the Royal Society, presented by Dr. Watson, was on LITTLE 

 the periodical star in Collo Ceti. JOURNEYS 



The members of the Society, always very jealous and 

 suspicious of outsiders, saw they had a thinker to deal 

 with jt ^ 



Some one carried the news to Bath a great astron- 

 omer was among them! About this time Horace Wai- 

 pole said, "Mr. Herschel will content me if instead of 

 a million worlds, he can discover me thirteen colonies 

 well inhabited by men and women, and can annex 

 them to the Crown of Great Britain in lieu of those it 

 has lost beyond the Atlantic." 



Bath society now took up astronomy as a fad, and 

 fashionable ladies named the planets backward and 

 forward from a blackboard list set up in the Pump 

 House by Fanny Burney, the clever one. Herschel 

 was invited to give popular lectures on the music, of 

 the spheres. 



Herschel's music parlors were besieged by good people 

 who wanted to make engagements with him to look 

 through his telescope. One good woman gave the 

 year, month, day, hour and minute of her birth and 

 wanted her fortune told. Poor Herschel declined, say- 

 ing he knew nothing of astronomy, but could give her 

 lessons in music if desired. 



In answer to the law of supply and demand, thus 

 proving the efficacy of prayer, an itinerant astronomer 

 came down from London and set up a five-foot tele- 

 scope on the Parade and solicited the curious ones at 

 tuppence a peep. 



145 



