The Daily Dispatch: September 19, 1861., [Electronic resource]

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The comet and the earth in Contact.

--We read that Professor Hind, the celebrated English astronomer, says that on the 30th of June, the earth, probably passed through the tail of the comet, at a distance of perhaps two thirds of its length from the nucleus. Two days previously, the head of the comet was in the ecliptic, distant from the earth's orbit only 13,800,000 miles, and the earth, according to his calculations, would encounter the tail on the day named. A peculiar illumination of the Northern sky on the evening of the 30th June, supposed to proceed from an Aurora glare was observed both in, England and the United States, and goes for, in the absence of scientific calculations to confirm this theory The result will be looked for with interest as betting at rest the vulgar fear of a collision between the earth and a comet, and proving that the latter is composed of gases far more ten ours than our atmosphere.