44 H. C. RUSSELL. 
Zone time.—It is known to the members that a persistent effort 
has been made throughout the world for a rearrangement of time 
notation, and in many countries the Hour Zone system has been 
adopted, and is a great convenience to the travelling public, 
because wherever one goes in such countries the minutes and 
seconds of time are the same. Changes of longitude or time are 
made every hour (15°). For Australia the system would work 
most conveniently, because the fifteenth hour Zone comes through 
Queensland, Victoria, and New South Wales, and the change of 
time for either Colony would not be large, and it is understood ~ 
that the Railway authorities in all the Colonies are most anxious 
for its adoption in the railway service. There can be no doubt 
that the change would be for the public convenience; but, I 
was obliged to point out in my report, that in an important case 
in the Supreme Court it was decided that “ time” for legal pur- 
poses ‘‘meant local mean-time,” and that if we adopted the ‘‘ Hour 
Zone time” for common purposes, that is, a time differing from 
“local mean time,” it would be almost impossible to carry out many 
legal processes without confusion, arising from the use of two 
“different systems” of time keeping. It is understood that the 
law officers of the Crown uphold the objection to the proposed 
change, and it is possible that a similar objection may exist in 
other countries. 
Solar Parallax.—In the past year was published what may 
probably be considered the best values of the solar parallax, 
derived from the transits of Venus and other methods, including 
the velocity of light, opposition of planets, &., and Dr. Auwers 
of Berlin, has at last published the result obtained from seven 
hundred and fifty heiiometer measures made by the German 
Transit of Venus parties in 1874 and 1882; the resulting solar 
parallax for 1874 is 8-877, and for 1882, 8:879. Professor Hark- 
ness, of Washington, has published the most elaborate discussion 
of the many attempts made to determine the solar parallax, in- 
cluding all but the two just published by Professor Auwers, and 
as the result of his discussion he adopts 8°834 in. as the final 
