SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



21 



CONDUCTED BY FRANK C. DENNETT. 







Rises 



Sets. 



Position at Noon 







h.m. 



h.m. 



R.A. 



Dec. 





1896. 



A.M. 



P.M. 



h.m. 





Situ 



.. June I 



... 3-50 



.. 8.5 .. 



4.40 . 



. 22° 10' N 





)i II 



... 345 



... 8.14 .. 



. 5-21 . 



. 23° 9' 





I. 21 



- 345 

 Rises. 



A.M. 



... 8.18 .. 

 Souths. 



A.M. 



6.2 . 



.23=27' 



Moon 



,, I 



... 0.7 



.. 4.39 









„ 8 



... 1.32 

 Souths. 



P.M. 



•■ 9-29 

 Sets. 



P.M. 









„ 14 



■■ 2.54 



P.M. 



.. 10.56 

 A.M. 









„ 21 



.. 8.45 



Souths 



P.M. 



.. 0.27 



. Semi 

 Diameter. 







Mercury. 



11 I 



•• 0.53 



A.M. 



- 5" 7 •■ 



5-36 . 



. 22° 34' N. 





,, II 



.. 11.48 . 



.. 6" .. 



5.16 . 



• 19^ 37' 





,, 21 



.. 10.56 . 



• ■ 5" 3 ■- 



5.1 .. 



. 18° 15' 



l^eniis 



)i I 



.. II. 15 . 



.. 5" .. 



356 .. 



. 19° 41' N. 





„ IX . 



.. 11.28 . 



• 4" 9 - 



448 .. 



. 22° 5' 





1) 21 . 



.. II.4I . 



• 4" 9 •■• 



541 •• 



. 23° 27' 



Mars 



.1 I ■ 



.. 749 • 



. 3" I ... 



0.32 .. 



• 1° 39' 





,, II . 



• 7.37 - 



. 3" 2 ... 



0.59 •• 



• 4" 30' 





,, 21 . 



. 7.25 . 



P.M. 



• 3" 4 - 



1.26 .. 



. 7° 14' 



Jupiter . 



., 21 . 



.. 2.46 . 



. 15" ... 



8.47 .. 



18° 38' N. 



Saturn .. 



,, 21 . 



■ S.43 . 



. 8" 4 ... 



1445 •■ 



13° 24' s. 



Uranus . 



11 21 . 



. 9.12 . 



. I" 9 ... 



15.14 .. 



17° 45' S. 



Neptune.. 



„ 21 . 



. II. 5 ■ 



. I" 9 ... 



5-9 •• 



21'^ 34' N. 





Moon's 



Phases. 







Last Qr.. 



June 3 ... 8 



2 a.m. 



New ... J 



line II . 



.. 8.43 a.m. 



ist Qr. .. 



„ 18 ... II 



41 a.m. 



FtiU ... 



„ 25 



.. 6.55 a.m. 



On June 14th there is an occultation of Jupiter. 

 The disappearance takes place at gh. 52m. p.m. ; 

 the reappearance at loh. 43m., but the planet will 

 be too near the horizon for this latter to be 

 observed. 



The Moon. — The Strand Magazine for April con- 

 tains an interesting paper on " Lunar Scenery " by 

 Sir R. Ball, prefaced by a reduced copy of Mr. T. 

 K. Mellor's outline map (Home and Thornthwaite), 

 and containing copies of some Lick and Paris 

 photographs. 



Planetoids.— It is stated that, although Dr. 

 Max Wolf, of Heidelberg, has discovered so many 

 of these little bodies — the last on April 2nd — he has 

 never directly observed one of them through the 

 telescope, his discoveries being made from the 

 photographic plates, on which, whilst stars are 

 shown as points, planets appear as short lines 

 owing to their motion. 



Comet, — Professor Lewis Swift, Director of the 

 Lowe Observatory, South California, discovered a 

 comet on April 13th. It was situated in R.A. jh. 

 39m. Dec. N. 19° 40', in other words, 5^ south of 

 the Pleiades. It was described as bright. Since 

 then it has travelled rapidly north, so that on May 

 3rd, Mr. E. R. Blakeley, of Dewsbury, found it in 



R.A. 3h., Dec. N. 57'^ still travelling to north- 

 east. Its diameter appeared about 3', it was 

 irregularly round, and fairly bright. Dr. Schorr 

 calculates that it passed its perihelion on April 

 17th, 189G, i2h. i4-4m. The comet appears to 

 be a new one. 



Personal Equation, in making telescopic 

 observations, is a subject which perhaps hardly 

 receives so much attention as it should. A singular 

 instance of this has just been brought to light. 

 Professor Ed. E. Barnard has pubHshed the results 

 of his observations on the satellites of Uranus. He 

 states that Ariel is about half a magnitude brighter 

 than Umbriel ; of the other two, Titania and 

 Oberon, he concludes that they are of constant, 

 nearly equal brightness, though his earlier ob- 

 servations made it seem that they both varied 

 to the extent of fully a magnitude. He has 

 been forced to the conclusion that if there are 

 two nearly equal lights, to his eye the lower 

 appears fainter. 



New Lunar Atlas. — It is to be hoped that ere 

 long Professor Dr. L. Weinek, of Prague, will suc- 

 ceed in having his photographic atlas of the moon 

 finished and published. To that end, Miss C. W. 

 Bruce, of New York, has generously contributed 

 1,250 marks, and the Imperial Academy of Science 

 at Vienna, has granted a subsidy of 500 florins. 

 Such an atlas would prove a far better " court of 

 appeal " than any of the published maps could 

 pos.sibly do, in difficulties such as arose in October, 

 1866, when the late Professor Schmidt missed 

 Linne, a crater which Lohrmann had described as 

 " very deep," and in its place found only a bright 

 patch and a little hill. Another time when such 

 a work would have proved of inestimable use 

 would have been in 1877, w^hen Dr. Hermann 

 Klein, on May 27th, discovered what is believed 

 to be a new crater, now known as Hyginus N. 

 Those who have familiarized themselves with 

 selenographical detail have long felt the need of 

 such a work. 



Meteors. — On April 12th, about 8 h. 5 m., a 

 brilliant meteor was visible, having a slow motion 

 from west to east. Reports of it are to hand from 

 places so far distant as the Isle of Wight and Ren- 

 frewshire. In London its altitude above the north- 

 north-east horizon was about 25". Mr. Frank Sich, 

 jun.. Niton, Isle of Wight, writes : — "On Sunday 

 night, April 12th, about five minutes past eight, I 

 was fortunate enough to see at Niton, in the Isle of 

 Wight, a very large meteor. It was travelling some- 

 what slowly, and rather low down in the north-east, 

 and going towards the east. I did not observe 

 that it left any trail behind it, but attached to it on 

 the west side was a small cone of red light. The 

 meteor-light was yellow. It suddenly ' went out ' 

 without any audible report." It helps much if those 

 who witness these beautiful phenomena, note, as 

 nearly as possible, their path amongst the stars, or, 

 at least, their altitude, and also, in making known 

 the same, state their exact place of observation. 

 This is of use in the calculation of the meteor's 

 distance above the earth. From such a comparison 

 of observations, M. Camille Flammarion calculates 

 that the great meteor of February loth. which 

 caused so much sensation and, indeed, damage, at 

 Madrid and neighbourhood, must have been at the 

 height of 14-4 miles at the time of its explosion. 

 Thus he writes in the Bulletin of the Society 

 Astronomique of France. 



