532 ■ General Notes. [J une > 



The New Polar Stations.— The Danish station has been 

 changed from Upernavik, as first proposed, to a more southerly 

 position at Godshaab, on the west coast of Greenland, so as to be 

 at a greater distance from the American station at Lady Franklin 

 Bay and the Austrian at Jan Mayen. The expedition, which is 

 well fitted out at government expense, will sail from Copenhagen 

 about May 20th, and is expected to reach Godshaab at the end 

 of June. It is to remain there until September, 1883. 



The Dutch propose to establish their station at Dicksonshavn, 

 at the mouth of the river Yenisei, unless the ice prevents their 

 reaching it, in which case they will go to the north-east point of 

 Novaya Zemlya. Funds have been supplied for this purpose 

 partly by the government and partly by public subscriptions. 

 The party will be about twelve in number and will take with them 

 all the instruments and apparatus specified by the International 

 Polar Conference besides other instruments and a wooden house. 

 It is hoped that an ascent of the Yenisei can be made in a steam 

 launch. 



The British Government has granted the sum of £2500 and the 

 Canadian Government $4000 for a circumpolar station. 



The Italian Antarctic Expedition started from Buenos Ayres 

 on November 8, 1881, under command of Lieutenant Bove. The 

 government of the Argentine Republic has sent out a commis- 

 sion with the expedition for the purpose of carefully revising the 

 survey of the coast of their country; thus the expedition now 

 consists of four ships, viz: Santa Cruz, Uruguay, Cape Horn and 

 a steam bark. The Cape Horn is the largest vessel and will pro- 

 ceed to the Antarctic regions, while the Uruguay will remain at 

 Cape Horn. Lieutenant Bove hoped to leave Cape Horn by the 

 end of December, in order to sail across to South Shetland and 

 Grahamsland. He hoped to be back at Tierra del Fuego by the 

 end of March, to stay there until May, and then to leave for 

 Buenos Ayres. 



MICROSCOPY. 1 



Measurement of Microscopic Aperture.— Hon. J. D. Cox, 

 in a very interesting article in the Am. Month. Mic Joum., dis- 

 cusses the present method of measuring angular aperture of the 

 microscope by taking the angle of which The apex is the center 

 of the microscopic field of view, and whose sides bound the tel- 

 escopic field' of view when the microscope is turned into a tele- 

 scope, either by removing the ocular and" looking down the tube 

 with the naked eye, or by substituting a terrestrial eye-piece by 

 restoring the ocular and adding an objective as an erector in 

 the draw-tube. By experiments, confirmed and explained by 

 geometric principles, he concludes that the telescopic aperture, 

 however correctly measured, is not the microscopic aperture; 

 and that the difference, which is practically immaterial in objec- 

 1- rhis department is edited by Dr. R. H. Ward, Troy, N. Y. 



