1867.] Astronomy. 91 



The error is, of course, due to a misprint ; but the circumstance is 

 noteworthy, as showing the confidence with which astronomers are 

 in the habit of accepting a series of predictions crowded together 

 in a thick octavo volume, published three or four years before the 

 predicted events happen. The non-astronomical world are astonished 

 when the few events which admit of general observation happen as 

 predicted ; but it is a source of far greater astonishment to the 

 astronomer that a single telescopic phenomenon out of many thou- 

 sands predicted should occur a few seconds before or after the 

 predicted time. 



In the Comptes Rendus of July 30, and August 6, 1866, there 

 is an interesting paper by M. Faye on variable stars. He sums up 

 the results of his examination of recorded phenomena as follows : — 



" So-called new stars are not really new, their all but sudden 

 apparition being only an exaggeration of the ordinary phenomenon 

 of periodical variables, a phenomenon corresponding (in turn) to 

 simple oscillations, more or less sensible, in the phenomenon of the 

 production and maintenance of the photospheres of all stars. These 

 phenomena, considered as successive when the history of a star is 

 examined in part, characterize the progress of the cooling of the 

 star, and the decline of its solar or photospheric phase. When 

 these phenomena occur thus in an irregularly intermittent manner, 

 with very long and gradually increasing intervals, they are the 

 precursors of the star's extinction, or at any rate of the formation of 

 a first crust more or less consistent. Hence it is that phenomena 

 of this sort take place only in stars already very faint, and never 

 result in the formation of a fine new star." 



Our space will not permit us to deal at length with the papers 

 read and discussed at the November meeting of the Astronomical 

 Society. The remarks in which the President claimed for astronomy 

 the credit of recovering the Atlantic Cable are noteworthy. The 

 connection between the price of Atlantic Telegraph shares and the 

 transit-tube at Greenwich, seems at first sight as far-fetched (and 

 is in reality as just), as that traced by a French astronomer 

 between the cotton trade and Jupiter's satellites. 



A paper by Mr. Lynn, " On the mass of Jupiter, as deduced 

 by Herr Kriiger from observations of Themis," deals with an 

 important subject. The determination by Pound in the 17th 

 century had for a long time been adopted as the true value, 

 though no account remained of the observations made by 

 Pound beyond the mere statement of the numbers in Newton's 

 ' Principia' (lib. iii., prop, viii., cor. i.). The mass thus assigned 

 was jQeyth of the sun's mass. But about the year 1826, Nicola 



calculated a larger value ( 1053-924 } ^J means oi the perturbations 



