The members of the observing party took up their abode in the larger of the three houses, sleeping in swinging cots slung from the verandas, which afforded shade on three sides of the building. The second house was occupied by the sailors, while the third was left to the natives. These latter were sufficiently conversant with English to serve as excellent guides. Each day the party bathed in a lagoon in the center of the island. This lagoon was bordered by a beach of dazzling white coral sand, and all through its water extended reefs of living coral of the more delicate and elaborate kinds. These corals gave the lake a wonderful variety of colors, forming a picture impossible to paint or describe, and with the least ripple from a passing breeze the whole scene changed to new groups of color. The water was very clear, and in some places deep; in others so filled with coral that a boat could barely skim over the surface without scraping the keel. After crossing a long reef, one day, they entered on a sheet of water so deep that their longest line would not reach the bottom, plainly visible beneath. Fish swarmed here, and it was characteristic of them that every species, if not brilliantly colored, was marked in the most peculiar manner. One variety which frequented the shallow water, where it was heated to the degree uncomfortable to the touch, was a pure milky white, with black eyes, fins, and tail. The French party arrived two days after the Americans. They had steamed directly from Panama with the hope of anticipating the Americans. It rained on the morning of the eclipse, but cleared off in good time, and the definition was particularly good. Photographs occupied the time of the English and French observers. Professor Holden and Dr. Dickson searched for intra-mercurial planets; Mr. Preston took the times of contact; Dr. Hastings and Mr. Rockwell devoted their attention to spectroscopic observations of the corona. Dr. Hastings' observations have led to the production of a new theory of the corona. Briefly stated, the theory is that the light seen around the sun during a total eclipse is not due to a material substance enveloping the sun, but is a phenomenon of diffraction.