Note 11 — Chapter V · THE SUN.

The maximum duration of totality, under every favouring circumstance, appears to be about 8 minutes. The great eclipse which occurred on August 18, 1868, maintained the total phase for nearly 6 minutes 50 seconds in the Gulf of Siam. In reference to this eclipse, Dr. Weiss says:—“In the records of ancient eclipses there are to be found only two which may be compared in size with that of August 18, 1868, but none in which the totality lasted so long. The first of these is the eclipse of Thales (28 May, 585 B.C.), which is said to have been the first predicted, and to have terminated a bloody war between the Lydians and the Medes. The second was visible on June 17, 1433, in Scotland, and the time of its occurrence was long remembered by the people of that country as ‘the black hour.’”