298 NATURE 
[JANuARY 28, 1897 
RUSSIAN OBSERVATIONS OF THE CORONA 
OF AUGUST 4, 1896. 
I HAVE for many years been a reader of your honour- 
able and interesting journal of science, NATURE. | 
beg you to accept for it the accompanying picture of 
the solar corona, as I had the opportunity to see it on 
August 9, 1896, in Sii-Kavuopio (on the Upper Muanio, in 
Lappania), where I went last summer as a member of 
the Lappanian Solar Eclipse Expedition of the Russian 
Astronomical Society. 
’ 
This photograph is the reproduction of a drawing care- 
fully made by myself on the same scale for the Astro- 
nomical Society, and in which I tried to combine all the 
details of ten corona-photographs, which our expedition 
were successful in obtaining, the instruments used 
being— - 
A 7-inch refractor (object-glass “ Merz”). 
A 4inch camera (object-glass ‘“ Ross”). 
A 2-inch camera (object-glass “ Steinheil”). 
Combined with the pictures obtained by these is the 
general impression of the corona, as seen with the eyes, 
during fine and calm weather and very transparent air. 
NICOLAS KAULBARS, 
Lieutenant-General, and Chief of Staff of 
the Finland Military District. 
NOTES. 
Ar the last meeting of the Chemical Society it was announced 
that Mr. J. J. Tustin had made a donation of one thousand 
guineas to the Research Fund of the Society. 
M. Friuor has been elected a member of the Section of 
Anatomy and Zoology of the Paris Academy of Sciences, in 
succession to the late M. Sappey. 
THE Paris Academy of Sciences has been invited to send re- 
presentatives to the International Congress of Naval Engineers 
and Architects, to be held in London next July. Efforts are 
being made to ensure that the forthcoming meeting in London 
NO. 1422, VOL. 55] 
shall be as brilliant and generous in hospitality as the last one 
held in Paris. 
THe German Emperor is always ready to recognise deserving 
He has just conferred the Order of the Crown 
on Dr. Hauchecorne, the Director of the Prussian Geological 
Survey and of the Berlin School of Mines, and the Order of the 
Red Eagle on Dr. Hampe, the eminent Professor of Chemistry 
at the Clausthal School of Mines, and on Dr. Loretz, of the 
Prussian Geological Survey. 
work in science. 
Pror. CHARLES D. WatLcorTt, Director of the United States 
Geological Survey, reports to the Secretary of the Interior the 
existence of an enormous gold belt in Alaska. An expedition 
sent out by the Survey in May last, investigated the valley of 
the Yukon River, from the British boundary to the mouth of 
the river. All the well-known placer deposits were examined, 
and the origin of the gold in them was found to be the quartz 
veins along the head-waters of the various streams entering the 
The length of the gold belt in Alaska is 300 miles, 
entering that territory near the mouth of Forty-Mile Creek, and 
Yukon, 
extending westward along the Yukon valley at the Ramparts. 
M. FAYE, whose contributions to astronomy and meteorology 
are of world-wide renown, was elected a Member of the Paris 
Academy of Sciences in January, 1847. In honour of his 
jubilee, at the meeting of the Academy on Monday, M. Chatin, 
the new President, delivered an eloquent tribute to a life devoted 
to the advancement of science, and enumerated his most notable 
achievements. At the close he presented M. Faye with a gold 
medal representing the astronomer’s effigy surrounded by an 
inscription affirming the pride of his colleagues in his friendship, 
and their admiration for his work. We learn from the 7%wes 
that at a dinner at the Grand Hotel on Monday evening, pre- 
sided over by M. Jannsen, M. Faye received from General Billot, 
Minister of War, the insignia of the Grand Cross of the Legion 
of Honour, bestowed upon him by special decree of the President 
M. Rambaud, Minister of Education, was also 
present, and among those who spoke were M. Loewy, Director 
of the Paris Observatory, and General Toulza, of the Ecole 
of the Republic. 
