THE BEGINNINGS OF AMERICAN ASTRONOMY. 103 



methods) early made itself felt througliout the whole country. The 

 mathematical text-books of Peirce, of Harvard, acd of Chauvenet, of 

 the JSTaval Academy, brought the latest learniug of Europe to American 

 students. Mitchell (class of 1829 at West Point) was the only gradu- 

 ate who became a professional astronomer (1842-1861). His direct 

 service to j)ractical observing astronomy is small, but his lectures 

 (1842-1848), the conduct of the Cincinnati observatory (1845-1859), and 

 his publication of the Sidereal Messenger (1840-1848), together with 

 his popular books, excited an intense and widespread public interest 

 in the science, and indirectly led to the foundation of many observa- 

 tories. He was early concerned in the matter of using the electric 

 current for longitude determinations, and his apparatus was only dis- 

 placed because of the superior excellence of the chronograph devised 

 by the Bonds. His work Avas done under immense disadvantages, in a 

 new community (Ohio), but the endowment of astronomical research in 

 America owes a large debt to his energy and efforts. 



The Navy and the United States JSTaval Academy (founded by Ban- 

 croft in 1845, at the suggestion of Chauvenet) were very active in astro- 

 nomical work. Chauvenet (Yale College, 1840) published a text-book 

 of trigonometry in 1850, which had an important share in directing 

 attention to rigid, elegant, and general methods of research. His 

 astronomy (1863) is a handbook for all students. Walker, Gilliss, 

 Coffin, Hubbard, Ferguson, Keith, Yarnall, Winlock, Maury, Wilkes, 

 were all connected with the Navy, more or less intimately. Walker's 

 career was especially brilliant; he graduated at Harvard College in 

 1825, and established the observatory of the Philadelphia High School 

 in 1840. He was the leading spirit in the United States JSTaval Observ- 

 atory at Washington (1845-1847) and introduced modern methods into 

 its practice at the beginning. From the observatory he went to the 

 Coast Survey to take charge of its longitude operations, and he contin- 

 ued to direct and expand this department until his death, in 1853. To 

 him, more than to any single person, is due the idea of the telegraphic 

 method ("the American method") of determining differences of longi- 

 tude. His assistant in this work was Gould, who succeeded to the 

 charge of it in 1853. His researches extended to the held of mathe- 

 matical astronomy also, and his theory of the planet JSTeptuue (then 

 newly discovered) marks an important step forward. His investiga- 

 tions and those of Peirce were conducted in concert and attracted gen- 

 eral and deserved attention. 



The exploring expedition of Wilkes required corresponding observa- 

 tions to be made in America, and during the period 1838-1842 William 

 Bond, at Dorchester, and Lieutenant Gilliss, at Washington, main- 

 tained such a series with infinite assiduity and with success. The 

 results of Gilliss' astronomical expedition to the southern hemisphere 

 (Chile, 1849-1852) were most creditable to him and to the Navy, though 

 his immediate object — the determination of the solar parallax — was not 

 attained. 



