This, again, was a discovery of primary importance. It has been confirmed at other observatories and observations with the largest existing telescope have revealed still greater velocities of recession in nebulae too faint to observe at Flagstaff. How this has led to the belief that the material universe is steadily expanding and that its ascertainable past history covers only some two thousand millions of years, can only be mentioned here.
This is a most remarkable record for thirty years’ work of a single observatory with a regular staff never exceeding four astronomers. But its distinction lies less in the amount of the work than in its originality and its fertile character in provoking extensive and successful researches at other observatories as well.
All this is quite in the spirit of its Founder, and, to his colleagues in the science, makes the Observatory itself seem his true monument. His body lies at rest upon the hill, but, in an unquenched spirit of eager investigation, his soul goes marching on.
FOOTNOTES
[1]It is dated Boston, August 24th, but the year does not appear. She was abroad and he at home in the summers of 1882 and 1887.
[2]Before leaving Korea he spent two delightful weeks at the Footes’.
[3]This came about a month later than ours.
[4](Atlantic Monthly, Nov. 1886, “A Korean Coup d’Etat”).
[5]“The Life and Letters of Lafcadio Hearn by Elizabeth Bisland,” Vol. I, p. 459.
[6]Ib., Vol. II, p. 28.