A Short History of Astronomy, Arthur Berry [large screen ebook reader .TXT] 📗

203. In 1718 Halley called attention to the fact that three well-known stars, Sirius, Procyon, and Arcturus, had changed their angular distances from the ecliptic since Greek times, and that Sirius had even changed its position perceptibly since the time of Tycho Brahe. Moreover comparison of the places of other stars shewed that the changes could not satisfactorily be attributed to any motion of the ecliptic, and although he was well aware that the possible errors of observation were such as to introduce a considerable uncertainty into the amounts involved, he felt sure that such errors could not wholly account for the discrepancies noticed, but that the stars in question must have really shifted their positions in relation to the rest; and he naturally inferred that it would be possible to detect similar proper motions (as they are now called) in other so-called “fixed” stars.

204. He also devoted a good deal of time to the standing astronomical problem of improving the tables of the moon and planets, particularly the former. He made observations of the moon as early as 1683, and by means of them effected some improvement in the tables. In 1676 he had already noted defects in the existing tables of Jupiter and Saturn, and ultimately satisfied himself of the existence of certain irregularities in the motion of these two planets, suspected long ago by Horrocks (chapter VIII., § 156); these irregularities he attributed correctly to the perturbations of the two planets by one another, though he was not mathematician enough to work out the theory; from observation, however, he was able to estimate the irregularities in question with fair accuracy and to improve the planetary tables by making allowance for them. But neither the lunar nor the planetary tables were ever completed in a form which Halley thought satisfactory. By 1719 they were printed, but kept back from publication, in hopes that subsequent improvements might be effected. After his appointment as Astronomer Royal in succession to Flamsteed (1720) he devoted special attention to getting fresh observations for this purpose, but he found the Observatory almost bare of instruments, those used by Flamsteed having been his private property, and having been removed as such by his heirs or creditors. Although Halley procured some instruments, and made with them a number of observations, chiefly of the moon, the age (63) at which he entered upon his office prevented him from initiating much, or from carrying out his duties with great energy, and the observations taken were in consequence only of secondary importance, while the tables for the improvement of which they were specially designed were only finally published in 1752, ten years after the death of their author. Although they thus appeared many years after the time at which they were virtually prepared and owed little to the progress of science during the interval, they at once became and for some time remained the standard tables for both the lunar and planetary motions (cf. § 226, and chapter XI., § 247).

205. Halley’s remarkable versatility in scientific work is further illustrated by the labour which he expended in editing the writings of the great Greek geometer Apollonius (chapter II., § 38) and the star catalogue of Ptolemy (chapter II., § 50). He was also one of the first of modern astronomers to pay careful attention to the effects to be observed during a total eclipse of the sun, and in the vivid description which he wrote of the eclipse of 1715, besides referring to the mysterious corona, which Kepler and others had noticed before (chapter VII., § 145), he called attention also to “a very narrow streak of a dusky but strong Red Light,” which was evidently a portion of that remarkable envelope of the sun which has been so extensively studied in modern times (chapter XIII., § 301) under the name of the chromosphere.

It is worth while to notice, as an illustration of Halley’s unselfish enthusiasm for science and of his power of looking to the future, that two of his most important pieces of work, by which certainly he is now best known, necessarily appeared during his lifetime as of little value, and only bore their fruit after his death (1742), for his comet only returned in 1759, when he had been dead 17 years, and the first of the pair of transits of Venus, from which he had shewn how to deduce the distance of the sun, took place two years later still (§ 227).

206. The third Astronomer Royal, James Bradley, is popularly known as the author of two memorable discoveries, viz. the aberration of light and the nutation of the earth’s axis. Remarkable as these are both in themselves and on account of the ingenious and subtle reasoning and minutely accurate observations by means of which they were made, they were in fact incidents in a long and active astronomical career, which resulted in the execution of a vast mass of work of great value.

The external events of Bradley’s life may be dealt with very briefly. Born in 1693, he proceeded in due course to Oxford (B.A. 1714, M.A. 1717), but acquired his first knowledge of astronomy and his marked taste for the subject from his uncle James Pound, for many years rector of Wansted in Essex, who was one of the best observers of the time. Bradley lived with his uncle for some years after leaving Oxford, and carried out a number of observations in concert with him. The first recorded observation of Bradley’s is dated 1715, and by 1718 he was sufficiently well thought of in the scientific world to receive the honour of election as a Fellow of the Royal Society. But, as his biographer115 remarks, “it could not be foreseen that his astronomical labours would lead to any establishment in life, and it became necessary for him to embrace a profession.” He accordingly took orders, and was fortunate enough to be presented almost at once to two livings, the duties attached to which do not seem to have interfered appreciably with the prosecution of his astronomical studies at Wansted.

In 1721 he was appointed Savilian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford, and resigned his livings. The work of the professorship appears to have been very light, and for more than ten years he continued to reside chiefly at Wansted, even after his uncle’s death in 1724. In 1732 he took a house in Oxford and set up there most of his instruments, leaving, however, at Wansted the most important of all, the “zenith-sector,” with which his two famous discoveries were made. Ten years afterwards Halley’s death rendered the post of Astronomer Royal vacant, and Bradley received the appointment.

The work of the Observatory had been a good deal neglected by Halley during the last few years of his life, and Bradley’s first care was to effect necessary repairs in the instruments. Although the equipment of the Observatory with instruments worthy of its position and of the state of science at the time was a work of years, Bradley had some of the most important instruments in good working order within a few months of his appointment, and observations were henceforward made systematically. Although the 20 remaining years of his life (1742-1762) were chiefly spent at Greenwich in the discharge of the duties of his office and in researches connected with them, he retained his professorship at Oxford, and continued to make observations at Wansted at least up till 1747.