Page:Evolution of the thermometer.djvu/87

 Seven years later Strömer, a colleague of Celsius, also inverted the scale and his thermometer was used in meteorological observations at Upsala from 1750.

The centesimal division of the scale between the freezing-point and the boiling-point has been claimed for Linnaeus, the eminent Swedish botanist. In 1844, Arago made a communication to the French Academy of Sciences, quoting a private letter of Linnaeus, who wrote that he was the first to construct a thermometer with the centesimal division of the scale between the freezing-point and the boiling-point of water, for use in a green-house. Unfortunately the date of Linnaeus' letter is not given. (Compte rendu, 18, 1063.)

I have now completed the task undertaken, viz., to sketch impartially the history of the evolution of the thermometer from its first beginnings in Italy, through its crude early forms down to the three standards now commonly used in all civilized lands. It is interesting to note: First, that no nation makes popular use of the thermometer designed by its own citizen. The instrument constructed by the German Fahrenheit in the Netherlands is used almost exclusively in English-speaking lands;