xvi President's Address 



ASTRONOMICAL PROGRESS IN AUSTRALIA. 



A few words on the recent progress of astronomy in this 

 part of the world will perhaps not be without interest to 

 you. With well-equipped public observatories at Sydney, 

 Adelaide, and Melbourne, aided by several private astronomers 

 (prominent among which is Mr. Tebbutt, of Windsor, New 

 South Wales), possessing excellent telescopes and other 

 instruments, we are by no means behindhand in the pursuit 

 of knowledge in this direction. As regards our own 

 Observatory, you will be glad to hear its capacity and useful- 

 ness have been materially increased by the erection of a fine 

 transit circle of the most modern construction, made by 

 Trough ton and Simms, of London. It has an object glass of 

 8-in. diameter, and is capable of the highest class meridian 

 work. The work done with the great telescope since its 

 erection in 1869, which consists of a revision of the southern 

 nebulas observed by Sir John Herschel at the Cape from 1834 

 to 1838, is now in the press, and will be shortly issued in 

 parts, with lithographs of the nebulas as they appear at 

 present. At the Sydney Observatory, Mr. Russell is busily 

 engaged with work in connection with the trigonometrical 

 survey of New South Wales, in addition to the ordinary 

 astronomical work. I had an opportunity of inspecting this 

 Observatory very recently, and it afforded me the greatest 

 interest and pleasure to examine the various improvements 

 in astronomical and physical instruments which have been 

 devised by my talented colleague. A noteworthy instance 

 is a new mounting of the Sydney 12-in. refractor, which is 

 the most stable mounting I have ever tried. While the large 

 telescope can be moved with great ease, when once it is 

 pointed on an object and clamped it is almost as rigid as a 

 meridian instrument, even while following the diurnal 

 motion of the object steadily and accurately, by means of 

 one of Mr. Russell's double-pendulum governors. The Ade- 

 laide Observatory, which possesses a fine 8-in. equatorial by 

 Cook and Sons, has now been furnished with an excellent 



