The Royal Observatory, Greenwich. E. Walter Maunder

followed up the study of its variations with the greatest energy. For this purpose it was necessary that he should travel, in view of the great importance of the subject to navigation. King William III. gave him a captain's commission in the Royal Navy—a curious and interesting illustration of the close connection between astronomy and the welfare of our navy—and placed him in command of a 'pink,' that is to say, a small vessel with pointed stern, named the Paramour, in which he proceeded to the southern ocean. His first voyage was unfortunate, but the Paramour was recommissioned in 1699, and he sailed in it as far as south latitude 52°.

      In 1701 and the succeeding year he made further voyages in the Paramour, surveying the tides and coasts of the British Channel and of the Adriatic, and helping in the fortification of Trieste. He became Savilian Professor of Geometry at Oxford in 1703, having failed twelve years previously to secure the Savilian Professorship of Astronomy, mainly through the opposition of Flamsteed, who had already formed a strong prejudice against him, which some writers have traced to Halley's detection of several errors in one of Flamsteed's tide-tables, others to Halley's supposed materialistic views. Probably the difference was innate in the two men. There was likely to be but little sympathy between the strong, masterful man of action and society and the secluded, self-conscious, suffering invalid. At any rate, in the contest between Newton and Flamsteed, which has been already described, Halley took warmly the side of the former, and was appointed to edit the publication of Flamsteed's results, and, on the death of the latter, to succeed him at the Royal Observatory.

      The condition of things at Greenwich when Halley succeeded to the post of Astronomer Royal in 1720 was most discouraging. The instruments there had all belonged to Flamsteed, and therefore, most naturally, had been removed by his widow. The Observatory had practically to be begun de novo, and Halley had now almost attained the age at which in the present day an Astronomer Royal would have to retire. More fortunate, however, than his predecessor, he was able to get a grant for instruments, and he equipped the Observatory as well as the resources of the time permitted, and his transit instrument and great eight-foot quadrant still hang upon the Observatory walls.

      As Astronomer Royal his great work was the systematic observation of the positions of the moon through an entire saros. As is well known, a period of eighteen years and ten or eleven days brings the sun and moon very nearly into the same positions relatively to the earth which they occupied at the commencement of the period. This period was well known to the ancient Chaldeans, who gave it its name, since they had noticed that eclipses of the sun or eclipses of the moon recurred at intervals of the above length. It was Halley's desire to obtain such a set of observations of the moon through an entire saros period as to be able to deduce therefrom an improved set of tables of the moon's motion. It was an ambitious scheme for a man so much over sixty to undertake, nevertheless he carried it through successfully.

      His desire to complete this scheme, and to found upon it improved lunar tables, hindered him from publishing his observations, for he feared that others might make use of them before he was in a position to complete his work himself. This omission to publish troubled Newton, who, as President of the Royal Society—the Greenwich Board of Visitors having lapsed at Queen Anne's death—drew attention at a meeting of the Royal Society, March 2, 1727, to Halley's disobedience of the order issued under Queen Anne, for the prompt communication of the Observatory results. That Newton should thus have put public pressure upon Halley, the man to whom he was so much indebted, and with whom there was so close an affection, is sufficient proof that his similar attitude towards Flamsteed was one of principle and not of arbitrariness. Halley, on his side, stood firm, as Flamsteed had done, urging the danger that, by publishing before he had completed his task, he might give an opportunity to others to forestall his results. It is said—probably without sufficient ground—that this refusal broke Newton's heart and caused his death. Certainly Halley's writings in that very year show his reverence and affection for Newton to have been as keen and lively as ever.

      Halley's work at the Observatory went on smoothly, on the lines he had laid down for himself, for ten years after Newton's death; but in 1737 he had a stroke of paralysis, and his health, which had been remarkably robust up to that time, began to give way. He died January 14, 1742, and was buried in the cemetery of Lee Church.

      As an astronomer, his services to the science rank higher than those of his predecessor; but as Astronomer Royal, as director, that is to say, of Greenwich Observatory, he by no means accomplished as much as Flamsteed had done. Professor Grant, in his History of Physical Astronomy, says that he seems to have undervalued those habits of minute attention which are indispensable to the attainment of a high degree of excellence in the practice of astronomical observation. He was far from being sufficiently careful as to the adjustment of his instruments, the going of his clocks, or the recording of his own observations. The important feature of his administration was that under him the Observatory was first supplied with instruments which belonged to it.

      HALLEY'S QUADRANT.

       (From an old print.)

      His astronomical work apart from the Observatory was of the first importance. He practically inaugurated the study of terrestrial magnetism, and his map giving the results of his observations during his voyage in the Paramour introduced a new and most useful style of recording observations. He joined together by smooth curves places of equal variation, the result being that the chart shows at a glance, not merely the general course of the variation over the earth's surface, but its value at any spot within the limits of the chart.

      Another work which has justly made his name immortal was the prediction of the return of the comet which is called by his name, to which reference will be made later. Another great scheme, and one destined to bear much fruit, was the working out of a plan to determine the distance of the sun by observations of the transit of Venus.

      Of attractive appearance, pleasing manners, and ready wit, loyal, generous, and free from self-seeking, he probably was one of the most personally engaging men who ever held the office.

      The salary of the Astronomer Royal remained under Halley at the same inadequate rate which it had done under Flamsteed—£100, without provision for an assistant. But in 1729 Queen Caroline, learning that Halley had actually had a captain's commission in the Royal Navy, secured for him a post-captain's pay.