pies of the Kalendar for 1624 to be publicly burnt.
There does not seem to be any reason for supposing that this insult
proceeded from his old enemies the Catholics. They would, no doubt, take
an active share in carrying it into effect; but it would appear that his
former patrons were affronted at Kepler's giving the precedence in his
title page to the States of Upper Ens, where he then resided, above the
States of Styria.

In 1622, the Emperor Ferdinand, notwithstanding his own pecuniary
difficulties, ordered the whole of Kepler's arrears to be paid, even
those which had been due by Rudolph and Mathias; and so great was his
anxiety to have the Rudolphine Tables published, that he supplied the
means for their immediate completion. New difficulties, however, sprung
up to retard still longer the appearance of this most important work.
The wars of the reformation, which were then agitating the whole of
Germany, interfered with every peaceful pursuit. The library of Kepler
was sealed up by order of the Jesuits, and it was only his position as
imperial mathematician that saved him from personal inconvenience. A
popular insurrection followed in the train of these disasters. The
peasantry blockaded Linz, the place of Kepler's residence, and it was
not till the year 1627, as the title page bears, or 1628, as Kepler
elsewhere states, that these celebrated Tables were given to the world.

The Rudolphine Tables were published at Ulm in one volume folio. These
Tables were calculated by Kepler from the Observations of Tycho, and are
founded on his own great discovery of the ellipticity of the planetary
orbits. The _first_ and _third_ parts of the work contain logarithmic
and other auxiliary tables, for the purpose of facilitating astronomical
calculations. The _second_ part contains tables of the sun, moon, and
planets; and the _fourth_ a catalogue of 1000 stars, as determined by
Tycho. A nautical map is prefixed to some copies of the tables, and the
description of it contains the first notice of the method of determining
the longitude by means of occultations.

A short time after the publication of these tables, the Grand Duke of
Tuscany, instigated no doubt by Galileo, sent Kepler a gold chain in
testimony of his approbation of the great service which he had rendered
to astronomy.

About this time Albert Wallenstein, Duke of Friedland, a great patron of
astrology, and one of the most distinguished men of the age, made the
most