The Royal Observatory of Scotland 53 



it, though his recommendation has been long before the world, 

 though telescopes have been since so greatly augmented in 

 number and in size, though the atmosphere forms an in- 

 creasingly larger per-centage of loss upon every successive 

 instrument, and though so many Observatories have been 

 built expressly for the purpose of procuring the most accu- 

 rate observations ; yet, not a single one has been built in the 

 place best calculated, according to Nature and Newton, for 

 procuring in the most perfect manner the ends for which it 

 was really established. For witness that our Observatories, 

 instead of being built on the highest mountains in the clear- 

 est climates, have always been erected at the bottoms of the 

 lowest valleys, hardly elevated in any sensible, certainly not 

 in any useful degree, above the level of the sea ; and that, 

 worse still, they are generally immersed in the smoke of our 

 largest towns. 



" In justice it must be allowed that many other duties have 

 often been demanded of Observatories, besides making ob- 

 servations, — duties, too, that compelled their proximity to the 

 haunts of men ; but even allowing for such compulsion in 

 many cases, it is strange that men have been content, in 

 every instance, to work under this excessive disadvantage, 

 and these ungrateful difficulties. So much the more fortu- 

 nate, however, for the Edinburgh Observatory, if the means 

 should at last be afforded for its occupying the vacant but 

 promising field for the promotion of Astronomy. Not but 

 what this Institution has more than sufficient of secular 

 business and social duties to keep it close to the city ; and 

 I am far from recommending the removal of this Observa- 

 tory, or the establishment of any new one, permanently, on 

 a high mountain : the expense of building in such a situation, 

 for a constant residence, would be very large, on account of 

 the strength necessary to withstand the severities of winter ; 

 while there would be great difficulty in carrying on the 

 printing, &c. of the observations. 



" What I propose is, merely to establish a temporary ob- 

 serving station for the summer months ; as in this way the 

 greater part of the good harvest which a mountain is capable 

 of affording, would be reaped at the least possible outlay : for 



