Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Light Totally Disappeared At
9 Hours 35 Minutes (Apparent Time), Nearly 3 Hours 50 Minutes After
Sunset, Without Any Diminution In The Serenity Of The Sky.
La Caille,
in his voyage to Rio Janeiro and the Cape, was struck with the
beautiful appearance displayed by
The zodiacal light within the
tropics, not so much on account of its less inclined position,
as of the greater transparency of the air.* (* The great serenity
of the air caused this phenomenon to be remarked, in 1668, in the
arid plains of Persia.) It may appear singular, that Childrey and
Dominic Cassini, navigators who were well acquainted with the seas
of the two Indies, did not at a much earlier period direct the
attention of scientific Europe to this light, and its regular form
and progress. Until the middle of the eighteenth century mariners
were little interested by anything not having immediate relation
to the course of a ship, and the demands of navigation.
However brilliant the zodiacal light in the dry valley of Tuy, I
have observed it more beautiful still at the back of the
Cordilleras of Mexico, on the banks of the lake of Tezcuco, eleven
hundred and sixty toises above the surface of the ocean. In the
month of January, 1804, the light rose sometimes to more than 60
degrees above the horizon. The Milky Way appeared to grow pale
compared with the brilliancy of the zodiacal light; and if small,
bluish, scattered clouds were accumulated toward the west, it
seemed as if the moon were about to rise.
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