Part 5 (1/2)
”Ireat work co ee erected in an upstairs room”
The sale of these telescopes of HERSCHEL'S e sum, for he had made before 1795 more than two hundred seven-feet, one hundred and fifty ten-feet, and eighty twenty-feet mirrors For many of the telescopes sent abroad no stands were constructed Theof the stand sent with them by which the mirrors could be mounted
In 1785 the cost of a seven-foot telescope, six and four-tenths inches aperture, stand, eye-pieces, etc, couineas, and a twenty-foot about 2,500 to 3,000 guineas He had
In 1787 SCHROETER got the mirrors and eye-pieces only for a four-and-three-quarter-inch reflector for five guineas; those for his seven-foot telescope were twenty-three guineas Later a seven-foot telescope, couineas, and the twenty-five-foot reflector, made for the Madrid observatory, cost them 75,000 francs = 15,000[19] It was ordered in 1796, but not delivered for several years, the Spanish govern short of money For a ten and a seven foot telescope, the Prince of Canino paid 2,310
VON MAGELLAN writes to BODE concerning a visit to HERSCHEL:[20]
”I spent the night of the 6th of January at HERSCHEL'S, in Datchet, near Windsor, and had the good luck to hit on a fine evening He has his twenty-foot Newtonian telescope in the open air and arden very simply and conveniently It is moved by an assistant, who stands below itNear the instruulated to sidereal timeIn the room near it sits HERSCHEL'S sister, and she has FLAMSTEED'S Atlas open before her As he gives her the word, she writes down the declination and right ascension and the other circumstances of the observation In this way HERSCHEL exa the least part He co power of one hundred and fifty, and is sure that after four or five years he will have passed in review every object above our horizon He showed me the book in which his observations up to this tireat number of them Each sweep covers 2 15' in declination, and he lets each star pass at least three tih the field of his telescope, so that it is i can escape him He has already found about 900 double stars and almost as many nebulae I went to bed about one o'clock, and up to that tiht four or five new nebulae The therarden stood at 13 Fahrenheit; but, in spite of this, HERSCHEL observes the whole night through, except that he stops every three or four hours and goes in the room for a few moments For some years HERSCHEL has observed the heavens every hour when the weather is clear, and this always in the open air, because he says that the telescope only performs hen it is at the saainst the weather by putting onHe has an excellent constitution, and thinks about nothing else in the world but the celestial bodies He has promised me in the most cordial way, entirely in the service of astrono of his own interest, to see to the telescopes I have ordered for European observatories, and he will himself attend to the preparation of the mirrors”
It was at this tihter of Mr JAMES BALDWIN, a merchant of the city of London, and theof JOHN PITT, Esq She is described as a lady of singular aentleness of character She was entirely interested in his scientific pursuits, and the jointure which she brought removed all further anxiety about money affairs They had but one child, JOHN FREDERICK WILLIAM, born March 7, 1792[21]
The house at Datchet became more and more unfit for the needs of the family, and in June, 1785, a move was made to Clay Hall, in Old Windsor
The residence here was but short, and finally a last change was h on April, 3d, 1786
The ardor of the work during these years can be judged of by a single sentence froht at Clay Hall was spent in sweeping till daylight, and by the next evening the telescope stood ready for observation at Slough”
Froh; his life, truly speaking, was in his observatory
It is indeed true, as ARAGO has said in his eloquent tribute to him: ”On peut dire hardih, que c'est le lieu du monde ou il a ete fait le plus de decouvertes Le noe ne perira pas; les sciences le transieusement a nos derniers neveux”
HERSCHEL'S first contribution to the _Philosophical Transactions_ was printed in the volume for 1780, his last in that for 1818 Of these thirty-nine volumes, there are only two (1813 and 1817) which contain no paper from his hand, and many volumes contain ht ht that his was an austere and grave existence Music, which he loved to enthusiasht to hiliet of his life with his friends show him always cheerful, ardent, and devoted Even in his later years, he had not lost a ”boyish earnestness to explain;” his simplicity and the charm of his manner struck every one
”HERSCHEL, you know, and everybody knows, is one of theand well-bred natural characters of the present age,” says Dr BURNEY, who had opportunity to know
The portrait which is given in the frontispiece er, ardent face shows his inner life far better than any words can do
Even in his scientific writings, which everything conspired to render grave and sober, the almost poetic nature of his mind shows forth In one of his (unpublished) note-books, now in the Royal Society's library, I found this entry:
”640th Sweep--November 28, 1786--The nebula of _Orion_, which I saw by the front vieas so glaring and beautiful that I could not think of taking any place of its extent”
He was quite alone under the perfectly silent sky when this ritten, and he was at his post simply to make this and other such observations
But the sky was beautiful to hi below, has preserved for us the words as they dropped from his lips
On the 11th of January, 1787, HERSCHEL discovered two satellites to _Uranus_
After he had well assured himself of their existence, but before he communicated his discovery to the world, he made this crucial test He prepared a sketch of _Uranus_ attended by his two satellites, as it would appear on the night of February 10, 1787, and when the night cas, by showing in the situation I had delineated theian planet attended by two satellites_ I confess that this scene appeared to me with additional beauty, as the little secondary planets seenity to the primary one which raises it into a reat bodies of the solar system”