DEATH OF RICHARD SHEEPSHANKS. 191 



we had seen him but seldom, for he came to London only 1855. 

 for the Royal Astronomical Society's meetings after the 

 work on the Standard Scale was completed. This work 

 had been very severe, and probably reduced his strength, 

 which was never great. His death was a blow to many 

 friends, to none more than to my husband, who went to 

 Reading to the funeral a painful duty, made less pain- 

 ful by his habitual manner of looking at death. He 

 wrote afterwards to me (for I was with the children at 

 Eastbourne), 



I returned this evening. I saw the body of my good old 

 friend safely into a bricked vault, specially made for him and 

 his sister, in the cemetery a mile out of the town. There 

 were Airy, Johnson, Simms, myself, and some others. I saw 

 Miss Sheepshanks for a few moments. . . . S. has, of course, 

 made her his sole heiress and executrix. She Intends to give 

 all his books and instruments where they may be most useful 

 perhaps to the Astronomical Society. The house is a very 

 nice one, with a garden so full of rich coloured flowers as to 

 make me almost admire it, with greenhouses, which I did not go 

 into, and a little observatory. 



Miss Ann Sheepshanks, who had lived with her 

 brother since the time he left Cambridge, lost with him 

 her great interest in life. She devoted all the energy of 

 a vigorous and self-sacrificing nature to the perpetuation 

 of- his name and memory, and the honour due to his 

 unostentatious but most useful efforts to promote Astro- 

 nomical knowledge. There was much self-denial as well 

 as exertion in her efforts to attain her end. She gave 

 10,000. to the University of Cambridge for an Astro- 

 nomical scholarship, to be called by his name. She pre- 

 sented his instruments and books to the Astronomical 

 Society, being in return elected to an honorary fellowship, 

 and she collected materials for a memoir, which was 

 drawn up by Mr. De Morgan. 



At this time the phenomena to which I have before 

 slightly referred began to attract general notice, chiefly 

 under the form of table-turning ; and natural philosophers, 



