Agnes Mary Clerke and Ellen Mary Clerke: an Appreciation

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AGNES MARY CLERKE AND ELLEN MARY CLERKE

... “above these heavens, which here we see, Be others farre exceeding these in light.”

E. SPENSER. [An Hymne of Heavenly Beautie.]

AGNES MARY CLERKE.]

AGNES MARY CLERKE AND ELLEN MARY CLERKE

AN APPRECIATION BY LADY HUGGINS HON. MEM. R.A.S.

PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION 1907

FOREWORD

Lady Huggins in her original draft of the obituary notice of my sister Agnes, which appeared in the Astrophysical Journal, included some words of personal appreciation and of reference to her family which were omitted from the copy sent for publication, as being, possibly, somewhat beyond the scope of a purely scientific journal. At my request Lady Huggins has consented to the full original draft, with a few additions, being published for private circulation. She has also, to my great gratification, and entirely on her own initiative, taken this opportunity of adding an appreciation of my elder sister.

My sisters’ acquaintance with Lady Huggins commenced only after they had been some time permanently resident in London; and for the accuracy of the statements relating to their earlier lives I am alone responsible. Their father had died before the period of which Lady Huggins speaks from personal knowledge; and perhaps it is fit that I should supplement what she says as to the influence of family life upon the characters and careers of my sisters by mentioning a few facts connected with my father. Although a classical scholar of Trinity College, Dublin, his interests were for the most part scientific. In our earliest years his recreation was chemistry, the consequential odours of which used to excite the wrath of our Irish servants. Later a “big telescope” (4 inch aperture) was mounted in the garden, and we children were occasionally treated to a glimpse of Saturn’s rings, or Jupiter’s satellites. In an age before railways and telegraphs had reached the remote parts of Ireland and before clocks were “synchronised with Greenwich,” the local time would have gone “all agley” had it not been for my father’s observations with his “orthochronograph.” These trivial things show that it was in an environment of scientific suggestion that our early lives were passed; and to me, at all events, my father’s influence was more than suggestion, for to his painstaking teaching I have to attribute any little successes which I subsequently achieved.

It is difficult for me to express to Lady Huggins my thanks in fitting terms, for to thank implies a service; and her work has been not a service to me, but a labour of love for those whose simple lives she records. Still I may say that I am deeply gratified by this finished product of her pen, and that I rejoice that she should have conceived the idea of writing this Appreciation, thereby enabling me to place it before the eyes of many friends.

I have to thank Director Frost of the Yerkes Observatory for his permission to reprint that part of the “Appreciation” which has already appeared.

AUBREY ST. JOHN CLERKE.

68 REDCLIFFE SQUARE, S.W.

CONTENTS

PAGE

AGNES MARY CLERKE 1

LIST OF PAPERS CONTRIBUTED TO THE Edinburgh Review 37

ELLEN MARY CLERKE 39

ILLUSTRATIONS

AGNES MARY CLERKE Frontispiece From a Photograph

MRS. CLERKE Facing page 1 From a Bust

ELLEN MARY CLERKE ” 39 From a Photograph

MRS. CLERKE.

From a bust executed in Rome in 1868.]

AGNES MARY CLERKE

Agnes Mary Clerke was born on February 10, 1842, at Skibbereen, a small country town in a remote part of the County Cork. Her father was John William Clerke; and her mother was a sister of the late Lord Justice Deasy.

Constitutionally delicate, Agnes Clerke from her earliest years, as so often is to be noticed in cases of frail health, found her chief delight in literary study and in music. From quiet talks often enjoyed with her in her later life, it was clear that the thoughtfulness of Agnes Clerke, and her liking for probing difficult problems, must have developed early.

Part 2

This is not the place for enlarging upon the family influences of her home life, but it should be said that these were truly fostering, and that she was a devoted and loving daughter, to whom the parental sympathy, strongly given on both sides, was at once inspiration and joy. Mrs. Clerke was a remarkable woman, with rare powers of insight and of capacity for love. Her conversational powers were of a high order, as was her musical ability. Those privileged to be present at her afternoon gatherings will not easily forget their pleasures; and intimate friends will long remember the charms of her music. Her rendering of old Irish airs on Ireland’s national instrument--the harp--was delightful; and so indeed was her piano-playing. She told me one day near the close of her life, when near her eightieth birthday, that she practised on her instruments every day. This was interesting; and showed that power of persevering work--even under the natural disabilities of age--which was a marked feature in her daughter Agnes.

The bust, a photograph of which is here reproduced, was executed in Rome when Mrs. Clerke was about fifty years of age.

In considering the fostering influences of Agnes Clerke’s home life, that of her only brother, Aubrey St. John Clerke, should be mentioned.

Mr. Clerke won the first gold medal of Trinity College, Dublin, in Mathematics at his Degree examination in 1865, and was awarded a studentship of £100 a year for seven years--the highest honour obtainable at the Degree examination. He also won the second gold medal conferred by the University for Experimental and Natural Science.

Mr. Clerke has told me--what indeed I always believed--that although not professing to be a mathematician, his sister’s perception of mathematical truth was singularly clear; and I feel sure that her brother’s mathematical powers and knowledge of Natural Science were a great advantage to her, for the helpfulness of thorough sympathy is very great. In her later life she took lessons in mathematics, and expatiated to me on the pleasure she felt in them. Not that she aimed at making herself a mathematician; she was too wise to so err. Her object was simply to go far enough to enable her to do better her own particular work. No one that I have known--man or woman--better understood that the half may be better than the whole; that the art of doing, consists, greatly, in--not doing. She could renounce. And in these days great renunciation is necessary if useful work is to be done.

In 1861 the Clerke family moved to Dublin, and in 1863 to Queenstown. The winters of 1867 and of 1868 were spent at Rome; those of 1871 and 1872 at Naples; and the next four winters at Florence--the summers of 1874-76 being passed at the Bagni di Lucca. Both sisters profited to the full from this sojourn in Italy, as their subsequent writings show; but Agnes at Florence worked specially hard, reading constantly in the Public Library there, and always, I believe, with one great object before her.

It is a question of much interest to examine into the early leanings and aspirations of those who distinguish themselves later, and Agnes Clerke early determined her life work. Before leaving Skibbereen, about the age of fifteen, she had clearly before her the intention of writing a history of Astronomy, and it is thought, had actually written a few chapters. Her first article accepted for the Edinburgh Review, is in harmony with the above facts.

Agnes Clerke’s first wish to examine into Science generally, was roused by the perusal of Joyce’s Scientific Dialogues; but as regards Astronomy, Sir John Herschel’s Outlines was her earliest guide--and I can imagine how much this really great book was to her, from my own early use of it.

* * * * *

Well do I remember reading an article in the Edinburgh Review for October 1880, on “The Chemistry of the Stars.” I admired it much: I wondered who had written it, for it seemed to me to be unlike the work of any one then known in the scientific world. Five years later I solved my puzzle, for in 1885 appeared the History of Astronomy in the Nineteenth Century; and I had not looked far into it before I exclaimed: “Now I know who wrote that article in the Edinburgh Review!”

Shortly after--dining at a house where to dine was always to share in a feast of reason and flow of soul--and sitting between our distinguished and kindly host Sir William Bowman, and Sir Robert Ball, Sir Robert and I exchanged ideas about the new History of Astronomy, and about its author, the new “Unknown.” With all his own acuteness, Sir Robert showed that the writer could not be a practical astronomer. But I was delighted to find that my admiration for the History was fully shared by him, and that his praise of it was very warm.

Shortly afterwards I entered upon a friendship, and upon a companionship in Astronomy, which have been among my best pleasures.

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