Spreading like Mercury thy rays?
Or chronicle the lapse of Time,
Wrapped in a Comet’s threatening blaze?”
That they are of the schoolboy order need surprise no one. Such a mere sip at the “Pierian spring” could scarcely bring inspiration.
Herschel’s grand survey of the heavens closed with his fourth review. His telescopic studies thereupon became specialised. The sun, the planets and their satellites, the lately discovered asteroids, certain double stars, and an occasional comet, in turn received attention. Laboratory experiments were also carried on, and discussions of profound importance were laid before the Royal Society. All this cost him but little effort. The high tension of his earlier life was somewhat relaxed; he allowed himself intervals of rest, and indulged in social and musical recreations. Concerts were now frequently given at his house; and the face of beaming delight with which he presided over them is still traditionally remembered. Visits to Sir William Watson at Dawlish gave him opportunities, otherwise rare, for talks on metaphysical subjects; and he stayed with James Watt at Heathfield in 1810. He had been a witness on his side in an action for infringement of patent in 1793.
Herschel rented a house on Sion Hill, Bath, for some months of the year 1799; and from time to time stayed with friends in London, or sought change of air at Tunbridge Wells, Brighton, or Ramsgate. In July, 1801, he went to Paris with his wife and son, made acquaintance with Laplace, and had an interview with the First Consul. It was currently reported that Bonaparte had astonished him by the extent of his astronomical learning; but the contrary was the truth. He had tried to be impressive, but failed. Herschel gave an account of what passed to the poet Campbell, whom he met at Brighton in 1813.
“The First Consul,” he said, “did surprise me by his quickness and versatility on all subjects; but in science he seemed to know little more than any well-educated gentleman; and of astronomy much less, for instance, than our own king. His general air was something like affecting to know more than he did know.” Herschel’s election in 1802 as one of the eight foreign Associates of the French Institute was probably connected with his Parisian experiences.
He inspired Campbell with the most lively enthusiasm. “His simplicity,” he wrote, “his kindness, his anecdotes, his readiness to explain—and make perfectly conspicuous too—his own sublime conceptions of the universe, are indescribably charming. He is seventy-six, but fresh and stout; and there he sat, nearest the door at his friend’s house, alternately smiling at a joke, or contentedly sitting without share or notice in the conversation. Any train of conversation he follows implicitly; anything you ask, he labours with a sort of boyish earnestness to explain. Speaking of himself, he said, with a modesty of manner which quite overcame me, when taken together with the greatness of the assertion, ‘I have looked further into space than ever human being did before me; I have observed stars, of which the light, it can be proved, must take two millions of years to reach this earth.’ I really and unfeignedly felt at the moment as if I had been conversing with a supernatural intelligence. ‘Nay, more,’ said he, ‘if those distant bodies had ceased to exist two millions of years ago we should still see them, as the light would travel after the body was gone.’ These were Herschel’s words; and if you had heard him speak them, you would not think he was apt to tell more than the truth.”
The appearance of a bright comet, in October, 1806, drew much company to Slough. On the 4th, Miss Herschel narrates, “Two parties from the Castle came to see it, and during the whole month my brother had not an evening to himself. As he was then in the midst of polishing the forty-foot mirror, rest became absolutely necessary after a day spent in that most laborious work; and it has ever been my opinion that on the 14th of October his nerves received a shock from which he never got the better afterwards; for on that day he had hardly dismissed his troop of men when visitors assembled, and from the time it was dark, till past midnight, he was on the grass-plot surrounded by between fifty and sixty persons, without having had time to put on proper clothing, or for the least nourishment to pass his lips. Among the company I remember were the Duke of Sussex, Prince Galitzin, Lord Darnley, a number of officers, Admiral Boston, and some ladies.”
A dangerous attack of illness in the spring of 1807 left Herschel’s strength permanently impaired. But he travelled to Scotland in the summer of 1810, and received the freedom of the City of Glasgow. Then, in 1814, he made a final, but fruitless attempt, to renovate the four-foot speculum. In the midst of the confusion attending upon the process, word was given to prepare for the reception of the Czar Alexander, the Duchess of Oldenburg, and sundry other grandees just then collected at Windsor for the Ascot races. The setting to rights was no small job; “but we might have saved ourselves the trouble,” his sister remarks drily, “for they were sufficiently harassed with public sights and festivities.”