Royal Astronomical Society. 217 



any accurate observations. Several hundreds of meteors must have 

 occurred during the three hours and a half to which I allude ; the 

 clouds then closing the sky, I gave up observation. The meteors 

 were small and very white, and generally left long trains behind 

 them : one meteor had a contrary direction, it was larger than the 

 rest, and moved slowly across the zenith towards the S.E. I am 

 most decidedly of opinion that this phaenomenon is altogether atmo- 

 spherical and connected with electrical changes ; nor does their mo- 

 tion, in the apparent direction of the magnetic poles, at all militate 

 against this hypothesis of their electrical origin. A few occurred 

 last 10th of August, during a disturbed state of the atmospheric 

 electricity ; and I saw three on the 20th of December." 



On the Variability of A Tauri, By Mr. Baxendell. 



" On the night of the 6th instant I observed that the star A Tauri 

 was decidedly less bright than usual, being barely equal to v, a little 

 less bright than y, and decidedly below o and ^ ; whilst on the pre- 

 vious night I had noted it down as being a little brighter than o and 

 ^, and decidedly above y and v, and in all my former observations I 

 had invariably placed it above y. On the following night (the 7th) 

 it had nearly recovered its usual lustre, being decidedly brighter 

 than y, above y, and equal to o and ^. A short time previous to the 

 6th instant I had remarked that my former observations of the stars 

 0, 0, and A Tauri exhibited discordances which rendered it impossible 

 to fix with certainty the order in which these stars ought to be 

 placed. After the observations on the nights of the 6th and 7th 

 instant, there could be no doubt that these discordances were mainly, 

 if not wholly, due to the variability of A ; and on carefully re-ex- 

 amining all my observations of this star, I was led to infer that its 

 changes were accomplished in a period of only about four days. I 

 therefore continued to watch it very closely, and on the night of the 

 10th instant had the satisfaction of again observing it reduced to an 

 equality with v. As, however, the presence of the moon on that 

 night might be supposed to have interfered with the estimations, L 

 have continued ray observations regularly since ; and having observed 

 A decidedly reduced in brightness on the nights of the 14th, 18th, 

 and 22nd instant, I can no longer have any hesitation in concluding 

 that this star belongs to the list of variable stars of short period, 

 being, in fact, the next in order after /3 Persei, the period of which 

 is the shortest yet known." 



Dr. Gerling, of Marburg, published (Astron. Nach. 502) an ac- 

 count of a method for determining the parallax of the sun by obser- 

 vations on Venus and Mars M'hen nearest the earth, and requested 

 the co-operation of American astronomers. Lieut. Gilliss, having 

 satisfied himself that the method was feasible, volunteered his ser- 

 vices to the American government to carry Dr. Gerling's proposal 

 into effect, and the expedition is now preparing. 



Lieut. Gilliss is to place himself in the most suitable station he can 

 find on the coast of Chili, where he is to make meridian and extra- 

 meridian observations of both planets, at the proper times, in cor-, 



