over all the subordinate phases. The
total phase which alone (with perhaps a couple of minutes added) is
productive of spectacular effects, and interesting scientific results is
a mere matter of minutes which may be as few as one (or less), or only
as many as 6 or 8.

As a rule, a summer eclipse will last longer than a winter one, because
in summer the Earth (and the Moon with it), being at its maximum
distance from the Sun, the Sun will be at its minimum apparent size, and
therefore the Moon will be able to conceal it the longer.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 11: _Month. Not._, _R.A.S._, vol. xlv., p. 400. June
1885.]

[Footnote 12: Johnson makes the eclipse of June 14, 2151, to be
"nearly, if not quite, total at London." Possibly it was this
eclipse which Hind had in his thoughts when he wrote in the _Times_
(July 28, 1871) the passage quoted above.]

CHAPTER V.

WHAT IS OBSERVED DURING THE EARLIER STAGES
OF AN ECLIPSE OF THE SUN.

The information to be given in this and the next following chapters will
almost exclusively concern total and annular eclipses of the Sun, for,
in real truth, there is practically only one thing to think about during
a partial eclipse of the Sun. This is, to watch when the Moon's black
body comes on to the Sun and goes off again, for there are no subsidiary
phenomena, either interesting or uninteresting, unless, indeed, the
eclipse should be nearly total. The progress of astronomical science in
regard to eclipses has been so extensive and remarkable of late years
that, unless the various points for consideration are kept together
under well-defined heads, it will be almost impossible either for a
writer or a reader to do full justice to the subject. Having regard to
the fact that the original conception of this volume was that it should
serve as a forerunner to the total solar eclipse of May 28, 1900 (and
through that to other total eclipses), from a popular rather than from a
technical standpoint, I think it will be best to mention one by one the
principal features which spectators should look out for, and to do so as
nearly as may be in the order which Nature itself will observe when the
time comes.

Of course the commencement of an eclipse, which is virtually the moment
when the encroachment on the circular outline of the Sun by the Moon
begins, or can be seen, though interesting as