355 
of Edinburgh, Session 1867 - 68 . 
Clarke did not find it to be ; but when I stated it close to the 
middle of his debateable ground, and after giving his two limits of 
that ground, — this second charge of the Proceedings' author is no 
truer than the first ; and appears to me a deliberate misrepresenta- 
tion of the numerical results before him. 
Seco7id Part of Accusation Second. 
2. 2 d part. — Not content, however, with making the charges 
indicated above, the Proceedings' author, on his p. 261, asks — 
“ But is there any valid reason whatever for fixing and deter- 
“ mining as an ascertained mathematical fact, the polar axis of 
u the earth to be this very precise and exact measure (viz., 
“ 500,500,000 British inches), with its formidable tail of nothings?” 
And then he answers, with implied crimination, “None, except 
“ the supposed requirements or necessities of Professor Smyth’s 
“ pyramid metrological theory.” 
But upon which Professor Smyth remarks, that — first, he has not 
done what the author describes in his question ; but, as already 
shown, has taken his numbers from the results of computed mea- 
sures of practical observers ; and second , it is an uncalled for 
calumny to say that Professor Smyth’s pyramid metrological theory 
requires, or necessitates, that there should be any particular or 
very precise number, and with many 0’s at the end of the British 
inches in the length of the earth’s axis of rotation. From his first 
quotations from Airy, Schubert, Herschel, Bessel, and others, down 
to his last from the Ordnance Survey volume, Professor Smyth, in 
prosecution of the Pyramid metrological theory, has merely sought 
to know how many British inches long, those who have measured 
the said axis, by the nearest approximations that can be made, — have 
found it to be; and whatever the latest and best measurers have 
found and proved it, he has always accepted ; and he is still ready to 
act in the same manner, for any geodesicai results of the future, 
if they shall be proved intrinsically better than the existing ones. 
Accusation Third. 
3. Further on, however (at p. 263), comes a more wide-sweeping 
libel ; and now against, not Professor Smyth, but Captain Clarke, 
Sir H. James, and all the greatest geodesists of every country 
