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THE GUIDE T< > WVTURE 



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The Need of an Astronomical 

 Observatory. 



As remarked by an astronomer and 

 published in a New York city newspa- 

 per, the wise and otherwise statements 

 and exploitations, mostly sensational, 

 i >t~ 1 1 alley's comet served one good pur- 

 pose. The visitor that comes only 

 once in seventy-five years reminded us 

 at his recent call of the need of an 

 astronomical observatory for this sec- 

 tion of the country. This need was 

 made manifest not chiefly for the study 

 of the visitor, but as the outcome of a 

 renewal of general interest in astro- 

 nomical observation. 



Almost incredible it is, there is not 

 even a medium sized observatory in or 

 near New York City. San Francisco 

 and the smaller cities and villages of 

 California have their Lick Observa- 

 tory on Mount Hamilton, hardly re- 

 mote from their "suburbs"; Chicago 

 and other places of the Middle West 

 have their Yerkes at Williams Bay, 

 Wisconsin — only a short run on the 

 train out from the glare and smoke of 

 the city. 



The hills north of So'ind Beach are 

 an ideal location for an observatory in 

 this section of the country. They are 

 just the right distance from New r York, 

 and within convenient access from sev- 

 eral coast cities and villages, and eas- 

 ily reached by one of the best railroads 

 in the country. Think of it. There is 

 no other location in the eastern United 

 States so well adapted to this purpose 

 nor so convenient to millions of people. 



Logically such an institution should 

 be under the management and care of 

 The Agassiz Association — the oldest 

 and largest organization in existence 

 for popularizing a study of every 

 department of nature. 



Such an observatorv need not be so 



large as the Lick or the Yerkes, per- 

 haps not even one fourth as large, be- 

 cause its work would quite properly 

 be, in this thickly settled part of the 

 country, more for general information 

 — popularizing and educational rather 

 than for original research. 



The Heavens in July. 



BY PROF. ALFRED MITCHELL, OF COLUMBIA 

 UNIVERSITY. 



To most people, Halley's comet was 

 a big disappointment. The much ad- 

 vertised heavenly visitor has come and 

 gone no more to be seen to the naked 

 eye for three-quarters of a century. 

 When it was discovered last Septem- 

 ber, we read articles in newspaper and 

 magazine of the wonderful accuracy of 

 astronomical prediction, and the keen 

 searching powers of the photographic 

 plate. As the comet got brighter, we 

 learned its history, with all the details 

 of Halley's interesting calculations 

 there, on back to the year 240 B. C, and 

 up to the present with fact and theory 

 interwoven. So much was written by 

 such a variety of persons, that the gen- 

 eral public expected a wonderful object 

 with a head almost as big as the 

 moon, and a brilliant tail streaming 

 far across the sky. Those who had 

 never before seen a comet looked for 

 such a sight — but it was not to be. 



Those who had looked carefully into 

 the subject did not expect as fine a 

 comet as that of 1882, which was less 

 bright than the comets of 1861 and 

 1858. To the trained astronomer who 

 had watched the comet grow from a 

 tiny hazy star visible only in the great- 

 est telescope to the fine spectacle we 

 saw in the morning and evening skies, 

 the comet was a remarkable object. 

 But even he was a little disappointed, 

 for the tail, though long, was always 



