AUSTRALASIA. 



57 



1894, found one immense mass and two smaller 

 ones of meteoric iron, weighing respectively 200.000 

 pounds (90 tons), 6,000 pounds, and 1,000 pounds, 

 in 1895 he brought the two smaller ones to the 

 United States, and in 1897 he transported the large ' 

 one in the steamer " Hope." It measures 12 feet 

 by 8 feet by 6 feet. In size and weight it im- 

 mensely exceeds any ever found on the Earth. 

 Polished samples of the three resemble highly 

 polished steel. The universal feature of all meteoric 

 irons, the Widmanstatic lines, are finely marked on 

 them, unmistakably showing that they fell from the 

 sky. Analysis shows them to consist of 92 per cent, 

 of iron and 8 per cent, of nickel. Some scientists 

 entertain the opinion that they are large shooting 

 stars. In the writer's opinion they have no connec- 

 tion with them or with comets. It is a significant 

 fact that during the great star shower of 1833, when 

 countless millions of shooting stars appeai'ed, there 

 was no recorded instance of a meteoric stone having 

 fallen to the earth. 



Prizes. The Council of the Royal Astronomical 

 Society of London awarded its gold medal to 

 William II. Denning, of Bristol, England, in recog- 

 nition of his numerous discoveries in meteoric 

 astronomy. The Laland prize was awarded to C. 



D. Perrine for the discovery of several comets in 

 1897 and 1898. 



Endowment. Miss Gould has given to the 

 United States National Academy of Sciences the 

 sum of $20,000 to form a Benjamin Apthorp Gould 

 fund, in honor of her distinguished father's 

 memory. The expenditure of the increase is, to be 

 controlled by Profs. Lewis Boss, Seth C. Chandler, 

 and Asaph Hall. The object of the gift is to 

 assist observers and investigators, actual expenses 

 being considered rather than their personal sup- 

 port. She desires that preference be given to 

 Americans, and to astronomers of precision, rather 

 than to astrophysics, and hopes her gift may relieve 

 the Bache fund of the Academy of some of its 

 astronomical expenses. 



Telescopes. On the comparative value of re- 

 fracting and reflecting telescopes for astrophysical 

 investigations varied opinions exist, which have 

 caused much and prolonged discussion. Prof. George 



E. Hale, director of the Yerkes Observatory, finds 

 certain important advantages in the reflecting form 

 of telescopes, as follow : " 1. Perfect exemption from 

 chromatic aberration : all wave lengths, from the 

 extreme infra-red to the extreme limit of the ultra- 

 violet, being brought to the same focal plane. 2. 

 Relatively small absorption for large apertures, the 

 Newtonian reflector bringing about 60 per cent, of 

 the visual, and 48 per cent, of the photographic rays 

 to the focal plane. Hence for apertures much larger 

 than that at the Yerkes Observatory (40 inches) the 

 reflector gives brighter images than the refractor 

 in both visual and photographic regions, and if the 

 infra-red and ultra-violet are alone considered, the 

 refractor would be of relatively small importance." 

 These opinions, with others, coming from so experi- 

 enced an investigator, are important as concerning 

 future discoveries in astrophysics. The securing 

 of large angular and linear apertures, coupled with 

 the small cost of a speculum compared with a re- 

 fracting object glass, the small cost of mounting, 

 and an almost inexpensive dome, are matters of 

 vasr importance to the astronomy of the future. 

 This settles a question which has been much dis- 

 cussed for many years. 



AUSTRALASIA, one of the grand divisions of 

 the globe, consisting of the continent of Australia 

 and the island colonies of Great Britain in the 

 Pacific, with intervening islands, all British depend- 

 encies except the Dutch and German parts of 

 New Guinea, the German protectorates of Bismarck 



Archipelago and the northern Solomon Islands, the 

 French colony of New Caledonia, and smaller 

 groups and islands still under native rule. The 

 five colonies of Australia and the colonies of Tas- 

 mania and New Zealand are self-governing, each 

 having its representative legislature and its respon- 

 sible ministry, disposing of its own revenues and 

 making all its own laws under constitutions granted 

 by the British Parliament, subject to a certain veto 

 power reserved to the Imperial Government and the 

 appellate jurisdiction of the Judicial Committee of 

 the British House of Lords in matters of imperial 

 concern. The Crown is represented by a governor 

 in each colony, who, as the executive head of the 

 colonial Government, acts on the advice of minis- 

 ters chosen from the party or combination that 

 forms the majority of the Legislative Assembly. 

 Fiji is a Crown colony, in which the natives are 

 governed partly by their own chiefs in accordance 

 with their traditional customs. 



Area and Population. The area of the British 

 Australasian colonies, according to the latest sur- 

 veys, and their estimated population are as follow : 



The Australian aborigines are almost extinct in 

 the older colonies. There were 8,280, including 

 3,183 half-castes, in New South Wales in 1891 : in 

 Queensland, about 12.000; in South Australia, 3,369 

 in the settled districts; in Victoria, 565. In Western 

 Australia there were 5,670 civilized aborigines, and 

 of those living in the unexplored regions no esti- 

 mate could be made. 



The population of New South Wales comprises 

 702,395 males and 609.045 females. Sydney, with 

 its suburbs, had 410,000 inhabitants in 1896. 



About five ninths of the population of Victoria 

 live in towns. Melbourne, the capital, has 451,110 

 inhabitants; Ballarat, 45,315 ; Bendigo, 41,660. 



The population of Queensland in 1891 consisted 

 of 223,779 males and 169,939 females. There were 

 8,574 Chinese. Brisbane, the capital, with its sub- 

 urbs, had 100,913 inhabitants at the end of 1896. 



In South Australia there were 182,185 males and 

 173,101 females. In 1891 the Chinese numbered 

 3,848. The population of Adelaide, the capital, in 

 1897 was 144,352, including the suburbs. 



Tasmania is scarcely increasing in population 

 from European immigration, but there is a slow 

 accession resulting from the movement between the 

 island and Victoria. The population of Hobart, the 

 capital, is about 26,000. 



Of the population of Western Australia estimated 

 in September, 1897, the males numbered 112.383 

 and the females 50,011. Perth, the capital, had 

 about 43,000 inhabitants. 



The white population of New Zealand on April 

 12, 1896, was 703,360, of whom 371,415 were males 

 and 331,945 females. Of these, 63 per cent, were 

 born in the islands and 31 per cent, in the United 

 Kingdom. There were 19,080 foreigners and 3,711 

 Chinese. The Maoris numbered 39,854, consisting 

 of 21,673 males and 18,181 females, and including 

 3,503 half-castes and 229 Maori wives of European 

 husbands. The population of Auckland, including 

 suburbs, was 57.616 at the census of 1896 ; that of 

 Wellington, the seat of Government. 41,758; of 

 Christchurch, 51,330; of Dunedin, 47,280. 



