Genre:

Essay, Drollery

Subjects:

Astronomy, Scientific Practitioners, Amateurism, Discovery, Periodicals, Error, Observation

    Calls for a 'check to be kept on the alleged discoveries of the amateur astronomers', not least because the editors of the newspapers to which these practitioners send their work have 'no opportunities for testing [... a] correspondent's veracity'. Regards the appointment of somebody commissioned to keep a register of celestial objects as 'very conducive to the interests of science', a vast improvement on the 'loose system of keeping our astronomical accounts which is now in force', and a way of checking whether a star is in its 'proper place' or 'a mere optical illusion of the alleged discoverer'.