I 9 2 11KKSCI1KL AND HIS WORK 



will l>e t ho liquids perhaps thirty thousand n 

 discovered." Tin- discovery of the fourth, called Y r esta, 



In- proll" II rYeMt of SUch Consequence " 



"engageliis immediate attention." lie called it "a valu- 

 able addition to our increasing catalogue ,f a 

 and lie spoke of the "celebrated discoverers " as in- 

 ducing "us to hope that some farther li^ht may soon 

 be thrown upon this new and most inter* 



tronomy." 1 Dr. Olbers himself wrote to 1 1< i 

 that Vesta " was not to he distinguished from a 

 star"; 2 while Sclirocter, the country man and neighbour 

 of OlbiTs, had already communicated a paper to tin- 

 Royal Society in which he said : "Itfl im 

 out the least difference, that of a fixed star of th 

 magnitude with an intense radiating liidit : so 

 this new planet may with the greatest propriety be 

 called an astrnn't." That one scientilic man should 

 attack, or rather slander, another for giving to these 

 small bodies a scientifically appropriate name, on the 

 ground that he thereby intended to derogate from the 

 credit of his own friends, whom he publicly extolled as 

 " celebrated discoverers," seems incredible. Yet it was 

 done. 



By a most ingenious contrivance he managed to 

 obtain approximate values for the diameters of Ceres 

 and Pallas. The former he found to be 161*6 miles; 

 the latter smaller, 147 or 110J miles. So small is 

 Pallas that it would require many thousands equally 

 small to make up a planet no larger than Mercury. 

 The colour of Ceres he found to be " ruddy, but not 

 very deep " ; that of Pallas, " milky whitish." 



1 Letter from Dr. Olbers, April 20, 1807. 



a Phil. Trans., 1807, p. 260. Phil. Trans., May 28, 1807, p. 245. 



