SETH CARLO CHANDLER. 



479 



1864 to 1870. On October 20, 1870, he married Caroline Margaret 

 Herman of Boston, who with several daughters survives him. Dr. 

 Gould was now in the Argentine Republic, founding the national ob- 

 servatory at Cordoba. Chandler had declined Gould's invitation to 

 go with him, possibly having in view his impending marriage. Feeling 

 now the need of more lucrative employment than afforded by science, 

 he became life insurance actuary from 1870 to 1885. Here his mathe- 

 matical ability discovered various interesting laws. For example, he 

 derived an accurate formula showing the distribution by age of appli- 

 cants for life insurance. 



In 1881 he moved to Cambridge and took part in the work of the 

 Harvard Observatory. In 1886 he became a private investigator, or 

 as he called it an "amateur" astronomer. In 1904 he removed to 

 Wellesley Hills, Mass., where he lived until his death. To give any 

 adequate account of his scientific work is impossible in this sketch. 

 It is to be found in more than 200 papers published chiefly in the 

 Astronomische Nachrichten, the Astronomical Journal, and the 

 Annals of the Harvard College Observatory. 



His Almacantar, an equal-altitude instrument floating in mercury, 

 gave results of greatest precision, and furnished him with the first 

 intimations of changes in latitude. To the series of masterly papers 

 by Chandler on the variation of latitude, appearing in 1891-1894, 

 Professor H. H. Turner has rendered a magnificent tribute in his book 

 "Astronomical Discovery." No better bird's-eye view can be found 

 of this great discovery, so contrary to the accepted opinions of the 

 astronomical world at that time. Chandler's courage and sound 

 practicality are shown in these words, written in 1893. " It should be 

 said, first, that in beginning these investigations last year, I deliber- 

 ately put aside all teachings of theory, because it seemed to me high 

 time that the facts should be examined by a purely inductive process; 

 * * * and that the entangled condition of the whole subject required 

 that it should be examined afresh by processes unfettered by any pre- 

 conceived notions whatever. * * * I am not much dismayed by the 

 argument of conflict with d^^namic laws, since all that such a phrase 

 means, must refer merely to tha existent state of the theory at any 

 given time." 



Facts won against theory. With great industry he skillfully coordi- 

 nated thousands of observations and proved conclusively that the 



