58 HISTORY OF THE [1830-40 
than those in the former. The positions of the planets ought to be 
given more frequently and more accurately.* 
Some of the most pressing needs both of seamen and of astro 
nomers were satisfied by a year-book published by Schumacher 
for the Danish Hydrographic Office, beginning with the year 1822, 
entitled Distances of the four planets Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and 
Saturn from the Moon, together with their places for every day in 
the year.\ But Young did nothing ; he had been the teacher of 
the world as regards the interference of light, but he would brook 
no interference with his comfortable and not too onerous post as 
Superintendent of the Nautical Almanac. The demand for reform 
was, however, becoming too strong for him, when in 1827 April, 
John Herschel, at a meeting of the Board of Longitude, “ produced 
a paper regarding improvements in the Nautical Almanac .” 
Airy, who tells this in his Autobiography, adds that Herschel and 
he were the leaders of the reforming party in the Board, but that 
Young, the Secretary, resisted change as much as possible. Some 
slight attempt to satisfy the demand for an enlargement of the 
Nautical Almanac was made by publishing separately a supplement 
as proposed by Herschel, beginning with the year 1828 ; but it 
seems to have been issued just at or after the commencement of 
the year, and could not in any way be considered a satisfactory 
solution 4 In the same year, 1828, the Board of Longitude was 
abolished, but Young remained Superintendent of the Nautical 
Almanac. This year also witnessed the publication of Encke’s 
Astronomisches Jahrbuch for 1830, embodying practically all the 
suggestions made in England. 
In 1829 January, Baily issued a second pamphlet, “ Further 
Remarks on the present defective state of the Nautical Almanac, 
* Curiously enough, South (p. 15) expresses his “ most earnest wish that 
astronomers on shore would unite in dismissing mean time altogether from 
their observatories, knowing as I do, that however suitable to the wants of 
culinary philosophy, it is only calculated to entail on astronomical observations 
needless labour, lamentable uncertainty, and, I might almost add, constant 
error.” 
t Young made arrangements with Schumacher to have a large number of 
copies imported ; but only fifty were sold in England, and Young maintained 
that this proved that practical seamen did not want any information of that 
kind. 
X This supplement was published for the years 1828-33. That for 
1831 contains : For every day at apparent noon, mean time, hourly difference, 
double the sun’s daily change of declination, time of semidiameter passing the 
meridian, sidereal time at mean noon. For the moon : R.A. and Decl. at 
time of transit, semidiameter in Sid. T. For midnight, log. of star constants 
A, B, C, D. Hor. parallax and log. dist. of planets for every five days. Moon- 
culminating stars. List of occultations. This particular supplement was 
edited by Pond. We may add that Henderson for some years calculated 
occultations in advance ; they were at first printed in the Quarterly Journal 
of Science, and from 1829 circulated by the Society in lithographed lists.