18th. Between
eight arid nine, a.m., on the 23d, a parhelion was
observed here on the ,outh side of the sun, the sky
was overcast with dense cirrostratus by night, and
rain followed with a long-continued gale from the
S. and S.W.
" THE NORTHERN LIGHTS.—In the evenings of
the 15th and 16th, faint Aurora Bort-ales were ob-
served here, but th,y were not int,resting, the
arches being low, undefined, and without coruscations
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crease in brilliancy and extent till eleven, P M., and
was partly screened by a black cloud of the cirro-
stratus kind, parallel with the amoral arch, but about
three degrees below it. A few of the principal
features of this meteoric phenomenon, by the way
of general information, may be considered interest-
ing to those who pay any attention to natural phe-
nomena. The whole of the time the centre of the
auroral arch coincided with the point of the magnetic
north, which is deserving of notice, because it leads
us to think, with some degree of reason, that it
originates from a superabundance of effluvia rising
from or near the termination of the magnetic pole,
far above the each', atmosphere, and spreading equi-
distant on each side, in an arch of light of a gaseous
quality. The coruscations began to rise from the aurora
at half past eight, and at intervals emanated in long and
short columns of light-red and yellowish tints, vary-
ing in width from a quarter to one degree and three
quarters, and from five to fifty-two degrees in alti-
tude, some of the streamers having risen higher
than Polaris. From a quarter past nine till a
quarter to ten o'clock a very remarkable column,
one degree and three-quarters wide and fifty degrees
long, was in the S. W. quarter, bearing W. S.W.,
and at that time about fifty degrees south of the
we,tern termination of the auroral arch; it was
Aqui* and had
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four or fiavned
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