OF THE EXPEDITION. XV 



gress of the United States ; and that, in testimony of the opinion of this society upon this sub- 

 ject, an official copy of these proceedings be transmitted to the Secretary of the Navy." 



The resolutions were adopted unanimously on the same evening, and were transmitted 

 through me. A few days afterwards I received from the Corresponding Secretary, Dr. Asa 

 Gray, the opinion expressed by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. It is in these 

 words : 



" Resolved, That, in the opinion of this Academy, the enterprise for determining the solar 

 parallax in the method proposed in the correspondence between Lieut. Gilliss and Dr. Gerling 

 is worthy to be promoted by the government of the United States, by sending an expedition to 

 Chiloe, both on account of the great uncertainty which attends the adopted value of this funda- 

 mental basis of astronomical measurement, and from the probability that this attempt will 

 prove successful, and thus redound to the honor of the country by which it is undertaken. 



"Resolved, That a copy of this resolution be transmitted by the Corresponding Secretary to 

 Lieut. Gilliss, with a request that he will communicate it to the public authorities who may 

 have the subject under their consideration." 



These quotations from a document printed by Congress (30th Congress, 1st session) will have 

 shown the origin and initiatory steps leading to the Expedition, and it is scarcely necessary to 

 republish in this place testimony from other correspondents repeating nearly the same argu- 

 ments. Foreign astronomers were far less sanguine of any results likely to set aside the value 

 of the solar parallax adopted from discussion of the transits of Venus ; but the question of col- 

 lateral benefits to science from such enterprise was not mooted by either of them, or, doubtless, 

 they would have been equally strong in its recommendation. So far as my personal support 

 could go, my mind was fully made up. Resolved to give the method of Dr. Gerling a faithful 

 trial, and endeavor to accumulate other data to render the Expedition valuable in case no useful 

 results should be deducible from the observations on Venus, on the 10th February the testimo- 

 nials and correspondence were laid before the honorable Secretary of the Navy. Entreating 

 their careful perusal by him, I proposed : 



That he should furnish me with instruments already within the control of the department ; 

 one assistant, an officer of the navy; and authority to embark for Valparaiso, or other port in 

 Chile, to make observations there from February, 1849, until April, 1851. Should he be 

 pleased to grant this, I pledged myself that the expenses of every kind, exclusive of instru- 

 ments, should not exceed five thousand dollars. 



Not only were there influences to prevent its favorable consideration by the department, but 

 it was not until the last day of March that the alternative presented by the American Philo- 

 sophical Society was adopted, and the honorable Secretary referred the matter to the action of 

 Congress. There, the papers were appropriately sent to the Naval Committee, and within a 

 fortnight the Hon. F. P. Stanton, of Tennessee, made the following report : 



" The Committee on Naval Affairs have had under consideration the correspondence sub- 

 mitted by the Secretary of the Navy, in his letter of the 31st March, 1848, and they beg leave 

 to present the following views of this interesting subject : 



" It is proposed to set on foot an expedition to the most southern available position on the 

 Western Continent, for the purpose of making observations on the planet Venus, during the 

 period of her retrograde motion, in conjunction with similar observations to be made at the 

 observatory in this city, with a view to the more accurate determination of the solar parallax, 

 which involves not only the distance of our own planet from the sun, but the dimensions of the 

 orbits of all the bodies of the solar system. These observations, if successfully made in the 

 manner proposed, will present data solely American for a new and independent determination 

 of this most important element an element which enters into all our determinations of longi- 

 tude, affecting the accuracy and safety of all such calculations, and therefore possessed of the 

 highest pocsible utility, not only to the government, but to all the enterprising citizens of our 

 country. In this view the expedition commends itself to us for warm encouragement and effi- 



