Professor Rigaud. 145 



fixed copious memoirs of Bradley himself. This work contains, be- 

 sides several other unedited papers of Bradley, his original observa- 

 tions for the determination of the constants of aberration and 

 nutation. These observations had been lost sight of for upwards of 

 seventj' years ; and, but for Mr. Rigaud's zeal and exertion, would, 

 in all probability, never have been recovered. Fortunately, however, 

 it came to his knowledge that several MSS. of Bradley still existed 

 among the papers of Dr. Hornsby, then in the possession of his fa- 

 mily, by whom they were readily given up on application from the 

 University. Mr. Rigaud was requested to undertake the office of 

 editor ; a task which was not an easy one, owing to the confused 

 state of the materials from which he had to derive his information. 

 He succeeded, however, in producing a work which will ever be re- 

 garded as a most valuable record in the history of our science. So 

 highly was it esteemed on the Continent, that in the very next year 

 after its publication, the Royal Academy of Sciences of Copenhagen 

 made the reduction of the observations for aberration and nutation 

 the subject of their jJrize ; which was adjudged to Dr. Busch of the 

 Kcenigsberg Observatory, the assistant of that illustrious astronomer 

 to whom the reputation of Bradley is so deeply indebted. As con- 

 nected with this subject, it may be mentioned, that it was through 

 the instrumentality of Mr. Rigaud, that his late Majesty, King Wil- 

 liam IV., was pleased to cause a monument to be erected at Kew, 

 to mark the spot where Bradley made the observations which led to 

 his great discoveries. In 1835, Mr. Rigaud published a small pam- 

 phlet, containing an account of the ' Astronomiae Cometicae Synop- 

 sis' of Halley, and, in 1838, the last work he lived to complete, 

 ' An Historical Essay on the first publication of Sir Isaac Newton's 

 Principia ;' which exhibits, in every page, the author's minute ac- 

 quaintance with the events of that important period. Besides these 

 works, Mr. Rigaud was the author of many papers read before the 

 Ashmolean Society in Oxford ; and also of one ' On the Principal 

 Instruments at Greenwich in the time of Dr. Halley,' which is in- 

 serted in the ninth volume of our Memoirs. 



" In 1827, Mr. Rigaud met with a severe domestic affliction in 

 the loss of his wife ; an event which left him sole guardian of a 

 large family of young children ; to the superintendence of whose 

 education much of the attention of the latter j'ears of his life was 

 devoted. The affection and solicitude with which he discharged 

 this duty was rewarded by his being spared to witness the academic 

 distinction of his eldest son, who is now a Fellow of our Society ; 

 and the Council are hapi)y in being able to state that he is com- 

 pleting the publication of a collection of letters from scientific men 

 in the beginning of the last centurj% upon which his father was 

 engaged at the time of his death ; and the original documents of 

 which formerly belonged to Mr. Jones, the father of Sir William 

 Jones, but now in the possession of the Earl of Macclesfield. 



" Many memliers of this Society have had opjjortunities of ob- 

 serving the kindness and unaffected simplicity of manner which 

 marked Mr. Rigaud's intercourse in private life ; and some of them, 



Phil. Ma'r. S. 3. Vol. 1«. No. 115. Feb. 1841. L 



