OP ARTS AND SCIENCES. '61d 



XX. 



OBSERVATIONS OF VARIABLE STARS IN 1885. 

 By Edward C. Pickering. 



Communicated February 10, 1886. 



The present publication is the third iu a series of annual statements 

 relating to variable stars, which was begun in 1884. The value of these 

 statements mainly depends upon their completeness, and it is therefore 

 to be hoped that all observers of variable stars will send accounts of 

 their work to the Observatory of Harvard College as soon as possible 

 after the close of each year. The principal facts desired are the desig- 

 nations of the stars observed, and the number of nights on which each of 

 them was examined. But brief statements of the results obtained, such 

 as the times of maxima and minima, are also desirable, when they can 

 be readily furnished. Information with regard to the instruments em- 

 ployed and the method of observation will likewise be very serviceable. 

 The evident need of a new catalogue of variable stars has occasioned 

 some preparations for such a list to be made, and the question of pub- 

 lishing it iu the Astronomische Naclirichten has been dit^cussed by 

 correspondence with Dr. Kriiger, the editor of that periodical. It is, 

 however, desirable that the catalogue, when published, should have a 

 definite and authoritative character, so that it appears best to avoid 

 premature action with regarJ to it. Meanwhile, it has been decided to 

 make no addition to the list of known variables published in the article 

 entitled " Recent Observations of Variable Stars," although some stars 

 not belonging to that list are now certainly known to be variable. In 

 the present publication such stars are therefore still mentioned in con- 

 nection with suspected variables. Several stars included in the origi- 

 nal list are not there designated by the letters which have at times 

 been applied to them, and it has been decided not to make any change 

 in this respect f )r the present, in order to avoid the possibility of con- 

 fusion. Observers are therefore requested to give the right ascensions 

 and declinations of all stars mentioned in their statements, unless they 

 can be designated by the numbers given in the first columns of Tables 

 I. and II. in "Recent Observations of Variable Stars." 



