SKETCH OF JEAN-CHARLES HOUZEAU. 551 



and Houzeau's friends had no hesitation in asserting that he was 

 the only Belgian who could supply the requisite faculties. But 

 there was much against him. He had been long away, and was 

 politically discredited and unorthodox. Even when his nomina- 

 tion had been put into the hands of the king for the royal signa- 

 ture, the ministers interposed objections. " He is a freethinker," 

 they said. " That is a matter for his conscience," the king replied. 

 " But he is a republican, too," they added. " That is my business," 

 said Leopold, and wrote his name confirming the appointment. 

 Even Rogier, who was responsible for Houzeau's dismissal in 

 1849, told the king that, if he were now minister, he would 

 appoint him. " I owe him a reparation," he said. 



Houzeau took charge of the observatory on the 17th of June, 

 1876. His views as to the renovation of the institution were 

 approved. New instruments were obtained; the meteorological 

 department was fitted up ; a spectroscopic department was insti- 

 tuted ; a daily meteorological bulletin was started, which he at- 

 tended to personally for the first six months; popular lectures 

 were instituted, the library was enlarged, new life was given to 

 the publications, a catalogue was made of the astronomical and 

 meteorological works in Belgian libraries ; Ciel et Terre, one of the 

 most valuable scientific periodicals of Europe, was begun, and vig- 

 orous activity was instituted in every department. During the six 

 years that he remained here he published The Study of Nature, its 

 Charms and its Dangers ; his General Uranometry ; an Elementary 

 Treatise on Meteorology (with M. Lancaster), and special papers. 

 In 1878, as Vice-President of the Geographical Society, he re- 

 ceived Mr. Stanley on his return from his Congo expedition. 



Houzeau revisited Jamaica, spending five months there, in 

 1878. In 1880 he was delegated as the Belgian representative in 

 the Meteorological Congress at Rome, and visited Italy for the 

 first time. In 1882 he led one of the two Belgian expeditions to 

 America one to Texas and the other to Chili to observe the 

 transit of Venus. Visiting San Antonio again, he gave lectures 

 there on scientific subjects, and particularly on the transit. He 

 had found the climate of Belgium too severe for his enfeebled 

 constitution, and determined not to return there. He came back 

 to France, and settled down for a year at Orthez, near Pau ; then, 

 wishing to be nearer to Brussels and to libraries while preparing 

 his Astronomical Bibliography, removed to Blois. In November, 

 1883, he resigned his position in the observatory. His father 

 dying in August, 1885, he resolved to return to his native land to 

 take care of his mother, to whom he was always a dutiful son. 

 The demands of his Astronomical Bibliography obliged him to 

 go to Brussels, where his labors on that important work were 

 varied by occupation with his Annuaire populaire, lectures for 



