1865. 1 Astronomy. 441 



Proceedings of the Eoyal Astronomical Society. 



The annual Report of the Council of this Society brought before 

 the General Meeting in February last, arrived too late to admit of 

 notice to be taken of it in our last Chronicles. In the mean time much 

 that it contains has ceased to have any particular interest in these 

 pages, and many of its announcements have already appeared in our 

 Chronicles. We shall, however, briefly glance through the report 

 (which occupies 70 pages of the Monthly Notices), and note anything 

 which may appear worthy of record here. From the Proceedings of 

 the various Astronomical Observatories, we extract a few matters of 

 interest. At Greenwich no important changes, instrumental or other- 

 wise, have been introduced during the past year. The connection 

 between the Observatories of Greenwich and Paris, by which the 

 Greenwich Observatory is charged with the Meridional Observations 

 of the Asteroids from new moon to full moon, and the Paris Ob- 

 servatory from full moon to new moon, has been found to afford relief 

 wdthout any loss of valuable observation. During the autumn of last 

 year, Colonel Forsch, Capt. Zylinski, and Doctor Tiele, gentlemen 

 connected with the measurement of the Great Arc of the parallel be- 

 tween Orsk on the Oural, and Valenria on the West Coast of Ireland, 

 were engaged in England in determining the differences of longitude 

 between Greenwich and Bonn, Nieuport, and Haverfordwest. 



At the Eadcliffe Observatory the Heliometer has been chiefly used 

 for the completion of the re-observation of Struve's Lueidce, of which 

 very few are found to exhibit any conspicuous orbital motion. The me- 

 teorological observations have been made and discussed with the same 

 rigour as in preceding years, and the photographic sheets are found 

 very useful in the comparison of storms passing over Oxford and other 

 places, where there are found similar self-recording instruments. 



At Cambridge, in addition to the usual work of an observatory, a 

 very complete series of observations has been made for the purpose of 

 determining by means of the method introduced by Professor Challis, 

 the errors arising from the form of the pivots of the transit instru- 

 ment. With the Northumberland Equatorial, observations have been 

 made of Comet I., 1864, and also of the places of 747 Ecliptic stars. 

 These have been made by means of a new eye-piece, of Steinheil's 

 construction, made by Mr. Cooke, of York, and provided with a 

 square bar micrometer, on a plan devised by Mr. Graham, the first- 

 assistant. 



The extensive works now in progress in the immediate neighbour- 

 hood of the Liverpool Observatory, have somewhat interfered with the 

 general routine duties of the establishment during the past twelve 

 months. Owing to the land on wbich it stands being required for 

 dock accommodation, and the impossibility of finding any site on the 

 Dock quays or near the margin of the river, which might not be 

 wanted for dock extension in a few years' time, it has been decided to 

 take the observatory over to the west-side of the river, where the Dock 

 Board possess two acres of land on Bidston Hill, on which there are 



