Abstract
THE PARIS GENERAL CATALOGUE OF STARS.—In the last Annual Report issued by Admiral Mouchez we find particulars of the progress of formation of this extensive and important catalogue. It is intended to contain all the stars observed at Paris during the forty-five years 1837 to 1881 inclusive, about 40,000, but it is mainly the result of the revision of Lalande's stars in the Histoire Celeste; indeed, for several years past, the meridian instruments have been almost wholly occupied upon this work, and upwards of 27,000 observations were made during 1882, the year to which the Report refers. The entire number of observations upon which the Paris General Catalogue will be founded is about 350,000. The positions are referred to three principal epochs; 1845.0 for the years 1837–53, 1860.0 for the years 1854–67, and 1875.0 for the years 1868–82. A specimen of the form in which it is intended to print the catalogue is appended to the Report. The right ascensions and declinations are given for each principal epoch, with the number and mean year of the observations. The precessions are reckoned from the year 1875, with the term depending upon the square of the time. The magnitudes and the differences from the positions of the Histoire Céleste are annexed, and where a star has not been observed by Lalande a synonym in some other catalogue is given. In the first column we have the ordinal number, and in the second the star's number in the reduced catalogue of the Histoire Céleste. It is mentioned in the Report that M. Bossert had undertaken a new deterannation of the places of the stars in that work, making use of the reduction-tables of the late Doctor von Asten, which are more exact than the tables of Hansen and Nissen, employed for the catalogue published in 1847. M. Bossert has already effected the reduction of 2,300 stars, a voluntary labour which has occupied his leisure hours. It would add to the value of the colucnns showing the differences between the new Paris positions and those of Lalande, if the comparisons could be made with places resulting from the application of von Asten's tables, though it might be necessary to supplement M. Bossert's laudable efforts. In the last Greenwich Catalogue (1872) the precessions are given to four places of decimals in right ascension (time), and to three places in north polar distance; the Paris Catalogue gives these quantities with a figure less, which we are inclined to regard as a retrograde step.
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Our Astronomical Column . Nature 28, 181 (1883). https://doi.org/10.1038/028181a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/028181a0