When the earth is at the full,
which is their midnight, it is also a season of great festivity with them.
_Eclipses of the sun_ are as common with the Lunarians as those of the
moon are with us--the same relative position of the three bodies producing
this phenomenon; but an _eclipse of the earth_ never takes place, as
the shadow of the moon passes over the broad disc of our planet, merely as
a dark spot.
The inhabitants of the moon can always determine both their latitude and
longitude, by observing the quarter of the heavens in which the earth is
seen: and, as the sun invariably appears of the same altitude at their
noon, the inhabitants are denominated and classed according to the length
of their shadows; and the terms _long shadow_, or _short shadow_, are
common forms of national reproach among them, according to the relative
position of the parties. I found the climate of those whose shadows are
about the length of their own figure, the most agreeably to my own
feelings, and most like that of my own country.
Such are the most striking natural appearances on one side of this
satellite. On the other there is some difference. The sun pursues the same
path in the corresponding latitudes of both hemispheres; but being without
any moon, they have a dull and dreary night, though the light from the
stars is much greater than with us. The science of astronomy is much
cultivated by the inhabitants of the dark hemisphere, and is indebted to
them for its most important discoveries, and its present high state of
improvement.
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