19 
i88o.] Scientific Progress of the Past Year . 
for the study of Astronomical Physics in France and 
Germany. 
The elder of these in point of date, namely that in France, 
although founded in 1876, has only quite recently been per- 
manently established in the Chateau at Meudon. . The 
Director has ever since the foundation been principally 
occupied with solar photography, and he has established the 
faCt that photography is capable of revealing phenomena 
which must necessarily escape ordinary telescopic observa- 
tion. In particular, he has succeeded in photographing the 
granulations previously seen on the solar disk by other 
astronomers ; and by means of his magnificent pictures, one 
of which he has recently presented to the Society, he has 
established the existence of what he terms the Reseau photo- 
spherique ; in other words, that the surface of the sun is 
divided into regions of calm and of activity. His present 
researches will doubtless enrich our knowledge with many 
new faCts. 
The German Observatory has been placed at Potsdam. 
In the selection of the locality, 320 feet above the sea, with 
a good horizon, and free from the smoke and vibration of the 
city, and in the furnishing of the Observatory, the German 
Government has done everything that could be wished. And 
it may confidently be hoped that in the hands of Professor 
Vogel and his colleagues much good work will be there done. 
The ramifications of Science are now so various in direc- 
tion, so comprehensive in grasp, and so immediate in their 
applications, that they have of late years . given rise to the 
establishment of special Institutes and Societies for the study 
and encouragement of their respective subjects. Among 
these there may be mentioned the Society of Telegraph 
Engineers, the Iron and Steel Institute, and otheis. 
At the meetings of these bodies it frequently happens that 
subjects which may have, in their primary form of a scientific 
discovery, been laid before the Royal Society, are brought up 
again and discussed from a different point of view, e.g. f in 
their relation to other subjects, or in their application to the 
special purposes of life. For instance, in the ‘ Proceedings 
of the Society of Telegraph Engineers ” we find the follow- 
in 0 " j-— • 
°i. Wires which run parallel to each other for a long dis- 
tance are very much troubled by induction between wire and 
wire. The effeCt on telegraphs is to diminish speed of work- 
ing, and on telephones to render speaking impossible. 
Hughes has studied these effects in his own peculiar way 
and has shown how, when the number of wires is limited 
