Extracts from the 1993 Centenary Tyndall Lecture

Extracts are presented from this lecture, entitled `On rainbows, their congeners, colours and applications', which was delivered at the University of Central Lancashire, Preston, on 2 December 1993. The article reworks the classic 1884 lecture by the `Poet of Science' by Interweaving some modern work on rainbows, including the author's instrumental development of the rainbow analyser, and giving details of Tyndall's career and contributions to nephelometry and colour theory.