393 REPORT — 1873. 



meteors at all the stations where they were carefully described is regarded as 

 not having much exceeded the fourth magnitude of the fixed stars. Orange, 

 red, and yellow, and more rarely green, were the predominating colours of 

 the brightest ; and when thus conspicuous an aureole of red and yeUow sparks 

 surrounded the nucleus in mid course, while a short white streak was left for 

 a few seconds, and very rarely for a few minutes, upon the track. The astro- 

 nomer at Bordeaux, M. Lespiault, however, records (' Comptes Rendus,' 1872, 

 Dec. 2nd) that " many of the meteors left bright streaks, some of which re- 

 mained visible 10"" or 15"", changing their shape and position in the sky 

 slightly before they disappeared." The great majority of the meteors were 

 mere points of dull white or yellowish light, without sparks or streak, moving 

 with very moderate speed in short courses of from 4° to 6° only, attaining 

 greater lengths of 10° or 15° and brighter white or bluish colour only in excep- 

 tional cases of the larger meteors of the shower ; their extinction was always 

 without explosion and quite gradual, but a few showed two maxima of 

 brightness or intermittent light. A frequent peculiarity of the meteors was 

 a curved or wavy course. This was noticed by Dr. Schmidt at Athens, by 

 Prof. IS'ewton at Newhaven, and by Mr. E. L. Layard at Para in Brazil, who 

 writes, " Some I saw apparently disappear for a moment and come out again, 

 and two to my great surprise had a wavy course." 



At the Mauritius, on the other hand, where the radiant was nearer the 

 horizon in the north, the meteors had long courses, and frequently left long 

 streaks upon their tracks. " The first meteor at 11" 22"" p.m. started from 

 the tail-stars of Aries, and vanished south of the echptic. The train of this 

 meteor was distinctly visible for 4 minutes, slowly wheeling from horizontal to 

 vertical, and remaining 2 minutes vertical to the horizon. The other meteor, 

 starting from a point at right angles to Aries and the Pleiades, passed through 

 the Pleiades, Taurus, and Orion, and vanished near Sirius. Its luminous 

 train was visible for more than a minute. Nearly all the meteors observed 

 radiated from a point near Aries, at right angles with the Pleiades, and shot 

 either like the last or transverse to it. A streak as broad as the head in aU 

 cases, and in 80 or 90 per cent, of them 10" or 20° long, remained visible on 

 their tracks generally for a second or two. In the last two cases the broad 

 bright streak was at least 40° long." (Messrs. Bruce and Hon. E. Newton.) 

 " Erom 10" 15"' to 10" 30", the Hyades, Pleiades, and Orion being about 

 40° or 50° above the north horizon, the meteors appeared flying from north 

 to south, and from N.E. to S.E. or from N.W. to S.W. on each side of north. 

 Their rate of appearance was about one per second, two or three sometimes 

 appearing together. The nearer ones every few minutes showed trains and 

 sparks like a rocket, varying from 2° or 3° to 5° or 6° in length, and seldom 

 reaching 10°. Towards 11 o'clock fewer seemed to be faUing than before." 

 (Messrs. A. C. M'Pherson and Hon. Robert Stein.) 



In lat. 19° 52' S., long. 50° 25' E., Captain Gaston of S. ' Penelope,' " saw 

 an extraordinary star-shower beginning at about 7" 30"". The meteors shot 

 from north towards south-east. Some of them were bright, others leaving 

 only a slender streak, and this display lasted until 2" a.m." The radiant in 

 the Mauritius must have been near o ^ Persei, and the time of maximum of 

 the shower at or soon after 11" p.m. (Mr. C. Meldrum's report on the shower 

 in ' Nature ' of January 23rd, 1873.) 



The radiation of this star-shower was very scattered, and the positions 

 assigned to it by various observers often differed very considerably from each 

 other. Thus the last-mentioned position assigned to it by Mr. Meldrum 

 from the observations at the Mauritius, is at about R. A. 54°, Decl. + 31° ; 



