Feeling simply 'dismal.'
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The Sir John Herschel Collection
The preparation of the print Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Herschel (Michael J. Crowe ed., David R. Dyck and James J. Kevin assoc. eds, Cambridge, England: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1998, viii + 828 pp) which was funded by the National Science Foundation, took ten years. It was accomplished by a team of seventeen professors, visiting scholars, graduate students, advanced undergraduates, and staff working at the University of Notre Dame.
The first online version of Calendar was created in 2009 by Dr Marvin Bolt and Steven Lucy, working at the Webster Institute of the Adler Planetarium, and it is that data that has now been reformatted for incorporation into Ɛpsilon.
Further information about Herschel, his correspondence, and the editorial method is available online here: http://historydb.adlerplanetarium.org/herschel/?p=intro
No texts of Herschel’s letters are currently available through Ɛpsilon.
Feeling simply 'dismal.'
Wishes JH well on his upcoming trip to the Cape of Good Hope. Asks JH to study the lower part of the Scorpion, for William Herschel was mystified by the 'uncommon appearance of that part of the heavens.' [Written as a postscript to a letter by Margaret Herschel.]
Thrilled that JH has arrived safely in Cape Town; notes that JH's Cape Town trip has captivated the intellectual world.
Experiencing 'a daily increase of pain and feebleness.'
Sweeping progressing quickly; has used the 20-ft. reflecting telescope since February. Discovered two planetary nebulae. Studying Scorpio closely, as CH suggested; has found gorgeous globular clusters there. The equatorial was erected recently.
Asks about JH's children. Remarks that JH's discovery of globular clusters in the Scorpion is not what she remembered William Herschel being mystified about; remembers that WH exclaimed that there seemed to be a 'Loch im Himmel' ('hole in heaven') there.
Hopes that JH will receive Friedrich Bessel's paper called 'On the Influence of the Irregularities of the Earth on Geodetic Operations, and their Comparison with Astronomical Determinations.'
Has decisively mapped Saturn's sixth satellite; doubts, however, that he will ever see the seventh. Asks CH to inform Friedrich Bessel of his observation.
[Postscript to a letter by Margaret Herschel:] JH notes that he has finished the reduction of the first 9 hours in Right Ascension of his southern nebulae and double stars.
Details her daily routine.
Hopes to introduce to Margaret Herschel some of her acquaintances, including the family of General Baron Hugh Halkett.
Lists those who visited CH on her birthday.
Angry that many call William Herschel's 40-ft. reflecting telescope 'useless.'
Asserting that her memory remains sharp, CH promises that she will periodically describe 'what passed in old times.'
Promises in her next letter to comment about JH's 'chrysotype' photographic process.
Finished the reductions of all of the nebulae and double stars recorded at Cape Town; JH soon hopes to prepare for the publication of his Cape Results.
Describes the visit of the Crown Prince and Princess [of Hanover?] on her 93rd birthday (16 March).
Urges JH to study a temporary index made by William Herschel that contains observations about types of zodiacal light.
Remarks that the citizens of Hanover 'are all out of their senses' over the newly completed railway. Has been confined to the upstairs of her home since 3 February.
Feels distant from her family in England. Notes that the French occupation has changed Hanover from what it was when CH left in 1772.