Mr. Swainson[95] shows that this notion is common on the Continent. Thus, at Milan the proverb runs, “If the morn be red, rain is at hand.”
Shakespeare, in “Richard II.” (ii. 4), alludes to another indication of rain:
“Thy sun sets weeping in the lowly west,
Witnessing storms to come, woe and unrest.”
A “watery sunset” is still considered by many a forerunner of wet. A red sunset, on the other hand, beautifully described in “Richard III.” (v. 3)—
“The weary sun hath made a golden set.”—
is universally regarded as a prognostication of fine weather, and we find countless proverbs illustrative of this notion, one of the most popular being, “Sky red at night, is the sailor’s delight.”
From the earliest times an eclipse of the sun was looked upon as an omen of coming calamity; and was oftentimes the source of extraordinary alarm as well as the occasion of various superstitious ceremonies. In 1597, during an eclipse of the sun, it is stated that, at Edinburgh, men and women thought the day of judgment was come.[96] Many women swooned, much crying was heard in the streets, and in fear some ran to the kirk to pray. Mr. Napier says he remembers “an eclipse about 1818, when about three parts of the sun was covered. The alarm in the village was very great, indoor work was suspended for the time, and in several families prayers were offered for protection, believing that it portended some awful calamity; but when it passed off there was a general feeling of relief.” In “King Lear” (i. 2), Gloucester remarks: “These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent effects; love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide; in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked ’twixt son and father.” Othello, too (v. 2), in his agony and despair, exclaims:
“O heavy hour!
Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse
Of sun and moon, and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration.”
Francis Bernier[97] says that, in France, in 1654, at an eclipse of the sun, “some bought drugs against the eclipse, others kept themselves close in the dark in their caves and their well-closed chambers, others cast themselves in great multitudes into the churches; those apprehending some malign and dangerous influence, and these believing that they were come to the last day, and that the eclipse would shake the foundations of nature.”[98]
In “3 Henry VI.” (ii. 1), Shakespeare refers to a curious circumstance in which, on a certain occasion, the sun is reported to have appeared like three suns. Edward says, “do I see three suns?” to which Richard replies: