Casimer, the name of a thin tweed woollen cloth, much in fashion for summer use.

Cassimire, or Cashmere. See Cashmere.

Cassine. See Botany Index. The Spaniards who live near the gold mines of Peru, are frequently obliged to drink an infusion of this herb in order to moisten their breasts; without which they are liable to a sort of suffocation, from the strong metallic exhalations that are continually proceeding from the mines. In Paraguay, the Jesuits make a great revenue by importing the leaves of this plant into many countries, under the name of Paraguay or South Sea tea, which is there drank in the same manner as that of China or Japan is with us. It is with difficulty preserved in England.

Cassini, Johannes Dominicus, a most excellent astronomer, was born at Piedmont in 1635. His early proficiency in astronomy procured him an invitation to be mathematical professor at Bologna when he was no more than 15 years of age: and a comet appearing in 1652, he discovered that comets were not accidental meteors, but of the same nature, and probably governed by the same laws, as the planets. In the same year he solved a problem given up by Kepler and Bullialdus as insolvable, which was, to determine geometrically the apogee and eccentricity of a planet from its true and mean place. In 1663, he was appointed inspector general of the fortifications of the castle of Urbino, and had afterwards the care of all the rivers in the ecclesiastical state; he still however prosecuted his astronomical studies, by discovering the revolution of Mars round his own axis; and, in 1666, published his theory of Jupiter's satellites. Cassini was invited into France by Louis XIV. in 1669, where he settled as the first professor in the royal observatory. In 1677 he demonstrated the line of Jupiter's diurnal rotation; and in 1684 discovered four more satellites belonging to Saturn, Huygens having found one before. He inhabited the royal observatory at Paris more than forty years; and when he died in 1712, was succeeded by his only son James Cassini.

Cassini, James, another celebrated astronomer, was the only son of the former. He was born at Paris, 18th February 1677. It would appear that his early studies were conducted in his father's house, where, from the pursuits and studies of his father, mathematics, and their application to astronomy, it is probable, were not neglected. He became a student afterwards at the Mazarine college, at the time that the celebrated Varignon was professor of mathematics. With the affluence of this eminent man young Cassini made such progress, that at 15 years of age he supported a mathematical thesis with great honour. At the age of 17 he was admitted a member of the Academy of Sciences; and the same year he accompanied his father in a journey to Italy, where he assisted him in the verification of the meridian at Bologna and other measurements. After his return he performed similar operations in a journey into Holland, and he discovered some errors in the measure of the earth by Snell, the result of which was communicated to the Academy in 1702. In 1696 he made also a visit to England, where he was made a member of the Royal Society. In 1712 he succeeded his father as astronomer royal at the observatory of Paris. In 1717 he gave to the Academy his researches on the distance of the fixed stars; in which he showed that the whole annual orbit, of near 200 millions of miles diameter, is but as a point in comparison of that distance. The same year he communicated also his discoveries concerning the inclination of the orbits of the satellites in general, and especially of those of Saturn's satellites and ring. In 1725 he undertook to determine the cause of the moon's libration, by which she shows sometimes a little towards one side, and sometimes a little on the other, of that half which is commonly behind or hid from our view.

In 1732 an important question in astronomy engaged ged the ingenuity of our author. His father had determined, by his observations, that the planet Venus revolved about her axis in the space of 23 hours; and M. Bianchini had published a work in 1729, in which he settled the period of the same revolution at 24 days 8 hours. From an examination of Bianchini's observations which were upon the spots in Venus, he discovered that he had intermitted his observations for the space of three hours, from which cause he had probably mistaken new spots for the old ones, and so had been led into the mistake. He also determined the nature and quantity of the acceleration of the motion of Jupiter at half a second per year, and of that of the retardation of Saturn at two minutes per year; that these quantities would go on increasing for 2000 years, and then would decrease again. In 1740 he published his Astronomical Tables, and his Elements of Astronomy; very extensive and accurate works.

Astronomy was the principal object of our author's consideration, but he did not confine himself absolutely to that pursuit, but made occasional excursions into other fields. We owe to him Experiments on Electricity, Experiments on the Recoil of Fire-arms; Researches on the Rise of the Mercury in the Barometer at different Heights; Reflections on the perfecting of Burning-glasses; and some other memoirs.

One of the most important objects of the French academy was the measurement of the earth. In 1669 Picard measured a little more than a degree of latitude to the north of Paris; but as that extent appeared too small from which to conclude the whole circumference with sufficient accuracy, it was resolved to continue that measurement on the meridian of Paris to the north and the south, through the whole extent of the country. Accordingly, in 1683, the late M. de la Hire continued that on the north side of Paris, and the older Cassini that on the south side. The latter was assisted in 1700 in the continuation of this operation by his son our author. The same work was farther continued by the same academicians; and finally, the part left unfinished by De la Hire in the north was finished in 1718 by our author, with the late Maraldi, and De la Hire the younger.

These operations produced a considerable degree of precision. From this measured extent of five degrees, it appeared also, that the degrees were of different lengths in different parts of the meridian; and our author concluded, in the volume published for 1718, that they decreased more and more towards the pole, and that therefore the figure of the earth was that of an oblong spheroid, or having its axis longer than the equatorial diameter. He also measured the perpendicular to the same meridian, and compared the measured distance with the differences of longitude as before determined by the eclipses of Jupiter's satellites: from which he concluded that the length of the degrees of longitude was smaller than it would be on a sphere, and that therefore again the figure of the earth was an oblong spheroid, contrary to the determination of Newton by the theory of gravity. Newton was indeed of all men the most averse from controversy; but the other mathematicians in Britain did not tamely submit to conclusions in direct opposition to the fundamental doctrine of this philosopher. The consequence was, that the French government sent two different sets of measurers, the one to measure a degree at the equator, the other at the polar circle; and the comparison of the whole determined the figure to be an oblate spheroid, contrary to Cassini's determination.

After a long and laborious life, James Cassini died in April 1756, and was succeeded in the Academy and Observatory by his second son. He published, A Treatise on the Magnitude and Figure of the Earth; as also, The Elements or Theory of the Planets, with Tables; beside a great number of papers in the Memoirs of the Academy, from the year 1699 to 1755.

Cassini de Thury, César François, a celebrated French astronomer, director of the observatory, and member of most of the learned societies of Europe, was born at Paris June 17, 1714. He was the second son of James Cassini, whose occupations and talents he inherited and supported with great honour. He received his first lessons in astronomy and mathematics from MM. Maraldi and Camus; and made such a rapid progress, that when he was not more than ten years of age he calculated the phases of a total eclipse of the sun. At the age of eighteen he accompanied his father in his two journeys undertaken for drawing the perpendicular to the observatory meridian from Strasbourg to Brest. A general chart of France was from that time devised; for which purpose it was necessary to traverse the country by several lines parallel and perpendicular to the meridian of Paris. Our author was charged with the conduct of this business; in which he was so scrupulous as to measure again what had been measured by his father. This great work was published in 1749, with a chart shewing the new meridian of Paris, by two different series of triangles, passing along the sea coasts to Bayonne, traversing the frontiers of Spain to the Mediterranean and Antibes, and thence along the eastern limits of France to Dunkirk, with parallel and perpendicular lines described at the distance of 6000 toises from one another, from side to side of the country.

Our author made a tour in 1741, in Flanders, in the train of the king. This gave rise, at his majesty's instance, to the chart of France; relative to which Cassini published different works, as well as a great number of the sheets of the chart itself. He undertook, in 1761, an expedition into Germany, for the purpose of continuing to Vienna the perpendicular of the Paris meridian; to unite the triangles of the chart of France with the points taken in Germany; to prepare the means of extending into that country the same plan as in France; and thus to establish successively for all Europe a most useful uniformity. Our author was at Vienna the 6th of June 1761, the day of the transit of the planet Venus over the sun, of which he observed as much as the state of the weather would permit him to do, and published the account of it in his Voyage en Allemagne.

Cassini, always meditating the perfection of his grand design, profited of the peace of 1783 to propose the joining of certain points taken upon the English coast with those which had been determined on the coast of France, and thus to connect the general chart of the latter with that of the British isles, as he had before united it with those of Flanders and Germany. The proposal was favourably received by the English government, government, and presently carried into effect under the direction of the Royal Society, by the late General Roy.

Between the years 1735 and 1770, M. Cassini published, in the volumes of Memoirs of the French Academy, a great number of pieces, consisting chiefly of astronomical observations and questions; among which are researches concerning the parallax of the sun, the moon, Mars and Venus; on astronomical refractions, and the effect caused in their quantity and laws by the weather; numerous observations on the obliquity of the ecliptic, and on the law of its variations. He cultivated astronomy for 50 years, the most important for that science that ever elapsed for the magnitude and variety of objects; and in which he commonly sustained a principal share.

M. Cassini was of a very strong and vigorous constitution, which carried him through the many laborious operations in geography and astronomy which he conducted. An habitual retention of urine, however, rendered the last twelve years of his life very painful and distressing, till it was at length terminated by the smallpox the 4th of September 1784, in the 71st year of his age. He was succeeded in the academy, and as director of the observatory, by his only son John-Dominic Cassini, the fourth in order of direct descent who has filled that honourable station. Hutton's Math. Det.

Cassiodorus, Marcus Aurelius, secretary of state to Theodoric king of the Goths, was born at Squillace, in the kingdom of Naples, about the year 470. He was consul in 514, and was in great credit under the reigns of Athalaric and Vitiges; but at 70 years of age retired into a monastery in Calabria, where he amused himself in making sun-dials, water hour-glasses, and perpetual lamps. He also formed a library; and composed several works, the best edition of which is that of Father Garet, printed at Rouen in 1679. Those most esteemed are his Divine Institutions, and his Treatise on the Soul. He died about the year 562.