The Reminiscences of an Astronomer Part 16

In conducting my office also, the utmost economy was always studied.

The increase in the annual appropriations for which I asked was so small that, when I left the office in 1877, they were just about the same as they were back in the fifties, when it was first established.

The necessary funds were saved by economical administration. All this was done with a feeling that, after my retirement, the satisfaction with which one could look back on such a policy would be enhanced by a feeling on the part of the representatives of the public that the work I had done must be worthy of having some pains taken to secure its continuance in the same spirit.

I do not believe that the men who conduct our own government are a whit behind the foremost of other countries in the desire to promote science. If after my retirement no special measures were deemed necessary to secure the continuance of the work in which I had been engaged, I prefer to attribute it to advent.i.tious circ.u.mstances rather than to any undervaluation of scientific research by our authorities.

IX

SCIENTIFIC WAs.h.i.+NGTON

It is sometimes said that no man, in pa.s.sing away, leaves a place which cannot be equally well filled by another. This is doubtless true in all ordinary cases. But scientific research, and scientific affairs generally at the national capital, form an exception to many of the rules drawn from experience in other fields.

Professor Joseph Henry, first secretary of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution, was a man of whom it may be said, without any reflection on men of our generation, that he held a place which has never been filled. I do not mean his official place, but his position as the recognized leader and exponent of scientific interests at the national capital. A world-wide reputation as a scientific investigator, exalted character and inspiring presence, broad views of men and things, the love and esteem of all, combined to make him the man to whom all who knew him looked for counsel and guidance in matters affecting the interests of science. Whether any one could since have a.s.sumed this position, I will not venture to say; but the fact seems to be that no one has been at the same time able and willing to a.s.sume it.

On coming to Was.h.i.+ngton I soon became very intimate with Professor Henry, and I do not think there was any one here to whom he set forth his personal wishes and convictions respecting the policy of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution and its relations to the government more freely than he did to me. As every point connected with the history and policy of this establishment is of world-wide interest, and as Professor Henry used to put some things in a different light from that shed upon the subject by current publications, I shall mention a few points that might otherwise be overlooked.

It has always seemed to me that a deep mystery enshrouded the act of Smithson in devising his fortune as he did. That an Englishman, whose connections and a.s.sociations were entirely with the intellectual cla.s.ses,--who had never, so far as is known, a single American connection, or the slightest inclination toward democracy,--should, in the intellectual condition of our country during the early years of the century, have chosen its government as his trustee for the foundation of a scientific inst.i.tution, does of itself seem singular enough. What seems yet more singular is that no instructions whatever were given in his will or found in his papers beyond the comprehensive one "to found an inst.i.tution at Was.h.i.+ngton to be called the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men." No plan of the inst.i.tution, no sc.r.a.p of paper which might a.s.sist in the interpretation of the mandate, was ever discovered. Not a word respecting his intention was ever known to have been uttered. Only a single remark was ever recorded which indicated that he had anything unusual in view. He did at one time say, "My name shall live in the memory of men when the t.i.tles of the Northumberlands and the Percys are extinct and forgotten."

One result of this failure to indicate a plan for the inst.i.tution was that, when the government received the money, Congress was at a loss what to do with it. Some ten years were spent in discussing schemes of various kinds, among them that of declining the gift altogether.

Then it was decided that the inst.i.tution should be governed by a Board of Regents, who should elect a secretary as their executive officer and the administrator of the inst.i.tution. The latter was to include a library, a museum, and a gallery of art. The plans for the fine structure, so well known to every visitor to the capital, were prepared, the building was started, the regents organized, and Professor Henry made secretary.

We might almost say that Henry was opposed to every special function a.s.signed to the inst.i.tution by the organic law. He did not agree with me as to any mystery surrounding the intentions of the founder.

To him they were perfectly clear. Smithson was a scientific investigator; and the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men could be best promoted on the lines that he desired, by scientific investigation and the publication of scientific researches. For this purpose a great building was not necessary, and he regretted all the money spent on it. The library, museum, and gallery of art would be of only local advantage, whereas "diffusion among men" implied all men, whether they could visit Was.h.i.+ngton or not. It was clearly the business of the government to supply purely local facilities for study and research, and the endowment of Smithson should not be used for such a purpose.

His opposition to the building tinged the whole course of his thought.

I doubt whether he was ever called upon by founders of inst.i.tutions of any sort for counsel without his warning them to beware of spending their money in bricks and mortar. The building being already started before he took charge, and the three other objects being sanctioned by law, he was, of course, hampered in carrying out his views.

But he did his utmost to reduce to a minimum the amount of the fund that should be devoted to the objects specified.

This policy brought on the most animated contest in the history of the inst.i.tution. It was essential that his most influential a.s.sistants should share his views or at least not thwart them. This, he found, was not the case. The librarian, Mr. C. C. Jewett, an able and accomplished man in the line of his profession, was desirous of collecting one of the finest scientific libraries. A contest arose, to which Professor Henry put an end by the bold course of removing the librarian from office. Mr. Jewett denied his power to do this, and the question came before the board of regents. The majority of these voted that the secretary had the power to remove his a.s.sistants.

Among the minority was Rufus Choate, who was so strongly opposed to the action that he emphasized his protest against it by resigning from the board.

A question of legal interpretation came in to make the situation yet more difficult. The regents had resolved that, after the completion of the building, one half the income should be devoted to those objects which Professor Henry considered most appropriate.

Meanwhile there was no limit to the amount that might be appropriated to these objects, but Mr. Jewett and other heads of departments wished to apply the rule from the beginning. Henry refused to do so, and looked with entire satisfaction on the slowness of completion of what was, in his eyes, an undesirable building.

It must be admitted that there was one point which Professor Henry either failed to appreciate, or perhaps thought unworthy of consideration. This is, the strong hold on the minds of men which an inst.i.tution is able to secure through the agency of an imposing building. Saying nothing of the artistic and educational value of a beautiful piece of architecture, it would seem that such a structure has a peculiar power of impressing the minds of men with the importance of the object to which it is devoted, or of the work going on within it. Had Professor Henry been allowed to perform all the functions of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution in a moderate-sized hired house, as he felt himself abundantly able to do, I have very serious doubts whether it would have acquired its present celebrity and gained its present high place in the estimation of the public.

In the winter of 1865 the inst.i.tution suffered an irreparable loss by a conflagration which destroyed the central portion of the building. At that time the gallery of art had been confined to a collection of portraits of Indians by Stanley. This collection was entirely destroyed. The library, being at one end, remained intact. The lecture room, where courses of scientific lectures had been delivered by eminent men of science, was also destroyed.

This event gave Professor Henry an opportunity of taking a long step in the direction he desired. He induced Congress to take the Smithsonian library on deposit as a part of its own, and thus relieve the inst.i.tution of the cost of supporting this branch.

The Corcoran Art Gallery had been founded in the mean time, and relieved the inst.i.tution of all necessity for supporting a gallery of art. He would gladly have seen the National Museum made a separate inst.i.tution, and the Smithsonian building purchased by the government for its use, but he found no chance of carrying this out.

After the death of Professor Henry the Inst.i.tution grew rapidly into a position in which it might almost claim to be a scientific department of the government. The National Museum, remaining under its administration, was greatly enlarged, and one of its ramifications was extended into the National Zoological Park. The studies of Indian ethnology, begun by Major J. W. Powell, grew into the Bureau of Ethnology. The Astrophysical Observatory was established, in which Professor Langley has continued his epoch-making work on the sun's radiant heat with his wonderful bolometer, an instrument of his own invention.

Before he was appointed to succeed Professor Henry, Professor Baird was serving as United States Fish Commissioner, and continued to fill this office, without other salary than that paid by the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution. The economic importance of the work done and still carried on by this commission is too well known to need a statement.

About the time of Baird's death, the work of the commission was separated from that of the Inst.i.tution by providing a salary for the commissioner.

We have here a great extension of the idea of an inst.i.tution for scientific publications and research. I recall once suggesting to Professor Baird the question whether the utilization of the inst.i.tution founded by Smithson for carrying on and promoting such government work as that of the National Museum was really the right thing to do. He replied, "It is not a case of using the Smithsonian fund for government work, but of the government making appropriations for the work of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution." Between the two sides of the question thus presented,--one emphasizing the honor done to Smithson by expanding the inst.i.tution which bears his name, and the other aiming solely at the best administration of the fund which we hold in trust for him,--I do not pretend to decide.

On the academic side of social life in Was.h.i.+ngton, the numerous a.s.sociations of alumni of colleges and universities hold a prominent place. One of the earliest of these was that of Yale, which has held an annual banquet every year, at least since 1877, when I first became a member. Its members.h.i.+p at this time included Mr. W. M. Evarts, then Secretary of State, Chief Justice Waite, Senator Dawes, and a number of other men prominent in political life. The most attractive speaker was Mr. Evarts, and the fact that his views of education were somewhat conservative added much to the interest of his speeches. He generally had something to say in favor of the system of a prescribed curriculum in liberal education, which was then considered as quite antiquated.

When President Dwight, shortly after his accession to office, visited the capital to explain the modernizing of the Yale educational system, he told the alumni that the college now offered ninety-five courses to undergraduates. Evarts congratulated the coming students on sitting at a banquet table where they had their choice of ninety-five courses of intellectual aliment.

Perhaps the strongest testimonial of the interest attached to these reunions was unconsciously given by President Hayes. He had received an honorary degree from Yale, and I chanced to be on the committee which called to invite him to the next banquet. He pleaded, as I suppose Presidents always do, the multiplicity of his engagements, but finally said,--

"Well, gentlemen, I will come, but it must be on two well-understood conditions. In the first place, I must not be called to my feet.

You must not expect a speech of me. The second condition is, I must be allowed to leave punctually at ten o'clock."

"We regret your conditions, Mr. President," was the reply, "but must, of course, accede to them, if you insist."

He came to the banquet, he made a speech,--a very good, and not a very short one,--and he remained, an interested hearer, until nearly two o'clock in the morning.

In recent years I cannot avoid a feeling that a change has come over the spirit of such a.s.sociations. One might gather the impression that the apothegm of Sir William Hamilton needed a slight amendment.

On earth is nothing great but Man, In Man is nothing great but Mind.

Strike out the last word, and insert "Muscle." The reader will please not misinterpret this remark. I admire the physically perfect man, loving everything out of doors, and animated by the spirit that takes him through polar snows and over mountain tops.

But I do not feel that mere muscular practice during a few years of college life really fosters this spirit.

Among the former inst.i.tutions of Was.h.i.+ngton of which the memory is worth preserving, was the Scientific Club. This was one of those small groups, more common in other cities than in Was.h.i.+ngton, of men interested in some field of thought, who meet at brief intervals at one another's houses, perhaps listen to a paper, and wind up with a supper. When or how the Was.h.i.+ngton Club originated, I do not know, but it was probably sometime during the fifties. Its members.h.i.+p seems to have been rather ill defined, for, although I have always been regarded as a member, and am mentioned in McCulloch's book as such, [1] I do not think I ever received any formal notice of election.

The club was not exclusively scientific, but included in its list the leading men who were supposed to be interested in scientific matters, and whose company was pleasant to the others. Mr. McCulloch himself, General Sherman, and Chief Justice Chase are examples of the members of the club who were of this cla.s.s.

It was at the club meetings that I made the acquaintance of General Sherman. His strong characteristics were as clearly seen at these evening gatherings as in a military campaign. His restlessness was such that he found it hard to sit still, especially in his own house, two minutes at a time. His terse sentences, leaving no doubt in the mind of the hearer as to what he meant, always had the same snap. One of his military letters is worth reviving.

When he was carrying on his campaign in Georgia against Hood, the latter was anxious that the war should damage general commercial interests as little as possible; so he sent General Sherman a letter setting forth the terms and conditions on which he, Hood, would refrain from burning the cotton in his line of march, but leave it behind,--at as great length and with as much detail as if it were a treaty of peace between two nations. Sherman's reply was couched in a single sentence: "I hope you will burn all the cotton you can, for all you don't burn I will." When he introduced two people, he did not simply mention their names, but told who each one was.

In introducing the adjutant-general to another officer who had just come into Was.h.i.+ngton, he added, "You know his signature."

Mr. McCulloch, who succeeded Mr. Chase as Secretary of the Treasury, was my beau ideal of an administrator. In his personal make-up, he was as completely the opposite of General Sherman as a man well could be. Deliberate, impa.s.sive, heavy of build, slow in physical movement, he would have been supposed, at first sight, a man who would take life easy, and concern himself as little as possible about public affairs. But, after all, there is a quality in the head of a great department which is quite distinct from sprightliness, and that is wisdom. This he possessed in the highest degree. The impress which he made on our fiscal system was not the product of what looked like energetic personal action, but of a careful study of the prevailing conditions of public opinion, and of the means at his disposal for keeping the movement of things in the right direction. His policy was what is sometimes claimed, and correctly, I believe, to embody the highest administrative wisdom: that of doing nothing himself that he could get others to do for him.

In this way all his energies could be devoted to his proper work, that of getting the best men in office, and of devising measures from time to time calculated to carry the government along the lines which he judged to be best for the public interests.

The name of another attendant at the meetings of the club has from time to time excited interest because of its connection with a fundamental principle of evolutionary astronomy. This principle, which looks paradoxical enough, is that up to a certain stage, as a star loses heat by radiation into s.p.a.ce, its temperature becomes higher. It is now known as Lane's Law. Some curiosity as to its origin, as well as the personality of its author, has sometimes been expressed. As the story has never been printed, I ask leave to tell it.

Among the attendants at the meetings of the Scientific Club was an odd-looking and odd-mannered little man, rather intellectual in appearance, who listened attentively to what others said, but who, so far as I noticed, never said a word himself. Up to the time of which I am speaking, I did not even know his name, as there was nothing but his oddity to excite any interest in him.

One evening about the year 1867, the club met, as it not infrequently did, at the home of Mr. McCulloch. After the meeting Mr. W. B. Taylor, afterward connected with the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution in an editorial capacity, accompanied by the little man, set out to walk to his home, which I believe was somewhere near the Smithsonian grounds. At any rate, I joined them in their walk, which led through these grounds. A few days previous there had appeared in the "Reader," an English weekly periodical having a scientific character, an article describing a new theory of the sun.

The view maintained was that the sun was not a molten liquid, as had generally been supposed up to that time, but a ma.s.s of incandescent gas, perhaps condensed at its outer surface, so as to form a sort of immense bubble. I had never before heard of the theory, but it was so plausible that there could be no difficulty in accepting it. So, as we wended our way through the Smithsonian grounds, I explained the theory to my companions in that _ex cathedra_ style which one is apt to a.s.sume in setting forth a new idea to people who know little or nothing of the subject. My talk was mainly designed for Mr. Taylor, because I did not suppose the little man would take any interest in it. I was, therefore, much astonished when, at a certain point, he challenged, in quite a decisive tone, the correctness of one of my propositions. In a rather more modest way, I tried to maintain my ground, but was quite silenced by the little man informing us that he had investigated the whole subject, and found so and so--different from what I had been laying down.

I immediately stepped down from the pontifical chair, and asked the little man to occupy it and tell us more about the matter, which he did. Whether the theorem to which I have alluded was included in his statement, I do not recall. If it was not, he told me about it subsequently, and spoke of a paper he had published, or was about to publish, in the "American Journal of Science." I find that this paper appeared in Volume L. in 1870.

Naturally I cultivated the acquaintance of such a man. His name was J. Homer Lane. He was quite alone in the world, having neither family nor near relative, so far as any one knew. He had formerly been an examiner or something similar in the Patent Office, but under the system which prevailed in those days, a man with no more political influence than he had was very liable to lose his position, as he actually did. He lived in a good deal such a habitation and surroundings as men like Johnson and Goldsmith lived in in their time.

If his home was not exactly a garret, it came as near it as a lodging of the present day ever does.

After the paper in question appeared, I called Mr. Lane's attention to the fact that I did not find any statement of the theorem which he had mentioned to me to be contained in it. He admitted that it was contained in it only impliedly, and proceeded to give me a very brief and simple demonstration.

So the matter stood, until the centennial year, 1876, when Sir William Thomson paid a visit to this country. I pa.s.sed a very pleasant evening with him at the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution, engaged in a discussion, some points of which he afterwards mentioned in an address to the British a.s.sociation. Among other matters, I mentioned this law, originating with Mr. J. Homer Lane. He did not think it could be well founded, and when I attempted to reproduce Mr. Lane's verbal demonstration, I found myself unable to do so.

I told him I felt quite sure about the matter, and would write to him on the subject. When I again met Mr. Lane, I told him of my difficulty and asked him to repeat the demonstration. He did so at once, and I sent it off to Sir William. The latter immediately accepted the result, and published a paper on the subject, in which the theorem was made public for the first time.