DORPAT AND POULKOVA. 



Br CLEVELAND ABBE, DIRECTOR CINCINNATI OBSERVATORY. 



The present condition of practical astronomy in tlae United States must 

 awaken strong hopes of our future eminence in cultivating' this most useful 

 science. But in order to avoid committing grave mistakes and to press due 

 onward in the path of usefulness, we must carefidly study and profit h}' the expe- 

 rience of our predecessors. Germany and England have each impressed certiiiu 

 characteristic features upon astronomical instruments and methods of research : 

 it may be expected that the younger nations, Russia and America, will with cos- 

 mopolitan impartiality make such use of the results of the past experience of 

 astronomers as will determine an epoch of still further advancement. 



We should do injustice and convey an erroneous impression, however, if we 

 characterized any school of astronomy as especially natiomil — for it is and must 

 be in a considerable degree individual. It is to Kepk>r and Roemer, to Bradley 

 and Herschel, to Bessel and Airy, that practical astronomy is indebted for much 

 of its present perfection, if, indeed, we ought to make any distinctions among a 

 host of names of those who have contributed their experience and labors towards 

 the increase of human knowledge. Those who have studied the steady march 

 of our science during the past lifty yeaxa scarcely need to be reminded of him 

 to whom Doi-pat owes its fome and Poulkova its magnificence. To appreciate 

 this latter impeiial obseiwatory one must consider the beginning of the history 

 of Struve and his school of astronomy in their huml)ler home in Dorpat, the 

 Heidelberg of northern Europe : to that beautiful city let us direct our steps. 



Lciiving the St. Petersburg and Warsaw railroad at Pskoff, \?hose mouldering 

 battlements have not long been deserted by mailed warriors, sunrise finds us on 

 board of a neat little steamboat that is to bear us down a quiet river and over 

 the famous lake Peipus, away from Russia westward into the ancient country 

 of the conquered Letts. Very interesting are the views of the Lettish fishennen 

 and their villages on onr right and left as we in the afternoon ascend the mean- 

 dering Emliach. At lengtli the last rays of the setting sun suddenly disclose 

 before us the dome of the observatory and the rains of the cathedral, amidst 

 groves whose bright autunni leaves annually strew and will at last obliterate 

 the battle-field and the fortress. 



Many are the eventful years preserved in the histoiy of the ancient town of 

 '' L^erpt." Centuries before the building of its majestic cathedral, the fortressed 

 hill, covered with its primeval forests, was the chosen battle-ground of Swedes, 

 Letts, Finns, and Ests — themselves the successors of the antediluvian races 

 whose only records are now found in the stone implements collected in the 

 museum of the University. The westward progress of the Sclavonic empire 

 caused the village at the foot of the hill to become a city of merchants ; whilst 

 with its increasing wealth and strong fortifications it became in })oace the thorough- 

 fare of the overland trafiic between Europe and (Jhina and in war tlie coveted 

 strategic post. Seven times sacked and burned, it had as often risen anew from 

 beneath its a.shes, until finally the civilization of southera Em-ope and the found- 

 ing of St. Petersburg robbed Dorpat of its inq3ortanco. An hundred years ago 

 there remained only ruins and the remembrance of former glory. Here, black 

 and mossy with age, the old stone bridge still spanned the Embach ■ there, 

 portions of the rebuilt walls, and the quaint church of St. John's, told of 



