Arizona republican., 1910-05-19
COMETS TAIL
 SWEPT PAST. It Left No Scars On This
 Mundane Ball ITS PASSAGE UNOBsERVED
Reappearance in the West Scheduled for Friday, Where It Will Give a Show for a Week at More Seasonable Hours.

The comet came. the comet went and this old earth Is no worse and no better, and thus far very little wiser. There was no collision. as the superstitious and the ignorant feared, and now that the comet is headed away from us. there will be no recurrence of the manifestations of terror that were recorded from all parts of the world.
 The earth did pass through sthe tail of the comet. but nobody suf- fered from the deadly cynogen gas. To the naked eye, the tail of the comet was indeed the veriest ap- proach to nothing set in the midst of naught."
 In fact the phenomena of the day light hours were far the more in- teresting. During the afternoon sun spots were observed in varying num- bers about the same hour from five western observatories, but the as tronomers who recorded them were almost unanimous in the belief that these disturbances of the solar at mosphere had nothing to do with the approach Of the comet and were merely coincidental. None of the eastern observatories had anything of note to report. either during the day or the night.
 The whole performance took little more than five hours. Observers diff fered as to the exact time at which the earth began to pass through the comets tail. but the opinion aver ages about between o'clock and midnight.
 The combined speed of the tail and the earth was estimated at slightly more than forty-siX miles a second. and the breadth of the tail at about 1 .0OO. 900 miles.
 Friday the comet will become vis- ibe again. headed away from us. with the tail sticking straight up out of the western sky, little above the spot where the sun sinks. There will then be no light from the rising sun to dim the glory of the spec tacle. and it Is likely to be far more majestic than in the stages of the approach.
 At the end of the month. farewell for another seventy five years.
 SAW NORTHERN LIGHTS.
 Yerkes Observatory. Williams Bay Wis, May 1s.-An unusual display of aurora lights at 9:30 p. m was said by Prof. Mitchell to he the di- rect result of the comet. As the world passed through the tail, the astronomers secured photographs and accurate records of meteoric phe- nomena, varying to a heavenly illu- imitation under atmospheric condi- tions that were nearly perfect. Prof Edward F.. Barnard, one of the worlds authorities on comets. was much pleased with the result of his observations.
 There was the most painstaking search through the tail for spots where the illumination might be lacking. This lack of illumination may aid in determining the substance of the glow that follows comets Prof. Barnard considers the negative phenomena as of as great value to science as the positive. A battery of cameras with hundreds of plates was exposed to every visible foot of the sky.
 Although a spectacular display of aurora lights. which reached across the sky from east to west. was ob- served here. Prof Frost. in charge of the observatory. and Prof. Mitch ell of New York do not connect the phenomena directly with the comet
 NOTICED NOTHING. Pasadena, Cal. May 1S.-Accord- ing to the computations of Dr. George F.. Hale and his assistants at the Carnegie observatory. Halley's comet passed on beyond the sun at S:35 o'clock tonight, and at the same time the earth was in the midst of the wanderers tenuous tail. But not one of the delicate instruments set to detect the expected phenomena showed the slightest variation. Dr. Hale mounted an electrometer to detect any changes in the mag netism of the earth, and a vario- meter. which would show any varia- tion in the magnetic pole. A tower also was erected, bearing metal plates coated with glycerine. to catch any of the dust particles with which the | comets tail is supposed to be laden but the astronomers have found nothing so far to indicate that natu- raf conditions had been affected by the earth's leap through the comets | tail.