The Reminiscences of an Astronomer

by Simon Newcomb

We touched six hours at St. Helena, enough to see the place, but scarcely enough to make a visit to the residence of Napoleon, even had we desired to see it. The little town is beautifully situated, and the rocks around are very imposing. My most vivid recollection is, however, of running down from the top of a rock some six hundred or eight hundred feet high, by a steep flight of steps, without stopping, or rather of the consequences of this imprudent gymnastic performance. I could scarcely move for the next three days.

Cape Town was then suffering from an epidemic of smallpox, mostly confined to the Malay population, but causing some disagreeable results to travelers. Our line of ships did not terminate their voyage at the Cape, but proceeded thence to other African ports east of the Cape. Here a rigid quarantine had been established, and it was necessary that the ships touching at the Cape of Good Hope should have had no communication with the shore. Thus it happened that we found, lying in the harbor, the ship of our line which had preceded us, waiting to get supplies from us, in order that it might proceed on its voyage. Looking at a row-boat after we had cast anchor, we were delighted to see two faces which I well knew: those of David Gill, astronomer of the Cape Observatory, and Dr. W. L. Elkin, now director of the Yale Observatory. The latter had gone to the Cape as a volunteer observer with Gill, their work being directed mostly to parallaxes of stars too far south to be well observed in our latitude. Our friends were not, however, even allowed to approach the ship, for fear of the smallpox, the idea appearing to be that the latter might be communicated by a sort of electric conduction, if the boat and the ship were allowed to come into contact, so we had to be put ashore without their aid.

We selected as our station the little town of Wellington, some forty miles northeast of Cape Town. The weather chances were excellent anywhere, but here they were even better than at the Cape. The most interesting feature of the place was what we might call an American young ladies' school. The Dutch inhabitants of South Africa are imbued with admiration of our institutions, and one of their dreams is said to be a United States of South Africa modeled after our own republic. Desiring to give their daughters the best education possible, they secured the services of Miss Ferguson, a well-known New England teacher, to found a school on the American model. We established our station in the grounds of this school.

The sky on the day of the transit was simply perfect. Notwithstanding the intensity of the sun's rays, the atmosphere was so steady that I have never seen the sun to better advantage. So all our observations were successful.

On our departure we left two iron pillars, on which our apparatus for photographing the sun was mounted, firmly imbedded in the ground, as we had used them. Whether they will remain there until the transit of 2004, I do not know, but cannot help entertaining a sentimental wish that, when the time of that transit arrives, the phenomenon will be observed from the same station, and the pillars be found in such a condition that they can again be used.

All the governments, except our own, which observed the two transits of Venus on a large scale long ago completed the work of reduction, and published the observations in full. On our own part we have published a preliminary discussion of some observations of the transit of 1874. Of that of 1882 nothing has, I believe, been published except some brief statements of results of the photographs, which appeared in an annual report of the Naval Observatory. Having need in my tables of the planets of the best value of the solar parallax that could be obtained by every method, I worked up all the observations of contacts made by the parties of every country, but, of course, did not publish our own observations. Up to the present time, twenty-eight years after the first of the transits, and twenty years after the second, our observations have never been officially published except to the extent I have stated. The importance of the matter may be judged by the fact that the government expended $375,000 on these observations, not counting the salaries of its officers engaged in the work, or the cost of sailing a naval ship. As I was a member of the commission charged with the work, and must therefore bear my full share of the responsibility for this failure, I think it proper to state briefly how it happened, hoping thereby to enforce the urgent need of a better organization of some of our scientific work.

The work of reducing such observations, editing and preparing them for the press, involved much computation to be done by assistants, and I, being secretary of the commission, was charged with the execution of this part of the work. The appropriations made by Congress for the observations were considered available for the reduction also. There was a small balance left over, and I estimated that $3000 more would suffice to complete the work. This was obtained from Congress in the winter of 1875.

About the end of 1876 I was surprised to receive from the Treasury Department a notification that the appropriation for the transit of Venus was almost exhausted, when according to my accounts, more than $3000 still remained. On inquiry it was found that the sum appropriated about two years before had never been placed to the credit of the transit of Venus commission, having been, in fact, inserted in a different appropriation bill from that which contained the former grant.

I, as secretary of the commission, made an application to the Treasury Department to have the sum, late though it was, placed to our credit. But the money had been expended and nothing could be now done in the matter. [3] The computers had therefore to be discharged and the work stopped until a new appropriation could be obtained from Congress.

During the session of 1876-77, $5000 was therefore asked for for the reduction of the observations. It was refused by the House committee on appropriations. I explained the matter to Mr. Julius H. Seelye, formerly president of Amherst College, who was serving a term in Congress. He took much interest in the subject, and moved the insertion of the item when the appropriation bill came up before the House. Mr. Atkins, chairman of the appropriations committee, opposed the motion, maintaining that the Navy Department had under its orders plenty of officers who could do the work, so there was no need of employing the help of computers. But the House took a different view, and inserted the item over the heads of the appropriations committee.