SCIENTIFIC SUMMARY. 
99 
of a renewed investigation of the solar parallax from the opposition of 
Mars in 1877, which he considers preferable to the transits of Venus, and 
will publish in the Monthly Notices a chart of the stars to be observed with 
the planet at that epoch. 
TheMinoi' Planets . — Discoveries in this region have been increasing in an 
unprecedented ratio. No. 150 was detected, Oct. 10, by Watson at Ann 
Arbor. — No. 151 by Palisa at Pola (on the Adriatic), Nov. 1. — No. 152 by 
Paul Henry at Paris, Nov. 2. — No. 153 by Palisa, Nov. 12. — No. 154 by 
Prosper Henry at Paris, Nov. 6. — No. 155 by Palisa, Nov. 8. — No. 156 by 
Palisa, Nov. 22. (These numbers are not in order of priority, and probably 
will have to be rectified.) So rapid a development of our knowledge in 
this direction, amounting to sixteen during the present year, and six in one 
month, is likely to cause embarrassment. Computation already begins to 
be uncertain, and failures frequent in rediscovery. 
Jupiter . — M. Flammarion, who has been drawing this planet, has noticed 
various remarkable changes in the colour of the luminous zones, and a 
number of white elliptic spots, seemingly followed by ill-defined shadows, 
and terminating in angular trains, as if the shadow passed through separate 
strata of clouds. — Miss Hirst, of Auckland, New Zealand, has sent to the 
Royal Astronomical Society some drawings made with an 8^-inch silvered 
glass Browning reflector during the opposition of 1875. On one occasion a 
number of small dark spots with extremely black centres were seen on the 
S. polar zone ; at another time a small oval patch of a decided sea-green for 
three days near the same pole. Lassell’s bright spots were twice observed. 
It is evident from these and other observations that we are at present far 
from having attained any consistent interpretation of the phenomena of this 
colossal planet ; and the want of consent among contemporary drawings 
points to the conclusion that something better must be accomplished in 
this way before we can make satisfactory progress. The inscription must 
be more faithfully copied before we can attempt to read it ; and probably 
this will not be done excepting in the use of those commanding instruments, 
now fortunately becoming more common, in which the size and brightness 
of the picture will diminish the ratio of personal equation to a much more 
unimportant fraction than that which now represents it. Dr. Terby may, 
we hope, be induced to repeat on this most interesting planet the investi- 
gation which he has so ably and diligently conducted in the case of Mars. 
— Le Verrier has investigated the mass afresh, and adopts 1 Q - 4 g. 77 , the value 
given by Airy from observations of the fourth satellite in 1835. This would 
of course be preferable to the old result, 1Q67 . ^, obtained by Laplace from 
Pound’s observations ; but he finds it superior also to Bouvard’s (1824) of 
iotW; deduced from the perturbations of Saturn by a method which he 
discovers to be inexact, but which accidentally led to nearly the same value 
as Pound’s. From Triesnecker’s observations in 1794 and 1795, Bessel had 
brought out j- Q5 g. 68 ; Nicolai, from fifteen oppositions of Juno, 1 ^ 92 ? Encke, 
from fourteen oppositions of Vesta, jo^ 36 i Santini had deduced 4049 . 2 ' ; Bessel, 
from his own measures, 1Q47 1 . 879 ; Kruger, from the perturbations of Themis, 
h 2 
