asure its
distance from the earth, with the result that it was proved to belong to
the region of the fixed stars, at an immeasurable distance, and was not
some nearer and more trivial phenomenon.

He was asked by the University of Copenhagen to give a course of
lectures on astronomy; but this was a step he felt some aristocratic
aversion to, until a little friendly pressure was brought to bear upon
him by a request from the king, and delivered they were.

He now seems to have finally thrown off his aristocratic prejudices, and
to have indulged himself in treading on the corns of nearly all the high
and mighty people he came into contact with. In short, he became what we
might now call a violent Radical; but he was a good-hearted man,
nevertheless, and many are the tales told of his visits to sick
peasants, of his consulting the stars as to their fate--all in perfect
good faith--and of the medicines which he concocted and prescribed for
them.

The daughter of one of these peasants he married, and very happy the
marriage seems to have been.

[Illustration: FIG. 19.--Map of Denmark, showing the island of Huen.

_Walker & Boutallse._]

Now comes the crowning episode in Tycho's life. Frederick II., realizing
how eminent a man they had among them, and how much he could do if only
he had the means--for we must understand that Tycho, though of good
family and well off, was by no means what we would call a wealthy
man--Frederick II. made him a splendid and enlightened offer. The offer
was this: that if Tycho would agree to settle down and make his
astronomical observations in Denmark, he should have an estate in Norway
settled upon him, a pension of L400 a year for life, a site for a large
observatory, and L20,000 to build it with.

[Illustration: FIG. 20.--Uraniburg.]

[Illustration: FIG. 21.--Astrolabe. An old instrument with sights for
marking the positions of the celestial bodies roughly. A sort of
skeleton celestial globe.]

[Illustration:

SEXTANS ASTRONOMICVS
TRIGONICVS PRO DISTANTIIS
rimandis.

FIG. 22.--Tycho's large sextant; for measuring the angular distance
between two bodies by direct sighting.]

Well, if ever money was well spent, this was. By its means Denmark
before long headed the nations of Europe in the matter of science--a
thing it has not done before or since. The site granted was the island
of Huen, between Copenhagen and Elsinore; and here the most magnificent
observatory ever built