the present, from taking any steps based upon it. I
found for Assistant at the Observatory an old Lieutenant of the Royal
Navy, Mr Baldrey, who came on Mar. 16.

"On May 4th I began lectures: there were 32 names. The Lectures were
improving, especially in the optical part. I do not find note of the
day of termination.--I do not know the actual day of publication of my
first small volume of Cambridge Observations, 1828, and of
circulation. The date of the preface is Apr. 27th 1829. I have letters
of approval of it from Davies Gilbert, Rigaud, and Lax. The system
which I endeavoured to introduce into printed astronomical
observations was partially introduced into this volume, and was
steadily improved in subsequent volumes. I think that I am justified,
by letters and other remarks, in believing that this introduction of
an orderly system of exhibition, not merely of observations but of the
steps for bringing them to a practical result--quite a novelty in
astronomical publications--had a markedly good effect on European
astronomy in general.--In Feb. and March I have letters from Young
about the Nautical Almanac: he was unwilling to make any great change,
but glad to receive any small assistance. South, who had been keeping
up a series of attacks on Young, wrote to me to enquire how I stood in
engagements of assistance to Young: I replied that I should assist
Young whenever he asked me, and that I disapproved of South's
course.--The date of the first visitation of the (Cambridge)
Observatory must have been near May 11th: I invited South and Baily to
my house; South and I were very near quarrelling about the treatment
of Young.--In a few days after Dr Young died: I applied to Lord
Melville for the superintendence of the Nautical Almanac: Mr Croker
replied that it devolved legally upon the Astronomer Royal, and on May
30th Pond wrote to ask my assistance when I could give any. On June
6th I was invited to the Greenwich Visitation, to which I believe I
went on the 10th.

"I had long desired to see Switzerland, and I wished now to see some
of the Continental Observatories. I was therefore glad to arrange with
Mr Lodge, of Magdalene College (perhaps 10 years senior to myself), to
make a little tour. Capt. W.H. Smyth and others gave me
introductions. I met Lodge in London, and we started for Calais on
July 27th 1829. We visited a number of towns in Belgium (at Brussels I
saw the beginning of the Observatory with Quetelet), an