A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century

A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century from Agnes Mary Clerke, an Irish astronomer and writer, mainly in the field of astronomy. She was born in Skibbereen, County Cork, Ireland, and died in London.

The progress of astronomy during the last hundred years has been rapid and extraordinary. In its distinctive features, moreover, the nature of that progress has been such as to lend itself with facility to untechnical treatment. To this circumstance the present volume owes its origin. It embodies an attempt to enable the ordinary reader to follow, with intelligent interest, the course of modern astronomical inquiries, and to realize (so far as it can at present be realized) the full effect of the comprehensive change in the whole aspect, purposes, and methods of celestial science introduced by the momentous discovery of spectrum analysis.