CORRESPONDENCE ON ASTRONOMICAL ANNOUNCEMENTS. 61 



Thus, taking the example in the Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections 

 referred to, it might read : 



^' Planet twenty three thirty five ten north, &c.," i. e., in 231" 35™ 10» 

 of right ascension, &c." 



Besides the convenience to observers, also consideration ought to be 

 had to the telegraph companies that convey messages free of charge. 

 The first application to the Atlantic Cable Company and which was 

 granted, was made, I remember, for about 10 words in each dispatch 

 and for 12 dispatches as a maximum in the year. When, of late, both 

 of these figures usually have been transgressed we owe the more thanks 

 to the liberality of the company silently acquiescing. But this should be 

 the more reason to use the privilege granted with modesty; (Professor 

 Tietjen proposed even that a second dispatch after 3 or 4 days follow the 

 first;) and I believe the form stated in the Smithsonian programme (with 

 the slight modification now suggested above) as precise and as complete 

 as can be desired. 



Permit me, dear sir, to take this occasion for reiterating the assurance 

 of the gratitude the astronomical world bears towards the Smithsonian 

 Institution for the acceleration of intercourse— and believe me, &c., &c., 



C. H. F. Peters. 



Letter from the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, November 26, 

 1879, to Mr. W. H. M. Christie of the Royal Observatory, Greemciih. 



Dear Sir: In answer to your esteemed favor of October 15 we beg 

 to say that by the original programme adopted by telegraphic announce- 

 ments of astronomical discoveries, the position given in the dispatch is 

 understood to be that for the midnight following the date, Washington 

 time for American and Greenwich for European discoveries. This 

 seemed to us to render it unnecessary to state local time of discovery. 

 We however referred the matter to Professor Peters, who takes the 

 same view as ourselves. 



Very respectfully, 



S. F. Baird. 



Letter from the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, December 22, 1879, to the 

 Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 



Sir: With reference to your letter of November 26 respecting tele- 

 graphic announcements of discoveries the Astronomer Koyal requests 

 me to say that there seems to have been a little misapprehension as to 

 what he desired. 



Our diflSculty has arisen from the frequent absence of any data what- 

 ever on the telegram, and even where this is given from an ambiguity 

 as to whether civil or astronomical reckoning is intended. (This am- 

 biguity occurred in the last two telegrams respecting comets discovered 

 by Lewis Swift— in the last the position given appears to have referred 



