January 6, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



15 



of stars by the Moon, and eclipses of Jupi- 

 ter's satellites. Much of the current work 

 of this instrument may be found in the 

 Astronomical Journal. 



The 26- inch equatorial has been continu- 

 ously emploj'ed by Professor Brown on ob- 

 servations of the more difficult asteroids, 

 on double stars, and on the satellites of 

 Mars, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. In 

 recent months some spectroscopic work has 

 been done. 



Assistant Astronomer George A. Hill has 

 charge of the Prime Vertical transit instru- 

 ment and the alt-azimuth. With the Prime 

 Vertical transit from July 24, 1S93, to No- 

 vember 20, 1898, he has made 1,140 obser- 

 vations of a Lyrse, Aurigse, a Canum 

 Venaticorum, p. Andromedse and y Bootis. 

 "With the alt-azimuth instrument from Feb- 

 ruary 24, 1898, to November 20, 1898, he 

 has made 425 vertical-circle observations of 

 American Ephemerisstars, and from Novem- 

 ber 22, 1894, to November 20, 1898, he has 

 also made 599 zenith telescope observations 

 of pairs of stars selected in groups as sug- 

 gested by Kiistner. 



As at the old Observatory, meteorological 

 observations are taken every three hours 

 by the watchman on duty. After removal 

 to the new site magnetic observations were 

 resumed, but it was soon found that the 

 influence of the suburban electric roads in 

 the vicinity entirely vitiated the photo- 

 graphic records, and they were discontinued 

 in the summer of 1898. 



The annual volume of Observations for 

 the year 1889 was published in 1893, and 

 that for 1890 was published in 1895. The 

 latter contained an important appendix en- 

 titled 'A catalogue of 16,748 stars, deduced 

 by the Naval Observatory from zone obser- 

 vations made at Santiago de Chili by the 

 United States Naval Astronomical Expedi- 

 tion to the Southern Hemisphere during the 

 years 1849, '50, '51, '52, Lieut. J. M. Gil- 

 liss, U.S.N. , Superintendent.' Advantage 



was taken of the interruption of the work 

 of the Observatory by reason of its removal 

 to a new site, to complete the reduction of 

 these zone observations. Among the many 

 persons who have shared in the computa- 

 tions Professors Harkness, Frisby and 

 Brown have performed the most important 

 part. 



In November, 1898, was published Ap- 

 pendix I to the Washington Observations 

 for 1892, entitled ' The Second Washington 

 Catalogue of Stars, together with the an- 

 nual results upon which it is based ; the 

 whole derived from observations made at 

 the United States Naval Observatory with 

 the 8. 5- inch Transit Circle during the years 

 1866 to 1891 and reduced to the epoch 

 1875.0, pi-epared under the direction of 

 John R. Eastman, Professor of Mathemat- 

 ics, U.S.N.' This catalogue contains the 

 positions of 5,151 stars which have been 

 derived from 72,941 observations, being the 

 entire series made while the Pistor and 

 Martins transit circle was located at the old 

 Observatory. 



It will be noted that the Naval Observa- 

 tory owes its existence primarily to an at- 

 tempt on the part of naval officers to pro- 

 vide a depot for the care and issue of charts 

 and nautical instruments. This naturally 

 involved the equipment of the Depot with 

 such astronomical instruments as are neces- 

 sary for rating chronometers, but the needs 

 of the Wilkes Exploring Expedition of 1838 

 to 1842, and the inception of the American 

 Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac ten years 

 later, soon showed the necessity for an in- 

 strumental equipment sufficient to cope with 

 all astronomical problems, and that followed 

 in due time. The principal aim of the Na- 

 val Observatory has always been to carry 

 forward a continuous series of Meridian ob- 

 servations on the Sun, Moon and planets, 

 such as can only be undertaken by great 

 government observatories, like those of 

 Greenwich and Paris. Since 1861 this work 



