Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Echinoderma" to "Edward, prince of Wales": Volume 8, Slice 10Various
Science
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Echinoderma" to "Edward, prince of Wales": Volume 8, Slice 10
Various
Encyclopedias and dictionaries
The physical phenomena attending eclipses of the moon are no longer of a
high order of interest either to the layman or scientific observer. A
brief statement of them and their causes will therefore be sufficient.
An observer watching such an eclipse from the moon would see the earth,
which has nearly four times the apparent diameter of the sun, impinging
on the sun's disk and slowly hiding it. The phenomenon would be quite
similar to that of an eclipse of the sun seen from the earth, until the
sun was completely covered. During the progress of this partial eclipse
the moon would be passing into the earth's penumbra. As the moment of
total obscuration approached, a red band of light would rapidly form in
the neighbourhood of the disappearing limb of the sun, and gradually
extend around the earth. This would arise from the refraction of the
sun's light by the earth's atmosphere, and the absorption of its blue
rays. When the light of the sun was completely hidden, a reddish ring of
great brilliancy would, owing to this cause, surround the entire dark
body of the earth during the period of the total eclipse.
The aspect of the moon, as seen from the earth, corresponds to this view
from the moon. The fading of the moon's light, due to its entrance into
the penumbra, is scarcely noticeable without direct photometric
determination until near the beginning of the total phase. Then, as the
limb of the moon approaches the earth's shadow, it begins to darken.
When only a small portion has entered into the shadow, that portion is
completely hidden. But, as the total phase approaches, the part of the
moon's disk immersed in the penumbra becomes visible by a reddish
coppery light--that of the sun refracted through the lower parts of the
earth's atmosphere. The brightness of this illumination is different in
different eclipses, a circumstance which may be attributed to the
greater or less degree of cloudiness in those regions of the earth's
atmosphere through which the light of the sun passes in order to reach
the moon. Its colour is due to absorption in passing through the earth's
atmosphere.
III. _Laws and Cycles of Recurrences of Eclipses of the Sun and Moon._
It has been known since remote antiquity that eclipses occur in cycles.
These cycles are known now to be determined principally by the motion of
the moon's node and the relations between the revolutions of the earth
round the sun and the moon round the earth.
Eclipse seasons.
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