" Now I perceived us involved in total darkness and palpable, as I may aptly call. it; though it came quick, yet I was so in tent that I could perceive its steps, and feel it as it were drop upon us, and fall on the right shoulder (we looking west ward) like a great dark mantle or cover let of a bed thrown over us, or like the drawing of a curtain on that side ; and the horses we held in our hands were very sensible of it, and crouded close to us, startling with great surprise ; as much as I could see of the men's faces that stood by me had a horrible aspect ; at this instant I looked around me, not without exclamations of admiration, and could discern colours in the heavens, but the earth had lost its blue, and was wholly black; for some time among the clouds there was visible streaks of rays, tending to the place of the sun as their centre ; but immediately after, the whole appearance of earth and sky was entirely black : of all things I ever saw in my life, or can by imagination fancy, it was a sight the most tremendous.
"Toward the north-west, whence the eclipse came, I could not in the least find any distinction in the horizon between heaven and earth, for a good breadth of about 60 degrees or more ; nor the town of Amsbury underneath us, nor scarce the ground we trod on : I turned myself round several times during this total. darkness, and remarked at a good dis tance from the west, on both sides, that is to the north and south, the horizon very perfect : the earth being black, the. lower part of the heavens light ; for the darkness above hung over us like a ca nopy, almost reaching the horizon in those parts, or as if made with skirts of a lighter colour ; so that the upper edges, of all the hills were as a black line, and I knew them very distinctly by their shape or profile ; and northward I saw perfectly that the interval of light and darkness in the horizon was between Martinsal hill and St. Ann's hill; but southward it was more indefinite : I do not mean that the verge of the shadow passed between those hills, which were but 12 miles distant from us : but so far I could distinguish the horizon, beyond it not at : the reason of it is this : the elevation of ground I was upon gave me an opportunity of see ing the light of the heavens beyond the shadow : neverthe less, this verge of light looked of a dead, yellowish, and greenish colour ; it was broader to the north than south, but the southern was of a tawny colour ; at this time, behind us, or eastward toward Lon don, it was dark too, where otherwise I could see the hills beyond Andover ; for the foremost end of the shadow was past thither ; so that the whole horizon was now divided into four parts, of unequal bulk and degrees of light and dark ; the part to the north-west broadest and blackest, to the south-west lightest and longest. All the change I could per ceive during the totality was, that the horizon by degrees drew into two parts, light and dark ; the northern hemisphere growing still longer, lighter, and broad er; and the two opposite dark parts uniting into one, and swallowing up the southern enlightened part.
" As at the beginning the shade came feelingly upon our right shoulders, so now the light from the north, where it opened as it were : though I could dis cern no defined light or shade upon the earth that way, which I earnestly watch ed for, yet it was manifestly by degrees, and with oscillations, going back a little and quickly advancing further ; till at length, upon the first lucid point appear ing in the heavens where the sun was, I could distinguish pretty plainly a rim of light running along side of us a good while together, or sweeping by at our elbows from west to east; just then hav ing good reason to suppose the totality ended with us, I looked on my watch, and found it to be full three minutes and a half more. Now the hill tops changed
their black into blue again, andI could distinguish a horizon wbere the centre of darkness was before : the men cried out they saw the copped hill again, which they had eagerly looked for ; but still it continued dark to the south-east, yet I cannot say that ever the horizon that way was undistinguishable ; immediately we heard the larks chirping, and singing very briskly, for joy of the restored lu minary, after all things had been hushed into a most profound and universal silence. The heavens and earth now appeared exactly like morning before sun-rise, of a greyish cast, but rather more blue interspersed ; and the earth, so far as the verge of the hill reached, was of a dark green or russet colour.
"As soon as the sun emerged, the clouds grew thicker, and the light was very little amended for a minute or more, like a cloudy morning slowly advancing. After about the middle of the totality, and so after the immersion of the sun, we saw Venus very plainly, but no other star. Salisbury steeple now appeared. The clouds never removed, so that we could take no account of it afterward, but in the evening it lightened very much. I basted home to write this let ter ; and the impression was so vivid upon my mind, that I am sure I could for some days after have wrote the same account of it, and very precisely. Afteit supper I made a drawing of it from my imagination, upon the same paper I had taken a prospect of the country before.
"I must confess to you, that I was (I believe) the only person in England that regretted not the cloudiness of the day,. which added so much to the solemnity of the sight, and which incomparably ex ceeded, in my apprehension, that of 1715, which I saw very perfectly from the top of Boston steeple, in Lincoln shire, where the air was very clear ; but the night of this was more complete and'i dreadful: there, indeed, I saw both sides of the shadow come from a great dis- ! tance, and pass beyond us to a great di* *41 tance; but this eclipse had much more of .° variety and majestic terror ; so that I cannot but felicitate myself upon the op. portunity of seeing these two rare acci dents of nature in so different a manner : yet I should willingly have lost this pleasure for your more valuable advan tage of perfecting the noble theory of the celestial bodies, which last time you gave the world so nice a calculation of; and wish the sky had now as much fa voured us for an addition to your honour and great skill, which I doubt not to be as exact in this as before."