625 



I must call attention to the fact, that all the remarks of Colonel 

 Waugh have reference to the operations carried on since 1832 by 

 me, himself, and our assistants, and are quite disconnected from 

 Colonel Lambton's results to the south of Damargida, which were 

 deduced in the early part of 1815. Now, as the two sets of opera- 

 tions unite at Damargida, it would be illogical to correct the southern 

 portion of the Indian arc by one value of h y and the northern por- 

 tion by another value of h ; for, manifestly, no spot on the earth's 

 surface can have two distinct heights above the sea differing from 

 each other by 100 feet or so at the same instant. 



It is rather a delicate matter for me to speak in terms of comment 

 of the labours of my predecessor, and I had much rather that any- 

 body else should undertake the invidious task ; but thus much is 

 very certain, that the instruments employed prior to 1832, were not 

 such as we should use with confidence now-a-days, whilst those 

 in use since that period are certainly not surpassed by any in ex- 

 istence. 



In 1842 I was sensibly alive to the probable inaccuracy of the 

 operations between Damargida and Cape Comorin, and, as the only 

 effectual remedy, proposed to the Government of India to revise that 

 work with the new instruments ; but the proposal was rejected ; so 

 that instead of forming, as it would and ought to have done, one un- 

 broken series from Cape Comorin to the Himalayan Mountains, the 

 great arc of India now consists of two distinct patches ; one to the 

 south of Damargida for ever uncertain as to its unit of measure, and 

 executed with instruments which we should now pronounce to be 

 crazy and unserviceable ; whilst the other to the north depends on 

 a unit tolerably well defined, and was performed with instruments 

 as perfect as can be desired. Of course, it is not for me to offer any 

 remarks about the propriety of the decision of the Right Honour- 

 able the Governor-General of India in Council, and the Court of 

 Directors of the East India Company, of those days, in a commu- 

 nication of this nature, except that, as far as science is concerned, 

 perhaps it will now and hereafter be lamented that all my argu- 

 ments for a revision were urged in vain. 



It will appear, from what I have above stated, that the question 

 of the amount of correction to be applied to my two sections A and 

 B, is not yet finally settled, and is still uncertain to the extent of 



