OFFICIAL. FROM THE RECORDS OF THE CORPORATION. MEETING OF JANUARY 8, 1883.- Voted to appoint CHARLES POMEROY PARKer, B.A., Instructor in Greek and Latin from January 3 for the remainder of the academic year. Voted, to proceed to the election of a Professor of Operative Dentistry, whereupon, ballots being given in, it appeared that THOMAS FILLEBROWN, D.M.D., was elected. The resignation of Professor Oliver WendelL HOLMES, Jr., was accepted as of December 15, 1882, that being the date on which he took the oath of office as Associate Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. MEETING OF JANUARY 29, 1883. -Voted, that a reduction of one half the full year's fees charged to students for certain laboratory courses under the vote of February 13, 1882, be allowed to students who withdraw from such courses and return their apparatus before January 1. The resignation of DWIGHT MOSES CLAPP, D.M.D., as Clinical Instructor in Operative Dentistry, was accepted. MEETING OF FEBRUARY 14, 1883. — The Treasurer reported that he had received from THOMAS G. APPLETON, Esq., acting on behalf of his brother, NATHAN APPLETON, Esq., the sum of $2,500, to be applied towards the expenses incurred in the improvements of Appleton Chapel, and it was Voted, that this gift be gratefully accepted, and that the Treasurer be requested to make suitable acknowledgment therefor. Voted, that the Superintendent of Buildings be directed to provide each room above the second floor of the College dormitories with a strong iron staple or ring, securel; fastened near a window, and suitable for the attachment of a rope in case of fire, with the exception of such rooms as may be otherwise provided with two ways of escape. Voted, that all designs for windows to be placed in Memorial Hall must be satisfactory to Professor WILLIAM R. WARE and HENRY VAN BRUNT, Esq., the architects of the building, but that the Corporation wish to adhere to the original plan, which allowed figures to be either typical or historical. Voted, that Messrs. WARE and VAN BRUNT be requested to prepare, for the use of the Class Committees, rules in relation to the design and execution of windows, and to send a copy thereof to this Board. Voted, to appoint JOHN RAYNER EDMANDS Assistant in the Observatory, in charge of the time service. Voted, to appoint JOHN RITCHIE, Jr., Assistant in the Observatory, in charge of the distribution of astronomical information. The following letter was received from SAMUEL ELIOT, Esq., the founder of the William Samuel Eliot Scholarship: "BOSTON, February 2, 1883. "TO THE PRESIDENT AND FELLOWS OF HARVARD COLLEGE: "With your consent, I desire that graduates and special students, as well as members of the four College Classes, may be eligible to the WILLIAM Samuel Eliot Scholarship. And it was Voted, to consent to such a change in the use of the William Samuel Eliot Scholarship as is desired by its founder. MEETING OF MARCH 9, 1883.-Voted, to transfer from the account of "Exhibitions,” as of date September 1, 1882, to a new account to be called the "Stoughton Scholarship Fund," the sum of $2,039.87, that being the proportion of the "Exhibitions" fund and its increase, which was derived from the sales of the Stoughton marsh, in Dorchester, and of a lease at a nominal rent for one hundred years from June 1, 1796, of the Stoughton pasture. Voted, to appropriate, and charge to College expenses, $1,000, to be expended at the discretion of the Committee on Athletics, in grading a new play-ground, and removing the old seats; also to - advance for the same purpose not exceeding $2,000 more, on condition that the Athletic Association shall repay the same with interest out of its future receipts. Voted, to appoint ARTHUR Lawrence HALL, A.B., 1880, Proctor. MEETING OF MARCH 23, 1883. — Voted, to grant leave of absence for the ensuing academic year to Professor BENNETT H. NASH, in accordance with the rules established by this Board May 31, 1880. A letter was received from WILLIAM AMORY, Esq., and others, acting as a committee, offering to the College, to be placed in Memorial Hall, a full-length portrait of President RUTHERFORD BIRCHARD HAYES, painted by Wм. M. CHAse, And it was voted, that this gift be gratefully accepted, and that the Treasurer be requested to make suitable acknowledgment therefor. FROM THE RECORDS OF THE OVERSEERS. STATED MEETING, January 10, 1883. The annual reports of President and Treasurer were presented in print. Concurred with the Corporation in appointing FRANCIS A. WALKER University Lecturer on the Tenure of Land for the current academic year. In electing WILLIAM GRAY, HENRY J. BIGELOW, and THOMAS G. APPLETON Trustees of the Museum of Fine Arts for one year from January 1, 1883. In reappointing G. STANLEY HALL University Lecturer on Pedagogy for the current academic year. In appointing CHARLES POMEROY PARKER, B.A., Instructor in Greek and Latin from January 3, for the remainder of the academic year. The vote of the Corporation electing THOMAS FILLEBROWN, D.M.D, Professor of Operative Dentistry, was referred to Messrs. GREEN, WYMAN, and LE BARON RUSSELL. Voted, that it is not at present expedient, in the opinion of this Board, to consent to the vote of the President and Fellows to assign certain Scholarships to special students. The Committee to whom was referred the vote of the Corporation appointing OLIVER WENdell Holmes, M.D., LL.D., Emeritus Professor of Anatomy, reported a recognition of the valuable services of Dr. HOLMES, with the recommendation that the Board concur in the appointment. The report was adopted, and the Board voted to concur in the appointment. MEETING OF FEBRUARY 28. The vote of the Corporation appointing MANUEL JACOB DRENMAN, A.M, Assistant Professor of English for five years from September 1, 1883, was referred to Messrs. SMITH, SALISBURY, and CABOT. A communication to the Corporation from the founder of the William and Samuel Eliot Scholarship, with the acceptance of its request by the Corporation, was presented to the Board for information, and referred to the Committee on Reports and Resolutions. Reports of the Committees on Government, and on Mathematics, Physics, and Chemistry were presented and referred to the Committee on Reports and Resolutions. A resolution "That a Professor emeritus is neither an officer of instruction or government, and is, therefore, eligible to election as a member of this Board, and, if otherwise qualified, is entitled to vote at the annual election of Overseers," was presented and referred to the Committee on Elections. The vote of the Corporation appointing THOMAS FILLEBROWN, D. M.D., Professor of Operative Dentistry was confirmed. fitted up with reference to electricity, heat, magnetism, and sound. In each room of the first floor there are independent piers, built up from the basement, insulated from the walls and floors upon which delicate instruments are to be placed. Similar rooms devoted to Optics, Electricity, and the Rumford Laboratory are located upon the second story. The third floor is as yet assigned to no definite use, and with the exception of a room for photography can be left to meet the wants of the future. The basement of this section is occupied by a room for magnetism, one for heat, and one for weights and measures. A room for constant temperature is excavated below the basement floor in the centre of the building. To afford facilities for the study of atmospheric physics and experiments for which great height is needed, a tower runs through the central part of the western section. The tower has a total height of 60 feet; it is built with double walls to isolate it from the rest of the building, the outer walls carrying the floors. Above the roof, the sides of the tower are almost entirely of glass. There is free access to the four sides of the tower, as well as to the top, which is at a height of 72 feet from the basement floor. Openings are left at every story to allow light to be sent to the central part of the tower. The piers of the first floor are also so arranged as to obtain lines of considerable length across the building. The doors are so placed that adjoining rooms are readily thrown open together. The Laboratory, built to commemorate Ellen Wayles Coolidge, grand-daughter of Thomas Jefferson, has been named the "Jefferson Laboratory." It seems most appropriate that the name of one who was among the first to recognize the value of university education in this country should be connected with a building to be devoted to the investigation of some of the most interesting problems of nature. The cost of the building, with the necessary fixtures, will be about $115,000. There is a fund of $75,000, the income of which is to be expended for the benefit of the Physical Laboratory, in addition to the appropriations and expenditures now incurred for Physics by the College. THE OBSERVATORY. -The formation of a collection of photographs, to be preserved at the Observatory, has recently been undertaken. The collection is designed to exhibit the progress of astronomical photography from its origin to the present time. The Observatory already possesses many specimens of much value for this purpose, and a circular has lately been issued requesting contributions to the collection from institutions and individual astronomers interested in the subject. Original negatives are especially desired; but if these cannot be spared, copies on glass, directly printed from the originals, would be very useful. Paper prints would also be valuable when specimens of the classes previously named cannot be furnished. Representations by these means of any astronomical objects will be an important aid in tracing the history of the art of photography as applied to the advancement of astronomy. It may not be generally known that Harvard College Observatory took an important part in the early experiments made in astronomical photography. Under the direction of Professor W. C. Bond, the first daguerreotype of a fixed star, and many early representations of other objects, were obtained here. After the invention of the collodion process, Professor G. P. Bond returned to the subject, and obtained an interesting series of photographs of various celestial objects. While stars of the first magnitude only could be depicted by the daguerreotype, the new process rendered it possible to photograph stars as inferior in brightness as those of the fourth magnitude. Professor Bond paid special attention to the means afforded by photography for the accurate measurement of double stars. For this purpose he procured numerous photographs of the star Mizar ($ Ursae Majoris), which he afterwards measured micrometically. The accuracy of the results was remarkable, and the average discordance of the values obtained from the photographs taken on eight different evenings was only o".3. During the past year, much attention has been paid at the Observatory to stellar photography. Two principal objects have been aimed at in this work: First, the formation by photography of a map of the entire heavens, exhibiting stars as faint as the eighth magnitude. Secondly, the determination of the brightness and color of the stars brighter than the seventh magnitude. With a large telescope, the field is so small that the labor of completing this work would be unduly protracted. Small lenses, of large angular aperture, such as are used in photographic cameras, are therefore employed. With these a region fifteen degrees square may be photographed without serious distortion. In this way two hundred photographs will be sufficient to exhibit the entire sky. Various devices have been tried to determine the color of the stars; that is, the distribution of the light in different portions of their spectra. It appears probable that differences imperceptible to the eye will be clearly indicated by these photographic methods. |