584 



NA TURE 



[October 13, 1904 



" radical " intended, or that which is still attached to it in 

 chemistry. (2) The use of "radical," though coming 

 through the French, can be defended on purely philological 

 grounds. (3) The original word should be retained out of 

 regard for its historical origin for the same reason that we 

 still employ the word oxygen, although the original mean- 

 ing has been modified. (4) The original word " radical " 

 is still retained by continental countries and America, and 

 it is only in this country that the change has been made. 



Messrs. F. H. Parshall and H. M. Hobart have in hand 

 a work on electric traction which will shortly be published 

 by Messrs. Constable and Co. 



A SECOND, revised edition of Dr. C. B. Davenport's 

 " Statistical Methods with Special Reference to Biological 

 Variation " has been published by Messrs. John Wiley and 

 Sons in New York, and by Messrs. Chapman and Hall, 

 Ltd., in this country. The first edition of the book was 

 reviewed in our issue of December 14, 1899, when the 

 opportunity was taken to suggest one or two directions in 

 which improvement was desirable. In addition to the 

 adoption of some of these suggestions. Dr. Davenport has 

 embodied many of the new statistical methods elaborated 

 by Prof. Karl Pearson and others in the new edition of his 

 work. 



The new edition of Dr. A. R. Wallace's work on " Man's 

 Place in the Universe," which has just been published by 

 Messrs. Chapman and Hall, Ltd., at the price of six 

 shillings, contains an appendix in which an argument based 

 on the general theory of organic evolution is used to sup- 

 port the conclusion arrived at as to the unique development 

 of man in the material universe. With this exception, the 

 work remains practically in its original form ; for Dr. 

 Wallace remarks that few errors in his facts or fallacies 

 in his conclusions have been brought under his notice, 

 while as to the argument, no student of science has dealt 

 with it in any detail, and " no biologist appears to have 

 thought it worthy of careful consideration." 



OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN. 



Discovery of a Nova or a New Variable. — Circular 

 No. 68 from the Kiel Centralstelle announces the discovery 

 of a nova or a new variable star by Mr. Stanley Williams, 

 of Hove, on September 20. 



The object was first observed on a photograph taken with 

 a 4-4-inch portrait lens between I5h. S9m. and i6h. 23m. 

 (G.M.T.) on the date named, and was then of about the 

 ninth magnitude, its approximate position being : — 



R..\. =22h. 190m., dec. = + 29° 44'. (1855). 



PHeven other plates of the same region, taken between 

 September 27, 1899, and January 16 this year, show no 

 trace of any object in that position, although most of them 

 show stars of the eleventh magnitude or fainter, whilst 

 two plates show stars down to the thirteenth magnitude. 



On October 3 the star was observed visually with a 

 65-inch reflector, and was estimated as being about one 

 quarter of a magnitude fainter than 8.0.4-29°. 4655 (g-i 

 mag.). Its colour was recorded as intensely red, almost 

 crimson, and was not unlike that of Nova Persei at the 

 epochs when that object became red. 



The above position lies in the constellation Pegasus, about 

 2" south of the middle of the straight line joining 17 and 

 Tr Pegasi. 



The Lick Observ.xtorv Programme for Ne.xt Year's 

 Solar Eclipse. — Mr. William H. Crocker has generously 

 undertaken to defray the cost of the Lick Observatory 

 NO. 1824, VOL. 70] 



expeditions to observe the total solar eclipse of August 30, 

 1905. Three expeditions will be fitted out, one going to 

 Labrador, another to Spain, and the third to Egypt. 



At each of these stations the programme will include a 

 photographic search for an intramercurial planet and the 

 photographing of the corona with a camera of 5 inches 

 aperture and 40 feet focus. 



The Spanish expedition also proposes to make a study 

 of the polarised light in the corona, and to obtain spectro- 

 grams of the sun's edge at second and third contacts and 

 of the green coronal line ; the latter are to be used expressly 

 for the measurement of the wave-length of that line. 



.\ttempts will also be made to secure spectra of the 

 " flash " and of the general light of the corona at both the 

 .Spanish and the Egyptian camps {Science, September 23). 



Visual Observation of Phceee. — Whilst, searching for 

 Saturn's ninth satellite, Phoebe, with the Yerkes 40-inch 

 telescope on August 8, Profs. Barnard and H. H. Turner 

 found an object resembling a star of about 155 or 160 

 magnitude the apparent place of which at i8h. (G.M.T.) 



R..-\. = 2ih. 23m. I OS., dec. 



-16° 36' 8". 



On September 3 Prof. Barnard found that the object was 

 missing from this place. 



As the Harvard ephemeris for the satellite gives the 

 approximate place on August 8 as 



R.A. =2ih. 



231 



dec. = — 16° 36'-4, 



the above was probably the first visual observation of this 

 object. 



An editori.'il note attached to the paragraph in the 

 Astronomische Nachrichten (No. 3970) in which the above 

 information is recorded enters a caveat as to the actual 

 correctness of the figures given, because the manuscript 

 received was very badly blotted. 



The Orbit of Castor. — .\ graphically determined orbit 

 of Castor was published in No. 3525 (1898) of the Astrono- 

 mische Nachrichten, but since its publication Prof. Doberck, 

 of Hong Kong Observatory, has determined the three sets 

 of possible elements given below by purely analytical 

 methods, and now publishes them in No. 3970 of the same 

 journal, together with a five-yearly ephemeris calculated 

 from the set of elements No. 4. 



The observed angles can be represented equally well by 

 orbits having periods of 200 to 600 years, or even more, but 

 the observed distances are best given by the No. 4 set of 

 elements, which also appears to represent correctly the 

 present decrease in distance. 



According to the ephemeris, the position angle at the 

 beginning of igoo was 225°-72, and the distance was 5"-627 ; 

 at the commencement of 1905 the corresponding figures 

 will be 223°-58 and 5".564. 



In the same publication Prof. Doberck gives a set of 

 elements, and a yearly ephemeris, for the orbit of 

 C Sagittarii. 



The Meeting of the Astronomischen Gesellschaft, 

 1904. — In No. 3970 of the Astronomische Nachrichten Herr 

 Elis Stromgren gives a brief outline of the papers read at 

 the meetings of the Astronomischen Gesellschaft, which 

 took place at Lund on September 5-8 under the presidency 

 of Prof. Seeliger. Numerous reports of the work suggested 

 by the committee were given by the observers by whom it 

 had been undertaken. 



.'\mong these there are reports by Herr Albrecht on 

 the International Latitude Service, by Herr Miiller on the 

 catalogue of variable stars, and many others. 



