PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 121 



thirds of saturation. Althougli no wind was perceptible, the naked 

 surface of the well was so unsteady as to give no definition, and it 

 was necessary to cover it with plate glass. Even then a very large 

 number of images were produced having a checker-board arrange- 

 ment. By careful manipulation these images were at length re- 

 duced to rows of points. 



Observations were made at the times of passage of trains. At 

 a distance of 0.29 of a mile, a fast express train produced an 

 appearance of boiling, the bright points being converted into a 

 patch of nebulous light. A slow train at the same distance pro- 

 duced only a radiation from the bright points. At greater dis- 

 tances, phenomena of somewhat difierent character were observed. 

 It appeared, however, that the effects of tremor were not propor- 

 tional to the distance, which must be attributed to inequalities in 

 different portions of the earth in their power of transmitting vibra- 

 tions. At 0.84 of a mile there was only a slight boiling from the 

 passage of a fast train, and a slight radiation of the points. At 

 0.94 of a mile, only radiation was observed. At 0.81 of a mile there 

 was less effect from the fast train than from the slow train at any 

 of the other localities. 



The next communication was by Mi*. Edgae Frisby. 



REMARKS ON THE TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE OF JANUARY 11th, 1880. 

 [Abstract.] 



Perhaps the phenomenon of the total eclipse of the 11th of 

 January, was more interesting on account of its comparatively 

 negative character than anything else ; the central line passed 

 through the most rugged part of the coast of California: about 150 

 miles south of San Francisco, it was observed from the top of the 

 Santa Lucia mountain, a peak about 6,000 feet above the level of 

 the Pacific ocean, it was of very short duration, only about 30 

 seconds ; one fact all the observers appeared to notice, that was, 

 as the moon's limb advanced over the sun, it was a little darker 

 than the surrounding sky near the sun. During totality it was 

 hardly as dark as I expected, we could barely discern Jupiter and 

 Mars, and no fixed stars were visible, a bright concentric corona 

 was seen round the sun hardly one-third part of the sun's diameter 

 in breadth and nearly uniform, but no outer corona and streamers 

 such as are usually described were visible, probably owing to the 

 short time of duration of the total phase. 



