





318 





So. 



Mag. 



R. A. 1800. 



Dec. 1800. 



Authority. 





/^-•^v*-! 



C ■ -^ ■ ■■^ 

 A. m. .s. 



/ "• N 



o 



f '■ """ 



1 



9.10 



13 50 36 



— 9 24.0 



L. 



2 



7. 8 



13 52 48 



— 9 55.8 



L. 



3 



7. 8 



13 52 53 



— 9 45.7 



L. B. 



4 



8. 9 



13 57 13 



— 10 11.7 



L. B. 



5 



9 



13 59 54 



— 10 26.4 



L. B. 



6 



8 



14 



— 11 26.5 



L. B. 



7 



8 



14 12 



— 11 8.3 



L. B. 



8 



7. 8 



14 12 09 



— 11 20.96 



L. 



9 



8 



14 29 37 



— 13 10.7 



L. B. 



missing # 



In this list, there are only three stars, viz: Nos. 1, 2 and 8, which 

 have not also been seen by Bessel. No. 1 is too small, 9.10 magni- 

 tude. No. 2 was considered too far south (17') of the computed 

 place of Leverrier. No. 8 was only 2' north of the computed locus 

 of Leverrier. It was of the right magnitude and not in Bessel. This 

 circumstance was noticed by Mr. Walker on the 2d of February, and 

 notified by letter, dated that evening, to Lieut. Maury, the Superin- 

 tendent of the Washington Observatory, with a statement of Mr. 

 Walker's belief, that as soon as the weather, then cloudy, should be- 

 come clear, that star on examining the heavens would be missing. 



On the 4th of February, Prof. Hubbard examined the heavens, and 

 found that the star was missing. Here, then, was an argument in 

 favour of the identity of the missing star and the planet Leverrier. 

 The general view of the case was this. Mr. Walker believed the 

 limits were sufficiently extensive to embrace the Leverrier region. 

 It was probable that Lalande had not omitted a star of the 7, 8 mag- 

 nitude. No other star could be found in the H. Celeste which, if 

 now missing, could be reasonably supposed to have been the planet. 

 The alternative left was to presume, either that Lalande did not ob- 

 serve this planet, or that this missing star was Leverrier. 



To offset this probability, however, Mr. Walker's attention has 

 since been called to a circumstance not noticed by him at the time, 

 viz: that the missing star has the mark of a colon (:) after it in the 

 H. Celeste, by which Lalande used to indicate that the declination was 

 doubtful to the extent of rb 5'. As this would leave it within admis- 

 sible limits, Mr. Walker would still have considered their identity as 

 not being improbable, if the two stars seen nearly at the same time 

 by Lalande, and marked with different declinations and magnitudes, 



