SOMERVILLE. 21 



friend and correspondent for many years, has testified 

 that Mrs. Somerville was renowned for her good 

 housekeeping, and "an excellent judge of a well- 

 dressed dejeuner and of choice old sherry." In a 

 paper read before the Social Science Congress on 

 the education of women, Miss Cobbe remarked : 

 " The woman whose home was the happiest I 

 saw; whose aged husband (as I have many 

 heard him) rose up and called her blessed abov^all, 

 whose children were amongst the most devoted\vis a: / rjl 

 the same woman who in her youth outstripped fifeaii y ^ 

 all the men of her time in the paths of science; andJJ J f/j 

 who in her beloved and honoured age still stii^ied^ 

 reverently the wonders of God's creation. .'%f lt 

 woman was Mary Somerville." 



The practice of cookery, however, did not put 

 algebra out of court, for Mary Fairfax was not the 

 sort of person to allow herself to be discouraged. She 

 said of herself, " I never lost sight of an object which 

 had interested me from the first" 



One day, when she was having her drawing lesson, 

 she heard Mr. Nasmyth talking to some ladies about 

 perspective. He said to them, "You should study 

 Euclid's Elements of Geometry : the foundation not 

 only of perspective, but also of astronomy and all 

 mechanical science." 



Here was the suggestion that was wanted. Advan- 

 tage could not, however, be immediately taken of it, 

 as " Euclid's Elements " was nowhere to be found, and 



