196 On the supposed hifluence of the 



that there was no corresponding agitation of the needle at Paris 

 on that day. 



We may now ask the candid inquirer after truth to compare 

 these facts with the assertions made by M. Arago in his com- 

 munication to the Academy of Sciences. Do they support the 

 sweeping conclusions which are there deduced ? or do they 

 not rather entirely overturn them ? 



Before we quit this part of the subject, we must notice a 

 very inexplicable passage in the communication to the Acade- 

 my of Sciences. In speaking of the agitation of the magnetic 

 needle on the ^9th March 1826, between 8 and 10 p. m., ayd 

 of his own prediction that an Aurora Borealis had taken place 

 in the north, M. Arago says: 



" Hitherto this prediction had not been verified ; and the 

 English philosophers saw in this the ground of a grave objec- 

 tion,'" 



Now, we do not scruple to characterize this statement as a 

 philosophical dream. The prediction was verified ; and the 

 English philosophers took no cognizance of the matter whatever. 

 The Aurora Borealis of the 29th March was as well known 

 to every philosopher in England, as the battle of Navarino is 

 to every politician. A long and minute account of it was pub- 

 lished in this Journal for April — June 1826, by Messrs Cold- 

 stream and Foggo * ; and as M. Arago uses this Journal in his 

 editorial capacity, it is strange that he should have overlooked 

 a meteorological paper by the two accomplished meteorologists 

 whose labours for 1825 had given him such high satisfaction. 



After M. Arago had uttered his prediction, might we not 

 have supposed that he would have searched with avidity every 

 English journal for the evidence of its truth ; and might we 

 pot have expected his scrutiny to have been repeated with fresh 

 diligence, when the English philosophers brought grave objec- 

 tions against his hypothesis from the want of an Aurora on the 

 29th of March. On the contrary, M. Arago remains nearly 

 two years in the belief that his prediction was unverified, and 

 he peacefully submits to the grave objections of the English 



* See Meteorological Observations made at Leithf in No. ix. p. 190. 



