r; the azure is
less blended with white because of the extreme dryness of the air. The
stars stand out with uncommon brilliancy, and the dark openings between
them the great German compared to "tubes through which we look into the
remotest depths of space." It is true at Quito, as Humboldt noticed at
Cumana, that the stars do not twinkle when they are more than fifteen
degrees high; "the soft planetary light" of the stars overhead is not
mere rhetoric.

Living under the equatorial line, Quitonians enjoy the peculiar
privilege of beholding the stars of both hemispheres, the guiding stars
of Ursa Major as well as the Magellanic Clouds and Southern Cross, not
omitting that black spot near the latter, "the unappropriated region in
the skies reserved by Manager Bingham for deposed American presidents."

The zodiacal light here appears in all its glory. This strange
phenomenon has long puzzled philosophers, and they are still divided. It
is generally considered to be produced by a continuous zone of
infinitesimal asteroids. The majority place this zone beyond the orbit
of the earth, and concentric with the sun. But Rev. George Jones, of
Philadelphia, who has spent several years in observing this light,
including eight months in Quito, considers it geocentric, and possibly
situated between the earth and its satellite. At New York only a short
pyramidal light, and this only at certain seasons, is to be seen; but
here, an arch twenty degrees wide, and of considerable intensity, shoots
up to the zenith, and Mr. Jones affirms that a complete arch is visible
at midnight when the ecliptic is at right angles to the spectator's
horizon. We have not been so fortunate as to see it pass the zenith; and
Professor Barnard contends that it never does pass. We may remark that
the main part of the zodiacal light shifts to the south side of the
celestial equator as we cross the line. To us the most magnificent sight
in the tropical heavens is the "Milky Way," especially near Sobieski's
Shield, where it is very luminous. We observed that this starry tract
divided at [Greek: a] Centauri, as Herschel says, and not at [Greek: b],
as many maps and globes have it. The brightest stars in the southern
hemisphere follow the direction of a great circle passing through
[Greek: e] Orionis and [Greek: a] Crucis.

Another thing which arrests the attention of the traveler is the
comparatively well-defined boundary-line between day and night. The
twilight