Show WHEN MOON LOSES ITS SILVERY HUE orb of night can assume intense blackness who has seen a black moon some have seen a blue moon but this Is so BO uncommon that its rarity has passed into a proverb of infrequency silvery Is the term that the poets apply to the new moon and golden to the full moon sometimes owing to the heaviness of the air near the horizon the moon may rise or set ing a deep red as if in the scriptural phrase it had turned to blood but when if ever Is the moon black it can only be when its side turned toward the earth is wholly unlighted cd then why not in an eclipse of the moon it then has a deep shade over it but its hue Is coppery and it Is lighted so well that we can even make out its face this thia Is ii due to irradiation through the earths atmosphere the rays of the hidden sun are bent around the solid body of the earth and fall upon the moon which at that time Is always exactly full we shall have to look for some other time if we are to find it lilack black Is there any time when the moon as it looks at us iq 19 wholly unlighted yes just when it is passing from old to now new for then the opposite side of the moon receives all the sunlight and our side none but if it is not lighted how can we see bee it nt at alli all i As a matter of fact we usually can not particularly since it is so near the sun as to be lost in its brightness the moon would surely be black if we could see it but liow how are we ever going to we have only to wait for an eclipse of the sun whether the eclipse be total or partial the blackened part of the sun as it seems to us Is not the sun at all but this very m moon 0 on that we are looking for there la Is no doubt about its blackness the bible compares it to the blackest haircloth kut but no hair or ink or jet was ever so black as this black moon and when the eclipse Is total and this gapit block black ball hangs hana in heaven blotting out the sun one mt must have strong nerves to behold it without a sudden feeling of terror tenor it is a black moon black beyond our wild est imaginings it if once we SOP see it we never shall forget it and we ve shall be fortunate if it does docs n not 0 t haunt our dreams il reams providence jou journal rno |