104 Answer to Remarks on determining the Latitude. 
That in October 1818 [ transmitted to you a full account of 
a method of finding the latitude by observations made with the 
sextant near noon, which I had practised for a considerable time 
previous; and that the observations in the accompanying ex- 
ample were made on September 24, 1817. 
That in the spring of 1821 I observed. a notice in the Edin- 
burgh Phil. Journal, that Gen. Brisbane’s promised communica- 
tion on this subject was just published in the Edinburgh Phil. 
Trans.; and in May 1821, when volume ix. part I. of the Edin- 
burgh Phil. Trans. was received in Newcastle, I saw the paper 
itself for the first time. It forms article XIV. of the part. 
That although it is thus impossible I could have been indebted 
to General B. for a method which I had previously practised for 
several years, and had actually published two years before I had 
any means of knowing what his method was, in a work in the * 
hands of every scientific person in Europe ; our methods are not 
only generally similar, but absolutely the same both in principle 
and in all their practical details. 
That, whatever Gen. B. may have done, | have never seen 
any of the three foreign works in which your correspondent says 
the substance of the same method is to be found. 
That, if I were disposed to quibble, I might say that the desig- 
nation of *‘ a new method” is not mine, as you know very well, 
sir, that the title of my letter in which that designation is intro- 
duced was prefixed by yourself. 
That, though I am sure every thing is done at Greenwich in 
the best possible way, I believe I need not say that the observa- 
tions made at that admirable establishment are made with other 
and better instruments than a sextant and an artificial horizon. 
And, finally, that the charge of incorrectness in an approximate 
formula arising from substituting the arc of one second for the sine 
of the same arc, requires no notice. 
With respect to the insinuation that I did mot practise the 
method of finding thé time which I stated myself to have prac- 
tised, till I saw Gen. B.’s communication on the subject ;—the 
affirmative, as the matter stands, depends on my integrity ;—the 
negative rests not on any authority whatever. From myself, on 
this subject, no other reply will be expected. 
Your obedient servant, 
Trinity House School, Newcastle, EpwarD RIDDLE. 
Aug. 6, 1821. 
XX, A Com- 
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