Mr.:
En arrivant à Washington j'ai tout-de-suite songé à votre
observatoire, où vous avez acquis tant de droit à l'estime
de tout ceux qui achèvent la science. Je m'y rendrai donc
aujourd'hui à 7 heures du soir, et je compte vous y trouver,
surtout pour vous remercier de votre beau mémoire que j'ai
reçu peu avant mon départ de mon pays, et que je n'ai pas
pu, par conséquent, apprécier autant que je l'aurais voulu.
En me plaisant de l'espoir de vous connaître personnellement
je vous prie de me compter parmi vos affectionnés.
D. Pedro D'Alcantara.
7 Mai, 1876.
Like other notes which I subsequently received from him, it was in his own autograph throughout: if he brought any secretary with him on his travels I never heard of it.
The letter placed me in an embarrassing position, because its being addressed to me was in contravention of all official propriety. Of course I lost no time in calling on him and trying to explain the situation. I told him that Admiral Davis, whom he well knew from his being in command of the Brazilian station a few years before, was the head of the observatory, and hinted as plainly as I could that a notification of the coming of such a visitor as he should be sent to the head of the institution. But he refused to take the hint, and indicated that he expected me to arrange the whole matter for him. This I did by going to the observatory and frankly explaining the matter to Admiral Davis. Happily the latter was not a stickler for official forms, and was cast in too large a mould to take offense where none was intended. At his invitation I acted as one of the receiving party. The carriage drove up at the appointed hour, and its occupant was welcomed by the admiral at the door with courtly dignity. The visitor had no time to spend in preliminaries; he wished to look through the establishment immediately.
The first object to meet his view was a large marble-cased clock which, thirty years before, had acquired some celebrity from being supposed to embody the first attempt to apply electricity to the recording of astronomical observations. It was said to have cost a large sum, paid partly as a reward to its inventor. Its only drawbacks were that it would not keep time and had never, so far as I am aware, served any purpose but that of an ornament. The first surprise came when the visitor got down on his hands and knees in front of the clock, reached his hands under it, and proceeded to examine its supports. We all wondered what it could mean. When he arose, it was explained. He did not see how a clock supported in this way could keep the exact time necessary in the work of an astronomer. So we had to tell him that the clock was not used for this purpose, and that he must wait until we visited the observing rooms to see our clocks properly supported.
The only evidence of the imperial will came out when he reached the great telescope. The moon, near first quarter, was then shining, but the night was more than half cloudy, and there was no hope of obtaining more than a chance glimpse at it through the clouds. But he wished to see the moon through the telescope. I replied that the sky was now covered, and it was very doubtful whether we should get a view of the moon. But he required that the telescope should be at once pointed at it. This was done, and at that moment a clear space appeared between the clouds. I remarked upon the fact, but he seemed to take it as a matter of course that the cloud would get out of the way when he wanted to look.
I made some remark about the "vernier" of one of the circles on the telescope.
"Why do you call it a vernier?" said he. "Its proper term is a nonius, because Nonius was its inventor and Vernier took the idea from him."
In this the national spirit showed itself. Nonius, a Portuguese, had invented something on a similar principle and yet essentially different from the modern vernier, invented by a Frenchman of that name.
Accompanying the party was a little girl, ten or twelve years old, who, though an interested spectator, modestly kept in the background and said nothing. On her arrival home, however, she broke her silence by running upstairs with the exclamation,—
"Oh, Mamma, he's the funniest emperor you ever did see!"