Dr. Herschei/s Observations, &c. 
49 
quence, and facts being stubborn things, we cannot decide 
upon them properly till they have been entirely laid open to 
our view, and sufficiently scrutinized. For this purpose the 
observations are all extracted from the journal, in the regular 
order in which they were made ; and here I must remark, that 
I purposely avoided any calculations, or even surmises, of the 
length of a rotation, while, the observations were making ; in 
order to be perfectly free from every bias that might mislead 
the eye. In this I succeeded so well, that, when I began to 
calculate, I mistook not less than 4 hours and ^ in the first 
supposition I made; which, happening to agree extraordinarily 
well with four of the most pointed observations, it misled me 
so far, that. I was very near rejecting the whole series as in- 
consistent, and began to think the changes in the belts to have 
been so frequent, and irregular, as not to fall under any kind 
of calculation. It will, however, soon appear that this has 
not been the case, and that, on the contrary, there has been 
more steadiness and regularity in the belts, than might well 
have been expected in such kind of appearances. 
Observations on the Belts of Saturn.* 
Nov. 11, 1793. 3 h 35'. ( Correction of the clock — 7' 27",i).-f 
Seven-feet reflector ; power 287 ; new specula, uncommonly 
* A few of these observations have been lately given ; but as they are essential to 
the series, I thought it better to repeat them here, than to refer to my former paper. 
f My time is kept by one of Shelton’s clocks, set now and then by equal alti- 
tudes, taken with a iz-inch Bird’s quadrant; and checked by the passage of a set of 
stars over the wire of a four-feet telescope, firmly fixer' t to the wall of my house. By 
calling the correction minus, I denote, in this case, that the clock is 7' 27",! too fast 
for true sidereal time. 
MDCCXCIV. 
H 
