NAPIER, John.

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The Construction of the Wonderful Canon of Logarithms. Translated from Latin into English with notes and a catalogue of the various editions of Napier's works, by William Rae MacDonald. First edition in English of the Constructio, the work that explained logarithms, and so "the most important of all Napier's works" (p. xvii). John Napier (1550-1617) first announced his discovery of logarithms in the Descriptio of 1614, but his death prevented him from publishing the Constructio to explain exactly how he had calculated them. This was left to his son Robert, who brought out the work in 1619.The translator, William Rae Macdonald (1843-1923), notes that the Constructio was nonetheless "so rare as to be very little known" (p. xvii).

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