8 H. A. Newton — Relation of the Orbits of 



along the line ^Q, the angle in the plane of the orbit from peri- 

 helion was a little more than twice the complement of qS, and 

 the perihelion distance somewhat less than Sin^S. But all 

 these quantities are easily computed in terms of the assumed 

 major axis. With a semi-major axis as large as 6 the change 

 in figure 1 would not be so considerable as to modify any 

 conclusions we can deduce from the grouping of the stars. 



The most noticeable fact revealed by the figure is the clus- 

 tering of the stars about the point Q. All but 7 of the 116 

 meteor quits are in the Q hemisphere ; that is, had orbits 

 whose inclinations were less than 90°. One hundred and nine 

 followed the earth, seven met it. Again the two lines STE 

 are drawn to represent circles inclined 35° to the ecliptic. 

 More than two-thirds of the meteor quits lie between these 

 two lines ; hence, over two-thirds of the orbits were inclined 

 less than 35° to the ecliptic, the motion being direct. 



It should be said that this clustering of the points near Q is 

 somewhat exaggerated in the figure by the nature of the stere- 

 ographic projection. The scale of distances near Q differs from 

 that near the circumference. But this does not affect the dis- 

 tribution between the hemispheres. 



It has been assumed that certain centers of quit areas were 

 themselves the quits. Can the condensation of the quits near 

 Q have been caused in any w&f by this assumption ? Or, is it 

 possible that general errors of observation, or inaccuracy of re- 

 porting, could have been the cause ? To answer this question 

 let us suppose that there had existed a law that led to conden- 

 sation of the relative quits in any manner whatever. The 

 effect of the errors of observing or reporting, and also the effect 

 of the assumption above stated, would be toward scattering 

 these relative quits over the heavens more equably, and thus 

 masking the law. Then when the relative quits thus unduly 

 scattered are reduced to absolute quits there might be as a 

 result a tendency towards condensation near Q. If, however, 

 we draw the circle TT, enclosing those absolute quits whose 

 relative quits are in the hemisphere next Q, the general ten- 

 dency of the errors in question would be towards equalizing 

 the number of absolute quits within to those without the circle 

 TT. Xow, the number of stars is nearly twice as great within 

 as without the circle. The condensation about Q,. shown in 

 figure 1, exists therefore in spite of, and not in consequence of, 

 these errors. With a good deal of confidence do I conclude that 

 these 116 meteors were, as a class and with probably a very 

 few exceptions, before coming into the air following the earth 

 in its orbit about the sun. 



Another fact of great interest is also shown by the grouping 

 of the p'oints in figure 1. In general these stones did not go 



