t 11. On Sundays he attended
morning service at church, and in the evening read a few prayers very
carefully and impressively to his whole household. He was very
hospitable, and delighted to receive his friends in a simple and
natural way at his house. In this he was most admirably aided by his
wife, whose grace and skill made everything pleasant to their
guests. But he avoided dinner-parties as much as possible--they
interfered too much with his work--and with the exception of
scientific and official dinners he seldom dined away from home. His
tastes were entirely domestic, and he was very happy in his
family. With his natural love of work, and with the incessant calls
upon him, he would soon have broken down, had it not been for his
system of regular relaxation. Two or three times a year he took a
holiday: generally a short run of a week or ten days in the spring, a
trip of a month or thereabouts in the early autumn, and about three
weeks at Playford in the winter. These trips were always conducted in
the most active manner, either in constant motion from place to place,
or in daily active excursions. This system he maintained with great
regularity, and from the exceeding interest and enjoyment that he took
in these trips his mind was so much refreshed and steadied that he
always kept himself equal to his work.

Airy seems to have had a strong bent in the direction of astronomy
from his youth, and it is curious to note how well furnished he was,
by the time that he became Astronomer Royal, both with astronomy in
all its branches, and with the kindred sciences so necessary for the
practical working and improvement of it. At the time that he went to
Cambridge Physical Astronomy was greatly studied there and formed a
most important part of the University course. He eagerly availed
himself of this, and mastered the Physical Astronomy in the most
thorough manner, as was evidenced by his Papers collected in his
"Mathematical Tracts," his investigation of the Long Inequality of the
Earth and Venus, and many other works. As Plumian Professor he had
charge of the small Observatory at Cambridge, where he did a great
deal of the observing and reduction work himself, and became
thoroughly versed in the practical working of an Observatory. The
result of this was immediately seen in the improved methods which he
introduced at Greenwich, and which were speedily imitated at other
Observatories. Optics and the Undulatory Theory of Li