three Degrees of the Mei-idian. 23 



collected at Paris, who confirmed their results, snd, by the 

 sanction of such an union of t.iients, gave such a degree 

 of crtdii and authenticity to their conclusions as could 

 scarcely be acquired bv other means. 



Since that tune, in the vear ISOG, Messrs. Biot and Arago, 

 members of the National Institute, were sent into Spain tof 

 the express; purpose of carrying on the same course of ope- 

 rations still further southward, from Barcelona as far as 

 Forinentera, the southernmost of the Balearic islands. For- 

 tnnaiely this last undertaking, which forms a most satis- 

 factory supplement to the former, was complete d by the 

 month of May 1808, at a period when political circum- 

 stances would not admit of any further operations being 

 pursued, as a means of verii'ying the results, by measuring 

 a base wliich should be independent of ll.ose foraserly ob- 

 tained in France. 



In the year ISOl, the Swedish Academy of Sciences, 

 encouraged by the success of the operations conducted in 

 France, sent also three of its members into Lapland, to 

 verify their former measurement taken in J 736, bv new 

 methods, and by the use of new instruments similar to 

 lho?e which had recently been used in France, and of 

 which the National Institute made a handsome present to 

 the Swedish Academy. The results of this new under- 

 takina, which lerminased in 1803, were drawn up by M. 

 Svanberg, and are high!y interesting, by their exactness, 

 by the perspicuitv of the details, and even a certain degree 

 of noveltv given "to tlie subject bv the arrangement adopted 

 by the learned author M. Svanberg. 



These new measures were found to confirm, in a remark- 

 able manner, the general results of those which had pre- 

 ceded, and gave very nearly the same proportion for the 

 eccentricity and other dimensions of the globe, so that 

 there would not have remained the smallest doubt respect- 

 ing the figure of the earth being flattcmd at the poles, had 

 ilfcre not been a fourth measurement performed in England 

 at the same time as that undertaken in Lapland, the resiilts 

 of which were entirely the revtrse. 'I'his measurement, 

 uhich comprised an arc of 2'-' 50', was undertaken by Lieut. 

 C"ol. Miidge, Fellow of the Roval Society, with instrumtnis 

 of the most perfect construction that had ever yet l)een 

 finished by any artist, contrived and executed for that ex- 

 press purpose by the celebrated Ramsden. The detail,^ of 

 iba observations and other operations of Lieut. Col. Mudge 

 may besccn in the volume of the Philosojihical Transactions 

 lor llic year 1S03 j and one cannot but admire the beauty. 

 U i and 



