106 SIS WM. AND CAROLINE HERSCHEL. 



ardor of a lady of seventy-five in the cause of 

 abstract science/ 7 



For this the Royal Astronomical Society voted 

 her the gold medal, and gave her the unusual dis- 

 tinction of honorary membership. 



Sixteen years after her return to Hanover, Sir 

 John Herschel, her nephew, who had made his 

 wonderful review of the southern heavens, dis- 

 covering as many new nebulae as his father, took 

 his only boy, Willie, to see her. 



She was now eighty-eight. The visit was over- 

 whelming to her affectionate heart. She watched 

 the child with the most intense delight. Fearing 

 the results if she knew the time of their departure 

 for England, Sir John, with mistaken kindness, 

 went away at four o'clock in the morning, without 

 saying good-by. But the anguish of separation was 

 thereby rendered greater. 



The years went by slowly. On her ninety-sixth 

 birthday the King of Prussia sent her a gold 

 medal, Alexander von Humboldt writing her a let- 

 ter from Berlin to accompany it. 



January 14, 1848, at the age of almost ninety- 

 eight, Caroline Herschel died, and was buried from 

 the same garrison church where 'nearly a century 

 before she had been christened. In her coffin was 

 placed, by her desire, a lock of her brother's hair. 

 Beautiful affection! great co-workers in their im- 

 mortal study of unnumbered worlds ! 



