Morning journal and courier., 1883-11-15
The secona pAa.u Work

or the National Academy Of Sciences
 The Solar Eclipse and other Important
 Topics Treated,
 The National Academy of Sciences held its second days sessfen 5csseEday. The attend ance was quite large, both morning and af- ternoon. The first topic taken up was the solar eclipse of May 6, 1883, which was treated by Professors Young, Holden and Hastings Professor Young spoke in geh- eral way of the success of the exbedition and thanked the officers of the navy for their aid. Professor Holden went more into details describing the party, the trip, the observa- tions and the results obtained. IL sssAns that the American party 6ens.sted of Edward S. Holden. 6sfector of Washburn observatory, Madison, Wis.,; Charles s. Hastings, professor of physics in the John Hopkins university, Baltimore, Md. Charles H. Rcckweli: Tat rytown, N. Y; E. D. freston, aid United ststss coast and geodetic survey, Washing ton Winslow Upton, United States sig nal office, Washington and Ensign s. J. Brown, United States navy, United States Naval observatory, Washingt6n The original six HhethBers of the party were joined on April 20 by four volunteer observ- CTS, all officers of the United States ship Hartford; these were Lieutenant B. F. ,Qual- trough, United States Navy, Past Assistant Surgeon W. 2. Dl&cn, United States navy; MtdBhtpman w. s. Fletcher, United States navy, and Midshipman J. G. Doyle, United States navy. Beside these, Messrs. Lawrence and Woods, sent out by the English govern ment to obtain photographs, joined the party at Panama. Every member had definite du- ties connected with the event assigned to Him, care being taken not to attempt the cov- ering of too much ground.
 The expedition was sent ont by the Ma tional academy and by the coast survey joint ly, the expense .keinE met by an appropria- tion of $5.OOO from Congress and from a fund left by Professor Watson. The efforts to provide money for the undertaking by subscription were unsuccessful, The navy department slze placed the United States steamer Hartford at the disposal of the acad' emy. The expedition left New York March 2, 1883, reached Panama March 12, and left Callao, where they joined the Hartford, March 22d, and after long and tedious voyage reached Caroline Island but two or three day s before the event, but in time, nevertheless. They arrived at the island, which is small coral ledge with lagoon, on tho s0th of April and left theEe on the 9th of May. Coming home they stopped at Honolulu May 30, and arrived at San Francisco June Il, having made in all 16, 900 miles and having been 101 days absent from the United States, 50 days on thu Hartford and 70 days at sea. This great journey was made in 8 comparatively uninhabited seq. The day of the eclipse was cloudy, but the clouds broke away just in time to enable the scientists to observe the four contacts, ahd good results were obtain ed both from the eclipse and other obserya tions made on the journey.
 Prof. Hastings paper was an argument against the commonly received hypothesis of 8 solar atmosphere extending beyond the surface of the sun 200, GOO miles. His -ob servations upon the rifts and streamers of the corona with the spectroscope led him to doubt the possibility of the present theory being justified by the incandescent and self luminous matter reported to be precipitated within the sun's atmosphere. He dtsproved this by the path of comets within the atmos. pheric space attributed to the sun. His a.. gument was that if the so=called elected mat ter became luminous by precipitation through the suns atmosphere, then the comets which in their perihelion pass | through the assigned atmospheric space ol 1 the sun for many millions of miles should also become incandescent and luminous 1 Other arguments were based upon the law | of the polarization of light.
 l Prof. J. D. Rena took several gentlemen dEouuO LAo DSdNoE pOAO 4OCd4lIJ dnu tA' 1 Pine marsh, and the scientist explained the | drift of the New Haven region.
 The afternoon session was occupied by discussion of Prof. Hastings paper. Prof l Wright and several 0th5rs spoke freely and criticised several of Prof Hastings' deduc l tions.
 The president announced the next paper al Prof. Newcomb's on the use of the word ligh l in Physics. Pref. Eswcomb spoke for hal | hour, illustrating his remarks on the black
 board by the use of an imaginary curve. H.
 said there was great waste of thought ant discussion among scientists arising from th'
 wrong Use of the word light. It il l only 8 relative, not an absolute term 1 There is talk of different kinds O
 rays, as heat rays, chemical rays, etc, but il
 fact there is only one kind of ray from thu
 sun. Rays may differ in intensity and wav
 length. Quite an animated discussion wa
 held on this subject, some of the professor
 crossing swords on different points connect
 ed with the subject. It was asserted that tn
 scientists of America hold advanced view l on this subject which seem heterodoK to tn
 English scientists.
 The scientists were rendered reception a Prof. Marsh's residence at which many of ou
 leading citizens were present.