Famous Men of Science

by Sarah Knowles Bolton

SIR WILLIAM HERSCHEL.

The fourth son, William, born November 15, 1738, not only learned French and English rapidly, but studied Latin and arithmetic with the teacher, after hours. He became passionately fond of books, reading their own little store with avidity. The mother, who could not even write, viewed with alarm this intellectual development, feeling that her children, if they became learned, would go away from home—possibly from Germany. Poor, ignorant heart! She cooked and sewed, and prevented her daughters from learning French or drawing; but her weak hand could not stay the power of a mind like William's, bent on acquiring knowledge.

Caroline, the eighth child, born in 1750, twelve years younger than William, looked upon this brother as a marvel; and shy, plain, and silent herself, watched the boy with pride, who, perchance, would be somebody by and by. Alexander, a little older than Caroline, was skilled on the violoncello, and both the boys became members of the Hanover foot guards.

Years later, Caroline gave this picture of that early life: "My brothers were often introduced as solo performers and assistants in the orchestra of the court, and I remember that I was frequently prevented from going to sleep by the lively criticism on music, on coming from a concert; or by conversations on philosophical subjects, which lasted frequently till morning, in which my father was a lively partaker and assistant of my brother William, by contriving self-made instruments....

"Often I would keep myself awake that I might listen to their animating remarks, for it made me so happy to see them so happy. But generally their conversation would branch out on philosophical subjects, when my brother William and my father often argued with such warmth that my mother's interference became necessary; when the names Leibnitz, Newton, and Euler sounded rather too loud for the repose of her little ones, who ought to be in school by seven in the morning. But it seems that on the brothers retiring to their own room, where they shared the same bed, my brother William had still a great deal to say; and frequently it happened that when he stopped for an assent or reply, he found his hearer was gone to sleep, and I suppose it was not till then that he bethought himself to do the same.

"The recollection of these happy scenes confirms me in the belief, that had my brother William not then been interrupted in his philosophical pursuits, we should have had much earlier proofs of his inventive genius. My father was a great admirer of astronomy, and had some knowledge of that science; for I remember his taking me, on a clear frosty night, into the street, to make me acquainted with several of the most beautiful constellations, after we had been gazing at a comet which was then visible. And I well remember with what delight he used to assist my brother William in his various contrivances in the pursuit of his philosophical studies, among which was a neatly turned four-inch globe, upon which the equator and ecliptic were engraved by my brother."

When William was seventeen, the guards went to England for a year, and on their return home he brought one precious memento of the country, Locke "On the Human Understanding." Such a boy would not remain in the foot guards forever. He was delicate in health, so that his parents removed him from the army.

At nineteen, he determined to try his fortune in England. He said good-by to the culture-loving and warm-hearted father, to the poor mother who knew "no other wants than good linen and clothing," and started out to make his way in the world. For three years nothing is known of him, save that he passed through many hardships. He played in military bands whenever and wherever he could find a situation, or at concerts, and led probably a cramped and obscure life.

There was little prospect then that he would become, as Prof. Edward S. Holden says in his admirable life, "the greatest of practical astronomers, and one of the world's most profound philosophers." What the poor German youth thought and felt in those years of trial, we do not know. He had one resource in his loneliness, the reading of useful books.