AN ECLIPSE IN MESOPOTAMIA.
[To THE EDITOR or THE SPECTATOR:1
think you might like to read the enclosed brief description of a lunar eclipse in Mesopotamia. It is taken from a friend's letter, and though it was not written for publication, it seems to are to have a charming torch.—I am, Sir, Sc., " I don't know whether it is a scientific truth, but it's undoubtedly in accordance with facts, full-moon eights are by far the hottest and the stillest. Two nights ago I was completely defeated. 1 tried to work sitting outside in my garden after dinner, but after half-an-hour the few clothes I was wearing were wringing sect, and I so much exhausted by a clay similarly spent that I went to bed helplessly and fell asleep of once on my roof. I hadn't been asleep long when I woke 11p to find the Great Bear staring me in the fere. (I lie looking North.) It was very strange to see the Great Bear shining so brilliantly in the full moon of Rannulhan, and while I wondered, half asleep, what had happened realized that the whole world was dark, and turning round saw the last limb of the moon disappearing in a total eclipse. So I lay watching it—a 'wonderful sight, the disc just visible, a dull and angry copper colour. In the bazaar a few hundred yards away every one was drumming with sticks on anything that lay handy, to scare away the devil which eta the moon. And indeed they ultimately succeeded, for after a long, long time the upper limb of the moan reappeared, and thedevil (- drew slowly down-
ards, angry still, with deep red tongues. and wreaths projecting from his copper-coloured body, and before I lincl time to sleep again the Rarettaban moon bad ORES more extinguished the shining of the Bear. But as for people who read of these things in their almanacs and know to a minute when to expect them, I think mailing of them and their educated sensations."
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