NOTES TO LECTURE XIII
Bode's Law.—Write down the series 0, 3, 6, 12, 24, 48, &c.; add 4 to each, and divide by 10; you get the series:
| ·4 | ·7 | 1·0 | 1·6 | 2·8 | 5·2 | 10·0 | 19·6 | 38·8 |
| Mercury | Venus | Earth | Mars | —— | Jupiter | Saturn | Uranus | —— |
numbers which very fairly represent the distances of the then known planets from the sun in the order specified.
Ceres was discovered on the 1st of January, 1801, by Piazzi; Pallas in March, 1802, by Olbers; Juno in 1804, by Harding; and Vesta in 1807, by Olbers. No more asteroids were discovered till 1845, but there are now several hundreds known. Their diameters range from 500 to 20 miles.
Neptune was discovered from the perturbations of Uranus by sheer calculation, carried on simultaneously and independently by Leverrier in Paris, and Adams in Cambridge. It was first knowingly seen by Galle, of Berlin, on the 23rd of September, 1846.