would
have been eclipsed at sunset, a finding which tallies fairly with the
statement of Gregorius.

It is not till far into the 6th century that we come upon a native
English record of an eclipse of the Sun as having been observed in
England. This deficiency in our national annals is thus judiciously
explained and commented on by our clever and talented American
authoress.[71] Speaking of the eclipse of February 15, 538 A.D., she
says:--"The accounts, however, are greatly confused and uncertain, as
would perhaps be natural fully 60 years before the advent of St.
Augustine, and when Britain was helplessly harassed with its continual
struggle in the fierce hands of West Saxons and East Saxons, of Picts
and conquering Angles. Men have little time to record celestial
happenings clearly, much less to indulge in scientific comment and
theorising upon natural phenomena, when the history of a nation sways to
and fro with the tide of battle, and what is gained to-day may be
fatally lost to-morrow. And so there is little said about this eclipse,
and that little is more vague and uncertain even than the monotonous
plaints of Gildas--the one writer whom Britain has left us, in his meagre
accounts of the conquest of Kent, and the forsaken walls and violated
shrines of this early epoch."

The well-known _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_[72] is our authority for this
eclipse having been noted in England, but the record is bare
indeed:--"In this year the Sun was eclipsed 14 days before the Calends of
March from early morning till 9 a.m." Tycho Brahe, borrowing from
Calvisius, who borrowed from somebody else, says that the eclipse
happened "in the 5th year of Henry, King of the West Saxons, at the 1st
hour of the day till nearly the 3rd, or immediately after sunrise."
Johnson finds that at London nearly three-fourths of the Sun's disc was
covered at 7.43 a.m.

The next eclipse recorded in the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_ is somewhat
difficult to explain. It is said that in 540 A.D. "The Sun was eclipsed
on the 12th of the Calends of July [= June 20], and the stars appeared
full nigh half an hour after 9 a.m." Johnson's calculations make the
middle of the eclipse to have occurred at about 7.37 a.m. at London,
two-thirds of the Sun's diameter being covered. He notes that the Moon's
semi-diameter was nearly at its maximum whilst the Sun's semi-diameter
was nearly at its minimum--a favourable combination for a long totality.
The visibility of the st