Abstract
ON the morning of October 4, 1881, while engaged in sweeping the eastern sky for new comets, I found an object about 10 degrees preceding α Leonis on the ecliptic which bore a strong resemblance to a bright round nebula, with a marked condensation in the centre. I roughly estimated the position of the object, and referring to Herschel's catalogue of nebulæ, endeavoured to identify it, but without success. Then carefully noting its place relatively to the small stars in the same field of my 10-inch reflector, I resumed sweeping in the region near. About half an hour later—3.45 a.m.—I re-observed the object, as clouds were rapidly coming up. A slight motion to the eastward was at once suspected to have occurred in the interval, but my positions were merely eye estimations, and I distrusted them though feeling certain at the time that the supposed displacement was real. I had only obtained a momentary glimpse when the sky became completely overcast, but fortunately the ensuing night was cloudless, and I was enabled to obtain another observation. The suspected object did not rise until soon after 1 a.m., and I knew that it would not come under the range of my 10-inch reflector before about 2h. 30m. a.m. Apart from this, the moonlight was very troublesome. Adjusting the telescope I immediately saw the small stars of the preceding night, but the nebulous object had disappeared though it was found directly afterwards in a place about half a degree east of its position on the previous morning. The true character of the object thus became unmistakeable. It was a telescopic comet with an apparent motion towards the sun, though really the distance between the two bodies was daily becoming greater, owing to the fact that the sun's apparent motion eastwards along the ecliptic was about twice as great as that of the comet.
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DENNING, W. Comet f 1881. Nature 25, 413–415 (1882). https://doi.org/10.1038/025413a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/025413a0