March 17, 1881J 



NA TURh 



455 



boyish earnestness to explain." Campbell relates that 

 he was anxious to get from him as many particulars as 

 he could, respecting his interview with Buonaparte, when 

 First Consul, who, it had been reported, had astonished 

 him by his astronomical knowledge. This interview must 

 have taken place in 1802, his sister's Memoir recording 

 that he left Slough on July 13 in that year to go to Paris, 

 returning on August 25 with his son (who had accom- 

 panied him) dangerously ill. The result of Campbell's 

 inquiries was hardly confirmatory of the reports which 

 were prevalent. "The First Consul," he said, "did 

 surprise me by his quickness and versatility on all 

 subjects ; but in science he seemed to know little more 

 than any well-educated gentleman, and of astronomy 

 much less for instance than our own king. His general 

 air was something like afiTecting to know more than he 

 did know." There would seem to be no other record of 

 this interview ; Lalande, gossip that he was, has no 

 reference in his notes for 1802 to Herschel's visit to 

 Paris, though he, in common with other French astro- 

 nomers, as Cassini, Mechain, Legendre, had visited at 

 Slough, and might be supposed to be interested in 

 Herschel's return-visit to the French capital. In a letter 

 to Alison, written in December, 18 13, Campbell reverts 

 to the pleasure which the day spent with Herschel had 

 afforded him ; in this letter he repeats it was "not true, 

 as reported, that Buonaparte understood astronomical 

 subjects deeply, but affected more than he knew." 



The occurrences of the later years of Herschel's life are 

 very briefly noticed by Prof. Holdcn. All through the 

 years 1814-1822 his health was very feeble. The severe 

 winter of 1813-14 told materially upon him. In 1814 he 

 attempted to re-polish the mirror of the 40-feet telescope, 

 but was obliged to give up the work. He found it 

 necessary to make frequent excursions for change of 

 air and scene. In December, 1818, he went to London 

 to have his portrait painted by Artaud, and while there 

 his will was made. Particulars of the will appeared in 

 the Gentleinaii s Magazine for 1822, p. 650 ; the instru- 

 ments, telescopes, observations, &c., were given, on 

 account of his advanced age, to his son for the purpose 

 of continuing his studies. " It is not necessary to say 

 how nobly Sir John Herschel redeemed the trust con- 

 fided to him. All the world knows of his Survey of the 

 Southern Heavens, in which he completed the review of 

 the sky which had been begun and completed for the 

 northern hemisphere by the same instruments in his 

 father's hands." During the next three years the time he 

 was able to spend in work was devoted to putting his 

 papers in order, but he was daily becoming more and 

 more feeble. 



Herschel died on August 22, 1822, at the age of eighty- 

 four years. He was buried in the church of St. Lawrence 

 at Upton, near Slough, and a memorial tablet was placed 

 over his grave with an epitaph which some have ascribed 

 to the late Dr. Whewell, others to a Provost of Eton, 

 with three lines from which we may close the present 

 notice, reserving for a concluding article the consideration 

 of the scientific labours of William Herschel, which forms 

 the subject of Prof. Holden's last chapter. 

 " Novis art is adjumentis innixits 



Qua ipse excogilavil et perfecit 



Ccelortim pcrrufit claiistra." 



J. R. Hind 



A POLAR RECONNAISSANCE 

 A Polar Ri'comiaissance : being the Voyage of the 

 " Istijoni" to Novayn Zemlya in 1879. By Albert H. 

 Markham, F.R.G.S., Captain R.N. Maps and Illus- 

 trations. (London : Kegan Paul and Co., 1881.) 

 A " RECONNAISSANCE " in military parlance is, we 

 •'*- understand, a preliminary to a serious attack in full 

 force ; and in this sense Capt. Markham evidently uses it 

 in the work before us. Had we any doubt of this, on a 

 perusal of Capt. Markham's story of his summer cruise, 

 the preface by Mr. C. R. Markham would set that doubt at 

 rest. But indeed the whole tone of the volume bears on 

 the resumption by Government of the search for the Pole, 

 and Mr. Markham's preface is essentially a catalogue of 

 the qualifications of the captain for the Command of an 

 Arctic expedition. Apart from the questionable taste of 

 this preface and the unpleasant feeling that the book as a 

 whole has been written with a purpose, most of those who 

 are competent to form an opinion will agree with us that 

 in this direction Capt. Markham's work is premature. 

 There is, we are glad to think, little chance of any 

 Government Polar Expedition being sent out for a long 

 time to come. No good could accrue to either science or 

 navigation from an expedition similar to our last expensive 

 failure, and even the additions to mere geography could 

 be of the most trivial importance. While we should be 

 glad enough to see the whole of the Polar area explored, 

 and to know whether the "apex of the world" is land or 

 water, we are content to wait until polar problems of 

 much greater scientific importance are solved. The 

 result of Sir George Nares's expedition has been to 

 compel the enthusiasts on behalf of the Smith Sound 

 Route to abandon it as hopeless, and seek for some other 

 gateway to the Pole. In this it may be found they have 

 been too hasty, for indeed our knowledge of the con- 

 ditions of the Polar area is of the scantiest. The expe- 

 dition sent out in the Jcannette by Mr. Gordon-Bennett 

 has been given up by many for lost ; though we are glad 

 to learn that the U.S. Government have resolved to send 

 out a search expedition. Within recent years the route 

 by Franz-Josef Land has become a favourite with many, 

 though why this should be so it is difficult to fathom, 

 seeing that we know scarcely anything about it. It was 

 discovered six years ago by the Payer- Weyprecht expe- 

 dition, and since then it has been twice visited— by the 

 Willem Barents in 1879, and by Mr. Leigh Smith in his 

 yacht last year. Mr. Smith, as we showed at the time of 

 his return, did some excellent work, having traced the 

 land to a considerable distance to the north-west. He 

 returns again next summer, and we trust he will be able 

 to add still farther to our knowledge not only of the land 

 itself, but of its physical and biological conditions, past 

 and present. One or two enthusiasts who hail the 

 discovery of a barren Arctic islet as if it were a new 

 world, have rushed to the conclusion that Franz-Josef 

 Land would form an excellent basis from which to storm 

 the Pole. But we consider it useless to discuss the 

 question. In a recent article we showed that in every 

 country but our own scientific geographers have come to 

 the conclusion that a mere search for the Pole is a wanton 

 waste of resources, and that the only effective method of 

 adding to our knowledge of the Polar area is by a series 

 of observations continued over several years carried on at 



