December 4, 1919] 



NATURE 



?6i 



Folk-lore), Miss J. L. \^'eston. yiessrs. Constable 

 and Co., Ltd., announce "Physiology and the 

 Nation's Needs," edited by Prof. W. D. Halliburton, 

 containinf; essays by Dr. M. S. Pembrcy, Prof. D. 

 Noel Paton, and the editor on, respectively, "Physical 

 Training and the Open-air Life," "Physiology in the 

 Study of Disease," and " Physiology and the Food 

 Problem." They also promise "Elementary Plane 

 Trigonometry," H. E. Piggott. 



Messrs. Dulau and Co., Ltd., 34 Margaret Street, 

 W.I, have issued a Catalogue (]Vo. 80) of nearly 

 six hundred works on Diatomacese, Botany, Horti- 

 culture, Agriculture, Natural History, Geology, 

 Palaeontologv, Voyages and Travels, .\stronomy. 

 Physics and Mechanics which will doubtless appeal 

 to manv readers of Nature. It can be obtained upon 

 application. 



OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN. 



Heliocentric Grouping of Planets in December. 

 — The astrologers have been amusing themselves and 

 alarming the timid by predicting violent cosmic con- 

 vulsions as the result of the planetary grouping on 

 December 17. The actual position is sufficiently 

 interesting to warrant a note. During the five days 

 December 13 to 17, six of the eight major planets v ill 

 be within a range of 26° in heliocentric longitude, 

 while Uranus will be in the same line on the other 

 side of the sun, the earth alone standing out. In the 

 following list the two longitudes given refer to noon 

 on December 13 and 17 respectively : — Mercury, 130° 

 to 154°; Venus, 135° to 143°; Earth, 79° to 84°; 

 Mars, 152° to 154°; Jupiter, 129°; Saturn, iS5i° ; 

 Uranus, 331°; and Neptune, 130°. There were 

 similar scares when the four giant planets were all 

 near perihelion together. We may safely predict that 

 they will be as baseless now as they were then. 



Comets. — Finlay's periodic comet passed perihelion 

 about October 15-38. It was a fairly conspicuous 

 object in November, and observations are numerous. 

 It will be much fainter in December, but an ephemeris 

 (for Greenwich midnight) may still be of use : — 



N. Decl. 



Dec. 5 I 3^ SQ 13 14 Dec. 13 2712 16 52 



17 28 



17 .S6 



18 17 



Dec. 13 



15 

 17 

 19 



R A. 

 h. m. s. 

 2 7 12 

 2 14 13 

 2 20 47 

 2 26 56 



Schaumasse's periodic comet is also fading, but more 



slowly. Ephemeris for Greenwich midnight :— 



R.A. S. DecL 



R.A. 



S. DecL 



Doc. 



Messrs. Braae and Fischer Petersen announce that 

 their supposition that comet 1919ft (Brorsen-Metcalf) 

 has made two revolutions since 1847 is not correct; 

 its true period is 72- 1 years. 



Fall of a Meteorite in .^MERICA.— The daily papers 

 report that on the night of November 27 last a large 

 meteorite descended into Lake Michigan, and that the 

 object was seen before its fall by many persons over 

 a wide extent of country. If this event is fully cor- 

 roborated, it seems quite possible that the meteorite 

 may have been a fragment of Biela's lost comet, like 

 the'Mazapil meteorite of November 27, 1885, on which 

 date there occurred a great shower of ordinary 

 meteors. 



The earth passed through the orbit of Biela's comet 



NO. 2614, VOL. 104] 



on that occasion, and must have been very near, if 

 not involved in, the denser portion of the material 

 forming the remains of the comet. The latter had a 

 periodic time of revolution amounting to about 

 61 years, and if we add five periods to the last return 

 near the end of 1S85 we arrive at the present time, 

 so that a display of meteors was rendered quite 

 probable. However, no very conspicuous shower 

 occurred, though from reports sent in by various 

 observers for the period November 19-25 a few- 

 meteors, including several of special brilliancy, were 

 recorded from the right direction in Andromeda. In 

 all, seventeen paths appear to be conformable to this 

 shower, and the radiant is indicated at 29°-f44° near 

 the star -y Andromedae. 



On the same night, at 9h. 50m., that the meteorite 

 is said to have fallen in .America, a fireball was seen 

 at Bristol descending slowly in the north-eastern sky, 

 but the atmosphere was very hazy and few stars 

 were visible. Observations of this object from other 

 places would be valuable. 



ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF 

 ROYAL SOCIETY. 



THE 



'T^HE anniversary meeting of the Royal Society was 

 -•■ held on Monday, when the report of the council 

 was presented and the president. Sir J. J. Thomson, 

 delivered an address. In the evening fellows and 

 their guests dined together at the Royal Palace Hotel, 

 Kensington, this being the first anniversary dinner 

 since 1913. The assembly received with much satis- 

 faction the announcement of the president that the 

 Prince of W'ales is to be admitted a fellow of the 

 society early next year. 



The report of the council is largely occupied with 

 an account of the origin and constitution of the Inter- 

 national Research Council and the related National 

 Research Council. It is hoped that the British 

 Government will consent to make the annual con- 

 tribution required from countries forming part of the 

 international organisation, in order to place the 

 Council on a sound financial basis. The report refers 

 also to the increased need of financial assistance for 

 the promotion of research in pure sciences and to 

 developments of the National Physical Laboratory 

 under Sir Richard Glazebrook's tlirectorship. The 

 names of the new officers and council were announced 

 in Nature of November 13 (p. 295) 



In his presidential address Sir Joseph Thomson 

 referred to the retirement of Sir .Alfred Kempe 

 (treasurer) and Dr. Schuster (secretary) and to the 

 invaluable services which these officers have rendered 

 to the society. He also announced with regret that 

 the assistant secretary, Mr. R. Harrison, has been 

 obliged to resign his office owing to ill-health. The 

 subjoined extracts are from the president's address. 



Einstein's Theory. 



I cannot jiass over without notice the remarkable 

 result that was announced at our first meeting this 

 .session : that the observations made at the eclipse of 

 May 29 showed that light was deflected, when passing 

 close to the sun, by an amount which, within the 

 somewhat wide limits of the experimental error, 

 apreed with that predicted bv Einstein. 



The deflection of light by matter, suggested bv 

 Newton in the first of his Queries, would in itself 

 be a result of first-rate scientific importance ; it is of 

 still greater importance when its magnitude supports 

 the law of gravity put forward bv Einstein, a law 

 which has explained the long-standing difliculty of the 

 motion of the perihelion of Mercury. 



On Einstein's law the velocity of light passing 



