mo 



Mr. J. B. N. Hennessey. 



[Nov. 20, 



only eight feet square, the top of the tent being removed, No sound 

 broke the enforced stillness that prevailed ; the sky was brilliantly 

 clear, and all cause for anxiety, as to clouding over, or the driving of 

 the equatoreal, or on any other account, was completely absent ; while 

 the events in question were plainly seen to progress so gradually and 

 deliberately that there was not the smallest occasion for hurry or con- 

 fusion of any kind, nor did any occur. Unlike a solar eclipse, when 

 every second is of the utmost importance, there was plenty of time for 

 every purpose. Under these circumstances, I repeat, it was practi- 

 cally impossible that any blunder in recording could be committed. 



3. Subsequently, when Colonel J. F. Tennant, F.R.S., was reducing 

 his observations, taken at Roorkee, he wrote to me,* pointing out that 

 ■there was apparently a blunder of three minutes in the recorded time 

 of my first internal contact. I was well aware of this anomaly, and 

 had previously alluded to it in Burlington House, when taking part in 

 the discussion that followed the reading of my Notes I and II before 

 the Royal Society in 1875 ; so that with the full knowledge I possessed 

 of all the facts of observations, I found it out of my power to adopt 

 Colonel Tennant's very natural suggestion, that the three minutes in 

 question were due to a blunder in recording. 



4. It appears desirable to add a few words as to this anomaly. If 

 due to a record-blunder, then, it will be seen from the observatory notes 

 preceding, the identical three minutes' blunder must have been re- 

 peated in no less than eight independent preceding times recorded ; 

 and this notwithstanding that, from our contiguity of position, both 

 Baboo Cally Mohun Grhose and myself availed ourselves of ample 

 opportunity to check Mr. Cole^s declarations of complete minutes ; a 

 conclusion which amounts to assuming practically that three indi- 

 viduals independently concurred in the erroneous records of nine 

 different times, which were equally wrong by three minutes. This is 

 by no means probable. 



5. If, on the other hand, the anomaly be ascribed to blunder on my 

 part in visible recognition of the contact, or briefly to contact-blunder, 

 the following evidence in my favour may be adduced by comparing my 

 intervals of contact with those observed by my friend the (late) Rev. 

 H. D. James, MJL, who was stationed only nineteen miles from me to 

 the north-west, f 



* Se? also his Report to Government, p. 41. 1877. 

 f At Chakatra, lat, 2s T . 30° 43', long. E. 77° 54', height 7,300 feet above sea 

 : < Proc. Roy. Soc." Yol. xxiii, pp. 381-384.) 



