298 
rOrULAll SCIENCE REVIEW. 
to apply to the transit of 1874. Mr. Proctor’s figures are appreciably dif- 
ferent from those of 1\I. Puiseiix (who, like the Astronomer Royal, has dealt 
with the passages of Venus’s centre in place of internal contact), and they 
present the method of durations in a more favourable light than do those 
which M. Puiseux has obtained. It remains to be seen, however, whether 
the difficulties of the Antarctic voyages which, as in 1882, would have to be 
undertaken to render the method of duration fully available, will deter our 
travellers and men of science from undertaking a task the satisfactory com- 
pletion of which would be so advantageous to the cause of astronomical 
science. If it be true, as Mr. Proctor states, that the transit of 1874, when 
treated by the method of durations, will give absolutely the best means of 
determining the sun’s distance available before the twent}^-first century, we 
need scarcely fear that this country will leave the fulfilment of the task to 
other nations. Any spot in the triangular space between Kerguelen Land, 
Crozet Land, and Enderby Land, would satisfy the requisite conditions for a 
southern station, as also would Sabrina Land, Adelie Land, and Victoria 
Land. But if an expedition could reach Enderby Land itself, so early as 
December 8, the observation made there would be the best of all. The 
northern station should be near Nertchinsk or Tsitsikar, in Siberia. 
Mr. Proctor deprecates the sending of expeditions to the neighbourhood of 
Victoria Land in 1882, as he asserts that there are no stations there at 
which the sun will have an elevation of 10° both at ingress and egress ; 
and Mr. Stone has expressed the opinion that observations made at a less 
elevation than this will be practically valueless. 
Doubtless these matters will be made the subject of fresh inquiry as the 
transits approach. It would be a misfortune if any misapprehension of the 
circumstances of the transit should lead either to the loss of favourable op- 
portunities for observation, or to the dispatch of expeditions, preparatory or 
otherwise, which would eventually be found to have been misdirected. 
Solar Activity . — During the last few months there have been some re- 
markable evidences of activity in the solar photosphere. We are approach- 
ing the epoch of maximum disturbance, and already the formation of large 
spots, single or clustering, indicates that we may look, during the actual 
period of the maximum, for manifestations of activity at least equal to those 
which have been exhibited on former occasions. At a recent meeting of the 
Royal Astronomical Society two enormous spots were described and 
pictured, one of them by Mr. Bidder, the other by Mr. Browning. The dis- 
cussion which ensued led to the consideration of the granules whose 
nature and appearance have been so often dealt with of late years. Mr. 
Huggins pointed out that it is only in the neighbourliood of the spots that 
those irregularities of form are to be noticed which have led to the com- 
parison of the granules to willow-leaves, straws, and so on. 
A cluster of spots measured by Mr. Browning on March 7, was found 
to have a length of 97,700 miles, and a breadth of 27,130 miles. The 
direction of its length was as nearly as possible parallel to the solar 
equator. 
Winneckea Short-period Comet . — This comet was re-discovered on April 
19 by Winnecke himself, at Karlsruhe. It presented an appearance closely 
resembling that which it had when first discovered in 1858 ; large, round, 
