69 



1833. He saw the great auroral arch of 17th Nov. 1835, from a 

 point near the junction of the Ohio and Mississippi, and on the 14th 

 November, 1837, he witnessed at Jefferson College a brilliant crim- 

 son arch, a rare phenomenon in that latitude, 31° 36'. He noticed, 

 also, occasional brilliant meteors on the 13th and 14th of November, 

 1837, but they did not appear to come from the well known radiant 

 point of 1833, in Leo. The times for observation in 1838 and 1839 

 were too cloudy to allow of satisfactory results. The subsequent an- 

 niversaries were clear, and well watched, but without any observation 

 of interest. 



Professor Forshey mentions that he had seen the zodiacal light in 

 the west, from December to May, but that he first witnessed it in the 

 east, on the 4th of October of last year, when it continued in great 

 brilliancy from 3 A. M. till daylight. 



Professor Bache communicated to the Society a statement 

 of the Observations made for the year past at the Magnetic 

 Observatory at the Girard College, and exhibited the original 

 records, the abstracts made from them, the calculated results, 

 and the curves by which they are represented. He reminded 

 the members that in consequence of the depressed state of the 

 Society's funds in May last, it had been judged inexpedient 

 to ask for the appropriation of any part of them to the object 

 of these observations ; and he mentioned the names of ten 

 members of the Society, and of three gentlemen, not members, 

 Messrs. Richard Price and J. D. Brown, of Philadelphia, and 

 Professor M'Lean, of Princeton, by whose liberality the Ob- 

 servatory had been supported during the year. 



After some remarks from Mr. Walker, describing the re- 

 sults which have been arrived at by the labours of Gauss, We- 

 ber and others, in magnetism, and referring to the practical 

 value to navigation of the magnetic investigations now making, 

 Dr. Chapman pressed upon the Society the importance of con- 

 tinuing the magnetic and meteorological observations in the 

 combined series which is now in the course of execution : — and 

 on his motion, a committee was appointed to devise means for 

 continuing the observations at the Girard College Observatory 

 during the remaining two years of the series. 



The Committee, consisting of Mr. Du Ponceau, Dr. Patter- 

 son, and Mr. Vaughan, to which was referred, on the 16th of 



