Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/80

 62 HISTORY OF THE [1830-40 for every day and their distance from the moon for every third hour were given in Schumacher's Ephemerides, but these were but little known in the British Navy ; it was therefore recommended that these items be given in the Nautical Almanac. Also that Mercury and the Georgian be treated in the same way by a " liberal and enlightened Government." Further recommendations in- cluded extended information about eclipses and transits of Jupiter's satellites ; the insertion of the list of moon-culminating stars given in the recent Supplements ; the extension of the " elements for computing the principal occultations " into a list of occultations of stars down to the 6th magnitude visible at Greenwich, with elements for predicting occultations of planets and stars to the 5th magnitude visible in some habitable part of the globe. The apparent places of the principal fixed stars to be given for the time of transit and not for noon, and their number to be increased to 100. The several monthly lists of phenomena to be made into one list. At the meeting of the Council in 1830 December a letter was read from the Admiralty, announcing that the Astronomer Royal had been directed to carry out the suggestions in the Report. But soon afterwards Stratford, Lieutenant, R.N., on half-pay, was appointed Superintendent of the Nautical Almanac, and carried out the recommendations of the Committee most thoroughly, beginning with the volume for 1834. Only a very few suggestions were not adopted : ephemerides of the satellites of Uranus, of Encke's comet, and of maxima and minima of Algol. The Society had rendered an important service to astronomy and to navigation by insisting on a thorough reform instead of the half-measures first proposed. The predictions of occultations commenced by Henderson were continued by Stratford and distributed by the Society till the end of 1833, after which date they appeared in the new Nautical Almanac. There was one desideratum which had not been noticed by the Committee, viz., an ephemeris of the planets for the time of their transit over the meridian of Greenwich. Perhaps they were afraid to ask for too much ; but attention had already been drawn to the utility of an ephemeris of that kind by Sheepshanks, who calculated and printed one for the first six months of 1830. In 1832 November, Stratford offered to provide " a working ephemeris of all the planets at transit," if the Society would pay for paper and printing, which offer was accepted. The same was done for 1834, most of the calculations being done by Mr. Epps, the Assistant Secretary, who undertook the whole of them for 1835. But this was found to take up too much of his time, while