62 MEMOIR OF AUGUSTUS DE MORGAN. 



1833. instrument was made serviceable in the opinion of the 

 arbitrator, and the whole claim was awarded, additions 

 included. Sir James did not let the instrument remain to 

 shame the arbitrator and the opponent witnesses; he 

 broke it up, sold the materials by auction, and placarded 

 the walls with a bill, headed " Observatory, Kensington ; " 

 and addressed to " shycock toy makers, smoke-jack 

 makers, mock coin makers, &c. &c.," and stating that 

 " several hundredweight of brass, &c., being the metal 

 of the great equatorial instrument made for the Ken- 

 sington Observatory by Messrs. Troughton and Simms, 

 were to be sold by hand on the premises ; the wooden 

 polar axis of which, by the same artists, with its botchings 

 cobbled up by their assistants, Mr. Airy and the Rev. R. 

 Sheepshanks, was purchased by divers vendors of old 

 clothes, and dealers in dead cows and horses, with the 

 exception of a fragment of mahogany specially reserved, 

 at the request of several distinguished philosophers, on 

 account of the great anxiety expressed by foreign astro- 

 nomers to possess them, was converted into snuff-boxes as 

 a souvenir piquant of the state of the art of Astronomical 

 instrument making in England during the nineteenth 



century, will be disposed of at per pound."' 



I do not mention these things with any wish to throw 

 blame on one who, as after events proved, was in a state 

 of mind which rendered eccentricity excusable. But at 

 that time this was not known, and, as so often happens, 

 that which would form an excuse for foolish conduct, and 

 ought to give others the right of restraining it, was not 

 suspected. The troubles arising from this cause among 

 men of science, and reaching public associations, were as 

 real as if they had been the result of wicked designs 

 rather than of morbid impulse. The Astronomer Royal, 

 who wished to visit Campden Hill for the inspection of 

 Groombridge's transit circle, begged that no reference 

 might be made during his visit to the trial then pending. 

 Sir James insultingly accused him of having changed his 



