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252 you to God. Written at our Castle of Copenhagen the 8th October Anno 1597. Under our seal, 2em (Address)—" To our beloved, the honourable and noble Tyge Brahe of Knudstrup, our man and servant."

The harsh and angry tone of this letter shows how completely the king's mind had become estranged from Tycho; and no matter how badly Tycho may have treated his inferiors, the fact remains that he was in his turn treated with severity and a want of appreciation of his great scientific merit which is inexcusable. It could not be expected that the king or his advisers should have been able to appreciate the true value of Tycho's scientific labours, but they could not help being aware that he enjoyed a world-wide reputation, such as no Dane had ever acquired before; and if he was a bad landlord, they might have endowed him in some other way. But this is neither the first nor the last time that a Government has given science the cold shoulder, since even in later and much more enlightened times statesmen of all nations not unfrequently have distinguished themselves by a sovereign contempt of science. But all the more let us admire the truly enlightened mind of Tycho's great benefactor and friend, King Frederick the Second, whom he had unfortunately lost too early. King Christian seems to have felt personally offended with Tycho Brahe for having first retreated to a distance and then attempted to make terms with him. But it is not impossible that Tycho may have thought of Vedel, who in 1595 had not only been deprived of his office of historiographer for delaying too long to write the Danish history, but had even been forced to deliver up all the materials which he had been collecting for years. Possibly Tycho wished to bring his great treasure of observations out