Anniversary o/* 1 8 40. 1 't 7 



lamented Lieut. Murphy in Asia, had been received, and placed in 

 the hands of Mr. Baily, for examination and reduction. Since that 

 period, the pendulums themselves have arrived, and Mr. Baily has 

 repeated his experiments on them, for the purpose of comparing the 

 results before and after the voyage, with those made by Lieut. 

 Murphy. A Report on the whole of these experiments, and on 

 their general result, will be made by Mr. Baily, and read to the 

 Society at one of the evening meetings. These pendulums are now 

 entrusted to Capt. James Clark Ross, as already mentioned, for the 

 purpose of making further experiments at such places as he may 

 find it convenient, during his present scientific voyage : and they 

 are thus, for the third time, placed in active operation. 



" As connected with this subject, it may be mentioned that when 

 Mr. Maclear departed for the Cape of Good Hope, to take the 

 superintendence of the Observatory there, he took with him one of 

 Rater's invariable pendulums, that had been previously swung in 

 this country by Mr. Baily. That pendulum has recently been 

 returned to this country, together with a detail of Mr. Maclear's 

 experiments. The whole have been placed in the hands of Mr. 

 Baily, who will, in this case also, report upon the general result. 



" In alluding to the labours of Mr. Maclear at the Cape of Good 

 Hope, the Council may mention also his intention of remeasuring 

 the arc of meridian formerly measured by Lacaille. Already have 

 the stations of Lacaille been satisfactorily identified, and the lati- 

 tudes of the extreme stations been observed, as we have seen by the 

 paper recently read to this Society : and the requisite apparatus has 

 been sent out for finishing what has been so auspiciously begun. 

 Under the direction of this able and zealous astronomer, there is 

 every reason to expect a satisfactory result to so important an 

 operation. 



" The Council have great pleasure in stating that the eleventh 

 volume of the Memoirs of the Society is now in the press, and that 

 considerable progress has been made in the printing. Amongst the 

 papers that will appear therein, is a very valuable catalogue of all 

 the stars that were observed by Mr. Airy during the time that he 

 had the superintendence of the Observatory at Cambridge. Partial 

 lists of those stars had from time to time been printed in the several 

 volumes which annually proceeded from that Observatory ; subject 

 however to a slight correction for reducing them to one and the 

 same equinox. In the catalogue about to appear in our Memoirs, 

 they are all uniformly reduced to the epoch 1830, with the annual 

 precessions annexed ; and are thus immediately available for occa- 

 sional reference and application. This catalogue will be found to 

 fill up many lacuna, and tend to rectify many errors in former cata- 

 logues, arising either from imperfect observation, or from mistakes 

 in transcribing or computing authentic records. It has been found 

 of great assistance in perfecting and enlarging the catalogue which 

 goes under the name of the Catalogue of this Society ; as it contains 

 several stars that had not been observed since the original observa- 

 tions by Hevehus, Flamsteed, and Bradley. With a view to extend 



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