75 
Mr. Baxendell stated that on the night of the 3rd instant 
he had an opportunity of examining the spot referred to by 
Mr. Birt with Mr. Gladstone’s equatorially mounted achro- 
matic of 7J inches aperture, using powers from 60 to 250. 
It was then a well-marked though shallow crater, having a 
diameter about three-fourths of that of Beer and Madler’s 
Hipparchus F. The shadow of the western wall was very 
conspicuous on the floor of the crater. 
Mr. Baxendell also read the following extract of a letter 
dated November 27th, 1867, which he had received from 
Mr. C. Ragoonatha Chary, the first native assistant at the 
Royal Observatory, Madras : — 
“I have prepared the necessary calculations connected 
with the total solar eclipse to take place in the Indian Penin- 
sula on the 18th of August, 1868, and these, with appropriate 
description and remarks on the eclipse by N. R. Pogson, Esq., 
are now in the press and will be published in the leading 
Madras Almanac. In these calculations I find that a slide- 
rule constructed for trigonometrical purposes may most 
advantageously be used even in such intricate cases as the 
solar eclipse. It saves more than three-fourths of the time 
and labour ; and having calculated independently with the 
slide-rule as well as by means of logarithms for several 
places, I found the difference rarely to amount to half a 
minute in time, which is no great matter in predicting for 
amateurs, and even for intending observers. Mr. Wool- 
house’s method is followed, I believe, in the Nautical 
Almanac. The skeleton forms of this method, which are 
printed in great detail for logarithmic calculations, may be 
greatly simplified and facilitated by the use of a slide-rule 
accurately divided. The one I used was not very accu- 
rately divided, and was only two feet in length. 
