Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 143 



intended to give was more speedily and better supplied from a foreign 

 source. 



The present, however, forms a new aera in the science j and some- 

 thing may now perhaps be done to place astronomy (as it ought to 

 be) on a better footing in this country. And since oeconomy is the 

 order of the day, and has in fact been publicly declared to be one of 

 the causes of the dissolution of the Board of Longitude, we would 

 propose to follow up that system, by getting rid also of the whole of 

 the expense incurred in forming the Nautical Almanac, and placing 

 it in totally different hands. For, the computers of the Berlin Ephe- 

 meris would (no doubt) for a small additional sum, be very readily 

 induced to adapt their calculations to the meridian of Greenwich : 

 and any respectable booksellers, or other body of men in this country, 

 if the copyright of such work were secured to them, would not only 

 very readily defray that additional sum, and the expenses of printing, 

 for the privilege thus conferred on them, but also employ an English 

 computer to revise the calculations. The astronomer would thus 

 be furnished with a work more fitted for his purpose, and the public 

 be relieved of a considerable expense, which, after all, has hitherto 

 produced only a secondary sort of Ephemeris*. 



We come now, however, to a more minute account of the work in 

 question, which is as follows. The ephemeris of the sun is for each 

 month divided into two pages ; one of which is devoted to apparent 

 noon, and the other to mean noon. The former page contains, besides 

 the days of the month and the days of the week, the mean time (to 

 two places of decimals in the seconds), the right ascension of the sun 

 (to two places of decimals), and its declination (to one place of de- 

 cimals), together with the equation of time (to two places of decimals), 

 and the logarithm of the double daily variation in the declination, — a 

 quantity extremely useful in determining the time from altitudes of 

 the sun. The latter page contains the right ascension of the meridian 

 (to two places of decimals), the longitude of the sun (to one place of 

 decimals), its latitude (to two places of decimals), the logarithm of the 

 radius vector (to seven places of decimals), and the semi-diameter of 

 the sun (to two places of decimals) -, together with not only the days 

 of the month, but likewise the number of days elapsed from the com- 

 mencement of the year. 



The ephemeris of the moon is also divided into two parts ; but as 

 the computations are made for every twelve hours, each month occu- 

 pies four pages. These contain the moon's longitude, latitude, right- 

 ascension, declination, parallax, and semi-diameter, (each to one 



* If the Nautical Almanac were made what it ought to be, and such as 

 the situation of this country demands, we have no doubt but that its sale 

 might be considerably increased. We know that the American booksellers 

 (who reprint that work in the United States) correspond with the German 

 astronomers for the supply of additional matter, to be inserted in the 

 annual volumes. And what is the consequence ? One bookseller alone 

 (and there are several who reprint the work) sells upwards of twelve thou- 

 sand copies ! We believe the total sale of the Nautical Almanac, in this 

 country, never amounted to seven thousand copies. 



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