The preceding statement refers to aurora in high northern latitudes, where the full magnificence of the phenomenon is displayed. It forms a fine compensation for the long and dreary night to which these regions are subject, the gay and varying aspect of the heavens contrasting refreshingly with the repelling and monotonous appearance of the earth. We have already stated that the direction in which the aurora generally makes its first appearance, or the quarter in which the arch formed by this meteor is usually seen, is to the northward. But this does not hold good of very high latitudes, for by the expeditions which have wintered in the ice, it was almost always seen to the southward; while by Captain Beechey, in the Blossom, in Kotzerne Sound, 250 miles to the southward of the ice, it was always observed in a northern direction. It would appear, therefore, from this fact, that the margin of the region of packed ice is most favorable to the production of the meteor. The reports of the Greenland ships confirm this idea; for, according to their concurrent testimony, the meteoric display has a more brilliant aspect to vessels passing near the situation of the compact ice, than to others entered far within it. Instances, however, are not wanting, of the aurora appearing to the south of the zenith in comparatively low latitudes. Lieutenant Chappell, in his voyage to Hudson’s Bay, speaks of its forming in the zenith, in a shape resembling that of an umbrella, pouring down streams of light from all parts of its periphery, which fell vertically over the hemisphere in every direction. As we retire from the Pole, the phenomenon becomes a rarer occurrence, and is less perfectly and distinctly developed. In September, 1828, it was observed in England as a vast arch of silvery light, extending over nearly the whole of the heavens, transient gleams of light separating from the main body of the luminosity; but in September, 1827, its hues were red and brilliant. Dr. Dalton has furnished the following account of an aurora, as observed by him on the 15th of October, 1792:—“Attention,” he remarks, “was first excited by a remarkably red appearance of the clouds to the south, which afforded sufficient light to read by at 8 o’clock in the evening, though there was no moon nor light in the north. From half-past nine to ten there was a large, luminous, horizontal arch to the southward, and several faint concentric arches northward. It was particularly noticed that all the arches seemed exactly bisected by the plain of the magnetic meridian. At half-past ten o’clock streamers appeared, very low in the south-east, running to and fro from west to east. They increased in number, and began to approach the zenith apparently with an accelerated velocity, when all on a sudden the whole hemisphere was covered with them, and exhibited such an appearance as surpasses all description. The intensity of the light, the prodigious