Darkness of complexion has been attributed to the sun’s power from the
age of Solomon to this day,--“Look not upon me, because I am black,
because the sun hath looked upon me:” and there cannot be a doubt
that, to a certain degree, the opinion is well founded. The invisible
rays in the solar beams, which change vegetable colour, and have been
employed with such remarkable effect in the daguerreotype, act upon
every substance on which they fall, producing mysterious and wonderful
changes in their molecular state, man not excepted.--_Mrs. Somerville._