2 SCIENCE. 
cer, and every eminent astronomer in the 
country who has ever expressed an opinion 
on the subject. Utterances by such au- 
thorities are surely worthy of being honored 
by .a refutation. We wish to facilitate in 
every way the task of making the most ef- 
fective refutation possible, and this we can 
best do by stating the substance of the crit- 
icisms as clearly and forcibly as we can, 
without implying any endorsement of them 
until we hear the other side. 
The only rational object that the nation 
can have in supporting a great public ob- 
servatory is the continuous making of those 
astronomical observations which require to 
be prosecuted on a uniform plan for long 
intervals of time, witha force larger than 
private observatories can ordinarily com- 
mand, and with a persistence more long- 
continued than they can be expected to 
exhibit. 
comprehensive plan of work, devised by the 
The first requirement of all isa 
best authorities at the command of the na- 
tion, and based on the latest aspects of 
This plan should be 
pursued without change except as improve- 
astronomical science. 
ments are suggested by the advance of re- 
It should be dependent on the life 
or temporary opinions of no individual, and 
search. 
should have a form of public support which 
will secure adherence to it. 
The criticism directed against the Obser- 
vatory is that its published observations and 
reports show little or nothing of this kind, 
and that neither permanence of purpose nor 
unity of object can be discerned in them. 
Much that we find in the published volumes 
looks like a collection of individual works 
of every degree of ability from the highest 
[N. 8S. Von XIII. No. 314. 
to the lowest, which have the appearance 
of being initiated by the worker himself, 
abandoned when he deemed it best to do 
80, and only now and then controlled by 
the guidance of any higher authority. Even 
in the case of those observations in which 
continuity from year to year can be best 
traced, gaps and unexplained changes and 
omissions occur through the whole history 
of the Observatory, for most of which no ex- 
planation is found, and none can be readily 
imagined except the varying moods of the 
observers. 
In these points the critics see no evi- 
dence of any permanent improvement in 
The 
reports for the last eight or ten years show 
the work of the new establishment. 
earnest efforts made by this and that as- 
tronomer to do this, that and the other, set 
forth the difficulties encountered in mak- 
ing these efforts, report the success reached 
in overcoming them, and describe the alter- 
ations necessary in instruments and arrange- 
ments. Sometimes an effort made one year 
seems toe be continued into the next, and 
sometimes we hear nothing more of it. It 
would be tedious to enumerate all the en- 
terprises which figure for a year or two in 
the annual reports, without any reason 
being assigned, and then disappear with- 
out any explanation. There seems to be as 
striking an absence of continuity from year 
to year as there ever was, the work with 
the prime vertical transit excepted. 
It is not denied by the critics that able 
and industrious astronomers have, from 
time to time, been attached to the institu- 
tion, that the qualifications of the working 
force are still excellent, and that much good 
