SKETCH OF PROFESSOR B. A. GOULD. 683 



SKETCH OF PROFESSOR B. A. GOULD. 

 By erving WINSLOW. 



BENJAMIN APTIIORP GOULD was born in Boston, Septem- 

 ber 27, 1824. He is tbe son of the late Benjamin Apthorp 

 Gould and Lucretia Dana Goddard. His childbood was marked by 

 many precocious indications of genius, which have been laid up in 

 the memory of a united and gifted family, in which his relations, 

 filial, fraternal, and paternal, have been singularly loyal, honorable, 

 and affectionate. When three years old he read easily and with 

 sufficient expression to make it pleasant for others to hear him. 

 At five he made a fair original version of an ode of Horace. As 

 a lad he was very fond of botany. Starting one day with his brother 

 in pursuit of a flower which grew at a great distance from home, 

 the brother returned to his mother after a long absence, asking what 

 was the matter with his companion. He said they had walked a 

 long time, and that then his brother had fallen and was lying on 

 the ground. He was sought in vain : and when he returned home 

 with his specimen it was found that the persevering boy had over- 

 taxed his strength, fainted from exhaustion, and after his recovery 

 had still followed and accomplished his pursuit. When he was ten 

 years old his family were summoned by written invitations to attend a 

 lecture upon electricity which young Gould had prepared, which 

 proved to be no mere childish play, but a well-considered discourse, 

 illustrated by a complete and neatly constructed electrical machine 

 entirely of his own manufacture. He prepared for college at the 

 Boston Latin School, taking high rank, receiving at one time five 

 prizes, among which was the Franklin, then the only gold medal 

 awarded in the school. He graduated from Harvard University at 

 the age of nineteen, and shortly after was appointed master of the 

 Roxbury Latin School an appointment made by the committee in 

 view of his scholarship, while in ignorance of the fact that he was 

 under twenty years of age, the regulations of the school forbidding 

 the appointment of any one who had not attained his majority. He 

 retained this position for a year, at the end of which time he resigned, 

 that he might pursue his studies in European universities. These 

 occupied about four years, during which he formed friendships with 

 the most eminent scientists of Europe, which lasted with many of 

 them, such as Argelander, Gauss, and Humboldt, until the close of 

 their lives. 



Dr. Gould's study of astronomy was pursued under the learned 

 Gauss and in the scientific courses at Paris, and in the observatory 

 there, then under the direction of Arago. On returning to America 

 he was employed to determine astronomically the various geodetic 



