September 27, 1895.] 



SCIENCE. 



399 



A number of years ago the German As- 

 tronomical Society inaugurated the plan of 

 making fairly accurate determinations of 

 the stars in the Durchmusterung of Arge- 

 landler and that of Schonfeld. The sky 

 was divided into bands or zones, every zone 

 overlapping for comparsion purposes on the 

 zones north and south. 



Mr. Skinner gave an account of the work 

 on the zone — 13° 50' to — 18° 10' which 

 had been assigned to' the Naval Observa- 

 tory, and which is now being observed 

 there under his chai'ge. Zero stars are dis- 

 tributed throughout the zone, the other 

 stars being determined differentially with re- 

 spect to them . Each star is to be determined 

 at least twice. The work has now been 

 going on for a year and a half. The zone 

 has been observed in one position of the in- 

 strument, and 5,714 stars in the reversed 

 position, the whole number of stars being 

 more than 8,000. Probably the observing 

 will be completed next winter and it will be 

 about two years after that before the re- 

 ductions are finished. 



Dr. Veeder is doing excellent work col- 

 lecting statistics with regard to auroras, 

 magnetic storms and thunder storms, and 

 endeavoring to derive general laws. It is to 

 be hoped that many observers may be found 

 who will furnish him the data he desires. 



The problems regarding the spectrum of 

 /3 Lyrse as brought to light by recent spec- 

 troscopic observations of this star at Pul- 

 kova, Potsdam and London were treated by 

 Professor Frost. 



Mr. A. S. Flint, of the Washburn observa- 

 tory, presented some results of the researches 

 with regard to stellar parallax undertaken 

 by him with the Repsold meridian circle of 

 that observatory by the method of Kap- 

 teyn. A list was made of stars having a 

 proper motion of 1" or more. A large num- 

 ber of these stars Mr. Flint has observed 

 for three epochs, and he proposes to con- 

 tinue until he shall secure live. As to the 



method of observing a bright field was used 

 and wire screens were employed so that all 

 stars should appear in the telescope as 

 approximately of the same brightness. The 

 observations were begun 1893, October. 

 The method of Kapteyn, which is differen- 

 tial, employing a preceding and following 

 comparison star, is certainly excellent. Mr. 

 Flint has obtained important results of a 

 high order of accuracy. 



Asaph Hall, Jr. 



SECTION B. GEOLOGY AND GEOGRAPHY. 



Eighteen papers were presented to the 

 section this year, but only thirteen were 

 read in full, as the authors of the others 

 were not present at the meeting. Major 

 Jed. Hotchkiss, of Staunton, Va., the Vice- 

 President, was absent from the early ses- 

 sions of the section, so that his address was 

 not delivered until Mondaj^ afternoon. He 

 then gave a somewhat informal talk on the 

 geological survey of Virginia, 1835-1841, 

 and its influence on the history of science 

 in this country. This survey was con- 

 ducted by Professors W. B. and H. D. Rog- 

 ers and was held by the speaker to have 

 been the first important geological survey 

 carried on in the United States. The work 

 was carried on for five years at an expense 

 of only $100,000 and the results lie at the 

 foundation of the progress made in geology 

 since. 



' The relations of primary and secondary 

 structures in rocks ' was the topic discussed 

 by Professor C. E. Van Hise, of Madison, 

 Wis. The paper inquired into the relations 

 of cleavage and fissility to bedding, and 

 showed that in homogeneous rocks the law 

 of hydrostatic viscous flow applies, and 

 therefore that the secondary structure cuts 

 the primary. In heterogeneous rocks the 

 beds are of varying strength, and the ac- 

 commodations between them control the 

 major movements, which are parallel to 

 them. The secondary structure is produced 



