“The observatory stands in Greenwich Park, the prettiest park I have yet seen; being a group of small hills.  They point out oaks said to belong to Elizabeth’s time—­noble oaks of any time.  The observatory is one hundred and fifty feet above the sea level.  The view from it is, of course, beautiful.  On the north the river, the little Thames, big with its fleet, is winding around the Isle of Dogs; on the left London, always overhung with a cloud of smoke, through which St. Paul’s and the Houses of Parliament peep.

“Mr. Airy was exceedingly kind to me, and seemed to take great interest in showing me around.  He appeared to be much gratified by my interest in the history of the observatory.  He is naturally a despot, and his position increases this tendency.  Sitting in his chair, the zero-point of longitude for the world, he commands not only the little knot of observers and computers around him, but when he says to London, ’It is one o’clock,’ London adopts that time, and her ships start for their voyages around the globe, and continue to count their time from that moment, wherever the English flag is borne.

“It is singular what a quiet motive-power Science is, the breath of a nation’s progress.

“Mr. Airy is not favorable to the multiplication of observatories.  He predicted the failure of that at Albany.  He says that he would gladly destroy one-half of the meridian instruments of the world, by way of reform.  I told him that my reform movement would be to bring together the astronomers who had no instruments and the instruments which had no astronomers.

“Mr. Airy is exceedingly systematic.  In leading me by narrow passages and up steep staircases, from one room to another of the irregular collection of rooms, he was continually cautioning me about my footsteps, and in one place he seemed to have a kind of formula:  ’Three steps at this place, ten at this, eleven at this, and three again.’  So, in descending a ladder to the birthplace of the galvanic currents, he said, ’Turn your back to the stairs, step down with the right foot, take hold with the right hand; reverse the operation in ascending; do not, on coming out, turn around at once, but step backwards one step first.’

“Near the throne of the astronomical autocrat is another proof of his system, in a case of portfolios.  These contain the daily bills, letters, and papers, as they come in and are answered in order.  When a portfolio is full, the papers are removed and are sewed together.  Each year’s accumulation is bound, and the bound volumes of Mr. Airy’s time nearly cover one side of his private room.

“Mr. Airy replies to all kinds of letters, with two exceptions:  those which ask for autographs, and those which request him to calculate nativities.  Both of these are very frequent.

“In the drawing-room Mr. Airy is cheery; he loves to recite ballads and knows by heart a mass of verses, from ‘A, Apple Pie,’ to the ’Lady of the Lake.’