SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. IV. No. 103. 



pupil of the illustrious Encke, of the elder 

 Struve, of Peters and Hansen and Arge- 

 iander, and the life-long friend of these re- 

 vered founders of modern astronomy. His 

 correspondence with them after his return 

 to his native land testifies to the mutual 

 confidence that characterized these memora- 

 ble associations. Following these, in the 

 next generation, come Winnecke,Schonfeld, 

 Auwers and a host of others, which to us are 

 great names, but to Gould were fellow- pupils 

 and associates. Of the same epoch, on this 

 side the water, we have Bache, Peirce, 

 Walker, Hubbard, Coffin, Chauvenet and 

 Winlock. Then come the two existing gen- 

 erations of astronomers, bringing friendships 

 and acquaintances wide as the world it- 

 self, extending his relations to the youngest 

 workers in the science. With such univer- 

 sal and intimate connection with the per- 

 sonal forces operating to advance astronomy 

 in all lands, with his intense patriotism, 

 with his positive intellectual and moral 

 traits, he could not fail to exercise a power- 

 ful moulding influence upon the develop- 

 ment of American astronomy, in correcting 

 wrong tendencies and establishing right 

 standards. It was to this end, in prefer- 

 ence to the satisfaction of ambition through 

 what he could accomplish by his personal 

 contributions to the fund of knowledge, that 

 his most earnest efforts, from the beginning 

 of his career, were directed. In one of his 

 letters to von Humboldt, in 1850, after 

 speaking of the dependent condition at that 

 time of science here, its self-distrust and 

 intellectual timidity, he says : " This I knew 

 before returning home, but realize it now, 

 for the first time, to its full extent. There- 

 fore it is that I dedicate my whole efibrts, 

 not to the attainment of any reputation for 

 ■ myself, but to serving, to the utmost of my 

 ability, the science of my country, or rather, 

 as my friend Mr. Agassiz tells me to say, 

 science in my country." And to Encke he 

 says, speaking of the establishment of the 



Astronomical Journal, and his fond hopes 

 in its agency as a means of raising the as- 

 tronomy of America to its proper position : 

 '' Though the labor of supporting it will pre- 

 vent me from working as I otherwise should 

 for the advancement of my own reputation, 

 still the consciousness that I may render 

 now a still greater service to science recon- 

 ciles me to the abandonment of a good deal 

 of personal ambition." The same spirit 

 breathes throughout his correspondence 

 with Gauss, Schumacher and other leaders 

 abroad, to whom he was wont to confide 

 his projects and aspirations, and who 

 sympathized with and counseeld him in re- 

 turn. His letter books are rich with simi- 

 lar illustrations. They form, indeed, a 

 treasure house of information relating to 

 the inner history of the beginnings of as- 

 tronomy in the United States. How hum- 

 ble these beginnings were few realize. As- 

 tronomy here has made such wonderful 

 strides within a few decades past that it is 

 hard to believe that, with a few brilliant- 

 exceptions, its record about the year 1840 

 was practically blank. We had then no 

 standing among the scientific nations. The 

 soil for its growth was not indeed sterile, 

 but its cultivation had scarcely begun. If 

 the right seed had not been sown we should 

 have had occasion to deplore to-day the 

 same stunted crop which, even in some 

 countries of far older civilization than ours, 

 stands in place of the rich harvest that 

 might have been gathered under more 

 favoring influences. And this brings us to 

 another remarkable feature of Gould's 

 career. If we were asked to place the fin- 

 ger upon the one epoch marking the birth 

 or regeneration of American astronomy, we 

 should feel inclined to name the date, July, 

 1845, when Gould placed his foot upon the 

 steamer from Boston with the avowed and 

 definite purpose to devote himself to a life 

 of purely scientific research. Up to that 

 time the instance of a man doing this as 



