1824.] Astronomical Society. 389 



The meetings of the Zoological Club, at which all the mem- 

 bers of the Linnean Society are entitled to be present, are held 

 at the Society's apartments in Soho Square, at eight o'clock in 

 the evening, on the second and fourth Tuesdays of every month 

 throughout the year. 



ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY. 



March 12.— The papers read at this meeting of the Society 

 were as follows : 



A letter from Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor of New South 

 Wales, to F. Baily, Esq. accompanied by Mr. Runiker's obser- 

 vations of the Summer Solstice 1823 at Paramatta; the results 

 of which are : 



For the mean obliquity of the Ecliptic. 23° 27' 44-39" 



For the latitude of the place of observation. ..33 48 42-61 



Also the mean of twelve months' meteorological observations 

 made at Paramatta between May, 1822, and May, 1823. 



A letter from Prof. Schumacher, of Altona, including Mr. 

 Hanson's computations of the elements of the comet of 1823, 

 1824, from observations made in the month of Jan. 1824. 



Two letters from Mr. Taylor, jun. of the Royal Observatory, 

 Greenwich ; the first containing the elements of the same comet 

 as computed by himself from the Greenwich observations of 

 January, 1824, using Boscovich's method ; and the second, a 

 comparison of anticipatory ephemerides of the places of this 

 comet, from the elements computed severally by Schumacher, 

 Carlini, Dr. Brinkley, and himself, with the Greenwich obser- 

 vations. 



On the Rectification of the Equatorial, by J. F. Littrow, 

 Director of the Imperial Observatory at Vienna. In this paper 

 the author directs his attention to those errors only which de- 

 pend upon the placing and use of the instrument, which the 

 observer himself must either be able to obviate or allow for ; 

 and he therefore enumerates the greater part of them, and 

 points out means for their rectification. 



On the Utility and probable Accuracy of the Method of deter- 

 mining the Sun's Parallax, by observations on the planet Mars 

 near his opposition ; by Mr. Henry Atkinson, of Newcastle- 

 upon-Tyne. In this paper the author shows, that in a series of 

 observations on Mars, taken with good instruments used in 

 north and south latitudes, the probability of error is very small ; 

 and as the synodical revolution of Mars takes place in about 

 780 days, that planet will be 23 times in opposition before the 

 next transit of Venus on the 8th Dec. 1874. Hence he infers, 

 that if careful corresponding observations are made on each of 

 those 23 oppositions, the probable error would be reduced nearly 

 4-790 times. The author concludes his paper by describing 



