Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 50.djvu/861

Rh communicated a paper on the subject to the British Association of 1875, illustrating his remarks by diagrams of the sun and the planet as seen from various stations, and was attentively listened to. The Americans had anticipated his party and taken the position they had intended to occupy, but they found a better one; and the three British detachments and the Americans co-operated, making four stations on the island. The weather was finer than they had anticipated from the accounts of the climate of Kerguelen, and from his station they were able to get observations of the internal and external contacts at egress. He was also a member of the observing party of the transit of Venus of 1882, in Madagascar, which was selected as one of the ingress stations. In 1886 he observed the eclipse of August 29th, at Carriacou, a small island to the north of Grenada; and in 1887 the eclipse of August 19th, in Russia.

In November, 1889, he sailed for the Isles de Salût to witness the solar eclipse of December 22d, and died soon after the observation. According to the account given of these, his last days, by Father Strickland, S. J., in The Tablet, he suffered much during the voyage from seasickness, and was in rather an exhausted condition when he reached the island. He nevertheless, intent upon his work, went ashore at once to inspect the proposed point of observation and introduce himself to the authorities. He was advised and urged to continue to live on the vessel (the Comus), going ashore only in the day. Father Strickland expressed the belief that if he had done this "his life would not have been sacrificed to the one anxious desire to do everything for the best for the success of the work confided to him." He preferred, however, to abide in the hospital, and said nothing of the illness which he felt. The road from the hospital to the observatory was steep and difficult, but he traversed it on foot four times a day. He complained the Friday before the eclipse of sickness, but worked till nearly three o'clock in the morning; lay down in a hammock in the tent to get a little rest where he was; was up again before six o'clock to take the position of the sun at rising; and superintended at half past seven a careful and successful rehearsal of the operations and duties that were to be performed in the observation of the eclipse the next morning. "Every one was surprised at Father Perry's exactitude in contributing to carry out his own orders, and his courage in facing fatigue. His readiness to sacrifice himself and his own convenience in order to save trouble to others endeared him to all who worked with him, and challenged their utmost efforts to secure success for their work in spite of the oppressive climate and surroundings." About noon on Saturday he was found much exhausted by a ship's officer who visited him, but was again at his post in the