Notes

Abstract

THE Royal Society conversazione, on June 9, was in all:spects satisfactory. We can only afford to refer briefly o a few of the exhibits which attracted the interest of lie numerous visitors, who were received by Professor and Irs. Stokes. A room was devoted to telephones connected with the Savoy Theatre, and the company were de-ighted to hear the Mikado under such novel conditions. The nodels of the Romano-British village near Rushmore, on the Borders of Dorset and Wilts, between Salisbury and Blandford, xhibited by Lieut.-Gen. A. Pitt-Rivers, F.R.S., attracted nuch attention. The rare earths from samarskite, gadolinite,:c., with illustrations of their phosphorescent spectra, exhibited by Mr. W. Crookes, F. R. S., were magnificent. The pumice, volcanic ash, drawings, diagrams, &c., illustrative of the effects produced by the great eruption of the island of Krakatão, Java, n August 1883, exhibited by the Krakatão Committee of the ioyal Society, proved very attractive, as did the fine collection of astronomical photographs exhibited by Mr. Common, Dr. jill, the Solar Physics Committee, and others. At 9.30 and 10.30 he stellar and solar photographs were demonstrated, and at IO Mr. Common demonstrated the photographs of nebulae and comets. The first series included the stellar photographs recently taken by the Brothers Henry at the Paris Observatory. The remaining photographs had reference to solar phenomena, and consisted of two series, one from Meudon, theotherfrom Kensington; the former, contributed by Dr. Janssen, had reference to the minute portion of the solar surface; the latter, to some recent attempts to photograph the spectra of sunspots and prominences. The photographs of planets, comets, and nebulae, exhibited by Mr. A. A. Common, F.R.S., consisted of (1) series of photographs of Saturn; (2) series of photographs of Jupiter; (3) photograph of Mars; (4) nucleus of the great comet 1882; (5) the Dumb-bell Nebula; (6) the Crab Nebula; (7) the Spiral Nebula; (8) the Great Nebula in Andromeda; (9) series of photographs of the Great Nebula in Orion, with exposures of I min. to 80 min. (the above were all taken with the 3-foot reflector at Baling); (10) recent photographs of Saturn, Jupiter, and the nebulæ in the Pleiades, by the Brothers Henry.