ty, describing their misfortune and
resigning their mission. But the Council of the Society speedily
let them know that they were unmoved by the misfortunes of their
scientific missionaries, and pointed out to them in caustic terms
that, having solemnly undertaken the expedition, and received money
on account of it, their failure to proceed on the voyage would
be a reproach to the nation in general, and to the Royal Society
in particular. It would also bring an indelible scandal upon their
character, and probably end in their utter ruin. They were assured
that if they persisted in the refusal, they would be treated with the
most inflexible resentment, and prosecuted with the utmost severity
of the law.

Under such threats the unfortunate men could do nothing but accept
the situation and sail again after their frigate had been refitted.
When they got as far as the Cape of Good Hope, it was found very
doubtful whether they would reach their destination in time for
the transit; so, to make sure of some result from their mission,
they made their observations at the Cape.

One of the interesting scraps of history connected with the transit
of 1769 concerns the observations of Father Maximilian Hell, S. J.,
the leading astronomer of Vienna. He observed the transit at Wardhus,
a point near the northern extremity of Norway, where the sun did not
set at the season of the transit. Owing to the peculiar circumstances
under which the transit was observed,--the ingress of the planet
occurring two or three hours before the sun approached the northern
horizon, and the end of the transit about as long afterward,--this
station was the most favorable one on the globe. Hell, with two or
three companions, one of them named Sajnovics, went on his mission
to this isolated place under the auspices of the king of Denmark.
The day was cloudless and the observations were made with entire
success. He returned to Copenhagen, where he passed several months
in preparing for the press a complete account of his expedition and
the astronomical observations made at the station.

Astronomers were impatient to have the results for the distance of
the sun worked out as soon as possible. Owing to the importance of
Hell's observations, they were eagerly looked for. But he at first
refused to make them known, on the ground that, having been made
under the auspices of the king of Denmark, they ought not to be made
known in advance of their officia