This passage illustrates what I have said on the editorial function (Vol. I, p. 15). What precedes and follows has some criticism on the Government, the Astronomer Royal, etc., but reserved in allusion, oblique in sarcasm, and not fiercely uncourteous. The coarseness of the passage I have quoted shows editorial insertion, which is also shown by its blunder. The inserter is waiting for the Almanac of 1851 that he may review Mr. Adams's paper, which is to be contained in it. His own contributor, only two sentences before the insertion, had said, "The Nautical Almanac, we believe, is published three or four years in advance." In fact, the Almanac for 1851--with Mr. Adams's paper at the end--was published at the end of 1847 or very beginning of 1848; it had therefore been more than two years before the public when the passage quoted was written. And probably every person in the country who was fit to review Mr. Adams's {148} paper--and most of those who were fit to read it--knew that it had been widely circulated, in revise, at the end of 1846: my copy has written on it, "2d revise, December 27, 1846, at noon," in the handwriting of the Superintendent of the Almanac; and I know that there was an extensive issue of these revises, brought out by the Le-Verrier-and-Adams discussion. I now give the review of myself, (February 23, 1850): "_The British Almanack and Companion._ "The Companion to this Almanack, for some years after its first publication, annually contained scientific articles by Sir J. Lubbock[262] and others of a high order and great interest; we have now, however, closed the publication as a scientific one in remembrance of what it was, and not in consequence of what it is. Its list of contributors on science, has grown 'small by degrees and beautifully less,' until it has dwindled down to one--'a last rose of summer left withering alone.' The one contributor has contributed one paper 'On Ancient and Modern Usage in Reckoning.' "The learned critic's _chef d'oeuvre_, is considered, by competent judges, to be an Essay on _Old Almanacks_ printed a few years ago in this annual, and supposed to be written with the view of surpassing a profound memoir on the same subject by James O. Halliwell,[263] Esq., F.R. and A.S.S., but the tremendous effort which the learned writer then made to excel many titled competitors for honors in the antique line appears to have had a sad effect upon his mental powers--at any rate, his efforts have since yearly become duller and duller; happily, at last, we should suppose, 'the ancient {149} and modern usage in reckoning' indicates the lowest point to which the _vis inertia_ of the learned writer's peculiar genius can force him. "We will give a few extracts from the article.