RECORD OF SCIENCE FOR 1887 AND 1888. 

 ASTRONOMY FOR 1887, 1888. 



By William C. Winlock. 



The following record of the progress of AstroDomy duriug the years 

 1887 aud 1888 is presented in essentially the form adopted by Professor 

 Holden in 1879. It is thought tliat this form is most suitable for an 

 annual record, as it furnishes a series of reference notes for those espe- 

 cially interested in the study of astronomy, and at the same time a con- 

 densed review for the general reader. 



The writer has made free nse of reviews and abstracts which have 

 appeared in the Bulletin Astronoinique, the Observatory, Nature, the 

 Atheneeum, and other periodicals. 



COSMOGONY. 



Dr. Carl Braun, S. J., formerly director of the Kalocsa Observatory, 

 has collected in a book of 167 pages a series of essays, first published 

 in the Catholic periodical Xatur und Offenbarung in 1885-'80, in which 

 he enters into a scientilic di.scussion of the evolution of the universe, 

 more particularly the formation of the sun aud planets. His theory 

 demands a structureless, motionless, tenuous nebula, its particles en- 

 dowed with gravity and atomic re[)ulsion. Such a nebula, if perfectly 

 homogeneous, should give birth to one portentous solitary sun. But, 

 in point of fact, it would possess innumerable, almost imperceptible, 

 local irregularities, which, forming so many ceuters of attraction, would 

 eventiuUly lead to the breaking up of the nebula into a vast multitude 

 of separate fragments. On one of these, the destined progenitor of the 

 solar system, we are asked to concentrate our attention. The manner 

 of its develoi)ment is, however, a widt-ly diiferent one from that traced 

 by Laplace, who assumed the needful rotation and left the rest to work 

 itself out' spontaneously. Dr. Braun, on the other hand, assumes less 

 to begin with, but invokes adventitious aid in emergencies. He ascribes 

 the rotation of the original solar nebula to the impact of masses drawn 

 in from the depths of space, comet-like projectiles, endowed with energy 

 external to the system. These masses would aflect the outer shell cou- 



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