Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
shadow of the mountain I observed a bright light over one part of the ridge, and soon after,
what seemed a fire of remarkable whiteness on the very summit of the hill. I called the at-
tention of my men to it, and they too thought it merely a fire; but a few minutes afterwards,
as we got farther off shore, the light rose clear up above the ridge of the hill, and some faint
clouds clearing away from it, discovered the magnificent comet which was at the same time
astonishing all Europe. The nucleus presented to the naked eye a distinct disc of brilliant
white light, from which the tail rose at an angle of about 30° or 35° with the horizon,
curving slightly downwards, and terminating in a broad brush of faint light, the curvature of
which diminished till it was nearly straight at the end. The portion of the tail next the comet
appeared three or four times as bright as the most luminous portion of the Milky Way, and
what struck me as a singular feature was that its upper margin, from the nucleus to very near
the extremity, was clearly and almost sharply defined, while the lower side gradually shaded
off into obscurity. Directly it rose above the ridge of the hill, I said to my men, 'See, it's not
a fire, it's a bintang ber-ekor' ('tailed-star,' the Malay idiom for a comet). 'So it is,' said
they; and all declared that they had often heard tell of such, but had never seen one till now.
I had no telescope with me, nor any instrument at hand, but I estimated the length of the tail
at about 20°, and the width, towards the extremity, about 4° or 5°.
The whole of the next day we were obliged to stop near the village of Tidore, owing to a
strong wind right in our teeth. The country was all cultivated, and I in vain searched for any
insects worth capturing. One of my men went out to shoot, but returned home without a
single bird. At sunset, the wind having dropped, we quitted Tidore, and reached the next is-
land, Mareh, where we stayed till morning. The comet was again visible, but not nearly so
brilliant, being partly obscured by clouds, and dimmed by the light of the new moon. We
then rowed across to the island of Motir, which is so surrounded with coral-reefs that it is
dangerous to approach. These are perfectly flat, and are only covered at high water, ending
in craggy vertical walls of coral in very deep water. When there is a little wind, it is danger-
ous to come near these rocks; but luckily it was quite smooth, so we moored to their edge,
while the men crawled over the reef to the land, to make a fire and cook our dinner—the
boat having no accommodation for more than heating water for my morning and evening
coffee. We then rowed along the edge of the reef to the end of the island, and were glad to
get a nice westerly breeze, which carried us over the strait to the island of Makian, where we
arrived about 8
P.M.
The sky was quite clear, and though the moon shone brightly, the comet
appeared with quite as much splendour as when we first saw it.
The coasts of these small islands are very different according to their geological forma-
tion. The volcanoes, active or extinct, have steep black beaches of volcanic sand, or are
