154 



NA TURE 



\_June 12, 1884. 



rainy, when suddenly streamers of light were seen in the northern 

 sky running from west to east. They were seen twice, the first 

 time lasting about a minute, but the second very short. The 

 light was so intense that the streets became quite light. 



The Museum of the Kendal Literary and Scientific Institu- 

 tion possesses a valuable series of Carboniferous fossils. Most 

 of the zoological groups are well represented, especially in rela- 

 tion to Brachiopoda and Gasteropoda, the former containing 

 large examples of Produdus giganteus, Martin, and the latter 

 important specimens of Euomphalus crotolostomus, M'Coy, and 

 Phaiiiivlinus crislalus, Sowerby. The fossils are chiefly local, 

 many of them having been collected by the once well-known 

 geologist of Kendal, John Ruthven, who prepared the geologica' 

 map for Miss Martineau's "English Lakes." This collection 

 has recently been named, classified, and catalogued by Mr. R. 

 Bullen Newton, F.G.S. 



IN the letter by M. Antoine d'Abbadie in Nature f n May 29 

 (p. 101), the passage, " it was then 24m. 8s. past midnight, 

 should be omitted. 



The additions to the Zoological Society's Gardens during the 

 past week include two Squirrel Monkeys (Chrysothri.x sciurea 

 6 9 ) from Brazil, presented by Mr. Robert Thorn ; two Black- 

 eared Marmosets [Hafale penicilla'a £ £) from South-East 

 Brazil, presented by Mr. C. D. Middleton ; a Common Squirrel 

 (-■'c'ui in vulgaris), British, presented by Mrs. Grover ; a Marsh 

 Ichneumon [He>pestes gahra), a Dusky Ichneumon (Hcrpeslcs 

 pulverulenius) from South Africa, presented by Dr. Holub> 

 C.M.Z.S. ; two Sociable Vultures (Vultur auricula* is) from 

 Africa, an Angolan Vulture (Gypohierax angolmsis) from West 

 Africa, presented by Sir Donald dime ; a Gray Amphisbsena 

 (Blanus cinereus) from Spain, presented by Mr. W. C. Tait, 

 C.M.Z.S. ; a Burchell's Zebra (Equus burcheliii ? ) from South 

 Africa, two Common Camels (Camelus dromedarius) from Egypt, 

 five Horned Lizards (Phrynosoma eornutum) from North 

 America, deposited ; five Goldeneyes (Clangula glaucion), five 

 Common Snakes (Tropiaonotus natrix), twenty-four Green 

 Lizaids (Laccta viridi), European, purchased; a Japanese 

 Deer ( Cervus sika 9 ), a Mexican Deer [Cm/us mexicanus 9 ), 

 a Long-fronted Gerbille [Geriillus lengifrons), born in the 

 Gardens. 



OUR ASTRONOMICAL COLUMN 

 The Observatory of Paris.— Admiral Mouchez's report 

 on the state of this establishment and the work accomplished 

 therein during the past year commences with some details of 

 his scheme for erecting a succursal 1 il is< rvati iry at a distance from 

 Paris, where the disadvantages of location' in the midst of a 

 great city would be avoided. His proposal was to dispose of a 

 pan of the actual grounds of the Observatory, a step which would 

 be likely to realise a sum adequate to the erection of the new 

 building, at the same time retaining the present one to form 

 the head-quarters of the Bureau des Calculs, the Archives, and 

 the Museum, the two establishments to remain under the same- 

 direction and to constitute together the Observatory of Paris. 

 '1 In- si heme, it is known, has not met with general acceptance 

 at the hands of the scientific authorities. 



_M. Lcewy, in charge of the Meridian Service, has been occu- 

 pied with the reobservation of stars in the Catalogue of Lalande, 

 while a large number of observations of the sun, moon, and 

 planets has also been made, eighteen observers taking part in 

 this work in the course of the year. The equatorials of 12 and 

 14 inches aperture and tire equatorial coudi were employed on 

 observations of comets and small planets. The Ecliptical Charts 

 Nos. 12, 19, 48, and 67 have progressed, and attention has been 

 paid to double-star measures. M. Mouchez reports that the 

 construction and installation of the great telescope (074 m.) has 

 been retarded by the difficulty of establishing it in the grounds 

 of lie Observatory at Paris. In the Department of \ ron 1 

 mical Physics JIM. Thollon and Trepied had been occupied for 

 ix weeks on the Pie du Midi, where, with M. Naussinat, in 



presenl charge of the Observatory, they studied the advantages 

 of the station, more especially for solar observations, concluding 

 that great scientific interest would attach to work that might he 

 accomplished during the four or five weeks of the fine season in 

 a small observatory at that point. Funds for the purpose are 

 not yet available. 



M. Mouchez further reports upon the distribution of time in 

 Paris, the additions to the Museum during the year, which con- 

 sist of instruments of the last century found in the t lbs< 1 

 Toulouse, a portrait of Copernicus, &c. ; the work of the Bureau 

 des Calculs, which remains in charge of M. Gaillot ; the pub- 

 lications of the Observatory during the year, including vol. xvii. 

 of the Annalts, in which are some important memoirs theoreti- 

 cal and practical ; and the personal work of the staff. 



A plan of the grounds of the Institution is appended, on 

 which are distinguished those portions which M. Mouchez had 

 proposed to alienate with the view to providing means for the 

 erection of an observatory at a distance from Paris. 



I 111 1 Ikeat Comet of 1882. — In an appendix to the Wash- 

 ington Observations, 1880, is an account prepared by Mr. W. C 

 Winlock, at the desire of the Superintendent of the Naval Obser- 

 vatory, Admiral Shufeldt, on the great comet of 1S82 as observed 

 at Washington, first with the 9 '6 inch and subsequently with the 

 26-inch refractor. The latest date on which the comet's position 

 was determined is April 4, 1SS3. Micrometrical measures of the 

 nucleus were made on a number of evenings, and from a plate 

 showing its aspect and formation between February I and March 

 3 the difficulty of deciding upon the proper point for observa- 

 tions of position, owing to the existence of several almost equally 

 luminous condensations in the head of the comet, is very apparent. 

 For a similar reason, in another plate the points observed with 

 the transit-circle from September 19 to March 3 are shown. 

 There has rarely, if ever, existed a greater need for precautions of 

 this nature, to assist in the combination of the places obtained at 

 various observatories, for the accurate determination of the orbit. 

 The comet was first seen at Washington shortly after noon on 

 September 19, and was visible for several hours to the naked eye 

 about twenty-eight minutes preceding the sun and i°'2 further 

 south. In the 9 6-inch equatorial "it presented the appearance 

 of a bird with wings extended," a description that applies to 

 other comets that have been seen in daylight or in a very strongly 

 illuminated sky, as for instance the first comet of 1847, figured 

 in Johnston's "Atlas of Astronomy." 



GEOLOGICAL NOTES 



Canadian Coals and Lignites. — Dr. G. M. Dawson 

 collects and publishes, chiefly from the Reports of the Geological 

 Survey of Canada, some useful Notes on the Coals and Lignites 

 of the Canadian North-West. These mineral fuels are all of 

 Cretaceous and Tertiary age. They are extensively developed 

 near the Bow and Belly Rivers and their tributaries, extending 

 eastward from the base of the mountains to about the mth 

 meridian ; but as this is the only region yet examined in detail 

 by the Survey, there may yet prove to be other districts of equal 

 value. Where the Cretaceous rocks have been much disturbed 

 and folded, the coal passes into the condition of anthracite, of 

 which a seam occurs on the Cascade River near its confluence 

 with the Bow River and close to the line of the Canadian Pacific 

 Railway. (Hit on the plains, however, the strata are nearly flat, 

 and as they recede from the mountains the coals show a larger 

 percentage of water, and assume more or less completely the 

 character of lignites. 



Ki LGIAN ERRATICS. — To the already cited examples of frag- 

 ments of Scandinavian rocks in the post-Tertiary deposits of 

 Belgium Mr. E. van den Broeck has recently added the dis- 

 covery of a piece of granite (measuring o"8 X 0'5 X o'6 metre) 

 in the most northern part of the kingdom, embedded in the fine 

 Campinian sands of Wortel — apparently the first Belgian 

 example of any fragment large enough to claim perhaps the 

 name of an erratic block (Ann. Sac. G60I. du Nord. xi. p. 2). 



Position of the Callovian Rocks. — M. Paul Choffat 

 protests against the inclusion of the Callovian among the Upper 

 Jurassic formations, as was decided at the last Conference 

 of the International Commission on Geological Nomenclature. 

 This decision, based on the palte mtological affinity of the 

 Callovian and Oxfordian stages he believes to be theoretically 

 false and to be practically impossible of application in any gene- 

 ral map of the whole of Europe. He gives a resume of obser- 



