Two English expeditions had been equipped for the special occasion of the eclipse--one to proceed to Sobral and the other to the Island of Principe, off Portuguese Africa; they were sent officially with equipment provided in the main by the time-honoured Royal Society. Considering the times, it was regarded as the first symptom of the revival of international science, a praiseworthy undertaking. A huge apparatus was set into motion for a purely scientific object with not the slightest relation to any purpose useful in practical life. It was a highly technical investigation whose real significance could be grasped by only very few minds. Yet interest was excited in circles reaching far beyond that of the professional scientist. As the solar eclipse approached, the consciousness of amateurs became stirred with indefinite ideas of cosmic phenomena. And just as the navigator gazes at the Polar Star, so men directed their attention to the constellation of Einstein, which was not yet depicted in stellar maps, but, from which something uncomprehended, but undoubtedly very important, was to blaze forth. In June it was announced that the star photographs had been successful in most cases, yet for weeks, nay for months, we had to exercise patience. For the photographs, although they required little time to be taken, took much longer to develop and, above all, to be measured; in view of the order of smallness of the distances to be compared, this was a difficult and troublesome task, for the points of light on the plate did not answer immediately with Yes or No, but only after mechanical devices of extreme delicacy had been carefully applied. At the end of September they proclaimed their message. It was in the affirmative, and this Yes out of far-distant transcendental regions called forth a resounding echo in the world of everyday life. Genuinely and truly the seconds of arc had come out, correct to the decimal point. These points representing ciphers, as it were, had chanted of the harmony of the spheres in their Pythagorean tongue. The transmission of this message seemed to be accompanied by the echoing words of Goethe's "Ariel": "With a crash the Light draws near! Pealing rays and trumpet-blazes,-- Eye is blinded, ear amazes." Never before had anything like this happened. A wave of amazement swept over the continents. Thousands of people who had never in their lives troubled about vibrations of light and gravitation were seized by this wave and carried on high, immersed in the wish for knowledge although incapable of grasping it. This much all understood, that from the quiet study of a scholar an illuminating gospel for exploring the universe had been irradiated.