March 1, 1889.] 



♦ KNO^A?^LEDGE ♦ 



111 



was expected to iindertake the iiistruction of two boys from 

 Christ's Hospital ia addition to his astronomical observations. 

 After seven years' work as assistant at Greenwich Sharp 

 left. The reason of hia going does not appear. Mr. Cud worth 

 suggests that it was on account of his health. Flamsteed 

 continued to correspond with his old assistant and friend 

 during the rest of his life. Mr. Gudworth gives a long series 

 of Flamsteed's letters with Sharp's answers; but we must 

 confess to some disappointment at not finding more new 

 matter. Baily and De Morgan seem already to have ex- 

 tracted the cream from the correspondence. On many of 

 the letters received by Sharp and in his note-books are 

 copious notes in shorthand, presumably the drafts of his 

 answers. Mr. Gudworth says : — 



The system in vogue in Sharp's time (and which was then com- 

 monly acquired in order, it is said, the more readily to record the 

 long-winded sermons of the period) is now obsolete . . . The 

 characters are beautifully formed, as might be expected from the 

 nicety of his caligraphy. In justice to Professor Baily's efforts, it 

 is propel- to state that we have been equally unsuccessful in 

 deciphering Mr. Sharp's shorthand notes, and in consequence the 

 purport of much that he wrote to his numerous correspondents is 

 ensnrouded in obscurity. 



What would that successful stockbroker and admirable 

 astronomer, Mr. Baily, have stid if he had heard himself 

 called " Professor Baily " 1 We believe that he was not 

 quite unsuccessful; at all events, his friend, Mr. Babbage, 

 claimed to have made out the shorthand alphabet which 



vidence pleaded my excuse, which has so troubled and perplexed me 

 that it is with much trouble and discomposure I now write. It has 

 pleased God to talce out of this world my nearest kinsman and only 

 nephew, a young man ever hopeful, in the flower of his age, who 

 had a few years ago been a student of physic at Leyden. A good 

 proficient for his time, just beginning to practise, of 'good parts and 

 solid judgments. The only son of a most disconsolate mother, him 

 on whom the hopes of a family depended which has continued here 

 in the same name over 500 years— now likely to be extinct. The 

 only parson here with whom 1 could have any agreeable converse. 



Abraham Sharp remiined a bachelor and continued to 

 live at Little Horton till his death at the age of ninety, in 

 174-3. lie occupied himself till the last in grinding len.ses 

 and in mathematical pursuits. His " Geometry Improved " 

 appeared under the signature, A. S. Philomath, in 1717. 

 Sharp calculated the "Quadrature of the Gircle" to In 

 places of decimals and proved the accuracy of his determina- 

 tion of TT by a second method to 72 places. Halley, in an 

 essay on the Quadrature of the Circle communicated to the 

 Royal Society, wrote : — 



The problem had tempted the ready pen of the most imcompar- 

 able Mr. Sharp, who h.ad contrived to double the famous numbers 

 of Van Caulen,* a degree of exactness far surpassing all belief. 



The minute details given with respect to Abraham 

 Sharp's private life are most interesting from an antiquarian 

 point of view. It would have been well if Mr. Gudworth 

 had induced some astronomical friend to look over his proof 

 sheets. He would then not have spoken of Sir John 





End op a Letter prom Fi,.\m8tef,d, with Speci-men of Abraham Sharp's Shorthand. 







»^\ fvs 



Sharp used, and to have deciphered at least one of the 

 letters. Some effort ought to be made to induce experts 

 to decipher these notes. For Sharp was in correspondence 

 with Halley as well as Flamsteed, and, if Mr. Gudworth 

 is right, with Nowton also. 



Abraham Sharp's eldest brother, the llov. Thom:\.s Sharp, 

 died in lO',):!, and Abraham shortly afterwards went to live 

 with his sister-in-law and nephew (the widow and son of 

 Thomas) at Little Horton, and he gave a great deal of his 

 time to managing the family property till the death of his 

 nephew in 1701. Ho was then tifty-one years of age, and 

 wrote to Flamsteed ; — 



My delay in returning answer to your two so exceedingly obliging 

 letters had been absolutely unpardonable had not a merciful "Pro- 



Hcrschel as the discoverer of Uranus (p. 177), or referred to 

 " tho late Mr. G. B. Airey " (p. 319), presumably referring 

 to Sir G. B. Airy, who is happily still alive. On p. 115 

 he refers to Mrs. Catherine Barton, Newton's half-niece, as 

 the widow of Colonel Barton, who was not her husband but 

 her brother. She was then Miss Barton and afterwards 

 Mrs. Conduit t. Young ladies out of the nursery and 

 schoolroom, and what would nowadays bo culled in Society, 

 were in Queen Anne's days spoken of, by courtesy, as Sirs, 

 or Mistress. On p. 76 Mr. Gudworth speaks of the '• Prin- 

 cipia " being published " through the persistence of Dr. 



* A Dutch mathematician, who calculated the value of ir to 

 35 places of decimals. 



