FullReads

It was more than a year after the fatal night,–if it all happened in the night, as I suppose,–that, as I dreamily read through the “Astronomical Record” in the new reading-room of the College Library at Cambridge, I lighted on this scrap:–

“Professor Karl Zitta of Breslau writes to the Astronomische Nachrichten to claim the discovery of a new asteroid observed by him on the night of March 31st.

App. A. R. App. Decl.
Bresl. M. T. h. m. s. h. m. s. @ ‘ ” Size.
March 31 12 53 51.9 15 39 52.32 -23 50 26.1 12.9
April 1 1 3 2.1 15 39 52.32 -23 9 1.9 12.9

He proposes for the asteroid the name of Phoebe. Dr. Zitta states that in the short period which he had for observing Phoebe, for an hour after midnight, her motion in R. A. seemed slight and her motion in declination very rapid.”

After this, however, for months, nay even to this moment, nothing more was heard of Dr. Zitta of Breslau.

But, one morning, before I was up, Haliburton came banging at my door on D Street. The mood had taken him, as he returned from some private theatricals at Cambridge, to take the comfort of the new reading-room at night, and thus express in practice his gratitude to the overseers of the college for keeping it open through all the twenty-four hours. Poor Haliburton, he did not sleep well in those times! Well, as he read away on the Astronomische Nachrichten itself, what should he find but this in German, which he copied for me, and then, all on foot in the rain and darkness, tramped over with, to South Boston:–

“The most enlightened head professor Dr. Gmelin writes to the director of the Porpol Astronomik at St. Petersburg, to claim the discovery of an asteroid in a very high southern latitude, of a wider inclination of the orbit, as will be noticed, than any asteroid yet observed.

“Planet’s apparent {alpha} 21^h. 20^m. 51^s.40. Planet’s apparent {delta}-39@ 31′ 11”.9. Comparison star {alpha}.

“Dr. Gmelin publishes no separate second observation, but is confident that the declination is diminishing. Dr. Gmelin suggests for the name of this extra-zodiacal planet `Io,’ as appropriate to its wanderings from the accustomed ways of planetary life, and trusts that the very distinguished Herr Peters, the godfather of so many planets, will relinquish this name, already claimed for the asteroid (85) observed by him, September 15, 1865.”

I had run down stairs almost as I was, slippers and dressing-gown being the only claims I had on society. But to me, as to Haliburton, this stuff about “extra- zodiacal wandering” blazed out upon the page, and though there was no evidence that the “most enlightened” Gmelin found anything the next night, yet, if his “diminishing” meant anything, there was, with Zitta’s observation,– whoever Zitta might be,–something to start upon. We rushed upon some old bound volumes of the Record and spotted the “enlightened Gmelin.” He was chief of a college at Taganrog, where perhaps they had a spyglass. This gave us the parallax of his observation. Breslau, of course, we knew, and so we could place Zitta’s, and with these poor data I went to work to construct, if I could, an orbit for this Io-Phoebe mass of brick and mortar. Haliburton, not strong in spherical trigonometry, looked out logarithms for me till breakfast, and, as soon as it would do, went over to Mrs. Bowdoin, to borrow her telescope, ours being left at No. 9.

Mrs. Bowdoin was kind, as she always was, and at noon Haliburton appeared in triumph with the boxes on P. Nolan’s job-wagon. We always employ P., in memory of dear old Phil. We got the telescope rigged, and waited for night, only, alas! to be disappointed again. Io had wandered somewhere else, and, with all our sweeping back and forth on the tentative curve I had laid out, Io would not appear. We spent that night in vain.