Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1890-12-26

I'''" ''iN 'ii''''l4'.I
No more fascinating myste ry has en-
gagged the atteniion OF as''t.nom, rs than
that which the nature 81 ,Ie solar corona
presents that vast and somewhat irregu-
lar halo surrounding the orb of dav, but
meyer seen except when the latter is total
ly eclipsed. Discussing this topic in his
book "Ihe Sum-" Professor Charles A.
Young expresses the opinion that we
shall learn nothing more about it than
was known five or ten years ago until
new methods of attacking the problem
are discovered. This IS precisely what
Professor Frank a. Biglow, of the Ma
tional Almanac office in the navy de-
partment has done; and in his paper on
the solar corona, read before the Ameri-
can association for the Advancement of
Science in indianapolis recently, he has
opened up large and important field of
inquiry in the realm of solar physics.
Scientists will eagerly await the repro
duction of this essay i'm "Ihe American
journal of Science" next November,
when it will be practicable to scrutinize
his work as it deserves. Meantime we
have hint of its tenor from prelimi-
nary treatise upon the subject by the
same gentleman, issued last year by the
Smithsonian Institution. In brief Pro-
fessor BigelOw holds that the corona is n
magnetic phenomenon, and his great
achievement is the demonstration that
I tha trall dot ;,,
display conform mathematicallv to what
are known as "the lines of force" of a
spherical magnet-at least, in the one or
two eclipse photographs examined by
him. Archimedes wanted fulcrum
from which he could move the world.
Professor Bigelow seems to have given
science somewhat similar ground and
leverage for handling several weighty
questions.
One of these touches the cause and
method of disturbance in terrestrial mag
netism. Why is it that almost all over
the globe, every day, the declnometer
swings first one way and then the other,
describing once in twenty-four hours
complete oscillation greater or less ac-
cording to location and season? Profess
sor Bigelow himself is at work on this
particular question, and he has put on re-
cord, in bulletin of the South African
Eclipse expedition, his theory, the fuller
elucidation of which is to come later.
Herein he suggests that the earth is NOV
ing through two "magnetic fields, gener-
ated by the sun; one being coronal, as
already intimated, and the other, techni-
cally described as radiant" proceeding
in straight lines like light.
The coseness of relationship between
| light and electricity is among the most
recent revelations of the physicists; al
though they have only partially discov-
cred the nature of it as yet. One valu-
able contribution to this study is to be
found in the September "American Jour
al of Science" Professor Samuel Shell
don there shows how he has succeeded in
exciting electricity by rotating "A beam
of polarized light. This is an advance
on Faraday's work. That savant merely
rotated the beam by means of electricity.
Professor Sheldon thus strengthens the
conclusion at which Professor Bigelow
and others have arrived that electrical
force, which is akin to, if not identical
with, sunlight is directed toward the
earth, in which as the latter revolves like
large dynamo are induced currents of
greater or less strength at different points
near the surface of our globe.
OF course, if this influence, combined
with that believed to be eXerted stimuli
taneously By the corona Cor rather by the
force of which the corona is manifesto
tom, proves competent automatically
to explain the needles diurnal variation
and the changes in that variation, then
we shall have a splendid lot of data from
which to compute more accurately and
safely than before the fluctuations of in
tensity in solar activity.
/ q