[13] Arago has implied that if Herschel had directed his telescope to Uranus only eleven days earlier than he did, this discovery would have escaped him, since at that time (March 2, 1781) the planet was at its station, and had no motion relative to the star. This is an entire misconception, since the new planet was detected by its physical appearance, and not by its motion. Does any one suppose that "a new and singular star" like this would have been once viewed and then forgotten?
[14] Four of Jupiter, one of the earth, and one of Saturn.
[15] John Michell had been a member of the Royal Society since 1760: he died in 1793. He was a philosophical thinker, as is shown by his memoirs on the distances of the stars, and by his invention of the method for determining the earth's density. It is not certain that he was personally known to Herschel, although his writings were familiar to the latter.
Alexander Wilson was Professor of Astronomy at Glasgow, and is chiefly known to us by his theory of the nature of the solar spots, which was adopted and enlarged by Herschel. He died in 1786; but the families of Wilson and Herschel remained close friends.
[16] Berliner Jahrbuch, 1784, p. 211. In the Connaissance des Tems for 1784 he is called "Horochelle."
[17] At the presentation Sir Joseph Banks, the President of the Royal Society, said: "In the name of the Royal Society I present to you this gold medal, the reward which they have assigned to your successful labors, and I exhort you to continue diligently to cultivate those fields of science which have produced to you a harvest of so much honor. Your attention to the improvement of telescopes has already amply repaid the labor which you have bestowed upon them; but the treasures of the heavens are well known to be inexhaustible. Who can say but your new star, which exceeds Saturn in its distance from the sun, may exceed him as much in magnificence of attendance? Who knows what new rings, new satellites, or what other nameless and numberless phenomena remain behind, waiting to reward future industry and improvement?"
LIFE AT DATCHET, CLAY HALL, AND SLOUGH; 1782-1822.
The new house at Datchet, which was occupied from 1782 till 1785, was a source of despair to Carolina Herschel, who looked upon its desolate and isolated condition with a housekeeper's eyes. This was nothing to her brother, who gayly consented to live upon "eggs and bacon," now that he was free at last to mind the heavens. The ruinous state of the place had no terrors in his eyes, for was there not a laundry which would serve as a library, a large stable which was just the place for the grinding of mirrors, and a grass-plat for the small twenty-foot reflector?