WOMEN IN ASTRONOMY. 537 



she organized the Meteorologico-ozonometric Station of the Capitol, 

 and edited its monthly bulletin ; she was one of the most active col- 

 laborators in the " Scientific Correspondence " of Rome ; and, like Caro- 

 line Herschel, Madame Riimker, and Miss Mitchell, she discovered a 

 comet on the night of the 1st of April, 1854. At a time when the 

 subject of shooting-stars was under lively discussion she prepared the 

 first catalogue of the meteors observed in Italy, and was the sole ob- 

 server at Rome of the great shower of 1866. She also left valuable 

 studies on the probable influence of the moon on earthquakes — a work 

 which brought her distinctions from the Society of Naturalists of Mos- 

 cow, the Geological Institute of Vienna, and other scientific bodies. 

 Many learned societies made her an honorary member, and the Italian 

 Government, in 1872, decreed to her a gold medal for her statistical 

 labors. With all this she was a good mother and a true woman. 



We mention a few more names : Madame Hortense Lepante, wife 

 of the horologist of the same name, who calculated a comet with La- 

 lande ; Miss Ashley, of our own time, who has so intelligently studied 

 the surface of the moon, and whose numerous labors are registered in 

 the " Selenographical Journal " ; and Miss Pogson, who is directing an 

 observatory at Madras. Several young women are employed as calcu- 

 lators at the Observatory of Harvard College, in Cambridge, Massa- 

 chusetts. 



I can not close my article without giving grateful testimony to 

 those women who, without having contributed directly to the advance- 

 ment of astronomy, have sustained their husbands or brothers during 

 their work with incessant devotion. This is a beautiful part reserved 

 for the astronomer's wife or sister, and many women have known how 

 to fulfill it with honor. 



We recall with an emotion of gratitude the name of Mrs. Asaph 

 Hall, whose persevering energy supported her husband when, despair- 

 ing of success, he was on the point of abandoning the search for the 

 satellites of Mars. With her encouragement, after long and painful 

 watches, Mr. Hall returned once again to his investigations in a final 

 effort, which was crowned with a most brilliant success. I must also, 

 with all the friends of science, give a tribute of homage to Madame 

 Janssen, who has exiled herself several times to the ends of the earth, 

 and accepted the privations of the hardest kind of life, to follow her 

 husband in his numerous astronomical voyages. 



Honor, then, to all these ladies and fellow-workers, who are plead- 

 ing or have pleaded more emphatically than the strongest speeches of 

 philanthropists in favor of the claims of their sex. They have proved 

 that when one will one can ; and that proverb is perhaps the best con- 

 clusion that can be drawn from our story. — Translated for the Popular 

 Science Monthly from Ciel et Terre. 



