‘we shall to some extent reverse our opinion. For our visible 
heavens contain no equivalent to a Centauri, the finest as 
well as the nearest of connected pairs ; or to such superb 
agzlomerations of stars as 47 Toucani with its ruddy heart 
and white border, or » Centauri, staring like a comet even 
“to the naked eye; or all the richness of manifold combi- 
nations in the Nubecula Major. Such are the regions 
whose investigation by successive explorers has been so 
well delineated in the pages before us. We have sketches 
by a master’s hand of many an earnest labourer whose best 
years were devoted to the undertaking. Among the rest we 
recognise the youthful Halley, who commenced at the early 
age of twenty the first regular telescopic survey of these un- 
familiar regions, experiencing, in consequence probably of 
his youth, the vexatious tyranny of some petty despot at 
St. Helena, whose name, withheld by him, is not worth 
digging up out of merited obscurity ;—Lacaille, the 
diligent, the accurate, the honourable, who on his return 
to France, out of 10,000 livres granted for his expenses, 
notwithstanding his having exceeded his stipulated task, 
insisted upon restoring the overplus of 855 to the 
Treasury ;—Sir T. Brisbane, who had served under the 
Iron Duke, in the Peninsula, and whose appointment to 
the governorship of New South Wales led to acharacteristic 
anecdote: Lord Bathurst having stated at head quarters 
“qu'il avait besoin d’un homme pour gouverner la terre et 
non les cieux,” and Brisbane having appealed to his old 
commander as to whether his love of science had ever 
interfered with his professional duties, the reply was, 
‘Non, certainement, et je dirai que dans aucune circon- 
stance vous ne ffites absent ni en retard, le matin, 4 midi, 
ou pendant la nuit ; et qu’en sus, vous fournissiez le temps 
a Parmée.”—Then we have the vicissitudes of honour and 
contempt encountered by Dunlop, whose unintelligible 
® Angosiades” (to borrow de Zach’s expression) at Para- 
matta were more injurious to the progress of astronomy 
than the blunders of the unlucky oid chevalier at Tarbes ; 
—the unmerited troubles and vexations and mortal sick- 
ness of poor Fallows, condemned to work with a bad 
instrument, and abandoned without help till he found 
his best assistant in his devoted wife ;—the brilliant 
career of Henderson, the detector of the parallax of | 
Sirius ;—the laborious attempts of Maclear to deduce the 
solar distance from observations of Mars, whose fault it 
certainly was not that the result was but partially satis- 
factory ; and his more successful verification and correc- 
tion of the meridian arc, not quite so accurately measured 
by Lacaille a century before—all these are given in most 
interesting recital, together with equally detailed notices 
of many less generally known observers. We have also 
a full record of a scientific expedition which has, perhaps, 
attracted too little attention in England—that sent by 
the United States to Chili; how Lieut. Gilliss erected 
his observatory on the columnar rock of Santa Lucia, in 
the middle of the town of Santiago, 176 feet above the 
stre2t, where the stones could not be blasted for fear of 
doing mischief below, and had to be split up by water 
after being roasted with flame ; how the inhabitants came 
up’at night by hundreds to see and gaze through the as- 
tonishing aguina, and had their curiosity gratified by 
the good-natured Americans, even to the sentry’s turn 
last of all ; how the weather was almost too fine, drawing 
so much upon their energies by the unremitting work of | 
if 
| 1772, 
odical rains setting in none too soon, and Gilliss’s vital 
was so dried up to the native standard of apathy, t 
he required a month of horse exercise to set him rig 
and how, with a staff so inadequate that they were obliged 
to confine their work to a portion only of the southern 
sky, 20,000 new stars were registered—a noble addition, 
of which we have reason to hope for.the publicatioa at no 
distant time, “ 
Such are a few only of the narratives with which 
this admirable memoir abounds; and we only regret 
that our cordial appreciation of its general excellence 
is subject tosome few, though not material, drawbacks ~ 
in the way of omission. The graphic way in which minor 
circumstances and incidents are interwoven in the rela 
tion of less important undertakings makes us conscious 
that the story of Sir J. Herschel’s memorable expedition 
to the Cape has been told in a too compressed form, 
and that details are comparatively absent which would 
have furnished matter not only of interest but of instruc- 
tion, 
Edinburgh Review : it would, perhaps, be an unfair, but 
it may not be an unnatural, inference that he had not had 
an opportunity of fully mastering the magnificent record 
of the Cape observations which astronomy owes to the 
| liberality of the Duke of Northumberland. We miss, too, 
the first outspoken challenge of the pseudo-planet Vulcan 
uttered from a southern latitude, and justified by the ~ 
event—the retort, not over courteous, of Liais, “ L’obser- 
vation du Dr. Lescarbault est fausse.” 
opinions regarding its success. But we should be sorry 
to appear even to detract from the merits of a memoir 
which deserves, and will obtain, so high a rank among — 
the materials for a general history of modern astronomy. 
The second pamphlet is also extracted from the 
“Livre commemoratif” of the same scientific body, and — 
is a history of astronomy as connected with the Académie 
Royale of Brussels, which has just reached the end of its — 
first century. Its range is accordingly more limited, but 
| the talent of its author has imparted a more than local — 
The Academy, founded — 
under the auspices of the Empress Maria Theresa in 
experienced a total interruption through political — 
value and interest to its contents. 
troubles from 1794 to 1816. During its earlierffexistence - 
it failed to awaken a scientific spirit in the Belgian pro- 
vinces, and depended almost entirely upon the contribu- 
tions of foreign talent, in which the conspicuous share 
claimed by England is testified by the names of Need- — 
A geodesical survey of Belgium — 
ham, Pigott, and Mann. 
being greatly needed, and the terms of some foreign as- 
tronomer being found exorbitant, application was made 
to Pigott, who was passing through Brussels in 1772 on 
his way-to Spa. He immediately gave up his intended 
journey, and applied himself to the undertaking with a 
generous and disinterested earnestness which ought never 
to fall into oblivion. For five months, accompanied by 
his son, Mr, Needham, and his servants, he carried on 
the survey at his own cost, and with his own instruments, — 
sent for from his observatory at Frampton House, near 
1 ah. 
The candour of the writer has led him to state 
that much of his recital is based on an article in the 
And we should — 
have preferred fuller information respecting the design — 
of the great Melbourne reflector, and the conflicting — 
