3-000-217 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Eclipse of the Sun on July 18 in Spain - Baily's Beads as seen with an inverting telescope - from a sketch by our special artist, 1860. 'About three minutes before the totality commenced, and when the crescent of the sun had decreased to the naked eye to an almost insensible thread of light, the telescopic observer perceived that the part of the solar disc which remained was broken. This was the beginning of the so-called "Baily Beads," and a few seconds or so afterwards this phenomenon (if phenomenon it may be called, which had nothing wonderful in itself, and which arose altogether, as all the observers present came to the conclusion, from the irregularities of the edge of the moon) the portion of the sunlight visible was observed to be broken up into three or four fragments. These constantly kept changing, both in number and magnitude, until the sun was totally obscured'. From "Illustrated London News", 1860.