138 
H. F. Blanford— M. Janssen's Photographs of the Sun. [April, 
cles, the son of Eukratides, as shown by his coins hearing an Arian-Pali 
legend The device of Hercules, especially the standing one, may, therefore, 
be° looked upon as peculiar to the Sogdian line of Bactro-Greek princes. 
Not Iono 1 afterwards—there appears to have been an intermediate Queen 
Agathokleia, whose coin also shows the sitting Hercules-the Bactro-Greek 
kingdoms were subverted hy Scythian tribes. The first to suffer that fate 
naturally was the northern kingdom of Sogdia and Bactria about B. D. 
127. The southern kingdoms continued for a short time longer. The 
gogdians themselves were Scythians, and they were joined by other tribes 
of the same race, living further to the east. Their leader would naturally 
assume the device of the standing Hercules of the old Sogdian house of 
Greek princes. This was done by Kadphises, under whom the Sogdian 
Scyths, advancing southwards, encroached on, and finally subverted the 
southern Greek kingdom under the last Greek king Hermaeus, about B. D. 
90. (3). In the legend of his coins, as read by me, Kadphises describes 
himself as the sovereign of the Sogda people. This would agree with and 
confirm the facts as stated in No. 2. It may be noticed also that Arrian (in 
his Anabasis VI, 15, 4) mentions a people of Sogds as living on the Indus, 
though already at the time of Alexander’s invasion. 
'V 
Mr. H. F. Blahpord exhibited an enlarged photograph of a portion of 
the solar disk, taken by M. Janssen at the Meudon observatory. Befer- 
ring to the observation of Mr. Nasmyth more than twenty years ago, that 
the surface of the sun appeared to he composed of lenticular luminous 
masses which had been compared hy some to willow-leaves and by others 
to rice-grains, he pointed out that the study of the solar surface by ocular 
inspection was attended with very great difficulties, owing to the intensity 
of the glare, which renders it almost impossible to determine the true forms 
of the luminous elements, notwithstanding such protection as may be afford¬ 
ed by the use of dark and coloured glasses. On the other hand in such 
photographs as have been taken for some years past at Kew and Greenwich, 
no structure is perceptible ; and that this is the case arises from the pheno¬ 
menon known as photographic irradiation. Any very brilliant object when 
represented in a photograph appears with blurred boundaries, the bril¬ 
liantly illuminated surface extending beyond its true outlines over any 
darker objects around. Hence, the solar surface, which as M. Janssen’s 
photographs show, consists of brilliant granules surrounded by others which 
are comparatively shaded, presents a blank area of uniform white. M. 
Janssen is the first who has succeeded in conquering this difficulty ; and, for 
the last two years, has obtained photographs, on all clear days, which present 
the details of structure so sharply aud distinctly, that they may be enlarged 
