• The Zodical Light

    There is a singular phenomenon in the sky — one of the most puzzling of all — which has long arrested the attention of astronomers, defying their efforts at explanation, but which probably not one in a hundred, and possibly not one in a thousand, of the readers of this book has ever seen. Yet…

  • Mars

    Two hundred and twenty-six millions of kilometers (140,000,000 miles) from the Sun is the planet Mars, gravitating in an orbit exterior to that which the Earth takes annually round the same center. Unfortunate Mars! What evil fairy presided at his birth? From antiquity, all curses seem to have fallen upon him. He is the god…

  • The Great Comet of 1881

    The finest comets of the last century were those of 1811, 1843, 1858, 1861, 1874, 1880, 1881, and 1882. The Great Comet of 1811, after spreading terror over certain peoples, notably in Russia, became the providence of the vine-growers. As the wine was particularly good and abundant that year, the peasants attributed this happy result…