20 



E. WALTER MAUNDER; F.R.A.S., OX 



Poland are in their turn struggling, hoping, working. A 

 striking illustration of the power of this instinct was afforded 

 us six years ago when the Convention of the South African 

 States met together to consider the question of union. I was 

 in South Africa at the time, and it struck me as one of the 

 most significant events of history. For this projected union 

 was not a union of a single race, but of two, speaking different 

 languages, having different traditions ; two which had been in 

 armed conflict less than seven years before. The attitudes of 

 Natal and of the Orange Eiver States were particularly 

 interesting ; Xatal was almost purely British, the Orange Eiver 

 almost purely Boer. Both States were proud of their 

 independence ; both States were small, and must necessarily 

 have a subordinate representation in the united government ; 

 both at the first blush of the new proposal were opposed to it, 

 but after due deliberation both gave it their adhesion. 



But the idea of nationhood suffered expansion in its turn. 

 Some 400 years ago Columbus discovered America, and as a 

 consequence Europe, which had hitherto looked eastward, now 

 faced westward. Commercial supremacy had belonged to the 

 great seaports of the Mediterranean ; the merchants of Venice 

 and Genoa had been the great men of the earth. But now the 

 states bordering on the Atlantic : Spain, Portugal, France, 

 England, and Holland, were better placed than Italy for 

 the new adventure, and the Italian seaports declined in 

 importance. 



A Digression. 



It is permitted to the cobbler to say, " There is nothing like 

 leather " ; and it may be likewise permitted to an astronomer 

 to point out that a not unimportant part in the decision as to 

 which nation should reap the greatest fruits of the new 

 discovery was played by Greenwich Observatory. The 

 navigation of the ocean raised problems of a different 

 order from those involved in the navigation of the Midland Sea ; 

 problems which could only be solved practically by a great 

 advance in astronomical science. The Observatory at Green- 

 wich was founded for this purpose. The problem was worked 

 out there, under Maskelyne, the fifth Astronomer Eoyal. One 

 of the earliest and most skilful masters of the new method of 

 navigation, Capt. James Cook, assisted General Wolfe (whose 

 home lay within a stone's throw of the Observatory) in the 

 operations preceding the taking of Quebec, surveyed the St.. 



