76 SIXTEENTH CENTURY. PT. in. 



astonished that the astronomers had been able to foretell 

 exactly the moment when an eclipse of the sun took place 

 in 1560, that he determined to learn this wonderful science, 

 which could predict events. His father had intended him 

 to be a lawyer, but Tycho bought a globe and books with 

 his own money, and studied astronomy in secret ; till at 

 last his family consented to let him follow his own inclina- 

 tion, and from that time he gave himself up to that science, 

 planning and making the most beautiful instruments for 

 taking observations in the heavens. 



At this time the theory of Copernicus had made very 

 little impression, and Tycho Brahe rejected it altogether 

 and made a theory of his own called the Tychonic system, 

 which was, however, soon laid aside and forgotten. This, 

 however, mattered very little, for the useful work which 

 Tycho did was not to lay down new laws, but to collect an 

 immense number of accurate facts which were invaluable to 

 the astronomers who came after him. For twenty-five 

 years he lived in the little island of Huen, in the Baltic, 

 which the King, Frederick II. of Denmark, had given him, 

 making accurate observations of the different movements of 

 the planet, and determining the positions of the fixed stars, 

 of which he catalogued 777. He built there a magnificent 

 observatory, which he called Uranienborg, or the City of 

 the Heavens, and filled it with instruments of every kind, 

 which enabled him to keep a register of the different posi- 

 tions of the heavenly bodies night after night. 



When Frederick II. died, Tycho was persecuted and 

 driven into exile by some envious people who grudged him 

 the pension he was receiving. He then went to Bohemia, 

 under the protection of the Emperor Rudolph II., and here 

 he drew up the valuable astronomical tables called the 

 Rudolphiue tables, which, as we shall afterwards see, were 



