444 SCIENTIFIC RECORD FOR 1885. 



provements consist in engraved type on the face of the wheels in place 

 of the rubber ones used at first, and of the substitution of a direct blow 

 by an electro-magnet upon the type wheel fillet, thus making the appa- 

 ratus much more light and comjDact than the old form. The mean of 

 the seconds and hundredths may be taken directly on the fillet without 

 transference to books. Professor Hough states that the instrument has 

 proved perfectly reliable. 



Flexure of transit instruments. — At the same meeting of the American 

 Association a paper was presented by Professor Harkness on the gen- 

 eral subject of the flexure of transit instruments. Professor Harkness's 

 thorough investigation of this subject has just been published as Ap- 

 pendix III to the "Washington Observations" for 1882. 



Optical works of Feil & Mantois. — We learn from L' Astronomie that 

 M. Charles Feil has, after some years' absence, returned to the active 

 management of his celebrated manufactory of optical glass in Paris, the 

 new firm beiug "Feil pere et Mantois." M. Feil is grandson of M. Gui- 

 naudjthe founder of the house in 1827. The new firm succeeded in ob- 

 taining a crown disk of the requisite size for the Lick 3G-inch glass, 

 having already furnished to MM. Henry the disk for the 30-inch objec- 

 tive for the Nice Observatory. 



Micrometer. — Mr. Chandler contributes to vohime 11 of the Memoirs 

 of the American Academy a valuable paper on the "Square-bar mi- 

 crometer. " 



MISCELLANEOUS. < 



Astronomical prizes. — The Lalande prize of the Paris Academic des 

 Sciences has been decreed to M. Thollon for his great map of the solar 

 spectrum. This map, which has so far demanded four years of uninter- 

 rupted work, extends from A to &, and contains 3,200 lines, 900 of which 

 M. Thollon has been able to identify as of telluric origin. The Damoi- 

 seau prize is reserved, no memoir liaving been offered for it. The sub- 

 ject proposed is the same as in former years — a revision of the theory 

 of the satellites of Jupiter, a discussion of observations with special 

 reference to the direct determination of the velocity of light, and 

 lastly, the construction of particular tables for each satellite. The 

 Valz prize has been awarded to Dr. Sporer for his researches on sun 

 spots, his discovery of the striking relationship between the distribu- 

 tion of the spots in latitude and the epochs of their maxima and minima 

 receiving special notice. {Nature.) 



The award of the Draper medal, made for the first time, was most 

 appropriately bestowed on Prof. S. P. Langley, of Allegheny, for his re- 

 searches and discoveries in solar radiation. 



The Warner prizes awarded in 1885 were two, of $200 each, to Mr. 

 E. E. Barnard, for the discovery of Comet 1885 II, and Comet e 1885, 

 and two, of $200 each, to Mr. W. R. Brooks, for the discovery of Comets 

 1885 III, and 1885 V. Mr. Warner has just given four prizes, aggre- 



