TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 
613 
If these dimensions be taken in inches, and the breaking 
weight in tons, the above constant is 26 for beams cast erect, 
and 25 for those cast on their side : and this agrees with the 
experiments to a great degree of accuracy. 
In many of the preceding experiments the elasticity seemed 
to be perfect when one half, or even two thirds, of the break¬ 
ing weight was laid on. The ultimate deflections, too, were 
rather greater than as the length, but were not as the square of 
the length, as is commonly assumed in rectangular forms. 
11. MISCELLANEOUS. 
Professor Babbage explained his views of the advantage 
which would be derived from a collection in Tables of all those 
Facts which can be expressed by Numbers in the various Sci¬ 
ences and Arts, and which he has denominated “ the Constants 
of Nature and Art." A very valuable collection of this kind lie 
thought might be formed, without much difficulty, by the co¬ 
operation of the Members of the Association. 
Mr. Rotch communicated some observations on the state of 
the laws respecting Patents, and the influence of those laws on 
the progress of the mechanical arts. 
Professor Rigaud stated, that having discovered the obser¬ 
vations which Bradley made at Kew and Wanstead, he had been 
entrusted by the University with the publication of them, toge¬ 
ther with the rest of Bradley’s miscellaneous Works. Among 
his loose papers were some observations of Halley s comet in 
1759, which suggested the wish of annexing those that Harriot 
had made of the same body in 1607. The Baron de Zacli had 
published them in 1793 (in the Supplement to Bode’s Jahrbuch), 
but very unfaithfully, as appeared from a careful examination 
of the originals, with which the Professor had been entrusted 
by the Earl of Egremont. He stated that the same inaccuracy 
pervaded the whole of the Baron’s account of these papers, and 
he instanced it particularly with respect to the discovery of 
Jupiter’s satellites. The Baron’s statement was originally 
printed in the Berlin Epliemeris for 1788, and a translation of 
it is inserted in Hutton’s Dictionary (Art. Harriot). He ar¬ 
gues in it that Harriot probably knew nothing of what had 
been done by the great philosopher of Florence, and adds, that 
he had found an observation of Jupiter’s satellites made by Har¬ 
riot as early as Jan. 16, 1610. In answer to this, Prof. Rigaud 
showed two separate memoranda, in Harriot’s own hand-writing, 
