340 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Oct.. 



myself with considerable interest, especially to fortification, whera 

 from fifteen to eighteen years of age. But he was also deeply 

 interested in astronomy and natural philosophy, and these branches 

 became my favorites. The great comet of 1811, and access to- 

 some good instruments for observino; it, belongino; to Deerfield 

 Academy, gave me a decided bias for astronomy. From the 7th 

 of September, 1811, to the 17th of December, corresponding to 

 the appearance and disappearance of the comet, I was engaged in 

 making observations, not only on the comet's distances from stars,, 

 but on the latitute and longitude by lunar distances and eclipses 

 of the sun and moon, and on the variation of the magnetic needle. 

 I gave myself to this labor so assiduously that my health failed,, 

 and I well remember that when my physician was consulted he 

 said, ' I see what your difficulty is : you have got the comet's tail 

 in your stomach.' To reduce my numerous observations cost ma 

 several more months of study, so imperfect were the means of cal- 

 culation in my hands. Yet I have sometimes thought, when 

 looking over my record of these observations and the results, that 

 they might almost be worth publication, although much inferior 

 to similar works in the observatories of the present day. Indeed,. 

 General Hoyt, under whose direction I labored, and who often 

 aided me in observations, communicated some of them to the 

 American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and they were published 

 by that society. But I experienced great benefit from the work^ 

 in the mental discipline it required, and I acquired a strong love 

 for theoretical and practical astronomy. I became, in fact, such 

 an enthusiast in this respect, that I could cheerfully forego every 

 ordinary source of pleasure sought after by young men, in order 

 to gratify this scientific passion. 



" But I was destined to a sad disappointment in this, my first 

 scientific love. I had for a considerable time been engaged in the 

 study of Latin and Greek, in the hope of entering the University 

 at Cambridge in advanced standing, and using my eyes upon 

 Greek during an attack of the mumps, a sudden weakness of the 

 eyes came on which compelled me to suspend nearly all study and 

 to change the whole course of my life, abandoning a college course 

 as impracticable, and, for a time, nearly all hope of pursuing science 

 or literature as a profession. I have now struggled with this 

 affliction fifty years; and though for some time past, through the 

 kindness of Providence, it has been much mitigated, it has seemed to 

 be a very serious obstacle to my literary pursuits, and it certainly 



