a town of Hertfordshire in England, five miles from St Albans and Duffield, stands on the river Verlamb and was of old called Verlamfiede. The land in the vicinity is a clay so thickly mixed with flints, that, after a shower, nothing appears but a heap of stones; and yet it bears good corn even in dry summers. This fertility is imputed to a warmth in the flint, which preserves it from cold in the winter; and to its closeness, which keeps it from the scorching rays of the sun in the summer. Edward VI., when an infant, was brought hither for his health; and, it is said, the bedstead he lay on, which is curiously wrought, is still preserved in the manor house near the town.

John, an eminent English astronomer, and the first who obtained the appointment of astronomer-royal, was born at Derby in the year 1646. He was educated at the free school of Derby, where he was head scholar at 14 years of age, at which period his constitution, naturally tender and delicate, was much tried by a severe illness. When some of his companions went to the university, the state of his health prevented him from accompanying them. He afterwards met with a book De Sphera, written by John Sacrobosco, which was perfectly suited to the natural turn of his genius, and therefore he perused it with uncommon satisfaction, translating as much of it into English as he thought would be necessary for him; and from the Astronomia Carolinae of Strut he learned the method of calculating eclipses, and ascertaining the places of the planets. Mr Hatton, a mathematician, sent him Kepler's Tabulae Rudolphinae, and Riccioli's Almagestum Novum, together with some other astronomical works to which he was as yet a stranger. In 1669 he calculated an eclipse of the sun, which had been omitted in the Ephemerides for the following year, together with five apparitions of the moon to fixed stars, and sent them to Lord Brouncker, president of the Royal Society, who submitted them to the examination of that learned body, by which they were greatly applauded, and he received a letter of thanks from Mr Oldenburg the secretary. He likewise received a letter of thanks from Mr Collins, one of the members. In 1670 he was invited to come up to London by his father, that he might become personally acquainted with his learned correspondents, of which he gladly accepted, and had an interview with Mr Oldenburg and Mr Collins, by the latter of whom he was introduced to Sir Jonas Moore, who became the warm friend and patron of Mr Flamsteed. In consequence of this journey he became acquainted with many astronomical instruments, and was presented by Sir Jonas Moore with Townley's micrometer, who also assisted him in procuring glasses at a moderate rate for the construction of telescopes. On his way home again he returned by Cambridge, where he paid a visit to the celebrated Dr Barrow. Flanders, Barrow and Sir Isaac, then Mr Newton, and entered a student of Jesus college.

In the year 1672, he made large extracts from the letters of Galileo and Crabtree, by which his knowledge of dioptries was very much improved; and during the same year he made a number of celestial observations when the weather would permit, which were afterwards published in the Philosophical Transactions. In 1673 he composed a treatise on the true and apparent diameters of the planets, when at their greatest and least distance from the earth, which even the great Newton did not scruple to borrow, and made some use of it in his Principia in 1685. He published an Ephemeris in 1674, in which he exposed the folly and absurdity of astrology, and the same year he drew up a table of the tides for the use of the king, with an astronomical account of their ebbing and flowing, which Sir Jonas Moore assured him would be well received by his majesty. Sir Jonas received from Mr Flamsteed a pair of barometers, with directions how to use them, which he presented to the king and the duke of York, to whose notice he embraced every opportunity of introducing Mr Flamsteed.

Having taken the degree of M.A. at Cambridge, he formed the resolution of entering into holy orders, when Sir Jonas wrote to him to come to London, where he had an appointment for him very different from that of the church. But as he found that nothing could make him abandon the resolution he had formed, he obtained a situation for him which was perfectly consistent with the character of a clergyman. This was the new office of astronomer to the king, with a salary of £100 per annum. He received ordination at Ely-house by Bishop Gunning, in Easter 1675; and on the 10th of August in the same year the foundation stone of the royal observatory at Greenwich was laid, which received the designation of Flamsteed house, in honour of the first astronomer royal. Till this edifice was erected, he made his observations in the queen's house at Greenwich, and in 1681 his Doctrine of the Sphere was published by Sir Jonas Moore in his System of the Mathematics. Notwithstanding his extraordinary merit, he never rose higher in the church than to the living of Burford in Surrey, although he was deservedly esteemed by the greatest men in the nation. He corresponded with the great Newton, Dr Halley, Mr W. Molyneux, Dr Wallis, and many others; and M. Cassini and he imparted their discoveries to each other with the utmost confidence and cordiality. But none of his works contributed so much to render his fame immortal as his "Historia Caesarea Britannica," in three volumes folio. Mr Flamsteed was suddenly carried off by a strangury on the 31st of December 1719; and notwithstanding the extreme delicacy of his constitution and incessant labours, he reached the 73rd year of his age.