The vast extension of the equatorial wings of
the corona in 1878 gave apparent support to this hypothesis; if the
substance of the corona could extend ten million miles from the sun,
why might it not extend even one hundred million, gradually fading out
beyond the orbit of the earth? A variation of this hypothesis assumes
that the reflection is due to swarms of meteors circling about the
sun, in the plane of its equator, all the way from its immediate
neighborhood to a distance exceeding that of the earth. But in neither
form is the hypothesis satisfactory; there is nothing in the
appearance of the corona to indicate that it extends even as far as
the planet Mercury, while as to meteors, the orbits of the known
swarms do not accord with the hypothesis, and we have no reason to
believe that clouds of others exist traveling in the part of space
where they would have to be in order to answer the requirements of the
theory. The extension of the corona in 1878 did not resemble in its
texture the Zodiacal Light.
Now, it has so often happened in the history of science that an
important discovery in one branch has thrown unexpected but most
welcome light upon some pending problem in some other branch, that a
strong argument might be based upon that fact alone against the too
exclusive devotion of many investigators to the narrow lines of their
own particular specialty; and the Zodiacal Light affords a case in
point, when it is considered in connection with recent discoveries in
chemistry and physics.
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