48 
number of exquisite examples showing not only the nodes 
but verticils of the linear leaves so characteristic of the 
plant. These specimens place the correctness of my pre- 
vious inference beyond all possibility of doubt, and finally 
settle the point that asteropliyllites is not the branch and 
foliage of a calamite, but an altogether distinct type of 
vegetation having an organisation peculiarly its own.” 
The author said that he had obtained the plant in almost 
every stage of its growth, from the youngest twig to the 
more matured stem, and that the genus would be the sub- 
ject of his next, or fifth, of the series of memoirs now in 
course of publication by the Royal Society. 
“ On a large Meteor seen on February 3, 1873, at 10 p.m.,” 
by Professor Osborne Reynolds, M.A. 
On the 3rd of February (that is yesterday), at lOh. 7m. 
(as afterwards appeared) by my watch (which was 7 minutes 
fast), I was walking from Manchester along the east side of 
the Oxford Road (which there runs 30° to the east of south), 
I had just reached the corner of Grafton-street, when I saw 
a most brilliant meteor. I first became aware of it from the 
brightness of the wall on my left, i.e., on the north-east, 
which caused me to turn my head in that, the wrong, direc- 
tion; the first effect was that of a flash of lightning, but it 
continued and increased until it was equal to daylight. On 
lifting my head I saw directly in front of me, what had 
previously been hidden by the brim of my hat, a bright 
object, apparently fixed in the sky, as though it were coming 
directly towards me ; immediately afterwards it turned to 
the west, and passed just under the moon (which it com- 
pletely out-shone). I was very much startled when I first 
caught sight of it, owing doubtless to the rapidity with 
which it was increasing in size, and the directness with which 
it seemed to be coming. The next instant I saw that it 
