[M.

Bessel, at the wish of the Royal Academy of Berlin, projected a plan for making a very extensive map of the heavens.

Too vast for any individual to attempt, it was proposed that a portion should be executed by the astronomers of various countries, and invitations to this effect were widely circulated.

One only of the divisions of this map was applied for by any English astronomer; and, after completing the portion of the map assigned to him, he undertook another, which had remained unprovided for.

This gentleman, the Rev.
Mr.Hussey, was one of the rejected applicants for the Greenwich Observations.] There was, however, another ground on which I had weakly anticipated a different result;--but those who occupy official situations, rendered remarkable by the illustrious names of their predecessors, are placed in no enviable station; and, if their own acquirements are confessedly insufficient to keep up the high authority of their office, they must submit to the mortifications of their false position.