Latitude of middle point. Fathoms. ° ′ ″ Arbury Hill and Clifton 52 50 29·8 60,766 Blenheim and Clifton 52 38 56·1 60,769 Greenwich and Clifton 52 28 5·7 60,794 Dunnose and Clifton 52 2 19·8 60,820 Arbury Hill and Greenwich 51 51 4·1 60,849 Dunnose and Arbury Hill 51 35 18·2 60,864 Blenheim and Dunnose 51 13 18·2 60,890 Dunnose and Greenwich 51 2 54·2 60,884 This table presents a singular deviation from the common rule; for instead of the degrees _increasing_ as we proceed from north to south, they appear to _decrease_, as if the Earth were an _oblong_ instead of an _oblate_ spheroid. * * The measurements of small arcs of the meridian in other countries have presented similar instances.”[4] [4] Encyclopedia of Geography, by Hugh Murray and several Professors in the University of Edinburgh. A number of French Academicians who measured above three degrees of the meridian in Peru, gave as the result of their labours the first degree of the meridian from the equator as 56,653 toises; whilst another company of Academicians, who proceeded to Bothnia in Lapland, gave as the result of their calculation 57,422 toises for the length of a degree cutting the polar circle. But a more recent measurement made by the Swedish Astronomers in Bothnia shows the French to have been incorrect, having given the degree there 196 toises more than the true length. Other observations have been made, but as no two sets of experiments agree in result, it would be very unsatisfactory to conclude from them that the Earth is an oblate spheroid.