NATURE 
2IT 
FURTHER DETAILS OF THE RECENT 
METEORIC SHOWER 
WE haye received the following further communications having 
reference to the recent meteoric shower. ‘The first is an 
extract from a letter by Prof. Herschel :— 
‘*Some light on the real extent and form of the radiant region 
will, I feel sure, be thrown as time brings fresh additions to the 
already great stock of information about its apparent place and 
features from so many obseryers, and from such widely distant 
quarters ; and the knowledge so gained would be of inestimable 
value in clearing up the difficulties that surround the general 
question of the wsettled radiation of many meteor showers ; 
from knowing the origin of this stream we might learn how far 
sporadic shooting stars may be derived from special showers of 
well-determined radiant points and of regularly foreseen returns. 
I have just received from Professors Newton and Heis in America 
and Germany long printed reports on their observations, which 
contain, I have no doubt, interesting details and speculations ; 
but I have not yet perused them sufficiently to gather any par- 
ticular idea of their contents. Capt. Tupman also wrote to me 
to-day, pointing out what had struck me, that the comet found 
by Mr. Pogson does not agree well with the contemporaneous 
place of the meteor-cloud through which the earth is supposed 
to have passed, unless its considerable distance from that place 
is really a proof of the extraordinary deflection of its path by 
the earth in its passage near it, which will make it most interest- 
ing to inquire what will become of the zew comet in future. 
Two observations, which seem to be all that Mr. Pogson could 
obtain, are unfortunately not enough to determine its new orbit, 
and its ‘periodic time’ will therefore give us no hint as to its 
probable return. Capt. Tupman even suggests (to account for 
its ‘ wnconformable motion’ between the first and second obser- 
vation), that perhaps comet I. of the pair was seen by Mr, Pogson 
in his first, and comet II. of the belated Biela’s couple in his 
second night’s observations. The comet, if it is really Biela’s, 
was, in that case at least, two months behind its time, or as 
Capt. Tupman says, /welve weeks, and it must haye been ‘ loiters 
ing’ somewhere on its path. Prof. Grant, who wrote to me 
to-day, says that he will send me in a few days the list of tracks 
of the meteors which he mapped during the shower at Glasgow, 
and I have no doubt that this contribution will be a very valuable 
. addition to my ‘working charts’ of these strange legions. 
**T see that I have made a mistake in my list of ‘radiant- 
points,’ (No. 30 reading thus— ‘A.D,P., Newcastle-on- 
Tyne,’ &c. ‘close to if not coincident with Mirach (y An- 
dromedz).’ This is a mistake, as Mirach is not y, but 8 An 
dromede, and this radiant-point is therefore altogether mis- 
placed in the list. I should like A.D.P.’s observations to be 
left out altogether and the observation of Mr. Van de Stadt 
substituted for it, thus— 
No. Observer Place h. m.| R.A. N-D.| Position 
30 H. van de Armhem 6.30 | 29—41" Andro- 
Stadt (Holland) to meda 
8.45 
able 
**The numbers in M. Denza’s observations (immediately pre- 
ceding it) should be changed to R. A. 29°, Decl. 41°; the R. A. 
and declination of the star y Andromedz, which I have only 
just now ascertained exactly. ; 
** Prof. Heis publishes (in the Miinster Wochenschrift fir 
Astronomie, &c., of December 11, 18, and 25) twelve descrip- 
tions of the shower by observers at Gottingen, Dantzig, Lichten- 
berg, Cornorn (Hungary), Athens, &c. Those at Gottingen by 
Mr. Heidornand Prof. Klinkerfues and at Athens by Dr. Schmidt 
are the most interesting. Prof. Klinkerfues relates that after 
determining the place of the radiant-point with the greatest pre- 
cision at R.A. 26°, N. Decl. 37° from the projected courses of 
80 meteors carefully mapped, and calculating from them the 
parabolic elements of the meteor-stream (which he gives with 
the radiant-point), in the usual way, he then only accidentally 
recognised its resemblance to, and evident identity with Biela 
while telegraphing a short note and transmitting a full account 
of the Gottingen observations to Dr. Heis. No wonder that at 
such an unexpected discovery he should have been immediately 
prompted to send to some observer of the southern hemisphere 
his famous telegram, ‘ Biela touched earth, &c., look for it near 
@ Centauri !’ 
‘* Schmidt, at Athens, watched the shower for 9 hours uninter- 
ruptedly, from sh. 30m, to 14h. 30m., and gives a complete 
curve of frequency for the whole time (in numbers for the 
‘four practised and two unpractised observers,’ who undertook 
the counting) reduced to hourly numbers for a position of the 
radiant-point in the zenith at intervals of successive hours. On 
this figure I haye merely altered the scale so as to exhibit his 
Curve of average frequency of Shooting Stars per minute seen by four 
practised observers at Athens, Nov. 27, 1872. J. F. Scumipt 
[Im Athens mean time, th. 35m, fast on G.M.T.] 
result in numbers per minute, instead of numbers per hour 
during the whole time. His more complete account of the 
shower was sent to the Astronomische Nachrichten, and he fixed 
the place of the radiant-point at R. A. 22°°5, N. Decl. 42°°5.” 
The following has been forwarded to us by Prof. H. A. 
Newton :— 
“*Dr. Weiss, of Vienna, who first pointed out in 1868* the 
probable connection between Biela’s comet and the meteors seen 
December 6, 1798, by Brandes, and December 6, 1838, by Mr. 
Herrick, gives the radiant for meteors following the path of that 
comet as R.A. 23°4°, N. Decl. 43'0°. I assigned a point 3° 
from y Andromedz as the centre of the radiant of the meteors, 
or about R.A. 25°3°, N. Decl. 43°3°. The longitude of the node 
of Biela’s comet was in 1852, according to Hubbard, 245° 51’, 
and the comet would pass about a million of miles from the 
earth’s orbit, between it and the sun. We passed that place of 
the node early Wednesday evening, November 27. There can 
hardly be a doubt, therefore, that these meteors were once frag- 
ments, or companions, of that comet. 
‘* Any theory that shall explain the formation of the present 
grouping of meteoroids must account for the magnitude and shape 
of the radiant areas. If the members of a group have nearly 
the same orbit, the radiant should be a point. But the area of 
the radiant, November 24-27, was at least 8°long. This implies 
that the orbits differ considerably, either—(c) in their inclina- 
tions to the ecliptic ; (4) in their major axes ; (c) inthe longi- 
tude of perihelion; or, in two or three of these elements 
combined. 
‘The shower ended abruptly on Wednesday évening, and in 
the clear evenings that followed nothing special was to be seen, 
Similarly marked limits are not uncommon in other showers. 
The orbits must then either be approximately in a plane or there 
must be a common node in the ecliptic, where the earth meets 
them. Such a node would point unequivocally to the earth as 
the body that originally scattered the comet. 
‘Tf, as seems more probable, the orbits, however, lie nearly in 
one plane, either the major axes, or the longitudes of the peri- 
helia, must differ widely. Neither of these conditions could be 
* Sitzungsberichte, vol. lvii. 
