ed in this voyage may be found in the Journals of the House of Commons, Vol. XXIX. page 546, in
items which we omit (in this abridgment) was personally unacceptable to the Lunar party. But the collision leaves no more respect for what the Professors kept out of sight, than we are wont to have for the conferences of the whispering Kings of Brentford. We could not, however, have anticipated such a scene of shifting and tergiversation as the following,—on August 9th, 1763: before the voyage to Barbadoes.—'William Harrison found that Mr. Blisse had proposed the trial should not be to Jamaica, but to some other Island. He then desired, if the Board pleased, it might be to Antigua: to which Mr. Blisse made answer, "No Sir, the Longitude of Antigua is also known."—By this Mr. Harrison found that he was not to go to Jamaica because the Longitude was known: and therefore said to Mr. Blisse—"Pray how long has the Longitude of Jamaica been known? to which Mr. Blisse answered—"a long time." William Harrision then said; "my fate is very hard; that I must not go to a place, because you say the Longitude of it is known; whereas a little time ago you would not give me the reward because, you said, the Longitude of that place was not known."—It was at last agreed that he should go to Barbadoes.'[subnote 1] It would be doing injustice to the rest of the Board to suppose they could deliberately sanction such gross prevarication and imbecile unfitness for what he appeared to direct; but it was evidently their duty to have interfered, if they were not parties to the misconduct of their interlocutor—Nathaniel Blisse, A. M. Astronomer Royal—who seems to have been a weak man, though he had filled the Sidereal chair, and also that of Geometry, at Oxford. So that the Journal quoted from unintentionally aids the strictures of Dr. Knox, who, had
- ↑ From the Minutes of the Board, it may be inferred that this Island was finally decided on to accommodate Dr. Maskelyne, who objected to the others on account of his health.
