which dominate so much of astronomy and render it unattractive or inaccessible to many. Moreover, not only can descriptive astronomy be appreciated and studied, but its progress can materially be assisted, by observers who have neither knowledge of higher mathematics nor any elaborate instrumental equipment.
Accordingly, while the successors of Laplace and Bradley have been for the most part astronomers by profession, attached to public observatories or to universities, an immense mass of valuable descriptive work has been done by amateurs who, like Herschel in the earlier part of his career, have had to devote a large part of their energies to professional work of other kinds, and who, though in some cases provided with the best of instruments, have in many others been furnished with only a slender instrumental outfit. For these and other reasons one of the most notable features of nineteenth century astronomy has been a great development, particularly in this country and in the United States, of general interest in the subject, and the establishment of a large number of private observatories devoted almost entirely to the study of special branches of descriptive astronomy. The nineteenth century has accordingly witnessed the acquisition of an unprecedented amount of detailed astronomical knowledge. But the wealth of material thus accumulated has outrun our powers of interpretation, and in a number of cases our knowledge of some particular department of descriptive astronomy consists, on the one hand of an immense series of careful observations, and on the other of one or more highly speculative theories, seldom capable of explaining more than a small portion of the observed facts.
In dealing with the progress of modern descriptive astronomy the proverbial difficulty of seeing the wood on account of the trees is therefore unusually great. To give an account within the limits of a single chapter of even the most important facts added to our knowledge would be a hopeless endeavour; fortunately it would also be superfluous, as they are to be found in many easily accessible textbooks on astronomy, or in treatises on special parts of the subject. All that can be attempted is to give some account of the chief lines on which progress has been made, and to
