Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy, George Biddell Airy [dark books to read TXT] 📗

them by heart on the chance of meeting with a stray question which he may answer.

The chief part of the Senior Optimes are in something of the same situation.

I think that the proposed addition of a day to the first part of the Examination, in which "easy questions in physical subjects" may be set, is, on this account, a great improvement.

Our new Scheme comes on for discussion on Friday next, March 20, at 2 p.m. in the Arts School. It is much opposed by private tutors, examiners and others, and may possibly be thrown out in the Senate this year, though I hope that with a little patience it may be carried, in an unmutilated form, eventually.

The enclosed Report on the Smith's Prize Examination will be discussed at the same time.

I will consider what is best to be done on the subject to which your note refers, without delay. With many thanks,

I am,
Very faithfully yours,
H.W. COOKSON,

_The Astronomer Royal._

* * * * *

In this year certain Members of the Senate of the University of Cambridge petitioned Parliament against the abolition of religious declarations required of persons admitted to Fellowships or proceeding to the degree of M.A. The document was sent to Airy for his signature, and his reply was as follows:

ROYAL OBSERVATORY, GREENWICH,
LONDON, S.E.
_1868, March 18_.

MY DEAR SIR,

Though I sympathize to a great extent with the prayer of the petition to Parliament which you sent to me yesterday, and assent to most of the reasons, I do not attach my signature to it, for the following considerations:

1. I understand, from the introductory clause, and from the unqualified character of the phrase "any such measures" in the second clause, that the petition objects to granting the M.A. degree without religious declaration. I do not see any adequate necessity for this objection, and I cannot join in it.

2. It appears to me that the Colleges were intended for two collateral objects:--instruction by part of the Fellows, on a religious basis; and support of certain Fellows for scientific purposes, without the same ostentatious connection with religion. I like this spirit well, and should be glad to maintain it.

3. I therefore think (as I have publicly stated before) that the Master of the College ought to be in holy orders; and so ought those of the Fellows who may be expected to be usually resident and to take continuous part in the instruction. But there are many who, upon taking a fellowship, at once lay aside all thoughts of this: and I think that such persons ought not to be trammelled with declarations.

4. My modification of existing regulations, if it once got into shape, would I dare say be but a small fraction of that proposed by the "measures in contemplation." Still I do not like to join in unqualified resistance to interference in the affairs of the Established Colleges, with that generality of opposition to interference which the petition seems to intimate.

I agree with articles 3, 4, and 5; and I am pleased with the graceful allusion in article 4 to the assistance which has been rendered by the Colleges, and by none perhaps so honourably as Trinity, to the parishes connected with it. And I could much wish that the spirit of 3 and 5 could be carried out, with some concession to my ideas in _my_ paragraph 3, above.

I am, my dear Sir,
Yours very truly,
G.B. AIRY.

_Rev. Dr Lightfoot._

* * * * *


1869

From the Report to the Board of Visitors it appears that application had been made for an extension of the grounds of the Observatory to a distance of 100 feet south of the Magnetic Ground, and that a Warrant for the annexation of this space was signed on 1868, Dec. 8. The new Depot for the Printed Productions of the Observatory had been transferred to its position in the new ground, and the foundations for the Great Shed were completed.--"The courses of our wires for the registration of spontaneous terrestrial galvanic currents have been entirely changed. The lines to Croydon and Deptford are abandoned; and for these are substituted, a line from Angerstein Wharf to Lady Well Station, and a line from North Kent Junction to Morden College Tunnel. At each of these points the communication with Earth is made by a copper plate 2 feet square. The straight line connecting the extreme points of the first station intersects that connecting the two points of the second station, nearly at right angles, and at little distance from the Observatory.--The question of dependence of the measurable amount of sidereal aberration upon the thickness of glass or other transparent material in the telescope (a question which involves, theoretically, one of the most delicate points in the Undulatory Theory of Light) has lately been agitated on the Continent with much earnestness. I have calculated the curvatures of the lenses of crown and flint glass (the flint being exterior) for correcting spherical and chromatic aberration in a telescope whose tube is filled with water, and have instructed Mr Simms to proceed with the preparation of an instrument carrying such a telescope. I have not finally decided whether to rely on Zenith-distances of gamma Draconis or on right-ascensions of Polaris. In any form the experiment will probably be troublesome.--The transit of Mercury on 1868, Nov. 4th, was observed by six observers. The atmospheric conditions were favourable; and the singular appearances usually presented in a planetary transit were well seen.--Mr Stone has attached to the South-East Equatoreal a thermo-multiplier, with the view of examining whether heat radiating from the principal stars can be made sensible in our instruments. The results hitherto obtained are encouraging, but they shew clearly that it is vain to attempt this enquiry except in the most superb weather; and there has not been a night deserving that epithet for some months past.--The preparations for observing the Transits of Venus were now begun in earnest. I had come to the conclusion, that after every reliance was placed on foreign and colonial observatories, it would be necessary for the British Government to undertake the equipment of five or six temporary stations. On Feb. 15th I sent a pamphlet on the subject to Mr Childers (First Lord of Admiralty), and in April I wrote to the Secretary, asking authority for the purchase of instruments. On June 22nd authority is given to me for the instruments: the Treasury assent to _L10,500_. On August 9th I had purchased 3 equatoreals.--I have given a short course of Lectures in the University of Cambridge on the subject of Magnetism, with the view of introducing that important physical science into the studies of the University. The want of books available to Students, and the novelty of the subject, made the preparation more laborious than the duration of the lectures would seem to imply."--In this year there was much work on the Standards Commission, chiefly regarding the suggested abolition of Troy Weight, and several Papers on the subject were prepared by Airy.--He also wrote a long and careful description of the Great Equatoreal at Greenwich.

Of private history: There was the usual visit to Playford in the winter. Mrs Airy was now becoming feebler, and did not now leave Greenwich: since April of this year her letters were written in pencil, and with difficulty, but she still made great efforts to keep up the accustomed correspondence.--In April Airy went to Cambridge to deliver his lectures on magnetism to the undergraduates: the following passage occurs in one of his letters at this time: "I have a mighty attendance (there were 147 names on my board yesterday), and, though the room is large with plenty of benches, I have been obliged to bring in some chairs. The men are exceedingly attentive, and when I look up I am quite struck to see the number of faces staring into mine. I go at 12, and find men at the room copying from my big papers: I lecture from 1 to 2, and stop till after 3, and through the last hour some men are talking to me and others are copying from the papers; and I usually leave some men still at work. The men applaud and shew their respect very gracefully. There are present some two or three persons who attended my former lectures, and they say that I lecture exactly as I did formerly. One of my attendants is a man that they say cannot, from years and infirmity and habit, be induced to go anywhere else: Dr Archdall, the Master of Emmanuel. I find that some of my old lecturing habits come again on me. I drink a great deal of cold water, and am very glad to go to bed early."--From June 10th-30th he was travelling in Scotland, and staying at Barrow House near Keswick (the residence of Mr Langton), with his son Hubert.--Subsequently, from Aug. 17th to 31st, he was again in the Lake District, with his daughter Christabel, and was joined there by his son Hubert on the 24th. The first part of the time was spent at Tarn Bank, near Carlisle, the residence of Mr Isaac Fletcher, M.P. From thence he made several expeditions, especially to Barrow in Furness and Seascale, where he witnessed with great interest the Bessemer process of making steel. From Barrow House he made continual excursions among the Cumberland mountains, which he knew so well.


1870

"In this year Mr Stone, the First Assistant, was appointed to the Cape of Good Hope Observatory, and resigned his post of First Assistant. Mr Christie was appointed in his place.--From the Report to the Visitors it appears that 'A few months since we were annoyed by a failure in the illumination of the