On the Meteors of 1 3th November, 1 833. 1 65 



V 



the twelve signs, AEB the earth's orbit, S the sun, and E the earth. 

 On the morning of Nov. 13th, the place of the sun was in 21£° of 

 Scorpio, and that of the comet in 23|° of Leo, (as observed at New 

 Haven) being distant from the sun within 2 |° of three signs or 90 de- 

 grees. The line of direction, therefore, as seen from the earth, was 

 very nearly a tangent to the earth's orbit, and consequently coincided 

 nearly with the line of direction in which the earth itself was moving* 

 In other words, the earth was moving almost directly towards the 

 comet. Therefore, S' being the place of the sun among the signs, 

 E' that of the earth, and C that of the comet, join EC, and the 

 comet's place will be in the line EC',* and, as was before shown, 

 very near to E. Let it be at C. 



Now the comet remained apparently at rest, and of course near 

 the line EC 7 for at least two hours. This it could not have done, 

 unless it had been moving in nearly the same direction as the earth, 

 and with nearly the same angular velocity around the sun. For had 

 it been at rest, the earth, moving at the rate of 19 miles per second, 

 would have overtaken it in less than two minutes ; or, had it been 

 moving in the opposite direction, the meeting would have occurred 

 in still less time j or had not the angular velocities of the two bodies 

 been nearly equal, they could not have remained so long stationary 

 with respect to each other. Hence we conclude, (1.) that the body 

 was pursuing its way along with the earth around the sun. 



Taking it for granted that the orbit of the body is elliptical, like the 

 orbits of all the other bodies of the system, we infer that, at the time 

 of observation, it must have been either at its perihelion, or its aphel- 

 ion, otherwise its angular velocity could not have corresponded so 

 nearly to that of the earth. The regular return of the phenomenon, 

 at short periods, indicates that the aphelion, and not the perihelion, is 

 near the orbit of the earth. Another reason will be staled hereafter, 

 which, it is supposed, confirms this conclusion. As the body was very 

 near the earth at the time of observation, it must have been at its 

 aphelion ; and being seen then, only 7{° from the ecliptic, the plane 

 of its orbit must be inclined at a small angle to the plane of the eclip- 

 tic, so that the body itself, if seen at all, will be seen within the zo- 

 diac. From all these considerations we conclude, (2,) that the body 

 revolves around the sun in an elliptical orbit, but little inclined to the 



• 7|° northward of the plane of the ecliptic, as observed at New Haren. 



