56 



- KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



[Jan. 26, 1883. 



SOME BOOKS ON ASTRONOMY.* 



By Richard A. Proctor. 



I'llTE ideal book on general astronomy remains still to be 

 written. Neither in the English nor in any other 

 language is there a work on astronomy which presents a 

 comprehensive view of that great science in such a way 

 that every intelligent reader can appreciate the full beauty 

 of the subject, while the truths of astronomy are correctly 

 and sutliciently indicated. In saying this I reflect on no 

 one — or, if on any, on very few — for, to the best of our 

 knowledge, no one has ever attempted to do what, I 

 here say, has not been done. Guillemin's " Le Ciel " comes 

 nearest to such an attempt, and perhaps was intended as 

 such — if so, the attempt unquestionably failed. But there 

 are a number of excellent astronomical works directed 

 to special ends, which must perhaps be accepted 

 collectively, as all we shall ever have to teach the general 

 public astronomy ; for, such a work as we have suggested 

 above would present so Tuany difliculties, that I very much 

 doubt if any writer will ever undertake the task ; and 

 certainly, however well the task might be done, other books 

 on astronomy would be very much wanted by learners in 

 different departments of the science. I know this as well 

 as most men ; for what I have written has usually been 

 intended to meet such wants as I have experienced myself 

 or as others have indicated to me — yet from a rough 

 computation I find that what I have written in essays 

 and papers, from the purely mathematical to the 

 lightest and easiest, and published in books, on astro- 

 nomy, amounts to more than three times the entire 

 contents of the Old and New Testament. And so far was 

 I from being impelled to this copious effusion of explana- 

 tions and descriptions by cacoi'lhes scribendi and ropin 

 rerborum, that my first essay was written at the r.ate of 

 not more than ten lines a day (so difficult was composition to 

 me), and my first book (" Saturn and its Sj-stem," written 

 in 1864-.'5) was more than a year in hand. In those days 



would go about with a whole chapter in my head, in 

 my unwillingness to put pen to paper. 



I have now before me several books on astronomy, not 

 all recent, about which I wish to say a few words. They 

 have been written to meet different wants, often expressed 

 to me by correspondents ; and, as I think they meet those 

 wants exceedingly well, I mention them here, briefly and 

 seriatim. 



First comes that great collection of useful knowledge, 

 ^Ir. Chambers' " Handbook of Descriptive Astronomy." 

 (It suggests a rather large hand, but that is by the way.) 

 This is a thoroughly honest book — like the others I have 

 to touch on here. To say, as I have said elsewhere (and 

 been rebuked for saying), that much of it is compiled, is to 

 say that the author has acted fairly by his readers. Pre- 

 serve us from an original treatise on astronomy — in a case 

 such as this, where what we chiefly want is to learn the 

 great headings of astronomy, not what A. B. or Y. Z. has to 

 say about those headings ! But a large portion of the work 

 is original, too ; and the amovmt of labour given to the 

 book must have been simply enormous. It is no mere 

 fai;o7i de parler, but the simple truth, to say that no 

 astronomical library is complete without Chambers' 



• " A Handbook of Descriptive Astronomy." By G. F. Ctiam- 

 bcra. (Third Edition: Clarendon Press, Oxford.) "Astronomy 

 without Mathematics." By Sir Edmund Beckett. (Seventh 

 Edition : Society for Promoting Cliristian Knowledge, London.) 

 "The Sun; its Planets, and their Satcfhtes. By Edmiuid Ledger, 

 M.A. (Edward Stanford, London.) "Rudimentary .\stronoray." 

 By Robert Main, lato Radcliffe Observer. (Third Edition : Crosby, 

 Lockwood, & Co., London.) 



"Descriptive Astronomy." Guillemin's "The Heavens" 

 is an excellent work of the same kind, but less compre- 

 hensive. It would be, however, unfair of me to remark on 

 the work as I have it, for I believe in later editions it has 

 been considerably improved. 



Next comes a work of a very different kind, one of the 

 most remarkable and valuable books ever written on 

 astronomy, and also one of the most original — Sir Ed. 

 Beckett's " Astronomy Without Mathematics," which has 

 just reached a seventh edition. I note first that the new 

 edition has not only been most carefully revised, but parts 

 have been re-written, while discoveries made since the sixth 

 edition have been introduced here. Of the newly-written 

 matter I must especially note that relating to the tides, on 

 pp. 187-189. The whole sulyect of the tides is admirably 

 dealt with.* If the reader remembers that this work is 

 what its name implies, " Astronomy without Mathematics," 

 not an " easy book of ' popular astronomy,' " he will recog- 

 nise the admirable way in which it fulfils its plan and 

 purpose. Sir Ed. Beckett set himself a ^-ery difficult task ; 

 he accomplished it like a master. The book is thoroughly 

 good, from the first page to the last, though I may say of 

 the author as he says of me (footnote, p. 69), " with some 

 of his conclusions and opinions outside of ['Astronomy 

 without'] Mathematics, I do not at all agree." 



The next work is a recent and noteworthy contribution 

 to the literature of Astronomy — Mr. Ledger's, " The Sun ; 

 its Planets and their Satellites." This work is the out- 

 come of a course of lectures on the solar system read in 

 Gresh.T,m College. The persons responsible for selecting 

 the Gresham lecturer may be congratulated on having 

 secured the services of such a zealous and faithful worker 

 as Mr. Ledger. The book before us tells of much honest 

 and careful labour. There is no silent appropriation of 

 other men's labours, such as we sometimes see in such 

 books ; but while necessarily Mr. Ledger (like Mr. 

 Chambers and other honest workers), has had occasion to 

 refer freely to results obtained by others, there is an even 

 superabundant record of indebtedness. Mr. Ledger deals 

 with the Sun and Planets only, leaving to another volume 

 the Stars, Comets, Meteors, and so forth. He investigates 

 thoroughly nearly every question which comes before him, 

 and not only so, but a number of matters of great interest 

 to thoughtful readers, yet not relating to observed phe- 

 nomena, such as the appearance and movements observable 

 from other worlds. I wish I could from my own ex- 

 perience encourage him to persevere in dealing with 

 matters thus outside of ordinary inquiry ; but, as a matter 

 of fact, it is astonishing how few can be persuaded to take 

 the least interest in them. Thousands take interest in the 

 perUielion-conjunction nonsense about the great planets ; 

 yet Mr. Ledger might with advantage have left out all 

 that he says on this point. If he had given as many pages 

 about the tides, for instance, it would have been as well, or 

 a trifle better. There is no explanation of the tides at all. 

 We note few errors in the book. But we are rather sur- 

 prised to find Mr. Ledger, who shows considerable mathe- 

 matical acumen, failing to correct that old blunder about 

 Neptune and Uranus, which has misled so many wi-iters 

 on astronomy. He uses the old figure, first drawn, 

 I think, by Lardner (who knew very little of mathe- 

 matics), in which it was thought sufficient to con- 

 nect Neptune and L^ranus by an arrow-marked line 

 pointing towards Neptune, and to say that that is 

 the way in which the attraction of Neptune acted 



* On lines 13, 26, the reader should substitute " west " for 

 " east." The correction is made by Sir E. Beckett himself, not 

 by me. Tory likely it would have escaped my notice. 



