limb of the Sun as compared with the corresponding bright calcium flocculi. The natural conclusion to which I came was that the hydrogen absorption shown in this photograph is produced at a somewhat higher level, amounting to something like 1500 miles, than the calcium radiation which gives us this photograph. Mr. Butler pointed out to me that the photographs of the flash spectrum show the calcium vapour to rise to a higher level than the hydrogen gas, and that the difference is about 1500 miles. There is no question about the validity of this result, and the point is to show that it is compatible with my conclusion. I think the reason is simple enough, and lies in this fact: the flocculi photographed with the H2 line do not represent the highest calcium vapour, but a level considerably below that; whereas the absorption phenomena known as hydrogen flocculi apparently represent the upper hydrogen in the chromosphere, or in some cases the prominences themselves. The level of the hydrogen absorption seems to be about 1500 miles higher than the region from which the H2 light of calcium proceeds. If, as occasionally happens, the highest calcium vapour in the chromosphere is recorded photographically, it acts as hydrogen does, and gives dark absorption phenomena, due to the high level H, line, and not to be confused with the bright calcium flocculi due to H. This point is perhaps a minor one, but it illustrates some of the results that can be obtained with a spectroheliograph. I see that I must rapidly draw to a close. I might mention various other methods of employing spectroheliographs, and if anyone present should be interested at some future time to take them up I shall be delighted to discuss them in detail. I may remark in passing that with a Littrow spectrograph, or any long focus spectrograph, and a fixed solar image, one can undertake other work of various kinds, such as a determination of the solar rotation, along some such plan as Dunér or Halm followed, but using different lines in the spectrum, and benefiting from the advantages of photographic methods. In all such work, co-operation with other investigators is greatly to be desired, because it might otherwise frequently happen that two men would be doing the same thing, whereas it would be just as easy for them to supplement each other's work instead of duplicating it. One other phase of the subject which I should like to have time to discuss, but cannot, is that of stellar spectroscopy. You will see that for stellar spectroscopy a large telescope in general does have an advantage. The more light one can collect and concentrate in a stellar image the more dispersion can be employed in the spectroscope, and the users of large apertures therefore do have an advantage in stellar spectroscopic work. But the fact remains that small instruments can be used to very great effect in this field also, provided that one intelligently plans his investigations. I know of no better example of this than one which I am permitted, by the kindness of Father Sidgreaves, to illustrate. Here is a photograph of the spectrum of o Ceti, made with a refractor of 4 inches aperture, with a prism of 22° angle placed over the object-glass. The focal length of the telescope is 4 feet. The slide shows the spectrum of Omicron Ceti on the 29th November 1905 and on the 1st December 1906, and brings out with great clearness the remarkable changes which occurred during that period. If this spectrum had been photographed with such an instrument, let us say, as the Bruce spectrograph of the Yerkes Observatory attached to the 40-inch telescope, there would have been some advantages, but there would also have been some disadvantages, because the entire region covered by the photographs made with that instrument (when three prisms are used) is a limited one here in the blue. All of these remarkable flutings in the less refrangible region would not have appeared in the photographs, and nothing would have been known, if one had been confined with such an instrument to a short region of the spectrum, about the very interesting changes shown in this particular case. The next slide shows another photograph taken by Father Sidgreaves, in this case with a somewhat different instrumental arrangement a direct vision prism at the focus of a 15-inch equatorial. But you will see the great range of spectrum included on the plate, and remember again that almost all the spectrum, except a very small region, would be missing on photographs taken with such instruments as the Bruce or Mills spectrographs, or other three-prism instruments employed for the investigation of stellar motions in the line of sight. You will notice the remarkably interesting and important fact that the He line of hydrogen is absent from the picture, probably, as Mr. Newall suggested, cut out by the absorption of the H line of calcium-the broad H1 band; perhaps in another star lying nearer to us than the star which gives the bright lines of hydrogen. This serves to illustrate the great importance of the work that can be done with an instrument of very small size indeed, even in this field of stellar spectroscopy, which seems peculiarly to belong to telescopes of large aperture. As I said before, in general the investigator with a telescope of large aperture does have an advantage in stellar spectroscopic work; but there are various investigations of this sort-and of the kind Professor Pickering has taken up in his very extensive surveys of the whole sky with objective prisms-which are of extreme importance, and which cannot be replaced by work done with large instruments. I might go on to speak of the possibilities of work on variable stars, but they are familiar to most of you. The observation of many wide double stars, my friend Burnham tells me, has been neglected since the time of Herschel, because the large instruments, and even the small ones, have been devoted to closer objects, so that in revising his great catalogue Burnham had to measure with the 40-inch a great many wide doubles which had not been looked at perhaps since Herschel discovered them more than a century before. Important double-star work is always open to men with small instruments, if a micrometer is available. Then I might go on to the case where a man has no telescope at all, and still wants to make contributions to astrophysics. I do not now speak of such splendid work as Anderson did when he discovered Nova Persei with the naked eye; but if one were convinced that the overcast sky of London would never open again, he could still work in his laboratory and make important contributions by identifying lines and bands in spot spectra, as Professor Fowler has been doing of late, or by researches in a score of other fields. I will close with a few practical suggestions. One reference to the matter of atmosphere. Perhaps some of us feel that if we could only ascend into the upper regions we could get results very much better than are obtainable in London. But if we stop to think of the men who work in London and what they have done, we must recognise the fact that even here the conditions are not so bad as we sometimes imagine. I have often been strongly impressed (since my work in Chicago) with the belief that a smoky atmosphere has some advantages in astronomical work, for it seems that the seeing is frequently improved in solar observations when the sky is smoky. Here is a fine chance to test that question, and I think it has been tested at Greenwich, and that some of the photographs taken there (both solar and stellar) prove that London smoke does not prevent excellent definition. I examined rather carefully some plates there yesterday, and the star images are surprisingly good in many instances. It seems to me that definition by night as well as by day at Greenwich must be of an order much higher than one might suppose when one thinks of Greenwich as being within the boundaries of London. But it is perfectly possible to get good results anywhere, provided sufficient care is taken. One must consider, for example, the best time of day for solar work. It usually happens that the best definition of the Sun occurs in the early morning and the late afternoon. Mr. Newall tells me that this is as true at Cambridge as it is at Mount Wilson. This is worth looking into if one takes up work on the Sun. Further, one must have a definite plan of work. This is of prime importance. Devote your entire attention to a single investigation, involving, if possible, two or three parallel series of observations, so devised as to throw light on one another. Frequently the value of a given series of observations may be enormously enhanced if other observations are available to aid in their interpretation. For example, in studying the spectra of sun-spots, the character of the spots, their motions, and changes of form, and the distribution of the flocculi in their neighbourhood, may be vital factors in interpreting the spectroscopic phenomena. Then, again, there is the great possibility that new methods and new instruments can be applied. Up to the present time I think the interferometers of Michelson or of Pérot and Fabry have never been systematically employed for work on the Sun: that admirable method which Fabry is using at the present time in the determination of absolute wavelengths would perhaps be very useful indeed if applied to the measurement of the displacement of solar lines at the centre and at the limb. I also believe that the echelon spectroscope has never been used for the observation of the narrow bright lines in the chromosphere. Furthermore, we are always confronted by the possibility of perfecting our optical apparatus. I have been trying for years to get good prisms of large size, but cannot get homogeneous glass, and therefore it now seems necessary to attack the problem of fluid prisms. If someone could take that question up and show us how to make very large prisms that would be essentially perfect, they would accomplish a great advance. Lord Rayleigh told me the other day how he made some large fluid prisms that gave nearly theoretical resolution. By an extension of the same methods it seems likely that still larger prisms, suitable for the exacting requirements of photographic work, could be obtained. And so I might go on pointing out opportunities of various kinds, but I should tire you if I ventured to do so. We must not forget, however, that the possibility always exists of getting some entirely new method that will be quite as important as any application of the interferometer, or the échelon, or other instruments to which I have called attention. In concluding, I may add that we have made at the Solar Observatory a few drawings of some of these simple wooden instruments, which I shall be very glad to place at the disposal of anyone who might care to build instruments in a similar way.* They may serve a useful purpose by saving a certain amount of time. I hope I have shown that it is possible not merely to do work of an inferior quality, but to do work of the first quality, with small or inexpensive instruments; work that cannot be duplicated or will not be duplicated with large instruments; in other words, that there is a splendid field for any man who wishes to accomplish results, wherever he may be situated, and however simple his means of research may be. I feel so strongly on this subject that I hope the suggestions I have made will not be entirely without effect. We need the ideas of men from all parts of the world; we need the contributions they can make; and we need them even more than we need larger instrumental means than we now possess. * At Mr. Maw's request, a number of blue prints will be sent to the Royal Astronomical Society for convenient reference. Errata in the Rev. T. E. R. Phillips's paper, Monthly Page 524, line 8, for 1895-6 read 1905-6. Page 526, line 31, for 1907 read 1906. H. F. NEWALL, Esq., M.A., F.R.S., PRESIDENT, in the Chair. were balloted for and duly elected Fellows of the Society. The following candidates were proposed for election as Fellows of the Society, the names of the proposers from personal knowledge being appended: Henry Hermann Gruning, M.Sc., Patent Agent and Engineer, Jan B. Hubrecht, Christ's College, Cambridge (proposed by Victor A. Lowinger, Trigonometrical Survey Department, Taiping, Federated Malay States (proposed by Sir David Rev. Malcolm Parker Miller McLean, M.A., The Rectory, Harold Knox Shaw, B.A., Trinity College, Cambridge (pro- Capt. Eldred Weston White, Brockley Villa, Upton Road, |