A TREATISE ON THE HIGHER PLANE CURVES: INTENDED AS A SEQUEL ΤΟ A TREATISE ON CONIC SECTIONS. BY THE REV. GEORGE SALMON, M.A., FELLOW AND TUTOR, TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN. DUBLIN: HODGES AND SMITH, GRAFTON-STREET, BOOKSELLERS TO THE UNIVERSITY. MDCCCLII. PREFACE. THE present volume forms the completion of a Treatise on the Analytic Geometry of Space of Two Dimensions, of which the first Part (containing the theory of Conic Sections) was published about four years ago. It was my wish that the work should be elementary enough to serve as a book of instruction to students commencing without any previous knowledge of the science, and at the same time should contain a sufficiently complete account of what is known on the subject of Curves to be capable of serving as a book of reference to more advanced readers. Considered merely in the former light, I am aware that the book is too long, and that many who take it will be startled at the sight of so many pages devoted to curves of higher dimensions. Now, though I have inserted nothing but what I have thought might be acceptable to some of those readers who take peculiar interest in the subject of Geometry, I am far from desiring that students in general should spend, in the perusal of the entire of this Treatise, time which ought to be devoted to more important branches of Mathematics. But I am of opinion that ordinary students, without spending more time on Analytic Geometry than they commonly do at present, might distribute that time more profitably. When once a student has worked through up |