Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/827

Rh  detained in another place, she mentions with regret having to depart without the formal consent of her eldest brother.

It was her deep power of sympathy with those she loved that weighed down the natural gladness of childhood. One can scarcely read without tears in one's eyes, of the little act by which she won a smile from her mother at a moment when she was overwhelmed with the parting from her husband and sons, who had just left to join the army; the little Caroline seeing a neckerchief that her father had worn hang over a chair, took it, and putting one end in her mother's hand, took the other herself, and sat down at her feet. But the deep well spring of love and self-devotion which lay in the heart of Caroline Herschel never went forth from its inmost depths, except towards her brother William. Her whole life and being were given to him, and throughout the record she gives of the period whilst they were together, he seems to have been entirely worthy of her love. The incidental light thrown upon his character by his sister's memoirs, reveals a nature so noble, that his grandest discoveries and great achievements in science, seem only the natural growth and outcome of the nobler inner life from which they sprung.

The change from the life at Hanover to the life at Bath was like the transformation scene in a pantomime. The little maid-of-all-work, who had been allowed no education by her mother, lest it should unfit her for household duties, who had been permitted to receive a lesson in music from her father only "when her mother was in a good humour or out of the way," was taken to Bath and told she was to prepare herself for taking part in public concerts and oratorios! She had lessons in music and singing twice a day, and was put under "Miss Flemming, the famous dancing-mistress," to be drilled to move like a lady; she had ten guineas presented by her brother to buy a suitable dress; Mr. Palmer, the manager of the theatre, told her she was an ornament to the stage: the Marchioness of Lothian and other great ladies complimented her on pronouncing her words like an Englishwoman!

In a wonderfully short time she was able to take the leading parts in oratorios and concerts, and even received the offer of an engagement at the Birmingham Festival. But she refused to appear anywhere, unless her brother William was the conductor. She had no wish to be anything for herself. All her life she had been in an atmosphere of music; her father was a bandmaster, and a fine musician; her brother William was an eminent composer and musician, who if he had not become an astronomer would have been remembered as a musician; her brother Alexander, who had come to England with William, and who lived with him, was also an excellent musician. But Caroline Herschel had never before received any regular instruction: it was the spirit of willing obedience, and the well-trained habit of doing exactly as she was told, that enabled her to perform what seem almost like miracles.

Her life at Bath seems to have been very happy, in spite of house-keeping difficulties and the perplexing difference betwixt housekeeping in Hanover and housekeeping in England, the extravagance of which distressed her sense of thrift; but there was more money to go upon, for her brother William was making a handsome income by his concerts and compositions, as well as by teaching.

Another transformation was, however, in store. The love of music in William Herschel was only second to his love of science. He had already begun to invent wonderful instruments for observing and measuring the distances of stars, etc.; more and more time was gradually taken from music to be devoted to astronomy. Caroline was quietly expected to assist him. She had to learn, as well as she could, the mysteries of logarithms, calculations how to compute distances and how to reduce sidereal time into mean time, and other things still more abstruse, which, to one unlearned, sound more like making incantations than anything else. Caroline Herschel learned to do all this, and more. In a letter, written long years after, she says, "My dear brother William was my only teacher, and we began generally with what we should have ended, he supposing I knew all that went before: and perhaps I might have done so once, but my memory he used to compare with sand, in which everything could be inscribed, but as easily effaced." It was only at odd times, and at meals, that she was able to obtain even this fragmentary instruction. She owns to never having been able to say the multiplication-table, but carrying a copy in her pocket for reference. Her industry and truly German perseverance carried her through these seemingly impossible tasks. The second brother, Alexander Herschel, a man of rare gifts, both as a musician and mechanician, was a very efficient assistant to his brother, but he was not endowed with patience, and could 