where the Thermometer is always some degrees above freezing: that, in case the cold amounts to
adage, which says, the proof of the pudding is in the eating of it, would have been more approved by Bacon and Locke, above all by Newton, than the mathematical triflers who had the assurance to sanction this miserable proof of the superiority of the Lunar method, which in effect is the sum and drift of the whole purpose.—We may add that in England, where a wager so frequently settles a dispute, the Gentlemen of the Jockey Club would immediately have taken three, four, or five to one, on the result of as many trials of the machine, under the care of some competent person, not a zealous bigot to the Lunar process, as was the case in the trial commented on.—Not long after the present affair, Dr. Maskelyne published a very large quarto of "Tables of Refraction and Parallax," highly creditable to his industry and professional researches, but equally a proof of his infatuation, in expecting masters of merchantmen, as well as the gentlemen of the navy, to conform to such complicated rules for finding the situation of their ship. Yet he says that "Lunar observations are now happily understood and practised, with the help of the Nautical Almanac, both in the Navy and the Merchants service."—That there is here and there a mercantile Captain accomplished enough to conform to these purposes,[subnote 1] is true, but they form an exception
- ↑ One of these (Captain William Collinson, the younger) stated to the Author, that with all possible care, and under the most favourable circumstances, he could not avoid an error equal to thirty miles. It would be a great mistake to imagine they prefer Lunations to a Timekeeper. On the contrary their opinion, in coincidence with that of his lamented friend, the reverend John Barnes Emmett (one of the best astronomers we had) is that the proper use of observations, when they can be had, is for the correction of any casual irregularity in the chronometers on board their ship:—but as this would have been assigning them only a secondary place, in utility, Dr. Maskelyne would sooner have parted with his dexter hand than affixed his signature to such a heterodox article of mechanical belief.
