Dr. Bowditch, President of the American Academy. XV 
tions of most of the cases of oblique-angled spheric trigonometry in 
a more simple manner than in their original form. 
Another interesting communication by him is upon the extra- 
ordinary aérolite, or meteor, that exploded over the town of Wes- 
ton in Connecticut, on the 14th of December, 1807; which excited 
greater attention throughout this country than any phenomenon of 
the kind had before done. The object of Dr. Bowditch was, to 
make an estimate, as nearly as practicable in such a case, of the 
height, direction, velocity, and magnitude of the body in question. 
He was induced to collect all the observations made, and to go into 
the calculations he has given, because, as he states, the methods of 
making these calculations are not fully explained in any treatise of 
trigonometry common in this country; and because one of his 
problems is not, to his knowledge, given in any treatise of spherics. 
In this curious and interesting paper his friendship has led him to 
make acknowledgments to me personally, which I do not feel con- 
scious of deserving, for some supposed assistance rendered him in 
collecting and combining the observations there detailed. The 
results obtained by him in the case will not be uninteresting. 
The course of the meteor was in a direction parallel to the surface 
of the earth, and at the height of about eighteen miles. These points, 
he thinks, were ascertained with a considerable degree of accuracy. 
From satisfactory data the height must have exceeded thirteen 
miles. Its velocity probably exceeded three miles in a second, 
which is fourteen times as great as that of sound, and nearly as great 
as that of a satellite revolving about the earth at the same distance. 
The magnitude of the meteor was a subject of more difficulty; as 
the apparent diameter was not measured exactly by any observer. 
The least of all the limits of the diameter was 491 feet; which 
would give a cubic bulk of six millions of tons. But, as the whole 
mass which fell at Weston did not exceed half a ton, and would not 
