There is much in the great field of astronomy that is discouraging to
the savant who hasn't the time nor the means to rummage around through
the heavens. At times I am almost hopeless, and feel like saying to
the great yearnful, hungry world: "Grope on forever. Do not ask me for
another scientific fact. Find it out yourself. Hunt up your own new-laid
planets, and let me have a rest. Never ask me again to sit up all night
and take care of a new-born world, while you lie in bed and reck not."
I get no salary for examining the trackless void night after night when
I ought to be in bed. I sacrifice my health in order that the public may
know at once of the presence of a red-hot comet, fresh from the factory.
And yet, what thanks do I get?
Is it surprising that every little while I contemplate withdrawing from
scientific research, to go and skin an eight-mule team down through the
dim vista of relentless years?
Then, again, you take a certain style of star, which you learn from
Professor Simon Newcomb is such a distance that it takes 50,000 years
for its light to reach Boston. Now, we will suppose that after looking
over the large stock of new and second-hand stars, and after examining
the spring catalogue and price list, I decide that one of the smaller
size will do me, and I buy it. How do I know that it was there when I
bought it? Its cold and silent rays may have ceased 49,000 years before
I was born and the intelligence be still on the way. There is too much
margin between sale and delivery. Every now and then another astronomer
comes to me and says: "Professor, I have discovered another new star and
intend to file it. Found it last night about a mile and a half south of
the zenith, running loose. Haven't heard of anybody who has lost a star
of the fifteenth magnitude, about thirteen hands high, with light mane
and tail, have you?" Now, how do I know that he has discovered a brand
new star? How can I discover whether he is or is not playing and old,
threadbare star on me for a new one?
[Illustration: 0256]
We are told that there has been no perceptible growth or decay in the
star business since man began to roam around through space, in his mind,
and make figures on the barn door with red chalk showing the celestial
time table.
No serious accidents have occurred in the starry heavens since I began
to observe and study their habits. Not a star has waxed, not a star has
waned to my knowledge. Not a planet has season-cracked or shown any of
the injurious effects of our rigorous climate. Not a star has ripened
prematurely or fallen off the trees. The varnish on the very oldest
stars I find on close and critical examination to be in splendid
condition. They will all no doubt wear as long as we need them, and wink
on long after we have ceased to wink back.
In 1866 there appeared suddenly in the northern crown a star of about
the third magnitude and worth at least $250. It was generally conceded
by astronomers that this was a brand new star that had never been used,
but upon consulting Argelander's star catalogue and price list it was
found that this was not a new star at all, but an old, faded star of
the ninth magnitude, with the front breadths turned wrong side out and
trimmed with moonlight along the seams. After a few days of phenomenal
brightness, it gently ceased to draw a salary as a star of the third
magnitude, and walked home with an Uncle Tom's Cabin company.
It is such things as this that make the life of the astronomer one of
constant and discouraging toil. I have long contemplated, as I say, the
advisability of retiring from this field of science and allowing
others to light the northern lights, skim chores. I would do it myself
cheerfully if my health would permit, but for years I have realized, and
so has my wife, that my duties as an astronomer kept me up too much at
night, and my wife is certainly right about it when she says if I insist
on scanning the heavens night after night, coming home late with
the cork out of my telescope and my eyes red and swollen with these
exhausting night vigils, I will be cut down in my prime. So I am liable
to abandon the great labor to which I had intended to devote my life, my
dazzling genius and my princely income. I hope that other savants will
spare me the pain of another refusal, for my mind is fully made up
that unless another skimmist is at once secured, the milky way will
henceforth remain unskum.