t outside.

"Are we already emerging from the shadow?" I inquired eagerly.

"No, not yet," replied the doctor. "But we are now entering its
illuminated core. I must prepare to photograph the strange appearance of
the Sun that we shall see presently."

I hastened to the port-hole, and did not leave until it was all over.
What I then saw was one of the most beautiful things of the whole trip.
The light outside was not bright, but soft and dreamy, like the first
twilight after a rich day of summer. The great corona all around the
outer edge of the Earth was the most magnificent appearance I have ever
seen. It was not at all dazzling, but had the melting shades, first of a
sunrise and then of a gorgeous sunset. We had missed the gradual
appearance of the phenomenon, but we had a good view of its highest
splendour. The colours were continually but slowly changing, and finally
the darker hues gradually suffused and dyed the pinks and crimsons.

The Earth was now about three times the diameter of a rising Full Moon,
and the corona was about a quarter her width, and looked as if twenty
shell-pink suns were set one against the other and overlapping all about
the edge of the dark orb.

"How do you know that is not really the extending edge of the Sun?" I
asked the doctor. "Perhaps we are already far enough away to see it all
about the Earth like that."

"If that were really the Sun, the light from his extending edge would
illuminate the surface of the Earth towards us. The planet's outline
would be irregular and partly glowing, but you see it is quite dull and
dark, and the outline is most plainly visible."

In rapt attention I watched the delicate shell-pink change to a deeper
hue of orange, and then our twilight waned a little and turned a sombre
grey. Presently the corona glowed a rich maroon, gradually dying to a
luminous purple, which slowly deepened and darkened, and finally melted
into the general blackness. And lo! we were in the shadow again, and the
dreamily beautiful panorama was over.

"It must have lasted nearly an hour," said the doctor. "I am sorry we
did not notice the beginning, but it must have commenced with the same
dull shades we saw at the end, and gradually changed to brighter
colours. I secured three negatives when the glow was most intense."

"Then we have had a waxing and a waning twilight coming together in the
middle of our night. And the corona was like a sunrise, followed
immediately by a s