1835.] 



Astronomical Tables and Observations, 93 



be the case with respect to other countries, I am sure that 

 this observation is pecuUarly applicable to India ; it was from 

 the general desire for information which has lately actuated 

 my countrymen, that about 18 months ago 1 selected the 

 divine science of Astronomy as the study and pursuit most 

 congenial to my disposition and best calculated fully to oc- 

 cupy my attention : as it had fortunately fallen under my 

 notice that many persons very imperfectly acquainted with 

 the mathematics appeared (notwithstanding their persual of 

 the v/orks of many eminent writers on Astronomy) to be un- 

 able to comprehend even the leading principles on which it 

 is founded, I next resolved to aspire abov e a mere general 

 idea, and to obtain a more than superficial knowledge of the 

 sublime mysteries of the science ; for this purpose I com- 

 menced a regular study of Euclid, Algebra, &c. and lately 

 have acquired a considerable degree of practical as well as 

 theoretical knowledge, and in proportion as I have increas- 

 ed my stock of knowledge, in the same degree has my desire 

 for further improvement and making myself useful increas- 

 ed ; it was from this feeling that on a late occasion v/hen my 

 friend the Hon'ble Company's Astronomer was so obliging 

 as to explain to me the means adopted by Astronomers for 

 predicting the Eclipses of the Sun, and Occultation of the 

 fixed Stars, that the possibility of constructing a table to 

 facilitate the computation occurred to me, the result of a 

 little reflection and some labour has produced what I desir- 

 ed, which I have taken the liberty to beg you to insert in the 

 Madras Journal of Literature and Science ; this table with 

 the assistance of the Nautical Almanac will afford a ready 

 means of discovering when occultations will happen, and 

 persons possessed of a Telescope and Regulator will be en- 

 abled to determine the longitude to a very great degree of 



ropean university, and which are deserving of particular admiration 

 and praise, when considered as the production of a native of this coun- 

 try, who must have laboured under peculiar disadvantages in studying 

 the diiticult though interesting science of astronomy in a foreign lan- 

 guage. — We trust that the distinguished success, which has attended 

 the labours of Goday Vencat Jaggarow, may serve to encourage his 

 countrymen in the prosecution of the study of this, and the other 

 branches of science, and we hail this display of talent as a bright spe- 

 cimen of "the march of mind" among the members of the native com- 

 munity of Southern India, — En, 



