Scientific News. — Accounts of Books. 55 1 



execution has been intruded. The accounts having hitherto been publifhed only in the 

 Philofophical Tranfa£l:ions,muftneceflarilyliave been of confined circulation, while the number 

 and expcnce of the engravings have prevented any fatisfa£lory detail from appearing in ^jther 

 publications. The geographer and man of fclence will, confequently, learn with greit plea- 

 fure, that the account of the operations, as far as they have yet been carried, together with 

 the plates of inftruments, furveys, and other refults, are to be had, in a beautifully printed 

 quarto volume, at a very eafy price. 



The original defign had, for its immediate obje£l:, the afcertaining of data, by which the 

 difference in longitude, between the obfervations of Greenwich and Paris, might be deter- 

 mined. Soon after the death of General Roy, the general furvey of th« kingdom wjp com- 

 menced, of which accounts were publifhed, in the Tranfaftions for 1 796. And in 1 798, Mr. 

 Faden having determined on republifliing all the papers relative to this objeft, the prefident 

 and council of the Royal Society rendered him the very efTential fervice of furnifhing him 

 with the original copper-plates, and the mafler-general of the ordnance granted him permif- 

 fion to reprint the accounts of the fubfequent trigonometrical furvey. This is now done 

 under the fuperintendencc of the able men whofe names appear in tlie title page, who 

 have omitted no care to render this colleftion of equal value with the originals, and in fome 

 few refpefts more fo. An account of the changes, which the editors have made in the original 

 papers, is given in the preface ; where we alfo obferve, that Mr. Faden, with the permifTion 

 of the Board of Ordnance, intends to publifh a very fuperior map of Kent, in the courfe of 

 the prefent year, from documents fupplied by the labours of the gentlemen employed on 

 the general furvey by government. 



A public inftitution for difFufIng the knowledge and facilitating the general introduftion 

 of ufeful mechanical improvements, and for teaching by courfes of ledlures and experi- 

 ments the application of fcience to the common purpofes of life, has been propofed to be 

 eflablifhed, by fubfcription, in London, by fome gentlemen of the firft refpeftability. I have 

 feen a printed paper, containing the outlines of a plan, and a lift of gentlemen, who have 

 fubfcribed fifty guineas each, for this purpofe. As the plan itfelf is ftill under deliberation, 

 with regard to various efTential particulars, and the prefent lift of fubfcribers does not 

 contain the whole of the names, on account of the rapidity with which that lift increafes, 

 I (hall enter into no further'detail at prefent, than fimply to obferve, that the plan appears 

 to have already met with a degree of fupport, which is no lefs honourable to the public 

 fpirit of the fubfcribers, than diftinftive of its own value and importance. 



