Page:History of the Royal Astronomical Society (1923).djvu/36

 22 HISTORY OF THE [1820-30 It thus appears that Dr. Pearson kept the plan in his head, where it lived through his transformation from a thriving London school- master into a country rector and magistrate, that he got together a number of astronomers to join him, and lubricated the business, to use Sam Johnson's phrase, by a dinner. I may be permitted so much reference to our age and country as will appear in a slight alteration of Moliere's text : " Le veritable fondateur Est le fondateur oh Ton dine. " Francis Baily (1819) gave in print a recommendation that such a Society should be formed. Sir J. Herschel, when he wrote his life of Baily, was not aware that Dr. Pearson had been agitating the plan for seven years. Dr. Pearson, who finally left London in 1821, could not have been, what Baily was from the very first, the guide and stay of the Society, an institution which many might have founded, but few could have nursed. If the word be plural both were founders; but so far as it can be used in the singular it applies only to Dr. Pearson. " It must be remembered that in 1820, Dr. Pearson stood in a position which the Society gradually altered by raising others to his level. He had that knowledge, which his work of 1824 so amply shows, coupled with great industry and zeal, and a remarkable collection of instruments. His standing in society was good, and his character high. To us Baily is what he made himself in making the Society : but in 1820, though Baily was well above the horizon, Pearson was on the meridian. " It is to be remembered that we are not to assume that we know of all Dr. Pearson's exertions in this matter. Action in 1812 and action in 1819, proved by record, may lead to more than sur- mise of something like continuous effort through all the intervening period. My floating recollections of what people said in 1830 tend to strengthen the conclusion that Dr. Pearson never lost sight of his favourite project." Dr. Pearson died in 1847 and the Council Report (M.N., 8, 69) contains a notice of his life over which much pains was clearly taken, but which ends apologetically for its meagreness. He was born in 1767 at Whitbeck, Cumberland, and resided for some time at Lincoln, where he constructed a portable clock which showed the age of the moon. De Morgan wrote to John Herschel in 1867 : " I have just found out that Dr. Pearson began life as a junior partner in Sketchley & Pearson, who kept a school at Fulham for boys from four to ten. Here he had been for some years in 1800. I picked up a sensibly written prospectus they said plan then