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 APPENDIX I.

A CATALOGUE OF RECENT COMETS.

1888-1908.

following Catalogue comprises all the comets which have appeared, and whose orbits have been calculated, between 1888 and 1908 inclusive, and is a continuation in the same form of the Catalogue No. I. which appears in my Handbook of Astronomy, 4th edition, vol. i; and the progressive numbers are carried on from that Catalogue, but with the last imperfect page repeated. The arrangement of the columns is the same except that the old Element, which used to be called the "Longitude of the Perihelion", and was represented by the Greek letter π, is replaced, to meet modern usage, by the "Argument of Perihelion", represented by the Greek letter ω. This is recommended for adoption by W. C. Winlock as having "a simpler geometrical signification than the longitude of the Perihelion π, and is now much more commonly used by Computers". For further remarks on this matter reference may be made to Chapter XI (ante).

A very elaborate statistical catalogue of all the comets calculated up to 1895 will be found in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, vol. viii, p. 141, June 1896. The compiler, W. C. Winlock, after giving the catalogue proper, has put all his comets into classes according to the different Elements, the members of each class being arranged in order from zero to the maximum figure, whatever it may be. degrees of arc, radii of the Earth's orbit, or eccentricity, &c.

Another catalogue of some value compiled by J. G. Galle, appears in ''Ast. Nach.'', vol. cxii, Nos. 2665-6, June 5, 1885. It comprises all comets from 1860 to date, and improved orbits of many older comets, but its matter is embodied in Galle's book published in 1894 (see Appendix III, post).