Feb. 27, 1879] 



NATURE 



389 



although it is pointed out that during the five years that 

 the equatorial has been mounted, " the position of the 

 pole of the instrument has changed only a fraction of a 

 minute of arc." The observations of the satellites of 

 Saturn refer mostly to Japetus, Hyperion, and Titan. 

 The disappearance of the ring took place February 6 ; 

 Bessel's elements were verified by observations of its 

 angle of position on thirty- six nights by Prof. Hall, and 

 on twenty nights by Prof. Holden. There are also ob- 

 servations of the satellites of Uranus and Neptune, 

 besides the fine series on the two satellites of Mars which 

 were placed in the hands of astronomers some time since. 

 A good series of measures of the companion of Sirius 

 was obtained, and the six stars in the trapezium of Orion 

 hare been measured in connection with obserrations of 

 Mr. Otto Struve's selected list of stars for determining 

 the personal errors of observers. Prof. Holden observed 

 the Orion nebula on twenty-eight nights, also six others 

 of the more interesting of this class of objects. 



The transit-circle and the 9"6-inch equatorial hare 

 been in charge of Prof. Eastman; 3,450 observations 

 were made with the former instrument during the year, 

 while the equatorial has been occasionally employed for 

 a very necessary auxiliary purpose when it is desired to 

 observe the fainter or less accurately computed minor 

 planets on the meridian, riz., in determining previously 

 the approximate correction of the ephemerides ; for want 

 of this necessary preliminary observed at Washington, a 

 considerable number of observations on the meridian 

 have been put upon record as observations of faint 

 minors, which have been found to belong to small stars, 

 to the equal vexation of observers and computers. 



During the transit of Mercury, seventy-two photographs 

 of the planet upon the solar disk were made at Washington 

 by Mr. Rogers, with one of the photoheliographs used for 

 the transit of Venus. Prof. Harkness proceeded to 

 Texas for the observation of this transit of Mercur}', 

 succeeding better with the later than the earlier half of 

 the phenomenon. The compilation and discussion of 

 the observations is proceeding under Prof. Eastman, and 

 will soon be ready for publication. 



With regard to the total solar eclipse, it is stated that 

 the liberal appropriation authorised by Congress allowed 

 of a number of separate expeditions being organised, and 

 the co-operation of the leading astronomers of the United 

 States was invited and cordially responded to ; but, while 

 the Observatory of Washington was enabled to assist in 

 a financial point of view, the heads of expeditions were 

 left free to arrange their own plan pi obser\'ation. The 

 report enters briefly into particulars of the stations and 

 success of the observers, to which space will not allow 

 further reference here. With respect to the search for 

 an intra- Mercurial planet or planets, it is mentioned that 

 the following, in addition to Prof. Watson, were so occu- 

 pied, at least during a part of the time that the sun was 

 obscured :— Prof. Asaph Hall at La Junta, Colorado, 

 with a 5-inch Alvan Clark equatorial, power 150 diame- 

 ters, sweeping south and following the sun to about 10° 

 distance ; Mr. O. B, Wheeler at the same place, with a 

 similar instrument, sweeping below and preceding the 

 sun; Prof. Newcomb at Separation, Wyoming, and 

 Professors Holden and Pritchett at West Las Animas, 

 Colorado, also conducted imsuccessful sweeps for an 

 intra- Mercurial planet 



The Washington Observatory has made arrangements 

 for dropping a time-ball in New York city, at noon daily, 

 which took effect from September 10, 1877; there have 

 been a few failures, the cause of which is explained. The 

 volume of observations for 1875 was daily expected to 

 be delivered from the press at the time the Report was 

 drawn up : we presume there are few real astronomical 

 workers who have not experience of the liberality with 

 which the handsome volume annually issued has been 

 distributed by the United States Naval Observatory. 



Tempel's Comet, 1867, II. — Since our last note re- 

 ferring to this comet, M. Gautier has published sweeping- 

 ephemerides, in the calculation of which he first assumes 

 the perihelion passage to occur May 10-9416 Berlin mean 

 time (that being the epoch fixed by his calculations after 

 taking into account the action of Jupiter during the 

 present revolution, which has delayed the comet less than 

 three days), and then varies this date by + 4 days ; he 

 believes the error of his computation will not exceed 

 these limits. The following are the positions taking 

 T = May 10*9416 for midnight at Berlin, or roughly for 

 iih. Greenwich time, during the next period of absence 

 of moonlight, or rather beyond it : — 



g Right 



""T^' Ascension, 



h. m. 6. 



March 10 ... 15 56 I ... 98 54*4 ... 0*0960 ... o*i88 



„ 14 ... 16 I 41 ... 99 10*5 ... o*o8o8 ... — 



„ 18 ... 16 7 2 ... 99 26*2 ... 0*0657 ... — 



„ 22 ... 16 12 2 ... 99 41*6 ... 0*0506 ... — 



„ 26 ... 16 16 39 ... 99 56*9 ... 0*0355 ... — 



,, 30 ... 16 20 51 .. 100 126 ... 0*0206 ... 0*278 



An acceleration of four days in the time of arrival at 

 perihelion will alter the comet's position on March 10, 

 -|- lom. IS. in R.A., and -|- 1° 4' in N.P.D. ; and on 

 March 30, + iim. sis. in R-A-, and -f* 1° n' iii N.P.D. 



North Polar Log. Distance Intensity 

 Distance. fix>m Earth, of Light. 



BIOLOGICAL NOTES 



New Fishes from Central Asia. — The last number 

 of the Bulletin of the Imperial Academy of Sciences of 

 St. Petersburg contains an interesting communication 

 from Prof. Kessler on the fishes obtained by Prjvalsky 

 during his recent expedition to Lob-Nor, a district pre- 

 viously unvisited by any naturalist. Herr Prjvalsky' s 

 collection from Lob-Nor and the basin of the Tarim con- 

 tained examples of eleven species of fishes, eight of which 

 belong to the family of Cyprinidce, and three to that of 

 CobitidcE. As might have been expected, nearly the whole 

 of these are new to science, and belong to genera {Dipty- 

 chus, Schizothorax, &c.) characteristic of the high lands of 

 Central Asia. One of the Cyprinoides is so peculiar as to 

 necessitate the institution for it of a new genus, which 

 Herr Kessler proposes to call Aspiorhynchus. Aspio- 

 rhynchus prjvalskii, as Prof. Kessler names this fish, in 

 honour of its discoverer, inhabits the lower Tarim and 

 Lob-Nor, where it attains a considerable size and furnishes 

 an excellent article of food. Prof. Kessler suggests that 

 two of the fishes obtained by the late Dr. Stoliczka during 

 Forsyth' s expedition to Yarkand, which were referred by 

 Dr. Day to the genus Ptychobarbus, probably belong to 

 his genus Aspiorhynchus. 



Dredging Operations, Gulf of Mexico. — The last 

 Bulletin (No. 9) of the Museum of Comparative Zoology 

 at Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass., contains an 

 account of some wonderful new or rare forms of echini, 

 by A. Agassiz, of corals by L. F. de Pourtales, and of 

 ophiurans, by T. Lyman, all the specimens having been 

 dredged, during the survey of the United States steamer 

 Blake, in the Gulf of Mexico. Preceding the technical 

 descriptions there is a bibliographical notice of the publi- 

 cations relating to the deep sea investigations carried on 

 by the United States Coast Survey from 1850 to the present 

 time. Of the echini described and figured in the present 

 number is a most interesting new species of Dorocidaris 

 {D. blakei). While the recent Cidaridae, so far as at present 

 known, do not by any means show the great variety in 

 the form of their spines, which is foimd so common 

 among the fossil genera of the family ; yet here we have 

 at least one species in which the variety of the shape of 

 the spines is extreme. Its long tapering spines would 

 have indicated its position in Dorocidaris, but its extra- 

 ordinary flattened fan-shaped spines seem nearly identical 

 with those of the Jurassic genus Rhabdocidaris — when 



