Ohituary Notices. 
V 
style characteristic of all the apparatus constructed by him affords 
perfect facility for observation near the celestial equator, but is in- 
convenient to a degree when the telescope is directed to the imme- 
diate neighbourhood of the pole of the heavens. 
In 1835 Pond, the sixth Astronomer-Royal, resigned, and Airy, 
the distinguished young Cambridge professor, was naturally 
appointed to the vacant post by Lord Auckland, then head of the 
Admiralty. Airy forthwith reorganised the national observatory, 
introducing the methods and arrangements that had proved so suc- 
cessful at Cambridge. From that time forth the annual volumes of 
Greenwich observations, in their familiar drab bindings, appeared 
with unfailing regularity. The field of work, too, was soon ex- 
tended. For some years the study of terrestrial magnetism had 
been making rapid strides, mainly under the auspices of the Mag- 
netiscke Verein., of which Gauss and Weber were the leading spirits. 
Desirous that this country should take a fitting share in investiga- 
tions so closely bearing on its varied maritime interests. Airy in 
1840 established the magnetical and meteorological services at 
Greenwich. The memorable Antarctic voyage of Captain (after- 
wards Sir) James Clark Ross at that time doubtless influenced the 
authorities in sanctioning this extension of the work carried on at 
Greenwich. The laborious eye obseiwations in this department 
were replaced by photographic records as early as 1848. The inter- 
dependence of solar and magnetic phenomena, which at first escaped 
Airy, was established from the Greenwich observations many years 
afterwards by the indefatigable researches of Mr Ellis. 
I^ot content with publishing and discussing his own work. Airy 
undertook the gigantic task of reducing all the lunar and planetary 
observations made by Bradley, Bliss, Maskelyne, and Pond from 
1750 to 1830. Bradley’s matchless observations of the sun ^nd 
fixed stars for the first twelve years of that period had already 
been utilised by Bessel in his Fundamenta Astronomic. For the 
planetary reductions. Airy in 1847 received the gold medal of the 
Royal Astronomical Society for the second time, and in the follow- 
ing year the lunar reductions gained him the equivalent testimonial 
of the same society. 
In 1847 was completed the Greenwich Altazimuth, designed by 
Professor Airy for the purpose of observing the moon near conjunc- 
