Jan. 6, 1876] 



NA TURE 



193 



vatory, had visited the principal observatories in England 

 and America, and the workshops of the first instrument 

 makers in these and Continental countries. The site of 

 the observatory, of which the foundation-stone was laid 

 in June 1874, is a plateau of between 14 and 15 acres at 

 an elevation of about 200 feet above the mean level of 

 Vienna, The observatory is 330 feet long in the direc- 

 tion of north-south, and 240 feet in that of east-west. 

 It is hoped that the building will be completed in 1877, 

 and Dr. De la Rue, judging from the progress which had 



- ??ffyffrf!y -wjq«f 



Fig. 3- — It will be seen that the first floor of the director's house is on the same level as the 

 ground floor of the observatory ; the apartments of the assistant astronomers are on the 

 ground floor. C C show the section of the gallery surrounding the ground-floor of the 

 great dome ; L, the section of the staircase. Referring again to Fig. 2, W is the 

 director's house in plan ; S and TT, the library; U, the lecture theatre ; and lastly, R, 

 the offices. 



been made when he visited it in October last, believes it 

 will be ready to receive the instruments at that time. 



The principal instrument of the observatory will be a 

 refractor of about 26 inches aperture, to occupy the 

 central dome of 42 feet internal diameter, both of which, 

 as well as three smaller domes, two of which are shown 

 in Fig. I, are being constructed by Mr. Howard Grubb of 

 Dublin. One of these smaller domes will contain an 

 equatorial refractor of 12 inches aperture, by Mr. Alvan 

 Clark, of Cambridgeport, Mass. "These two instru- 

 ments, together with a meridian circle having a telescope 

 of 8 inches aperture, and augmented by the instruments in 

 the old observatory, will constitute the first equipm.ent of 

 the new establishment. Later on it is intended to place 

 in the third dome an equatorial reflector specially adapted 

 for photography, and also a prime vertical instrument in 

 the room near the fourth dome, to the north of the central 

 dome." 



One arrangement, which Dr. De la Rue, with some 

 justice, considers a drawback to an otherwise admirably 

 aranged establishment, is that the buildings comprise 

 tie dwellings of the director, and apartments for tha 

 assistant astronomers. Although this arrangement will 



no doubt add to the comfort of the astronomers, '' it would 



lave been," Dr. De la Rue says, "in my opinion, pre- j these natiu-alists our readers have already been made acquainted' 



ferable for the dwellings to have been detached, as the 

 heated air emanating from them wiU be liable to disturb 

 the definition of the instruments." We hope, however, 

 that practically no real inconvenience will arise from this 

 arrangement. 



" From the preceding description it will be seen," Dr. 

 De la Rue concludes, *' that Austria will not be left behind 

 in the steps which are being taken to promote physico- 

 astronomical observations ; and I sincerely hope that our 

 own Government will ere long adopt measures to ensure 

 to England a fair chance of honourably com- 

 peting in the advancement of that branch of 

 astronomical science which the Fellows of this 

 Society have done so much to promote mainly 

 from their own individual resources." 



THE ROYAL SOCIETY COMMITTEES 



"PEW outsiders are aware of the amount of admi- 

 -*- nistrative work done by the Royal Society by 

 means of its numerous committees. The work in 

 this direction done during the past year is so well 

 set forth in the recent anniversary address (just pub- 

 lished) of the president. Dr. Hooker, that an abstract 

 of it will no doubt be interesting to our readers. 

 The principal committees are the Eclipse Com- 

 mittee, the Transit Naturalists' Committee, the 

 Arctic Committee, and the Challenger Committee. 



The first enterprise referred to by Dr. Hooker 

 was the Arctic Expedition, in the scientific equip- 

 ment and instructions of which the Royal Society 

 took an important part Referring to the cruise 

 of the Valorous, Dr. Hooker stated that it was 

 through the representations of the Royal Society 

 that Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys and an assistant were ap- 

 pointed to carry on temperature soundings and deep- 

 sea dredging. 



" Capt Loftus Jones and Mr. Jefifreys dredged on 

 the Greenland coast from 70"" 30' N. lat to the 

 entrance of Davis's Straits, and in the Adantic as 

 far as 25" 58' W. long., in depths of which the 

 greatest was 1,785 fathoms; and temperattire- 

 soundings were taken at eleven out of the twenty 

 stations indicated in the Admiralty Instructions. 



" Among the valuable results obtained are the fact 



that the fauna of the Greenland seas agrees with its 



land flora in being mainly Xorw^an, there being 



(with the exception of the Echinoderms) an absence 



of many North-American forms, which; as it appears, 



have not been found eastward of the meridian of 



Cape Chidley in Labrador. A remarkable mollusk, previously 



dredged at a depth of about 1,000 fathoms oflF the coast ot 



Portugal by the Porcupine, and which, when first found in a 



fossil state in the newer tertiaries of Sicily was supposed to be 



an extinct type, reappears in the deep waters of Davis' Straits ; 



and a Campanularia was found, specifically identical with one 



discovered this year in the opposite hemisphere, viz. in Ker- 



guelen's Land, by Mr. Eaton, the naturalist of the Transit of 



Venus Expedition to that island. A most singular sponge-like 



diatom, named by Dr. Dickie Syjudra Jeffreys:, with living 



Globigerin(E entangled in the colloid collecting-matter of its 



frustules, was taken in the towing-net 



" The existence of a remarkable elevation of the floor of the 

 ocean was ascertained in lat. 56^N., long. 34" 42' W., where sound- 

 ings of 690 fathoms were obtained between depths of 1,450 

 fathoms on one side and 1,230 fathoms on the other — an inter- 

 esting fact when taken in connection with H.M.S. Bull-dog 

 having found a similar elevation in lat. 59^ 40' N. and long. 

 29° 30' W. It makes known the probable existence of a sub- 

 oceanic ridge running N.E. and S.W. between Great Britain 

 and Greenland." 



With regard to the Transit of Venus Expedition, Dr. Hooker 

 referred to the results obtained by the naturalists, who, on the 

 recommendation of the Council, were appointed to accompany 

 the expeditions to Rodriguez and Kerguelen's Land ; in the 

 former case Messrs. Balfour, Gulliver, and Slater, and in the lat- 

 ter the Rev. A. E. Eaton. With many of the results obtained by 



