60 BULLETIN OF THE 



discrepancy being due to insufficient data. It would probably be 

 impossible to see it at every return, for assuming its ^period to be 

 approximately 5 2 years, the earth would at each alternate return be 

 at the opposite side of its orbit, and the sun would then intervene 

 between the earth and the comet. It passed nearest to the earth 

 about the 18th of November. 



The logarithms of the radii vectors and distance from the earth 

 on the dates given are : 



log. r log. A 



October 25, 0.035328 9.221510 



November 7, 0.029018 9.141693 



November 20, 0.034557 9.119295 



No theory about any periodic time was assumed in these calcu- 

 lations. 



At the conclusion of Mr. Frisby's paper the Society adjourned. 



192d Meeting. January 22, 1881. 



The President in the Chair. 



Thirty-seven members present. 



The following communication was read by Mr. J. W. Chicker- 

 ing, entitled — 



NOTES ON ROAN MOUNTAIN, NORTH CAROLINA. 



The great Appalachian "chain, with its undulating line of 1,300 

 miles, from the promontory of Gaspe, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 

 to Georgia and Alabama, beginning as a series of simple folds of 

 moderate height, increases in complexity as in altitude from north 

 to south, attaining its greatest elevation in a veritable mountain 

 knot in the Black range. Following it from its commencement to 

 the Hudson, we find the single chain of the Green Mountains, rising 

 to its extreme height in Mount Mansfield, 4,430 feet, with, on the 

 east, the outlying clusters of the White Mountains in New Hamp- 

 shire, with Mount Washington reaching 6,288 feet, and others ex- 

 ceeding 5,000 feet, and Mount Katahdin in Maine, 100 miles away, 

 about 5,200 feet, and on the west the Adirondack group, rising to 

 5,379 feet, and the Catskills considerably lower. 



From the Hudson to the New River in Virginia, 450 miles j 

 through the States of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, it 



