Page:Memoirs of a Trait in the Character of George III.djvu/233

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APPENDIX.
NO. 1.

Having sufficiently refuted the first part of the opinion already, it only remains for me to make such remarks on the Lunar method of finding the Longitude, as this coupling of my Invention with it seems to call upon me for.

It is with reluctance that I follow Mr. Maskelyne into a subject in which I may seem, like him, to be actuated by a selfish preference to my own scheme; however, as I shall give my reasons for what I advance, I will not hesitate to submit them


    he swears that the crust is good mutton. It reminds us, however, of a Colossus of ambition, "damn'd to everlasting fame" who, after all his plans were overthrown on the memorable field of Waterloo, more decisively than those of Charles XII. at Pultowa, had the weakness to demonstrate on paper, illustrating it with a diagram of six Vs that by all the rules of the art of war he ought to have had the victory; and, as if emulating the Astronomer, he would needs try to demolish the reputation of his rival, to plant his own statue on the ruins! The affair between Mr. Mudge, junior, and the Astronomer Royal, gave occasion for a curious and important illustration of the superiority of mechanism being appealed to, by the former.—Admiral Campbell was on his return from Newfoundland, with a fleet of men of war; and, having a Timekeeper by Mudge with him, carried a press of sail in the night as they were approaching the Scully Rocks to the great dismay of the other Commanders, who, their reckonings being up, were in dread every moment of the fate of Sir Cloudesly Shovel.—It is almost superfluous to add that this Officer, who, we learn from Dr. Maskelyne was a skilful astronomer, would certainly never have thought of placing the same dependance on the best Lunar observation he could get: if the Moon was not then in her zenith at the antipodes.