Page:Memoir and correspondence of Caroline Herschel (1876).djvu/125

Rh to peep at the heavens, but have put me into good humour with myself.

With my respectful compliments to Mrs. and Miss Maskelyne,

The following is from a friend who took the deepest interest in the career of both brother and sister:—

April 30, 1799. 2em It is with much satisfaction that I received through the hands of Dr. Herschel, the valuable publication you are so kind as to send me, and which indeed is the more welcome as I have the volumes of the "Historia Cœlestis," and shall most probably have occasion to use them. Were Flamsteed alive, how cordially would he thank you for thus rendering the labours of his life so much more useful and acceptable to posterity, for he surely little thought that his great work required to be elucidated by an additional folio volume of explanations, errata, and indexes, the advantages of which, by their excellence and accuracy, must every day be more and more acknowledged, and future astronomers, as well as those of the present times will doubtless often be conscious of the merit and obligation you are entitled to.

Dr. and Mrs. Herschel, whom I have occasionally the