1 86 



NATURE 



[Dec. 28, 1876 



dried state, and it is to be regretted that none have found their 

 way into this Exhibition, as they might have stimulated us to 

 endeavour to do something to improve the art, which in most of 

 our anatomical museums is now almost obsolete. 



The methods of preserving the hard parts of invertebrate 

 animals, such as insects, molluscs, and coral animals, in a dry 

 state, are so generally understood, and so fully described in many 

 special treatises,-^ that there is no occasion to detain you with 

 them at present. The best illustration in the present collection 

 of this branch of the subject is the very valuable and instructive 

 preparation of the Exoskeleton of the common lobster (No. 

 3904 e) prepared by Mr. E. T. Newton, and exhibited by Prof. 

 Huxley, which is a model of a class of preparations which might 

 be largely employed in teaching zoology. I may also call atten- 

 tion to a small series of preparations contributed by Prof. H. 

 Landois, of Miinster (No. 3878), which purport to show some- 

 thing of the life history and habits of several species of insects, 

 an idea which might be more fully carried out in biological 

 museums, and to the typical collections of the shells of molluscs 

 exhibited by Mr. R. Damon (Nos. 3808 to 381 1). 



(Tff be continued^ 



OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN 



The New Star in Cygnus.— On the evening of December 

 13 this star, as regards brightness, was about midway between 

 75 Cygni and Bessel's star, Weisse XXI. 1004, the DurcJwius- 

 ^c/w«^ magnitudes of which are 5*2 and 6"5 respectively, giving 

 for the new star a magnitude of about 5 '8 to 6"0, as staged last 

 week. On December 20 it was not more than 0'25m. brighter 

 than Bessel's star, indeed at moments it was difficult to say which 

 was the brighter of the two ; its present rate of decline is there- 

 fore slower than during the first ten days after the discovery. In 

 the foggy sky of December 20, there was a yellowish tinge in its 

 light, not perceptible in Bessel's star. A further careful search 

 through our star-catalogues has failed to reveal any previous 

 observation of a star in this position. It falls in one of the two 

 zones, the re-observation of which has been undertaken at Bonn. 



The Binary- Star dp Eridani, — It may be hoped that 

 some one of our southern observers is putting upon record mea. 

 sures of this double star, of which, so far as we know, none have 

 been published since those of Mr. Eyre B. Powell at Madras, at 

 the beginning of 1861, when the angle of position was 253°, and 

 the distance 4" '9. Altering the node in Capt. Jacob's second 

 orbit to 109° 40', and assuming the peri-astron passage to have 

 occurred i8i7'64, with a period of revolution of 117 "48 years, 

 the measures from 1835 to 1861 are very closely represented 

 without change in inclination, distance of peri-astron from node, 

 or semi-axis major. Dunlop's measures in December, 1825, 

 which are of doubtful interpretation, would, with Jacob's correc- 

 tion, differ 6^° from the computed angle. Later measures than 

 those of 1 86 1 are required for a decision on the true form of 

 orbit, a Centauri and h 5 114 (R.A. I9h. 17m. 50s., N.P.D, 

 144° 34' for 1876) are equally to be recommended to the close 

 attention of the southern astronomer. 



When a systematic remeasurement of the double stars of Sir 

 John Herschel's Cape catalogue, which are out of reach in these 

 latitudes, is undertaken (and we know of no more desirable or 

 more interesting work in the miscellaneous astronomy of the 

 other hemisphere), a large accession to the list of binaries may 

 be anticipated. Perhaps M. O. Struve has not -in 24 Comte 

 Berenicis — detected the most rapid of the revolving double stars, 

 which it may remain for a southern observer to bring to light. 



Periodical Comets in 1877.— Of the known comets of 

 short periodonly one— that of D'Arrest — has been predicted 

 for the ensuing year, though if the elements of De Vico's comet 

 of 1844 have not undergone a violent change since that appear- 



tr- "^^ j^°.*' recent being " Notes on Collecting and Preserving Natural 

 History Objects,' edited by J. E. Taylor, Ph.D., and published by Hard- 

 wicke and bogue, Loudon, 1876. 



ance, it may be expected to be in perihelion also within the next 

 twelvemonths. 



D'Arrest's comet will arrive at its l^east distance from the sun 

 on May 10, but will not be nearest to the earth until'October ; 

 its positions when observations should be most feasible, are not 

 favourable for observers in the northern hemisphere. M. 

 Leveau's elaborate ephemeris affords every possible assistance 

 towards its detection. At its last visit in 1870 this comet was 

 excessively faint, and was not observed at more than four or five 

 of the numerous European Observatories. 



Surely there must soon be an end of the dearth of discoveries 

 of new comets which has prevailed since the beginning of 

 December, 1874. 



Ancient Solar Eclipses. — In Nature (vol. xv.,'p. 116), 

 Sir George Airy notes a difference in the path of the shadow in 

 the total eclipse of B.C. 763, June 14, given in this column 

 (p. 65) from that defined by a direct calculation from Hansen's 

 Tables, In explanation of this difference it should be stated that 

 our elements of the eclipse of B.C. 763, as also (with one excep- 

 tion) for other eclipses to which we have from time to time re- 

 ferred, are obtained by the use of Damoiseau's Lunar Tables of 

 1824, with the main arguments, and one or two of the principal 

 equations adapted to the e'ements resulting from Sir George 

 Airy's laborious discussion of the observations of the moon at 

 the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, frona 1750 to 1830, com- 

 bined with M. Leverrier's Solar Tables, and the introduction of 

 Hansen's last values of the terms in longitude, anomaly and 

 node depending on the square of centuries. 



METEOROLOGICAL NOTES 



The Storm of March 12, 1876. — We turned with con- 

 siderable interest to the account of this storm, which passed 

 over the south of England on March 12, as published in the 

 Journal of the English Meteorological Society for July. The 

 interest was all the greater, seeing that the account was drawn 

 up, at the request of the Councd of that Society, by Mr. Scott, 

 assisted by Messrs. Gaster and Whipple, that descriptions of the 

 same storm had been previously published by Prof. Quetelet, 

 Dr. Neumayer, and the late M. C. Sainte-Claire Deville, and 

 that another paper on the same subject was intimated by Dr. 

 Buys Ballot. The widespread interest which this storm has 

 called forth is seen at once on looking at the nine weather maps 

 and tables of Mr. Scott's paper, which show it to be one of the 

 most remarkable storms of recent years, whether regard be paid 

 to the rapid rate of its propagation eastwards, estimated by Dr. 

 Neumayer at seventy-seven miles per hour over part of its course ; 

 to the rate of the barometric fluctuation, almost unprecedented in 

 these islands, the bar meter at Kew having risen 0*407 inch 

 during the two hour from 2 to 4 p.m. ; or to the violent con- 

 trasts of temperature and weather on the two sides of the storm 

 at comparatively short distances apart. To illustrate the subject 

 with greater fulness a woodcut is given showing the automatic 

 registrations of the different meteorological instruments at Kew, 

 and tables of pressure and temperature for every ten minutes 

 during the most interesting phase of the storm. To these curves 

 a noteworthy and novel feature is added in the form of a curve 

 showing the electrical changes from positive to negative, and 

 vice versa, at the time. The hourly readings of their self-recording 

 instruments for March were moreover published shortly after by 

 the Meteorological Office. On turning to these two barometric 

 records taken from the same instrument at Kew, referring to the 

 same time, and published by the same authorities, and comparing 

 them together, we meet with nothing but confusion. Of the 

 whole of the eleven instances on which readings are printed in 

 the two records for the same instants of time, no two agree, the 

 eleven differences being in order, -f o'oo6, -0*024, -O'OoS, 



