If the "Great Star-Catalogue Case" is not surrounded with such mystery
as would entitle it to a place among _causes celebres_, it may well
be so classed on account of the novelty of the questions at issue.
It affords an instructive example of the possibility of cases in
which strict justice cannot be done through the established forms
of legal procedure. It is also of scientific interest because,
although the question was a novel one to come before a court, it
belongs to a class which every leader in scientific investigation
must constantly encounter in meting out due credit to his assistants.
The plaintiff, Christian H. F. Peters, was a Dane by birth, and
graduated at the University of Berlin in 1836. During the earlier
years of his manhood he was engaged in the trigonometrical survey
of the kingdom of Naples, where, for a time, he had charge of an
observatory or some other astronomical station. It is said that, like
many other able European youth of the period, he was implicated in
the revolution of 1848, and had to flee the kingdom in consequence.
Five years later, he came to the United States. Here his first
patron was Dr. B. A. Gould, who procured for him first a position
on the Coast Survey, and then one as his assistant at the Dudley
Observatory in Albany. He was soon afterward appointed professor
of astronomy and director of the Litchfield Observatory at Hamilton
College, where he spent the remaining thirty years of his life.
He was a man of great learning, not only in subjects pertaining
to astronomy, but in ancient and modern languages. The means at
his disposal were naturally of the slenderest kind; but he was the
discoverer of some forty asteroids, and devoted himself to various
astronomical works and researches with great ability.
Of his personality it may be said that it was extremely agreeable so
long as no important differences arose. What it would be in such a
case can be judged by what follows. Those traits of character which
in men like him may be smoothed down to a greater or less extent
by marital discipline were, in the absence of any such agency,
maintained in all their strength to his latest years.
The defendant, Charles A. Borst, was a graduate of the college and had
been a favorite pupil of Peters. He was a man of extraordinary energy
and working capacity, ready to take hold in a business-like way of
any problem presented to him, but not an adept at making problems for
himself. His power of assimilating learning was unusually developed;
and this, combined with orderly business habits, made him a most
effective and valuable assistant. The terms of his employment were
of the first importance in the case. Mr. Litchfield of New York was
the patron of the observatory; he had given the trustees of Hamilton
College a capital for its support, which sufficed to pay the small
salary of the director and some current expenses, and he also, when
the latter needed an assistant, made provision for his employment.
It appears that, in the case of Borst, Peters frequently paid his
salary for considerable periods at a time, which sums were afterward
reimbursed to him by Mr. Litchfield.
I shall endeavor to state the most essential facts involved as they
appear from a combination of the sometimes widely different claims
of the two parties, with the hope of showing fairly what they were,
but without expecting to satisfy a partisan of either side. Where an
important difference of statement is irreconcilable, I shall point
it out.
In his observations of asteroids Peters was continually obliged to
search through the pages of astronomical literature to find whether
the stars he was using in observation had ever been catalogued.
He long thought that it would be a good piece of work to search
all the astronomical journals and miscellaneous collections of
observations with a view of making a complete catalogue of the
positions of the thousands of stars which they contained, and
publishing it in a single volume for the use of astronomers situated
as he was. The work of doing this was little more than one of routine
search and calculation, which any well-trained youth could take up;
but it was naturally quite without the power of Peters to carry it
through with his own hand. He had employed at least one former
assistant on the work, Professor John G. Porter, but very little
progress was made. Now, however, he had a man with the persistence
and working capacity necessary to carry out the plan.
There was an irreconcilable difference between the two parties as
to the terms on which Borst went to work. According to the latter,
Peters suggested to him the credit which a young man would gain as
one of the motives for taking up the job. But plaintiff denied
that he had done anything more than order him to do it. He did
not, however, make it clear why an assistant at the Litchfield
Observatory should be officially ordered to do a piece of work for
the use of astronomy generally, and having no special connection
with the Litchfield Observatory.
However this may be, Borst went vigorously to work, repeating all the
calculations which had been made by Peters and former assistants,
with a view of detecting errors, and took the work home with him
in order that his sisters might make a great mass of supplementary
calculations which, though not involved in the original plan,
would be very conducive to the usefulness of the result. One or
two of these bright young ladies worked for about a year at the job.
How far Peters was privy to what they did was not clear; according
to his claim he did not authorize their employment to do anything
but copy the catalogue.
By the joint efforts of the assistant and his two sisters,
working mostly or entirely at their own home, the work was
brought substantially to a conclusion about the beginning of 1888.
Borst then reported the completion to his chief and submitted a
proposed title-page, which represented that the work was performed
by Charles A. Borst under the direction of Christian H. F. Peters,
Professor of Astronomy, etc. According to Borst's account, Peters
tore up the paper, opened the stove door, put the fragments into
the fire, and then turned on the assistant with the simple order,
"Bring me the catalogue!"
This was refused, and a suit in replevin was immediately instituted
by Peters. The ablest counsel were engaged on both sides. That of
the plaintiff was Mr. Elihu Root, of New York, afterward Secretary of
War, one of the leading members of the New York bar, and well known
as an active member of the reform branch of the Republican party of
that city. For the defendant was the law firm of an ex-senator of
the United States, the Messrs. Kernan of Utica.
I think the taking of evidence and the hearing of arguments occupied
more than a week. One claim of the defendant would, if accepted,
have brought the suit to a speedy end. Peters was an employee
of the corporation of Hamilton College, and by the terms of his
appointment all his work at the Litchfield Observatory belonged to
that institution. Borst was summoned into the case as an official
employee of the Litchfield Observatory. Therefore the corporation of
the college was the only authority which had power to bring the suit.
But this point was disposed of by a decision of the judge that it was
not reasonable, in view of the low salary received by the plaintiff,
to deprive him of the right to the creations of his own talent.
He did not, however, apply this principle of legal interpretation to
the case of the defendant, and not only found for the plaintiff, but
awarded damages based on the supposed value of the work, including,
if I understand the case aright, the value of the work done by the
young ladies. It would seem, however, that in officially perfecting
the details of his decision he left it a little indefinite as to
what papers the plaintiff was entitled to, it being very difficult
to describe in detail papers many of which he had never seen.
Altogether it may be feared that the decision treated the catalogue
much as the infant was treated by the decision of Solomon.
However this might he, the decision completely denied any right of
the defendant in the work. This feature of it I thought very unjust,
and published in a Utica paper a review of the case in terms not quite
so judicial as I ought to have chosen. I should have thought such a
criticism quite a breach of propriety, and therefore would never have
ventured upon it but for an eminent example then fresh in my mind.
Shortly after the Supreme Court of the United States uttered its
celebrated decision upholding the constitutionality of the Legal
Tender Act, I happened to be conversing at an afternoon reception
with one of the judges, Gray, who had sustained the decision.
Mr. George Bancroft, the historian, stepped up, and quite surprised
me by expressing to the judge in quite vigorous language his strong
dissent from the decision. He soon afterward published a pamphlet
reviewing it adversely. I supposed that what Mr. Bancroft might do
with a decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, a humbler
individual might be allowed to do with the decision of a local New
York judge.
The defense appealed the case to a higher court of three judges,
where the finding of the lower court was sustained by a majority
of two to one. It was then carried to the Court of Appeals, the
highest in the State. Here the decision was set aside on what
seemed to me the common sense ground that the court had ignored
the rights of the defendant in the case, who certainly had some,
and it must therefore be remanded for a new trial.
Meantime Peters had died; and it is painful to think that his death
may have been accelerated by the annoyances growing out of the suit.
One morning, in the summer of 1890, he was found dead on the steps of
his little dwelling, having apparently fallen in a fit of apoplexy
or heart failure as he was on his way to the observatory the night
before. His heirs had no possible object in pushing the suit;
probably his entire little fortune was absorbed in the attendant
expenses.
When the difference with Borst was first heard of it was, I think,
proposed to Peters by several of his friends, including myself, that
the matter should be submitted to an arbitration of astronomers.
But he would listen to nothing of the sort. He was determined to
enforce his legal rights by legal measures. A court of law was,
in such a case, at an enormous disadvantage, as compared with
an astronomical board of arbitration. To the latter all the
circumstances would have been familiar and simple, while the
voluminous evidence, elucidated as it was by the arguments of
counsel on the two sides, failed to completely enlighten the court
on the points at issue. One circumstance will illustrate this.
Some allusion was made during the trial to Peters's work while he was
abroad, in investigating the various manuscripts of the Almagest of
Ptolemy and preparing a commentary and revised edition of Ptolemy's
Catalogue of Stars. This would have been an extremely important and
original work, most valuable in the history of ancient astronomy.
But the judge got it mixed up in his mind with the work before the
court, and actually supposed that Peters spent his time in Europe
in searching ancient manuscripts to get material for the catalogue
in question. He also attributed great importance to the conception of
the catalogue, forgetting that, to use the simile of a writer in the
"New York Evening Post," such a conception was of no more value than
the conception of a railroad from one town to another by a man who
had no capital to build it. No original investigation was required
on one side or the other. It was simply a huge piece of work done
by a young man with help from his sisters, suggested by Peters,
and now and then revised by him in its details. It seemed to me
that the solution offered by Borst was eminently proper, and I was
willing to say so, probably at the expense of Peters's friendship,
on which I set a high value.
I have always regarded the work on Ptolemy's catalogue of stars,
to which allusion has just been made, as the most important Peters
ever undertook. It comprised a critical examination and comparison
of all the manuscripts of the Almagest in the libraries of Europe,
or elsewhere, whether in Arabic or other languages, with a view
of learning what light might be thrown on the doubtful questions
growing out of Ptolemy's work. At the Litchfield Observatory I
had an opportunity of examining the work, especially the extended
commentaries on special points, and was so impressed by the learning
shown in the research as to express a desire for its speedy completion
and publication. In fact, Peters had already made one or more
communications to the National Academy of Sciences on the subject,
which were supposed to be equivalent to presenting the work to the
academy for publication. But before the academy put in any claim for
the manuscript, Mr. E. B. Knobel of London, a well-known member of
the Royal Astronomical Society, wrote to Peters's executors, stating
that he was a collaborator with Peters in preparing the work, and
as such had a claim to it, and wished to complete it. He therefore
asked that the papers should be sent to him. This was done, but
during the twelve years which have since elapsed, nothing more has
been heard of the work. No one, so far as I know, ever heard of
Peters's making any allusion to Mr. Knobel or any other collaborator.
He seems to have always spoken of the work as exclusively his own.
Among the psychological phenomena I have witnessed, none has appeared
to me more curious than a susceptibility of certain minds to become
imbued with a violent antipathy to the theory of gravitation.
The anti-gravitation crank, as he is commonly called, is a regular
part of the astronomer's experience. He is, however, only one of a
large and varied class who occupy themselves with what an architect
might consider the drawing up of plans and specifications for a
universe. This is, no doubt, quite a harmless occupation; but the
queer part of it is the seeming belief of the architects that the
actual universe has been built on their plans, and runs according to
the laws which they prescribe for it. Ether, atoms, and nebulae are
the raw material of their trade. Men of otherwise sound intellect,
even college graduates and lawyers, sometimes engage in this business.
I have often wondered whether any of these men proved that, in all
the common schools of New York, the power which conjugates the verbs
comes, through some invisible conduit in the earth, from the falls
of Niagara. This would be quite like many of the theories propounded.
Babbage's "Budget of Paradoxes" is a goodly volume descriptive of
efforts of this sort. It was supplemented a year or two ago by
a most excellent and readable article on eccentric literature, by
Mr. John Fiske, which appeared in the "Atlantic Monthly." Here the
author discussed the subject so well that I do not feel like saying
much about it, beyond giving a little of my own experience.
Naturally the Smithsonian Institution was, and I presume still is,
the great authority to which these men send their productions.
It was generally a rule of Professor Henry always to notice
these communications and try to convince the correspondents of
their fallacies. Many of the papers were referred to me; but a
little experience showed that it was absolutely useless to explain
anything to these "paradoxers." Generally their first communication
was exceedingly modest in style, being evidently designed to lead on
the unwary person to whom it was addressed. Moved to sympathy with
so well-meaning but erring an inquirer, I would point out wherein
his reasoning was deficient or his facts at fault. Back would come
a thunderbolt demonstrating my incapacity to deal with the subject
in terms so strong that I could not have another word to say.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science was another
attraction for such men. About thirty years ago there appeared at
one of its meetings a man from New Jersey who was as much incensed
against the theory of gravitation as if it had been the source of
all human woe. He got admission to the meetings, as almost any one
can, but the paper he proposed to read was refused by the committee.
He watched his chance, however, and when discussion on some paper was
invited, he got up and began with the words, "It seems to me that
the astronomers of the present day have gravitation on the brain."
This was the beginning of an impassioned oration which went on in an
unbroken torrent until he was put down by a call for the next paper.
But he got his chance at last. A meeting of Section Q was called;
what this section was the older members will recall and the reader
may be left to guess. A programme of papers had been prepared,
and on it appeared Mr. Joseph Treat, on Gravitation. Mr. Treat got
up with great alacrity, and, amid the astonishment and laughter of
all proceeded to read his paper with the utmost seriousness.
I remember a visit from one of these men with great satisfaction,
because, apparently, he was an exception to the rule in being
amenable to reason. I was sitting in my office one morning when a
modest-looking gentleman opened the door and looked in.
"I would like to see Professor Newcomb."
"Well, here he is."
"You Professor Newcomb?"
"Yes."
"Professor, I have called to tell you that I don't believe in Sir
Isaac Newton's theory of gravitation!"
"Don't believe in gravitation! Suppose you jump out of that window
and see whether there is any gravitation or not."
"But I don't mean that. I mean"--
"But that is all there is in the theory of gravitation; if you jump
out of the window you'll fall to the ground."
"I don't mean that. What I mean is I don't believe in the Newtonian
theory that gravitation goes up to the moon. It does n't extend
above the air."
"Have you ever been up there to see?"
There was an embarrassing pause, during which the visitor began to
look a little sheepish.
"N-no-o," he at length replied.
"Well, I have n't been there either, and until one of us can get up
there to try the experiment, I don't believe we shall ever agree on
the subject."
He took his leave without another word.
The idea that the facts of nature are to be brought out by
observation is one which is singularly foreign not only to people
of this class, but even to many sensible men. When the great comet
of 1882 was discovered in the neighborhood of the sun, the fact was
telegraphed that it might be seen with the naked eye, even in the
sun's neighborhood. A news reporter came to my office with this
statement, and wanted to know if it was really true that a comet
could be seen with the naked eye right alongside the sun.
"I don't know," I replied; "suppose you go out and look for yourself;
that is the best way to settle the question."
The idea seemed to him to be equally amusing and strange, and on
the basis of that and a few other insipid remarks, he got up an
interview for the "National Republican" of about a column in length.
I think there still exists somewhere in the Northwest a communistic
society presided over by a genius whose official name is Koresh,
and of which the religious creed has quite a scientific turn.
Its fundamental doctrine is that the surface of the earth on which
we live is the inside of a hollow sphere, and therefore concave,
instead of convex, as generally supposed. The oddest feature of
the doctrine is that Koresh professes to have proved it by a method
which, so far as the geometry of it goes, is more rigorous than any
other that science has ever applied. The usual argument by which we
prove to our children the earth's rotundity is not purely geometric.
When, standing on the seashore, we see the sails of a ship on
the sea horizon, her hull being hidden because it is below, the
inference that this is due to the convexity of the surface is based
on the idea that light moves in a straight line. If a ray of light
is curved toward the surface, we should have the same appearance,
although the earth might be perfectly flat. So the Koresh people
professed to have determined the figure of the earth's surface by
the purely geometric method of taking long, broad planks, perfectly
squared at the two ends, and using them as a geodicist uses his base
apparatus. They were mounted on wooden supports and placed end to
end, so as to join perfectly. Then, geometrically, the two would
be in a straight line. Then the first plank was picked up, carried
forward, and its end so placed against that of the second as to fit
perfectly; thus the continuation of a straight line was assured.
So the operation was repeated by continually alternating the planks.
Recognizing the fact that the ends might not be perfectly square,
the planks were turned upside down in alternate settings, so that
any defect of this sort would be neutralized. The result was that,
after they had measured along a mile or two, the plank was found to
be gradually approaching the sea sand until it touched the ground.
This quasi-geometric proof was to the mind of Koresh positive.
A horizontal straight line continued does not leave the earth's
surface, but gradually approaches it. It does not seem that the
measurers were psychologists enough to guard against the effect of
preconceived notions in the process of applying their method.
It is rather odd that pure geometry has its full share of paradoxers.
Runkle's "Mathematical Monthly" received a very fine octavo volume,
the printing of which must have been expensive, by Mr. James Smith,
a respectable merchant of Liverpool. This gentleman maintained that
the circumference of a circle was exactly 3 1/5 times its diameter.
He had pestered the British Association with his theory, and come
into collision with an eminent mathematician whose name he did
not give, but who was very likely Professor DeMorgan. The latter
undertook the desperate task of explaining to Mr. Smith his error,
but the other evaded him at every point, much as a supple lad might
avoid the blows of a prize-fighter. As in many cases of this kind,
the reasoning was enveloped in a mass of verbiage which it was very
difficult to strip off so as to see the real framework of the logic.
When this was done, the syllogism would be found to take this very
simple form:--
The ratio of the circumference to the diameter is the same in all
circles. Now, take a diameter of 1 and draw round it a circumference
of 3 1/5. In that circle the ratio is 3 1/5; therefore, by the
major premise, that is the ratio for all circles.
The three famous problems of antiquity, the duplication of the cube,
the quadrature of the circle, and the trisection of the angle, have
all been proved by modern mathematics to be insoluble by the rule
and compass, which are the instruments assumed in the postulates
of Euclid. Yet the problem of the trisection is frequently attacked
by men of some mathematical education. I think it was about 1870
that I received from Professor Henry a communication coming from
some institution of learning in Louisiana or Texas. The writer
was sure he had solved the problem, and asked that it might receive
the prize supposed to be awarded by governments for the solution.
The construction was very complicated, and I went over the whole
demonstration without being able at first to detect any error.
So it was necessary to examine it yet more completely and take it
up point by point. At length I found the fallacy to be that three
lines which, as drawn, intersected in what was to the eye the same
point on the paper, were assumed to intersect mathematically in
one and the same point. Except for the complexity of the work,
the supposed construction would have been worthy of preservation.
Some years later I received, from a teacher, I think, a supposed
construction, with the statement that he had gone over it very
carefully and could find no error. He therefore requested me to
examine it and see whether there was anything wrong. I told him in
reply that his work showed that he was quite capable of appreciating
a geometric demonstration; that there was surely something wrong in
it, because the problem was known to be insoluble, and I would like
him to try again to see if he could not find his error. As I never
again heard from him, I suppose he succeeded.
One of the most curious of these cases was that of a student, I am not
sure but a graduate, of the University of Virginia, who claimed that
geometers were in error in assuming that a line had no thickness.
He published a school geometry based on his views, which received
the endorsement of a well-known New York school official and, on
the basis of this, was actually endorsed, or came very near being
endorsed, as a text-book in the public schools of New York.
From my correspondence, I judge that every civilized country has
its share of these paradoxers. I am almost constantly in receipt
of letters not only from America, but from Europe and Asia, setting
forth their views. The following are a few of these productions
which arrived in the course of a single season.
Baltimore, Sept. 29, 1897.
104 Collington Ave.
Prof. Simon Newcomb:
_Dear Sir_,--Though a stranger to you, Sir, I take the liberty
to enlist your interest in a Cause,--so grand, so beautiful,
as to eclipse anything ever presented to the highest tribunal
of human intellect and intuition.
Trusting you to be of liberal mind, Sir, I have mailed you
specimen copy of the "Banner of Light," which will prove
somewhat explanatory of my previous remarks.
Being a student of Nature and her wonderful laws, as they
operate in that subtle realm of human life,--the soul,
for some years, I feel well prepared to answer inquiries
pertaining to this almost unknown field of scientific
research, and would do so with much pleasure, as I am
desirous to contribute my mite to the enlightenment of
mankind upon this most important of all subjects.