L52 Scientific Intelligence. 



River group, and the upper part possibly to the Middle Eocene 

 faunal zones of the Bridger Basin." it. s. l. 



4. Geological Survey of New Jersey. Annual Report of the 

 State Geologist, Henry B. Kummkl, for 1909. Pp. 123. Tren- 

 ton, 1910. — The latest volume from the New Jersey State Survey 

 contains, in addition to the Administrative Report by the State 

 Geologist, three detailed papers upon " Development of the 

 Passaic Watershed by Small Storage Reservoirs," by C. C. Ver- 

 meule ; " Records of Wells in New Jersey, 1905-1 909," by Henry 

 B. Kumniel and Howard M. Poland ; and " Notes on the Mineral 

 Industry," by Henry B. Kiimmel. The first of these reports is 

 accompanied by a large folded map. 



III. Astronomy. 



1. Transactions of the Astronomical Observatory of Yale 

 University. Vol. II, Part II, pp. 213-325. Published by the 

 Observatory, 1910. — Part I of this publication ranks among the 

 foremost of contributions to the world's knowledge of stellar 

 distances by reason of the number of star measures recorded, the 

 high character of the work and the important deductions made 

 from it. The present publication is of less importance only 

 because of the smaller number of parallax measures in it. The 

 character of the work is the same. 



Part II gives the work of the Observatory on 35 stars, per- 

 formed by Dr. Chase with the collaboration of Dr. Elkin and 

 Mr. Smith. The stars discussed are grouped in five classes, as 

 follows : 



A — 6 stars with remarkably large proper motions. 



B — 6 second magnitude stars not previously tested by reliable 

 methods. 



C — 1 stars from Part I which showed either exceptionally large 

 parallax or appreciable negative results. 



D — Additional stars from Vol. I, of large proper motion, re- 

 measured. 



E — Certain stars in the Pleiades which might furnish evidence 

 of the parallax of the group as a whole. 



The most elaborate discussion is that of Arcturus, the earlier 

 measures of which, by Elkin, gave a parallax so small as com- 

 pared with what might be expected from its brightness and proper 

 motion that a remeasurement seemed called for. 



The present discussion covers everything that has been done on 

 this star at the Winchester Observatory during twenty-three 

 years, by Elkin, Chase and Smith. The groups of measures by 

 each observer are all reduced independently by three different 

 methods, each based on a different hypothesis as to the weighting 

 of the observations ; and the conclusions reached as to the paral- 

 lax of Arcturus may well be regarded as final. (7r= +0."066± 

 0."006.) 



