Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 19.djvu/254

 original was bequeathed by Mrs. Flamsteed to the Royal Society. A replica is preserved in the Bodleian Library. The features are strongly marked, and bear little trace of age or infirmity; the expression is intelligent and sensitive. Flamsteed was described by an old writer as a ‘humorist and of warm passions.’ That he occasionally relished a joke is shown in an anecdote related by him to his friend, Dr. Whiston, concerning the unexpected success with which he once assumed the character of a prophet (, Athenæ Cantabr.; Add. MS. 5869, f. 77; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. iii. 285). Peter the Great visited the Royal Observatory, and saw Flamsteed observe several times in February 1698.

Flamsteed's communications to the Royal Society extended from 1670 to 1686 (Phil. Trans. iv–xvi.), and his observations during 1713, ‘abridged and spoiled,’ as he affirmed, were sent to the same collection by Newton (ib. xxix. 285). ‘A Correct Table of the Sun's Declination,’ compiled by him, was inserted in Jones's ‘ Compendium of the Art of Navigation’ (p. 103, 1702), and ‘A Letter concerning Earthquakes,’ in which he had attempted in 1693 to generalise the attendant circumstances of those phenomena, was published at London in 1750.



FLANAGAN, RODERICK (1828–1861), journalist, son of an Irish farmer, was born near Elphin, co. Roscommon, in April 1828. His parents, with a numerous family, emigrated to New South Wales in 1840, and settled in Sydney, where Flanagan received his education. At the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to a printer, and on the completion of his indentures became attached to the ‘People's Advocate.’ After contributing to the ‘Advocate,’ the ‘Empire,’ the ‘Freeman's Journal,’ and other newspapers for several years, he founded, in conjunction with his brother, E. F. Flanagan, a weekly journal called ‘The Chronicle.’ It had only a brief existence, and upon its cessation