CELESTIAL APPARITION.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLVII, Issue 139, 14 June 1913, Page 6

CELESTIAL APPARITION.

INCITEMENT IN SYDNEY,

) At a few minutes before ten o'clock ; on Saturday morning, May 17, a re-, \ markable phenomenon was seen in the ! sky. It became visible through the j clouds at a point which was roughly I 40 degrees from the horizon, ancf 40 | degrees north of east. It was circular | in shape, a,nd suggested nothing more ! plainly than a glowing globular ball | suspended in the heavens. Though obscured from time to time by clouds, it reappeared persistently. At times its brightness was so intense that it I could not be gazed at comfortably S without the aid of smoked glasses. ! The Government Astronomer, when j rung up at the Observatory, said that j the heavenly object which had created such excitement was a familiar phenomenon in astronomy, though rarely seen in Sydney in May. It was known to the ancients as Sol or Helios, and was an object of superstitious worship among ancient Persians. An old Ptolemaic theory held that it revolved | round the earth, but the modern Cc~ ! pern ican theory reverses that principle j of rotation. j _ The phenomenon was surveyed curi, iously by many who had never seen j it before, or, if they had ever seen it, had forgotten that it existed.