Prediction of 1816; the end of the world announced for July 18–Article in the Journal des Débuts–The comet of 1832; its rencontre with the orbit of the earth– Notice by Arago in the Annuaire du Bureau des Longitudes–Probability of a rencontre between a comet and the earth–The end of the world in 1857 and the comet of Charles V

The terrors of the year 1773 create a smile at the present day; but similar fears, it ought not to be forgotten, have been renewed from time to time in our own century; as, for example, in 1816, 1832, and 1857

In 1816 a report was current of the approaching end of the world; July 18 was the date fixed for the fatal event. Some days after there appeared in the Journal dés Debate a satirical article by Hoffmann, in which that critic ridiculed in the following manner the hypothesis of the earth coming into collision with a comet:–

‘A great mathematician (Laplace), to whom we owe the complete exposition of the system of the world, and whose work is law, has been kind enough to reassure us a little concerning the uncivil comets of Lalande ; but that he is far from having banished all cause of alarm we may judge from the following passage, which I will literally transcribe : “ The small probability of such a rencontre may, by accumulating during a long series of years, become very great.”