ASTRONOMICAL PHENOMENA AND PROGRESS. 



fire-ball seen in England, Ireland, and Wales, 

 on the evening of November 23, 1877, at 8 ht 

 24 m -, G. M. T. The radiant of this meteor was 

 in R. A. 62, N. dec). 21 ; height when first 

 saen, 96 miles; first explosion at mid-course, 

 exactly over Liverpool, at a height of 46 miles ; 

 length of visible path, 133 miles ; time of flight, 

 8 saconds nearly ; velocity, 17 miles per sec- 

 ond; final explosion over the Irish Sea, at an 

 elevation of 14 miles. A bright streak 40 miles 

 in length and nearly half a mile in diameter 

 remained visible for several seconds over the 

 latter part of the path. " All that was left after 

 the explosion settled slowly downward, perhaps 

 for a mile, before becoming invisible, which 

 would indicate that it was of the nature of an 

 impalpable powder." The plane of the meteor's 

 motion was nearly coincident with that of the 

 ecliptic. Oapt. Tapman remarks that this fire- 

 ball undoubtedly belonged to a meteor stream 

 previously known, whose radiant is in Taurus, 

 and that the orbit is near that of the comet of 

 1702. 



The disappearance of the meteor was fol- 

 lowed by the most violent detonation. " The 

 explosion of a 13-inch bomb-shell, consisting 

 of some 200 pounds of iron, would not have 

 produced a sound of one hundredth part of the 

 intensity of the meteor explosion. This proves 

 that it was of considerable mass compared to 

 an ordinary shell. A difficult question remains 

 to be answered. How is it conceivable that 

 such a mass of heavy matter can be reduced to 

 impalpable powder in five or six seconds ? All 

 these bodies must be heavy to retain their 

 planetary velocities after impact with the at- 

 mosphere in the way they do." 



Several other large meteors were seen on 

 the same evening, their paths, or at least some 

 of them, radiating from the same point in the 

 constellation Taurus. Oapt. Tupman thus con- 

 cludes his interesting paper : 



Th.3 frequency of large detonating meteors about 

 November 21st-23d was long ago pointed out by Mr. 

 E. P. Greg and Prof. A. S. Herschel, but the exact 

 determination of the radiant point or of their real 

 heights has seldom been possible. It is satisfactory 

 to have secured one of them so well. From the in- 

 vestigations of Prof. II. A. Newton of Yale Univer- 

 sity, the great detonating meteor of November 20, 

 1877, in the United States, proceeded from the radi- 

 ant near Gamma Cassiopeia, found by Prof. Herschel 

 for a detonating meteor on the same night in 1864. 

 It is evident, therefore, that there are two streams, 

 perfectly distinct, crossing the earth's orbit in the 

 place it occupies about November 20th-23d, and both 

 yielding very large detonating meteors. 



In " Nature " for February 28, 1878, Mr. H. 

 Hatfield describes a meteor seen by himself on 

 the morning of February 18th, at 12 h - 47 m \ Its 

 brilliancy surpassed that of the moon then 

 full. 



In the "Science Observer 1 ' for April, Mr. 

 E. F. Sawyer describes a meteor observed at 

 Boston on the 31st of March, at 7 h> 54 m -. It 

 moved very slowly over an arc of eight de- 

 grees, and its apparent diameter was one 



third that of the moon. The same fire-ball 

 was seen at Everett, Mass., by Mr. William F. 

 Delany. 



A daylight meteor was seen in full sunshine 

 near Hawick, England, by Mr. James Elliott 

 and others, at 10 h - 20 m< on the morning of March 

 25th. 



A large detonating fire-ball was observed at 

 several points in England on the evening of 

 April 2d, at 7 h- 55 m -. It appeared in Ursa Ma- 

 jor, passed between Sirius and the belt of 

 Orion, and thence at a slow rate and in a di- 

 rect line to the horizon. Its diameter was 

 about half that of the moon. 



A meteor whose apparent magnitude was 

 estimated at one third that of the moon was 

 seen at Pultney, England, by Mr. James L. 

 McOance, on the evening of April 20th. In 

 about two seconds it moved from R. A. 42, 

 N. decl. 30, to R. A. 47, N. decl. 20. 



A very bright meteor was observed by Mr. 

 Trouvelot of Cambridge, Mass., on the evening 

 of June 6th, at 9 h - 25 m -. It occulted Omicron 

 Ursae Majoris, and moved nearly due west. 

 When about the middle point of its visible 

 path it burst into several parts, but the explo- 

 sion was followed by no detonation. 



On the evening of August 22d, at 10 h - 2 m -, a 

 brilliant meteor was simultaneously seen by 

 Mr. Seth C. Chandler, Jr., at Marlboro, N. H., 

 and Mr. E. F. Sawyer, at Cambridge, Mass. 



At 7 o'clock P. M., November 12, 1878, a 

 very brilliant meteor was seen in southern 

 Indiana. Prof. D. E. Hunter of Washington, 

 Davies County, describes it as presenting a 

 clearly denned disk with a diameter equal to 

 two thirds that of the full moon. It appeared 

 in Lyra, very close to Vega, passed in a south- 

 erly direction through the Milky Way, and dis- 

 appeared about 20 N. W. of Jupiter. It was 

 visible ten seconds. 



Binary Stars. In Christie's " Observatory" 

 for August and the following months Dr. 

 Doberck of Markree, Ireland, has a valuable 

 memoir on binary stars. The following are 

 his latest determinations of the periods of sev- 

 enteen systems, together with the true eccen- 

 tricities of their orbits : 



The average eccentricity of the binaries 

 whose periods are less than 200 years is 



