M.-p.— Vol.. I.] DAVIDSON— APPARENT PROJECTION, ETC. 77 



however, that the observer was not looking at the spot 

 where the star reappeared, and thereby lost the earlier 

 reappearance of the well-known companion; and at any 

 rate he could not have seen the star reappear with sudden 

 brightness unless the dark limb was undisturbed. The 

 same occultation was observed at Waverly, Sydney, by 

 Walter F. Gale, under fairly good conditions and thick 

 haze. With a six and a quarter-inch objective and magn. 

 power 140 "the disappearance was instantaneous at a 

 notch formed in the Moon's limb by two peaks." This 

 description of the point of ingress indicates that the limb 

 of the Moon was steady and sharp. 



The same occultation was also observed at Warrickville, 

 near Sydney, by C. J. Merfield, with a seven and a half- 

 inch reflector, with power 170. "The definition was fair, 

 although hazy at the time of disappearance, which was not 

 instantaneous, as is usual." 



Professor Young, in his " General Astronomy " (p. 246), 

 refers to the projection of a star on the Moon's dark limb 

 in the following paragraph: " In some cases observers have 

 reported that a star, instead of disappearing instantaneously 

 when struck by the Moon's limb (faintly visible by earth- 

 shine), has appeared to cling to the limb for a second or 

 two before vanishing, and in a few instances they have even 

 reported it as having reappeared and disappeared a second 

 time, as if it had been for a moment visible through a rift 

 in the Moon's crust. Some of these anomalous phenomena 

 have been explained by the subsequent discovery that the star 

 was double, or had a faint companion. ' ' No further explana- 

 tion is attempted. We have purposely watched stars 

 occulted at the ash-gray limb of the Moon, but have never 

 been able to see a sufficiently bright and defined limb to 

 note whether it was invaded by the star before its sudden 

 disappearance. 



In the publications of the Astronomical Society of the 

 Pacific for November 30, 1889, Professor Barnard, of the 

 Lick Observatory, says that " at a number of occultations 

 of the satellites [of Jupiter] I watched carefully for any 

 evidences of their being seen through the edges of the 



