Sir William Herschel arrived in England from Hanover, his birth-place,
about the end of the year 1759, when he was in his 21st year. He was
bred a professor of music, and went to live at Halifax, where he
acquired, by his own application, a considerable knowledge of
mathematics; and, having studied astronomy and optics in the popular
writings of Ferguson, he was anxious to witness with his own eyes the
wonders of the planetary system. He accordingly borrowed of a friend a
telescope, two feet in focal length; and, having directed it to the
heavens, he was so delighted with the actual sight of phenomena, which
he had previously known only from books, that he commissioned a friend
to purchase for him in London a telescope, with a high magnifying power.
Fortunately for science, the price of such an instrument greatly
exceeded his means, and he immediately resolved to construct a telescope
with his own hands. After encountering the difficulties which every
amateur at first experiences, in the casting, grinding, and polishing,
of metallic specula for reflecting telescopes, he completed, in 1776, a
reflecting instrument, _five feet_ in focal length, with which he was
able to observe the ring of Saturn, and the satellites and belts of
Jupiter. This telescope was completed when he resided at Bath, where he
acquired by degrees, and in his leisure hours, that practical knowledge
of optics and mechanics which was necessary for such a task.
His experience in this scientific art was of the most remarkable kind;
and, by 1781, he had constructed so many telescopes, as to be better
furnished with the means of surveying the heavens than were possessed by
any other astronomer, in either of the fixed observatories in Europe.
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