Alexander von Humboldt 
Cosmos a Sketch of a Physical Description of the Universe [PDF ebook] 

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Led to the discovery of these stars not by any reasonings of others, but by the result of my own investigations, and that they were observed by me in Germany, about the very same time or a little sooner than Galileo first saw them in Italy. To Galileo, among the Italians, is therefore due the merit of having first discovered these stars. But whether, among my own countrymen in Germany, any person before me has dis covered and seen them, I have not as yet been able to asoer tam.