Page:Women worth emulating (1877) Internet Archive.djvu/30

14 studies; indeed, he was himself devoted to scientific pursuits, both in his profession as a physician and in his leisure hours. He was a tender and generous step-father to the one surviving son of his wife's first marriage. There were three daughters of the second marriage—Margaret, Martha, and Mary. The first, to her parents' great grief, died in early life; the two latter survived to be the tender ministers to their mother's declining years, her literary helpers, and biographers.

The life of Mrs. Somerville, from the time of her second marriage, is but a happy record of her scientific achievements; and the publication of her valuable books. One trouble came—a loss of fortune, which compelled them to remove from their house in Hanover Square, and made Dr. Somerville accept the post of physician to Chelsea Hospital, in 1827, and take up his abode there. The residence never suited Mrs. Somerville's health, but she employed herself with characteristic perseverance and cheerfulness.

In 1831, she brought out her "Mechanism of the Heavens." This was followed by her chief work, "The Connection of the Physical Sciences," which ran through several editions, and became a class book at our universities.

I cannot refrain from mentioning that I met with that book in a very remote region. At the little town of St. Just, at the extreme west point of England, near Cape Cornwall, a Literary and