University of Virginia Library

SCHOOL OF PRACTICAL ASTRONOMY.

Professor Stone.

I. General Astronomy.—First Year.—The aim of this course is to give
such a knowledge of the facts, principles, and methods of Astronomy as every
well-educated person should possess. The preparation required is a good
working knowledge of Arithmetic, Algebra through Quadratics, Plane and Solid
Synthetic Geometry, and Plane Trigonometry through the Solution of Triangles.
The class pursuing this course meets three times a week.

Text-Books.—Young's General Astronomy.

Second Year.—This course is intended to elucidate selected portions of the
subject more fully and from a more strictly mathematical point of view than
can be taken in the Junior course.

Text-Books.—Doolittle's Practical Astronomy; Gauss's Theoria Motus (Davis's
translation).

Candidates for the degree of Bachelor of Arts are required to complete
the work of the first year; those for the degree of Master of Arts must pass
examinations on the subjects embraced in both classes.

II. Practical Astronomy, including a systematic training in making and
reducing astronomical observations; theory and use of the instruments of a
fixed observatory; methods of reducing observations; construction of star catalogues.

Text-Books.—Chauvenet's Spherical and Practical Astronomy; various memoirs and
volumes of observations in the Observatory Library.

III. Celestial Mechanics, with practice in numerical computations;
general laws of equilibrium and motion; formation and integration of the differential
equations of motion of a system of bodies subject to the laws of gravity.

Text-Books.—Dziobek's Theory of Planetary Motions; Tisserand's Mécanique Céleste.

A prescribed course in this School, to be agreed upon in a conference of
the professors interested, will be considered as the equivalent of the Graduate
Course in either Mathematics or Natural Philosophy for graduates in the M. A.
courses of these schools.

The Astronomical Observatory is situated upon an elevation known
as Mount Jefferson, which furnishes an unobstructed horizon. The principal
building is a rotunda, forty-five feet in diameter, and contains the great Clark
refractor of twenty-six inches aperture. The building and instrument are the
gift of Leander J. McCormick, Esq., of Chicago. The computing rooms are
adjoining, and contain clock, chronograph, etc., and a working library. In a
smaller building are a three-inch Fauth transit and a four-inch Kahler equatorial.