18 TEE LITE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. 



which of course I regard it. I first commenced a rude 

 meteorological register, which I believe is preserved, I 

 think in February 1823; and from this time scientific 

 pursuits occupied much of my private thoughts, though 

 they were carefully concealed from the members of my 

 family. Astronomy presently became a passion with me, 

 and, having exhausted some trifling children's and school 

 books to which I had access, I read Ferguson's Astronomy, 

 of which my father gratified me by presenting me with 

 a handsome copy, and also a small orrery, in 1825. 

 The astronomical journal to which I have referred opens 

 with the mention of a visit to the Edinburgh Observatory. 

 The first year's record (1825), containing a great deal 

 of puerility and showing much inexperience, is marked 

 at the same time by a devotion to the subject and an 

 ardour for learning which is sometimes touching. My 

 calculations and observations (with a good achromatic of 

 my father's, two and three-quarters inch aperture) were 

 pursued at late hours, and also on journeys. Many of 

 the pages are filled with elaborate (though often very 

 inaccurate) arithmetical calculations of the positions of 

 planets and satellites for a planisphere I was constructing. 

 The books I consulted were Ferguson's Astronomy, 

 " Wonders of the Telescope," Swing's Astronomy, with 

 tables for calculation of planetary places (this book 

 was lent me by Mr. Hunter, schoolmaster, Colinton), 

 Keith on the Globes (Mr. Hunter's), Chambers's (folio) 

 Dictionary ; and I seem to have ventured on an occasional 

 consultation of Woodhouse's Astronomy, to which I had 

 access at home. In July 1825 I commenced reading 

 through the astronomical papers in Button's abridgment 

 of the Philosophical Transactions. In September 1825 I 

 became possessed (by Miss Ballingall's kindness) of a 

 Nautical Almanac, which gave me a thrill of pleasure 

 which I yet vividly remember. 



'In October 1825 I began making rude angular in- 

 struments. In December 1825 I made an observation 

 on a peculiarity of oblique vision in apparently in- 

 creasing the number of the stars, which in 1826 



