12 Mr. Drinkwater's Observations respecting 



book, where he is discussing the subsequent progress of the 

 invention; and it is not easy to imagine why it was suppressed 

 in this place, except that it would necessarily have interfered 

 with his plan of mentioning Galileo as one who shamelessly 

 endeavoured to rob the first inventor of the credit due to him. 

 In his petition to the States, nothing whatever is said about the 

 invention of the telescope. This first instance of Borel's un- 

 fairness made me examine the rest of the book with more jea- 

 lousy. In the twelfth chapter we are told that Zachary Jansen 

 discovered the telescope in 1590, and " immediatclij applied 

 himself to the discovery of stars and other novelties". — "This 

 new Daedalus saw more with one tube and a single eye than 

 did Argus or Lynceus" — " In the moon too, he ivas thejirst to 

 discover spots ; and aftertioards Galileo Jbllovoing his exaynple 

 observed the same more accurately" These passages (in which 

 the allusion to the society oi Lincci, of which Galileo was a 

 member, must not be overlooked,) seem to me to justify the 

 first part of my assertion, that Borel " endeavoured to secure 

 for Jansen and his son the more solid reputation of having 

 anticipated Galileo in the useful employment of the invention." 

 No one had heard of these pretended observations till Borel 

 published his book in 1655, thirteen years after Galileo's death; 

 nor do they rest on any proof but Borel's own declaration. 

 There is indeed a communication from Jansen's son John, 

 with respect to his own discoveries, but it does not contain a 

 syllable in support of his father's. The substance of this com- 

 munication is given in the fourteenth chapter, which Borel en- 

 titles, " The excellent evidence of the above-named inventors, 

 by which the foregoing statements are supported." Dr. Moll 

 finds fault with me for calling this statement a letter from John, 

 and in fact it appears that it is only compiled from such a letter. 

 I was misled by Borel himself j who, in referring to it, invites 

 his readers to "learn what John himself has communicated by 

 his oian letters, though there are no means of confirming his 

 statement by other evidence." In this occurs the following 

 passage, amongst accounts of other discoveries which John 

 positively claims as his own. "I have often observed the 

 planet Jupiter, which appears round and indistinctly spherical. 

 Near him I have occasionally found two little stars, situated at 

 or near the upper part ; sometimes also three. But generally 

 I have seen four; and as far as I have been able to observe, 

 they circulate continually round Jupiter: but this I leave to 

 astronomers." This is the passage by which it seems to me 

 that Borel intended to hint away (as lar as he durst) Galileo's 

 claim to the earliest discovery of Jupiter's satellites; and ills 

 remarkable that this conmiunication is given entirely without 

 date, in a work which, being written to establish a chrouolo- 



