The North American Review (Volume 236) (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1849. Excerpt: ... the other between Pulkowa and Altona. Numerous smaller astronomical papers and geographical memoirs have been published. The Recherches sur la Parallaxe des EtoiUs Fixes, published by Dr. Peters, in October last, must rank among the most remarkable works of this century. We only allude to it, without attempting even a description, as the importance of the subject and the work alike forbid superficial views. Through the liberality of the Petersburg Academy, of which the Pulkowa observatory forms a department, copies of the Description of the observatory have been forwarded to all the observatories, and to some of the public libraries of the United States. It is thus placed within the reach of all our astronomers, and must be their text-book. The author of it closes his description in the following words: --" Those who have read this description will cordially agree with the author, when he designates the foundation of the Central Observatory of Russia as an epoch in the history of astronomy; inasmuch as the history of science cannot furnish a single example of protection so liberal as that which has been accorded to it by the Emperor Nicholas. The results of the labors of the commission and the exertions of the astronomers during the first years of the observatory's existence, will justify the thesis which I here propound, 'that the observatory of Pulkowa is to be regarded as the realization of a scientific idea, clearly conceived, and executed with the illimitable means furnished by the munificence of its founder.'" Art. VII.--Sermons by the late William B. O. Peabody, D. D., with a Memoir, by his Brother. Second Edition. Boston: Benjamin H. Greene. 1849. 12mo. pp.393. Of the characters commonly termed great, many appear so by virtue of their deficiencies....