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Rh of the reach of envious people, who might suggest that it had been gathered at the public expense, and therefore was public property; but by doing so he destroyed the bridge behind him, and could now only look abroad for a place to continue his labours.

As Tycho had no reason to remain any longer at Rostock, where the plague besides made the stay unpleasant if not dangerous, he now accepted the invitation of Heinrich Rantzov to reside for a while in one of his castles. Of these, Wandsbeck, which had been rebuilt not long before, seemed to Tycho the most convenient, as it was situated close to Hamburg (only two or three miles north-east of it), and the intercourse with foreign countries, therefore, was easy. As Rantzov, who was a very wealthy man, had spent great sums on accumulating books and treasures of art in his various castles in Holstein and Slesvig, Tycho found at Wandsbeck (or Wandesburg, as the new castle was called) not only a comfortable dwelling, but also one in which the owner's refined tastes had created a home which might to some extent bear comparison with the one he had left for ever. Tycho removed with his family and belongings to Wandsbeck about the middle of October 1597, and met a former acquaintance there in the person of Georg Ludwig Froben (Frobenius) from Würzburg, who six or seven years before had visited Uraniborg after studying at Tübingen and Wittenberg. He was at that time probably employed by Rantzov at Wandsbeck in literary work, and he settled in the year 1600 as a printer at Hamburg, where he remained till his death in 1645.

Tycho could now think of resuming the observations which had been interrupted seven months before. On the 20th October he wrote a short statement of the causes of this interruption and of his departure, which we have