11 



for the determinations of proper motions. In 1866 Dr. Gould also 

 became deeply interested in the applications of photography to 

 astronomy. He measured and deduced the right ascensions and 

 declinations of about 50 stars from some photographs of the Pleiades 

 taken by Ruth erf urd, and showed that the results thus obtained 

 agreed closely with Bessel's Helio meter measures. In 1870, on the 

 eve of his departure for Cordoba, he again took up this question and 

 obtained the relative positions of the stars on Rutherfurd's plates of 

 the cluster Prsesepe. Dr. Gould was so encouraged by his success 

 that he made arrangements for the regular application of photo- 

 graphy at the Cordoba Observatory. This work was, however, 

 seriously interfered with by the breaking of his photographic object- 

 glass in transit, and secondly, when a new object-glass had been 

 secured, by personal difficulties and the pressure of other work ; but 

 some valuable results were obtained. 



The establishment of the Observatory at Cordoba, and the work 

 executed there by Dr. Gould and his assistants, must be regarded as 

 the most important astronomical work of his life. These works in- 

 clude the ' Uranometria Argentina,' the ' Zone Catalogue,' and the 

 ' Argentine General Catalogue,' for the epoch 1875. The ' Urano- 

 metria " gives " the brightness and position of every fixed star, 

 down to the seventh magnitude within 100° of the South Pole," 

 with an atlas consisting of fourteen maps exhibiting on a stereo- 

 graphic projection the position of the stars to the seventh magni- 

 tude. The magnitudes are based fundamentally on Argelander's 

 scale. The ' Uranometria ' was published in 1879. The positions of 

 the stars in the General Catalogue are generally fixed by several 

 observations and are accurate results ; this Catalogue was published 

 in 1886. The volumes of the Zone observations were passed through 

 the press, after Dr. Gould had left Cordoba, by his successor, and 

 the last volume ajDpeared only a short time before Dr. Gould's 

 death. 



The value of the work which Dr. Gould was enabled, by his own 

 energy and the devotion of his assistants, to carry out whilst resident 

 in Cordoba has received the fullest recognition of his contemporaries 

 and has placed him in the first rank of practical astronomers. But 

 besides work of this class, Dr. Gould established, in 1849, the 

 ' Astronomical Journal,' of which he continued the editor till 1861, 

 when its publication was suspended by the war ; but after his return 

 from Cordoba this Journal was re-established, and is at present con- 

 tinued by his friends Dr. Chandler and Professors Asaph Hall and 

 Lewis Boss. 



Dr. Gould married in 1861, Mary Apthorp Quincy, daughter of 

 the Hon. Josiah Quincy; Mrs. Gould died in 1883, and to her 

 memory the 1 Zone Catalogue of Stars ' is dedicated. Dr. Gould's 



