THE ASTRONOMICAL JOURNAL    VOLUME 112, NUMBER 1, PAGE 171            JULY 1996

          K GIANTS IN BAADE'S WINDOW. II. THE ABUNDANCE DISTRIBUTION

                               ELAINE M. SADLER

         School of Physics, University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
                   Electronic mail: ems@physics.usyd.edu.au

                                R. MICHAEL RICH

       Department of Astronomy, Pupin Laboratories, Columbia University,
               538 West 120th Street, New York, New York 10027
                   Electronic mail: rmr@cuphyd.columbia.edu

                                D. M. TERNDRUP

              Department of Astronomy, The Ohio State University,
                   174 W. 18th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43210
              Electronic mail: terndrup@baade.mps.ohio-state.edu


                                   ABSTRACT

    This is the second in a series of papers in which we analyze spectra of
    over 400 K and M giants in Baade's Window, including most of the stars
    with proper motions measured by Spaenhauer et al. [AJ, 103, 297
    (1992)].  In our first paper, we measured line-strength indices of Fe,
    Mg, CN, and HBeta and calibrated them on the system of Faber et
    al. [ApJS, 57, 711 (1985)].  Here, we use the <Fe> index to derive an
    abundance distribution of [Fe/H] for 322 stars with effective
    temperatures between 3900 K and 5160 K.  Our derived values of [Fe/H]
    agree well with those measured from high-resolution echelle spectra
    (e.g., McWilliam & Rich [ApJS, 91, 749 (1994)] for the small number of
    stars in common.  We find a mean abundance <[Fe/H]> = -0.11 +/- 0.04
    for our sample of Baade's Window K giants.  More than half the sample
    lie in the range -0.4 < [Fe/H] < +0.3.  We estimate line-of-sight
    distances for individual stars in our sample and confirm that, in
    Baade's Window, most K giants with V < 15.5 are foreground disk stars,
    but the great majority (more than 80%) with V > 16 belong to the
    bulge.  We also compare the metallicities derived from the CN and Mg2
    indices to those from iron.  Most of the metal-rich stars in our sample
    appear to be CN-weak, in contrast to the situation in metal-rich
    globular clusters and ellipitcal galaxies.  The metal-poor half of our
    sample ([Fe/H] < 0) shows evidence for a mild Mg overenhancement
    ([Mg/Fe] ~ +0.2); but this is not seen in the more metal-rich stars
    ([Fe/H] >= 0).  The K giants in Baade's Window therefore share some,
    but not all, of the characteristics of stars in elliptical galaxies as
    inferred from their integrated light.