The result was that, if it happened to clear off after a cloudy evening, I frequently arose from my bed at any hour of the night or morning and walked two miles to the observatory to make some observation included in the programme.

We are probably nearing the limit of all we can know about astronomy.

Though born in Nova Scotia, I am of almost pure New England descent.

My father followed, during most of his life, the precarious occupation of a country school teacher.

I had not yet gotten into the world of light. But I felt as one who, standing outside, could knock against the wall and hear an answering knock from within.

The beginning of 1856 found me teaching in the family of a planter named Bryan, residing in Prince George County, Md., some fifteen or twenty miles from Washington.

My father was the most rational and the most dispassionate of men.