e fervour of the great astronomer, and
the reverent attention given to his orders.

It is impossible not to refer here to the sisterly devotion of Caroline
Herschel, who was in every respect worthy of her noble-minded,
tender-hearted, and enthusiastic brother.

She stood beside him to the last, sharing his labours, brightening his
life. In the days, says her biographer, when Herschel gave up a
lucrative career that he might dedicate all his energies to astronomical
pursuits, it was through her care and thriftiness that he was spared
from the unrest of pecuniary anxieties. As she had been his helper and
assistant during his career as a popular musician, so she became his
helper and assistant when he gave himself up, like the Chaldeans of old,
to the study of the stars. By dint of a resolute will and a love that
shrank from no sacrifice or exertion, she acquired such a knowledge of
mathematics and calculations, mysterious as these generally seem to the
feminine mind, that she was able to formulate with exactness the result
of her brother's researches. She never failed to be his willing
fellow-labourer in the workshop; she helped him to grind and polish his
mirrors; she stood beside his telescope, in order to record his
observations, during the dark and bitter mid-winter nights, when the
very ink was frozen in the bottle. It may be said, without exaggeration,
that she kept him alive by her care: thinking nothing of herself, she
lived for him, and him alone. She loved him, she believed in him, she
aided him with all her heart and all her strength. Her mental powers
were very considerable; and undoubtedly she might have attained to
eminence on her own account, for she herself discovered no fewer than
eight comets. But she shunned self-glorification; she desired to live in
her brother's shadow; she worked for him, never for herself; and in her
elevated character no feature more strongly demands our admiration than
her heroic though unconscious self-denial. Happy the man who has such a
sister; happy the sister whose brother is worthy of so much devotion! It
is pleasant to know that William Herschel deserved the love so lavishly
poured out at his feet; that great as were his achievements in science,
lofty and broad as was his genius, they were fully sustained and
ennobled by the beauty and worth of his inner life. Who can contemplate
their twofold career in all its singleness of purpose, its purity, its
unselfishness, its subl