Aurora seen at Sunderland, Feb. 8, 1817. Formation of corona.
It began about 7 P.M. during a strong gale from the N.W., with single bright streamers in the N. and N.W., which covered a large space and rushed about from place to place with amazing velocity, and had a fine tremulous motion, illuminating the hemisphere as much as the moon does eight or nine days from change. About 11 o’clock part of the streamers appeared as if projected south of the zenith and looked like the pillars of an immense amphitheatre, presenting a most brilliant spectacle and seeming to be in a lower region of the atmosphere, and to descend and ascend in the air for several minutes. (This appears to have been the formation of a corona.) One streamer passed over Orion, but neither increased nor diminished its splendour.
Description of Aurora by Dr. Hayes, 6th January, 1861.
Dr. Hayes’s Aurora, 6th January, 1861.
‘Recent Polar Voyages’ contains a narrative of the voyage of Dr. Hayes, who sailed from Boston on the 6th of July, 1860, and wintered at Port Foulbe. He witnessed a remarkable display of the Aurora Borealis on the morning of the 6th January, 1861.
Development of Aurora.
The darkness was so profound as to be oppressive. Suddenly, from the rear of the black cloud which obscured the horizon, flashed a bright ray. Presently an arch of many colours fixed itself across the sky, and the Aurora gradually developed.
Rays changed to glow.
The space within the arch was filled by the black cloud; but its borders brightened steadily, though the rays discharged from it were exceeding capricious, now glaring like a vast conflagration, now beaming like the glow of a summer morn. More and more intense grew the light, until, from irregular bursts, it matured into an almost uniform sheet of radiance. Towards the end of the display its character changed. Lurid fires flung their awful portents across the sky, before which the stars seemed to recede and grow pale.