al succeeding ones we gathered that the king would not
suffer my brother to return to his profession again, and by his
writing several times for a supply of money we could only suppose
that he himself was in uncertainty about the time of his return.

"In the last week of July my brother came home, and immediately
prepared for removing to Datchet, where he had taken a house with a
garden and grass-plat annexed, quite suitable for the purpose of an
observing-place. Sir WILLIAM WATSON spent nearly the whole time at
our house, and he was not the only friend who truly grieved at my
brother's going from Bath; or feared his having perhaps agreed to no
very advantageous offers; their fears were, in fact, not without
reason. . . . The prospect of entering again on the toils of teaching,
etc., which awaited my brother at home (the months of leisure being
now almost gone by), appeared to him an intolerable waste of time,
and by way of alternative he chose to be royal astronomer, with a
salary of L200 a year. Sir WILLIAM WATSON was the only one to whom
the sum was mentioned, and he exclaimed, 'Never bought monarch honor
so cheap!' To every other inquirer, my brother's answer was that the
king had provided for him."

On the 1st of August, 1782, the family removed to Datchet. The last
musical duty was performed on Whit-Sunday, 1782, in St. Margaret's
Chapel, Bath, when the anthem for the day was of HERSCHEL'S own
composition.

The end of the introductory epoch of his life is reached. Henceforth he
lived in his observatory, and from his forty-fourth year onwards he only
left it for short periods to go to London to submit his classic memoirs
to the Royal Society. Even for these occasions he chose periods of
moonlight, when no observations could be made.

He was a private man no longer. Henceforth he belongs to the whole
world.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] Probably on the model of one of SHORT'S Gregorian
telescopes, which were then the best instruments of the kind.

[11] For a description of the main points of HERSCHEL'S
processes of making reflectors, which will illustrate his strong
mechanical talents, see _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, eighth edition,
article _Telescope_.

[12] These have never been published, nor is it likely at this
day, when our measuring instruments are so greatly improved, that they
would be of any material value to science, although of interes