nd covered a foot deep with melting snow, Miss
Herschel fell on one of these hooks, which entered her right leg above
the knee. To her brother's injunction, "Make haste!" she could answer
only by a pitiful cry, "I am hooked!" He and the workmen hastened
immediately to her assistance, but they could not disentangle her
without leaving nearly two ounces of her flesh behind. For some weeks
she was an invalid, and at one time it was feared that amputation might
be necessary.

* * * * *

Not satisfied with the magnifying power of any of the instruments he
had hitherto constructed, Herschel resolved, in 1784, to attempt a
forty-foot telescope. Such a work, however, was far beyond his limited
private resources; and he did not venture to undertake it until promised
a royal bounty of L2000. Then he removed from Datchet to Clay Hall, Old
Windsor; and again, in 1786, to Slough, where he finally settled, and
succeeded in erecting a commodious and well-equipped observatory. "We
may confidently assert," says Arago, "relative to the little house and
garden of Slough, that it is the spot of all the world where the
greatest number of discoveries have been made. The name of that village
will never perish: science will transmit it religiously to our latest
posterity."

At Slough, as at Datchet, prevailed the most enthusiastic industry; and
the house was soon as full of well-ordered labour as a bee-hive. Smiths
were kept constantly at work on different parts of the new telescopic
leviathan; and a whole troop of labourers was engaged in grinding the
tools required for shaping and polishing its mirror. Had not a cloudy or
moonlight night sometimes intervened, Herschel and his sister must have
died of sheer exhaustion, for they toiled with unremitting ardour both
day and night. With the morning came the workpeople, of whom no fewer
than between thirty and forty were at work for upwards of three months
together: some employed in felling and rooting out trees, some digging
and preparing the ground for the bricklayers, who were laying the
foundation for the telescope. Then there were the carpenter and his men;
and, meanwhile, the smith was converting a wash-house into a forge, and
manufacturing complete sets of tools for his own share of the labour.
In short, the place was at one time a complete workshop for the
manufacture of optical instruments; and it was a pleasure to enter it
for the purpose of observing th