78 HERSCHEL AND HIS WORK 



While we are satisfied that there is no ground for 

 finding fault with Herschel's name for the new planet 

 he discovered, we are more satisfied that, by the mouth 

 of Bode, the jury, to whom he required to appeal, 

 disallowed the flattery, and called the planet Uranus, 

 not even Herschel, as Lalande proposed. The next 

 planet that was discovered, the first of the asteroids, 

 was named by its discoverer Ceres Ferdinandea 

 after a contemptible King of Naples, but Ceres has 

 long since swallowed Ferdinandea up. Even at the 

 time an amused cynicism, speaking in the Letters 

 of Horace Walpole, was saying, " Must not that host 

 of worlds be christened ? Mr. Herschel himself has 

 stood godfather for His Majesty to the new Sidus. 

 His Majesty has a numerous issue; but they and all 

 the princes and princesses in Europe cannot supply 

 appellations enough for twenty millions of new-born 

 stars." ! 



In the year 1782 Herschel not only continued to 

 prosecute the studies he had begun, but ventured into 

 new and almost untrodden fields of research. Two or 

 three months were cut out of the working time of that 

 year by a summons to Windsor to see the King and 

 hear what he might do for him. But his activity and 

 enjoyment in work made up for lost time. In 1780 he 

 contributed two papers, or twenty-five large pages, to 

 the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society ; 

 in 1781 he contributed two papers, or thirty-five pages ; 

 and in 1782, notwithstanding the loss of two months, 

 four papers, or nearly one hundred pages a good 

 year's scientific work for any man, more especially for 

 one who was giving thirty or even thirty-eight music 

 1 Letters, vi. 259. 



