208 MR. ALFRED BROTHERs's 



Eespecting the star 6 1 Cygni^ Powell states (Mem.R. Ast. 

 Soc. vol. xxxii. p. 95 j, " Surely the movements of the com- 

 ponents cannot be of an orbital nature;" and Mr. Davres 

 also saySj in a letter of 8th September i866^ "The motion 

 observed in 6 1 Cygni is not orbital, but rectilinear, arising 

 from difference of proper motion.^^ On such authority 

 perhaps the star ought to have been omitted; but it is one 

 of Smyth^s binaries, and for that reason, as well as for the 

 special interest attaching to it, it is retained. 



The star ^Herculis was observed to be single from about 

 1863 to 1865 ; but the following remarks, contained in the 

 letter from Mr. Dawes above quoted, may be of some in- 

 terest : — '' From the extreme difficulty, or perhaps impos- 

 sibility, of seeing ^ Herculis in the least elongated in 1863, 

 I imagined it could not be otherwise than ' single ' to 

 telescopes of ordinary dimensions in 1865. I find, how- 

 ever, that the small star has made more haste to emerge 

 from its concealment than I supposed to be probable ; . . . . 

 but near the end of October I received a letter from Alvan 

 Clark, informing me that with one of his exquisite object- 

 glasses of 7 inches aperture he had seen ^ Herculis double. 

 He gave me no particulars of angle or distance, and I con- 

 fess I thought it likely there might be some mistake. On 

 August 31st I turned an 8 -inch refractor on to ^ Herculis, 

 and instantly saw the small star perfectly detached from 

 the large one." 



fi^ Herculis. — Of this star I have not found any other 

 measures than those by Mr. Dawes in 1858 and 1864, and 

 by Mr. Knott in 1865 ; but as the change of the angle of 

 position amounts in 17 years to about 20 degrees, the 

 binary character of the object may, perhaps, be considered 

 established. The measures by Alvan Clark, as published in 

 1856, are not complete. 



IT Cephii. — The first measures of this object appear to 

 have been made by Admiral Smyth in 1843; audit is 



