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vatory, he was sent to the principal establishments of the kind in Europe, and on this tour he was accompanied by his wife. He had married on the 20th of September, 1825, the daughter of a French physician, and the niece of the chemist Van Mons. To an intimate acquaintance with the usages of polite society this lady united a ready wit and not inconsiderable literary attainments. She was also an excellent musician. Obliged at an early age to preside in the house of her father, where was congregated the best society of Brussels, she acquired ease and grace of manner, and was well prepared to assist her husband when, in after years, he had arrived at distinction, and exercised a generous hospitality toward the distinguished strangers of every country who visited the observatory. During his journey, Quetelet made the acquaintance of some of the most distinguished men of the age, of Herschel, Schumacher, Grauss, Olders, and others, and at Weimar he had the pleasure of assisting in the celebration of the eightieth birthday of Goethe, with whom he remained eight days. The great poet showed him his experiments in optics, and entertained him with his theory of colors. He was also present at the conference of German naturalists, held at Heidelberg on the 18th of September.

While waiting the completion of his plans in regard to the observatory, he, in conjunction with M. Garnier, established the periodical La Correspondance Mathématique et Physique, to which the most eminent men of the age were willing contributors. This publication continued without intermission till 1839, when Quetelet was obliged to resign its supervision on account of the pressing nature of his engagements as permanent secretary to the academy, to which office he had been elected in 1834.

The erection of the observatory was decided upon on the 8th of June, 1826. It was constructed according to the plans of Quetelet, but was not finished till after many vicissitudes, occasioned principally by the political events of 1830. He had been appointed to the directorship in 1818, but the observatory was not completed until 1832. He then immediately commenced his labors, of which it would occupy too much space to give even a list. They included meteorology, terrestrial physics, astronomy, the collection of materials for the Annales Annuaires of the observatory, and the other special works in which he has brought together the results of his researches. In the early days of the observatory, all the attention of Quetelet was directed toward meteorology and terrestrial physics. The elements of these two sciences had been almost totally neglected in Belgium, and his first desire was to correct this grave error, a task in which he perfectly succeeded. He has given the results of his persevering observations in his works Upon the climate of Belgium, and Upon the physics of the Globe, and thus the basis of the meteorology of Belgium was established. The meteorological observations were commenced in 1833, and also the observations for the determination of the latitude and longitude of the establishment. At that time Quetelet pos

sessed only very few and very inferior astronomical instruments. In the month of July, 1835, the meridian telescope and the mural circle were put in position, but the equatorial was not mounted until June of the following year. Quetelet was anxious to have the turning-dome for the equatorial ready in time to observe Halley's comet, the return of which was looked for with great interest by all Europe, but in spite of all his efforts, and the good-will of the government, he was disappointed, and was obliged to follow the course of this eccentric wanderer with only his telescope.

The determination of the difference of longitude between the observatories of Brussels and Greenwich was later a source of great anxiety as well as interest to him, when, in 1853, a trial was made of the new electrical telegraph for this purpose. Two successful attempts of the kind had been made in America, but the distance between the two places, the intervention of the sea, the great reputation of the director of the observatory of Greenwich, and the responsibility assumed before the world, rendered Queteiet very solicitous as to the result of his co-operation, and his anxiety did not cease until the two sealed packets, containing the observations made simultaneously at Greenwich and Brussels, which were by common consent opened on the same day in both places, proved the result to be entirely satisfactory. A similar attempt was made in 1868 between Brussels and Leyden.

At the time the observatory was erected, clocks and watches throughout the country were regulated only by sun-dials, and as these were often defective and liable to get out of order, it frequently happened that there would be a difference in time of from 20 to 25 minutes between the clocks of different towns, and even between those of the same city. The establishment of railroads necessitated more precision, and on the 22d of February, 1836, a royal decree enacted that a meridian should be traced and an instrument of observation be established in forty-one of the principal cities of the kingdom. The execution of this work was intrusted to Quetelet.

From 1841 to 1845 the observatory of Brussels was the center of a vast meteorological net-work, which comprised more than eighty stations in Europe and in the north of Asia. Its director published the results of this great enterprise, with a large number of plates, showing the course and rapidity of the movements of the atmospheric waves. He also made many observations upon the temperature of the earth, and an uninterrupted series of observations of the elements of terrestrial magnetism. But, perhaps, the most remarkable works of Quetelet were the papers he published on his observations of the periodical phenomena of plants and animals. These gave an impulse to similar studies throughout the whole of Europe, and he may on this account be considered as the founder of a new science.

As a class for the study of the fine arts had been added to the academy, and other changes made, it was deemed advisable to form a

new institution, and on the 16th of December, 1845, was established The Royal Academy of Science, Letters, and Fine Arts of Brussels. The first communication made by Quetelet to the new establishment was upon the history of art in Belgium; the manners and customs of the people at different ages; their habitations, ornaments, furniture, the instruments they used to supply the needs of life, &c. He recommended the forma tion of an ethnological museum to assist in the study of various types of the human race as well as of their habits, and in 1847, through his instrumentality, was formed the Museum of Antiquities of Belgium.

In 1853 Quetelet was appointed president of the maritime conference held at Brussels on the suggestions of Lieutenant (afterward Captain) Maury. Its purpose was to establish a system of uniform observations at sea.

The regular astronomical observations of the Brussels Observatory commenced in 1836, although the small corps of the establishment, and the attention given to meteorological observations, did not permit of a great field of work. The observations made from 1837 to 1839 furnish in the Annals of the Observatory a catalogue of 666 stars. From 1848 these observations were carried on with renewed ardor; but all the regularity Quetelet desired could not be secured until 1857. year a great work has been continued up to the present day. to the catalogue of 10,000 stars, still in preparation, but which will soon be published, completing the monument raised to astronomical science. by Adolphe Quetelet, and his son M. Earnest Quetelet, who during nearly eighteen years has shared the work of the observatory, and whose labors have not been interrupted by his father's death.

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Adolphe Quetelet contributed greatly to the progress of the study of shooting-stars, about the nature of which little was then known. His attention was first turned to them in 1819, when he wrote his thesis upon the orign of aerolites, and a few years later, he gave, in the first number of the Correspondance, a method for determining the height of a meteor from two observations in different places. In 1826 simultaneous observations were organized by his efforts at Brussels, Gand, and Liege. He then abandoned the subject, and did not take it up again until ten years. later, when he resumed his observations, and continued them for the rest of his life. He first called attention to the periodicity of the starshowers of the 10th of August, and stimulated astronomers of his own and other countries to make numerous observations, which, taken together, have prepared the way for the remarkable theories now formed as to the character of these interesting meteors. We are indebted to him for very valuable catalogues of their appearances, and also for conscientious. and precise researches on their frequency and on the several peculiarities they present.

The direction of the establishment confided to his care did not hinder him from devoting himself to studies of another order, which show the variety of his powers and the habitual industry of his life. We refer to the statistical works, which obtained for him a high place in the world

of science. His first memoir upon this subject, The laws of birth and mortality in Brussels, was read before the academy on the 4th of June, 1825. "The establishment of life-insurance companies in our prov inces," says the author, "and the desire to see these laudable and, if well conducted, benevolent institutions continued among us has induced me to make some researches into the laws of birth and of mortality."

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After showing that during the preceding year the births and the deaths had followed almost exactly in the same proportion the variations of the thermometer, only in contrary directions, he gives some tables of mortality and population, with distinction of sex, and shows how they might be made of use in the speculations of the life-insurance companies. Two important remarks appear in the memoir. One, that the annual number of births and of deaths corresponds to a sinusoid, of which the abscissas represent the different times of the year, and the ordinates the number of births or of deaths at these seasons. other verifies the observation of Malthus, that the number of births increases when through any accidental cause an unusual loss of life has been sustained by a population. Another memoir, in 1827, upon the births, deaths, prisons, and poor-houses of the Pays-Bas, was intended to complete and develop the preceding. It contained another table of mortality for the lower provinces, but without distinction of sex. Researches upon population next appeared, and in 1828 Statistical re searches in the kingdom of the Netherlands. In the importance of the facts given, in breadth of view and novelty of deduction, this memoir is superior to the two preceding. A short introduction gives the origin, aim, resources, and use of statistics, the degree of probability which may be obtained in deductions from them, the uncertainty, which can never be entirely overcome, and the objections of ignorance and false knowledge. The author divides the subject as follows: Extent of the kingdom of the Netherlands; population; imposts and commerce; libraries and daily papers; educational and benevolent institutions; crimes and delinquencies; comparative examination of the different parts of the kingdom. Some of the results obtained are very striking. Thus, in comparing the fecundity of marriage with us and with the English, he says: "Great Britain produces less than our country, but her fruit is more durable. She gives birth to fewer citizens, but she preserves them better. If her fecundity is less, her useful men are more numerous, and generations are not as often renewed to the detriment of the nation. Man during his early years lives at the expense of society. He contracts a debt which he ought some time to pay, and if he fails to do so, his existence has been a loss instead of a gain to his fellow-citizens.” Speaking of criminals and delinquents, he says: "The proportion condemned to the number accused in the criminal and police courts is the same in Belgium and in France; but in the courts of assize the proportion of the condemned to the accused in Belgium is 84 to 100, while in France and England it is only 65; a fact due to the want of the jury in Belgium at the time the observations were made. When that

institution was restored, the number of the condemned was reduced to that of France. The author then gives a table indicating the number of crimes committed at different ages, and also giving the amount of what he calls the tendency to crime.

"What is very remarkable," he observes, "is the frightful regularity with which crimes are repeated. Year after year are recorded the same crimes, in the same order, with the same punishments; in the same proportions. Sorrowful condition of the human race! The number condemned to the prison, irons, and the scaffold is as certain as the revenue of the state. We can tell in advance how many individuals will poison their fellows, how many will stain their hands with human blood, how many will be forgers, as surely as we can predict the number of births and of deaths.

During the years 1831 and 1832 Quetelet devoted most of his time to statistical researches, and the five following memoirs were the fruit of his labors: Upon the law of the growth of man; Upon the tendency to crime at different ages; Upon the weight of man at different ages; Upon reproduction and mortality; and Statistics of the courts of justice of Belgium from the years 1826 to 1831. The researches in regard to the size and. weight of man were new at the time. Quetelet found that the law of growth, at least from birth until the thirteenth year, could be represented by a hyperbola. Twenty years later MM. Bravais and Martins adopted a hyperbola as the curve of the diametrical increase of the Norway pine, which is at least a singular coincidence. In the memoir upon the tendency to crime, he enlarges upon the ideas already given, passes in review the different causes which lead to the development or suppression of this tendency, and denies the favorable influence ordinarily attributed to education. "We too often," he says, "confound. moral instruction with the merely learning to read and write, which in many instances only provides new instruments for the commission of crime. On the other hand, as to the injurious moral effects of poverty, some of the provinces of France reputed to be poorest are also the most virtuous.

In connection with these two memoirs he says: "Man, without knowing it, and supposing that he acts of his own free will, is governed by certain laws from which he cannot escape. We may say that the human species, considered as a whole, belongs to the order of physical phenomena. The greater the number, the more the individual will is subordinated to the series of general results which proceed from general causes. that control the social condition. These causes ought to be sought out, and only observation can discover them." Man, as the author considers him, is analogous to the center of gravity in a body. "If the average man were determined for a nation, he would represent the type of that nation; if he could be determined for an assembly of all men, he would represent the type of an entire human species. Although, his will is restrained within very narrow limits, man contains within him moral forces which distinguish him from the animal, and by which he can, to

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