Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/158

 134 HISTORY OF THE [1860-70 Under Cayley's editorship, which continued until 1881, some convenient alterations of form were introduced in the Annual Reports. Until 1863 (in which year Cayley was elected first Sadleirian Professor of Pure Mathematics at Cambridge) there were no headings at all in those reports. Then we have headings to indicate the observatories from which reports of work had been sent, and a general heading " Progress of Astronomy " ; and by 1865 we have headed subdivisions throughout the whole report. The somewhat ambitious " Progress of Astronomy " was modified in 1869 to " Notes on some points of interest connected with the progress of Astronomy during the past year." And so it has remained with but slight modification down to the present time. An innovation was given trial during the presidency of Warren de la Rue, in the form of insertion in the Monthly Notices of brief reports of the discussions which took place at the meetings after the reading of the various communications. The reports were, however, not systematic, and though it was clear that such reports were regarded as desirable and likely to be of some value, they were not continued. Possibly the improvement in the reports of discussions, which were published in the Astronomical Register, may have been due to this indication of an obvious desideratum. This astronomical periodical was started in 1863 January by Sandford Gorton, who was a Fellow of our Society elected in 1860. It had occurred to him that it would be very desirable " to collect together those stray fragments of information, which, though not of sufficient importance possibly to occupy the pages of the Monthly Notices, may nevertheless in the shape of passing conversations or occasional notes, be useful for future reference." He wished " to introduce a sort of astronomical Notes and Queries, a medium of communica- tion for amateurs and others." It aimed further at giving an account of the discussions which took place at the meetings of the Royal Astronomical Society, both for the sake of those who were unable to be present and also in order that some permanent record of them should be preserved. It must be admitted that the reports of the discussions were of a very slight description at first. One would judge that very often they recorded only some pithy remarks separated from their serious context, and giving but a poor idea of the discussions in which they were let fall. One can hardly imagine that the real gist of the Astronomer Royal's remark about Bessel's probable error in his measures of the parallax of 61 Cygni are justly recorded when he is reported as saying that " these probabilities are not worth a pin ! " However, as time went on, the discussions