On Sept. 30th Mr Bosanquet
wrote to me about the Eclipse of Thales, and I urged on the
computations related to it, through Mr Breen. In October the eclipse
of Agathocles (the critical eclipse for the motion of the Moon's node)
was going on. In October Hansteen referred me to the darkness at
Stiklastad.--I went to Sweden to observe the total eclipse of July
28th, having received assistance from the Admiralty for the journeys
of myself, Mr Dunkin, Mr Humphreys and his friend, and Capt.
Blackwood. I had prepared a map of its track, in which an
important error of the _Berliner Jahrbuch_ (arising from neglect of
the earth's oblateness) was corrected. I gave a lecture at the Royal
Institution, in preparation for the eclipse, and drew up suggestions
for observations, and I prepared a scheme of observations for
Greenwich, but the weather was bad. The official account of the
Observations of the Eclipse, with diagrams and conclusions, is given
in full in a paper published in the Royal Astr. Society's
Memoirs.--This year I was President of the British Association, at the
Ipswich Meeting: it necessarily produced a great deal of business. I
lectured one evening on the coming eclipse. Prince Albert was present,
as guest of Sir William Middleton: I was engaged to meet him at
dinner, but when I found that the dinner day was one of the principal
soiree days, I broke off the engagement.
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