ASTRONOMY FOR 1889, 1890. 1-^9 



1890, but were unfavorably situated for observation aud escaped de- 

 tection. 



Comets of 1889 and 1890. — W. R. Brooks reported the discovery, on 

 the morning of January 15, 1889, of a faint comet in Sagittarius, and to 

 it the designation Comet a 1889 was given, as the firstcomet discovered 

 during the year. A careful search for the object was made by a num- 

 ber of observers, especially by Barnard and Swift, but without success. 

 As the three observations necessary for determiuing the orbit were not 

 secured, the comet is not catalogued with those of the year. A comet 

 announced by Swift on July 15, 1889, is also omitted, as it proved to be 

 identical with the comet discovered by Brooks on August 7, 1888. 

 (1888 III). 



A phenomenon reported at Grahamstown, South Africa, on the 27th of 

 October,1890,should be mentioned inconnection with thenoteson comets. 

 It was described as a bright band one-fourth of a degree wide and 30° 

 longitude, afterwards increasing to 90°. At one end it looked like the 

 head of a comet, while the other end faded out gradually. Its motion 

 was extraordinary, as it swept over more than 100° in less than .1*^ 15™. 



The comets for the years 1889 and 1890, with their final designations, 

 in the order of perihelion passage are as follows: 

 Comet 1889 I: j The tirst comet of 1889, in the order of perihelion 



= Comet e 1888. [ passage, was that discovered by Barnard at the 

 Lick Observatory with a 4-inch comet-seeker on September 2, 1888, or 

 the morning of September 3. It was also independently discovered by 

 Brooks, at Geneva, New York, on the following morning. At the end 

 of November, and as late as January 4, 1889, it was visible to the naked 

 eye. Perihelion was passed on January 31, 1889, and by that time, 

 the comet disappeared in the sun's rays. The first observations after 

 conjunction were made about May 24, and it was followed till its light 

 was again overpowered by that of the sun, late in October, 1889, its 

 appearance being about the same as before perihelion, small, rouud, 

 quite bright, and with a short tail. The orbit seems to be hyperbolic. 



Barnard remarked on June 3 that there was an anomalous tail directly 

 following the comet, about 1° in length aud some 2' or '6' broad, a phe- 

 nomenon which, according to Bredichin, was probably an eflect of per- 

 spective. 



The comet was observed again at the Lick Observatory b\^ Barnard 

 August 17, 1890, although its distances from the earth and sun were 

 then, respectively, G.O and 6.5 in terms of the earth's mean distance. 

 The later observations confirm the hyperbolic character of the orbit. 

 Comet 1889 II : | On the evening of March 31, 1889, E. E. Barnard 



= Comet b 1889. j discovered, with the 12- inch equatorial of the Lick 



Observatory, a very small and slender comet, with a tail 15' long. By 

 the end of April it was lost in the evening twilight, reappearing again, 

 with extremely slow geocentric motion, about July 25, and remaining 

 visible to November 21. The great perihelion distance of this comet is 



