Notwithstanding the extreme difficulty with which the Uranian satellites are observed, the two brighter ones, Titania and Oberon, discovered by William Herschel in 1787, have been occasionally detected in telescopes of moderate power, and identified by means of an ephemeris which has shown that the computed positions approximately agree with those observed. During the last few years Mr. Marth has published ephemerides of the satellites of both Saturn and Uranus, and many amateurs have to acknowledge the valuable aid rendered by these tables, which supply a ready means of identifying the satellites, and thus act as an incentive to observers who are induced to pursue such work for the sake of the interesting comparisons to be made afterward. In one exceptional instance the two outer satellites of Uranus appear to have been glimpsed with an object glass of only 43 inches aperture, and the facts are given in detail in the "Monthly Notices of the R.A.S.," April 1876, pp. 294-6. The observations were made in January, February, and March, 1876, by Mr. J.W. Ward, of Belfast; and the positions of the satellites, as he estimated them on several nights, are compared with those computed, the two sets presenting tolerably good agreement. Indeed the corroborations are such as to almost wholly negative any skepticism, though such extraordinary feats should always be received with caution. In this particular case the chances of being misled are manifold; even Herschel himself fell into error in taking minute stars to be satellites and actually calculating their periods; so that when we remember the difficulties of the question our doubts are not altogether dispelled. Extreme acuteness of vision will, in individual instances, lead to success of abnormal character, and certainly in Mr. Ward's case the remarkable accordances in the observed and calculated positions appear to be conclusive evidence that he was not mistaken. It will be readily inferred that the great distance and consequent feebleness of Uranus must render any markings upon the disk of the planet beyond the reach of our best telescopes; and indeed this appears to have been a matter of common experience. Though the surface has been often scanned for traces of spots, we seldom find mention that any have been distinguished. Consequently the period of rotation has yet to be determined. It is true that an approximate value was assigned by Mr. T.H. Buffham from observations with a nine-inch reflector in 1870 and 1872. but the materials on which the computation was based were slender and necessarily somewhat uncertain, so that his period of about twelve hours stands greatly in need of confirmation. The bright spots and zones seen on the disk in the years mentioned appear to have entirely eluded other observers, though they are probably phenomena of permanent character and within reach of instruments of moderate size. Mr. Buffham [1] thus describes them: