Abstract
In 1848, the winds of revolution were blowing once again. King Louis Philippe, who had reigned since the July revolution of 1830, failed to take notice. His “bourgeois” monarchy had become increasingly authoritarian and out of touch, his sole advice to the poor being to get rich. On February 23, a revolt broke out in several places in Paris. By morning, the rebels were in control of the area from the quais to the boulevards, on both sides of the rue Saint-Denis. The director of the Paris Observatory, old François Arago, was an ardent republican who had known Louis Philippe in the days when he had posed as a Jacobin. He now fought by the side of the working men against the soldiers of the king. The outcome was decided when Louis Philippe called the National Guard to arms. Instead of turning on the rebels, they immediately placed themselves in the army’s way, crying “Vive la Réforme!” preventing them from charging. After learning what had taken place in Paris, Louis Philippe, disguised as a Norman bourgeois, made his way in a farmer’s cart to Honfleur and boarded a small boat for England.
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Notes and References
C. Flammarion, Popular Astronomy, trans. J. Ellard Gore (London: Chatto & Win-dus, 1894), 466.
Charles Joseph, Etienne Wolf, Histoire de l’Observatoire de Paris de sa fondationa 1973 (Paris: Gauthier-Villars, 1902), 194.
M. J. Bertrand, L’Académie et les Académiciens, de 1666 a 1793; quoted in ibid., 215.
For a vivid, but not balanced, appraisal of Airy’s rule, see Joseph Ashbrook, “The Airy Regime at Greenwich,” in Astronomical Scrapbook (Cambridge, Mass. Sky Publishing Corporation 1984), 41–47.
E. Dunkin, “M. Le Verrier,” The Observatory 1, 199–206:204 (1877).
Sources for Flammarion’s life include his autobiographical Mémoires biographiques et philosophiques d’un astronome (Paris: E. Flammarion, 1911), Emile Touchet, La Vie et L’Oeuvre de Camille Flammarion, Bulletin Societé de Astronomique de France 39, 341–365 (1925),
and Luigi Prestinenza, “Camille Flammarion,” L’Astronomia 52, 34–44 (1986);
above all, see the very readable biography by Philippe de la Cotardière and Patrick Fuentes, Camille Flammarion (Paris: Flammarion, 1994).
Quoted in Cotardière and Fuentes, 51.
Ibid., 50.
Ibid.
Ibid., 56.
Samuel Johnson, Lives of the English Poets: A Selection [London: Dent (Everyman’s Library)], 106.
J. C. Adams, “Address on Presenting the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society to M. Le Verrier,” in Scientific Papers, vol. 1, p. 357.
U. J. J. Le Verrier, “Nouvelles recherches sur les mouvements des planètes,” Comptes Rendu 29, 1–3:2 (1849).
Jacques Laskar, “Appendix: The stability of the solar system from Laplace to the present,” in Planetary Astronomy from the Renaissance to the Rise of Astrophysics, Part B, eds. Taton and Wilson, 245. As later shown by Henri Poincaré, the series approximations used by astronomers were in general divergent; thus they only served to represent the motions of the planets for a limited period of time. Since then, computers have been used to show that for the smaller planets, their motion becomes chaotic, preventing all prediction beyond about 100 million years. Or as Laskar says, the solar system is unstable (p. 247).
Zachary, 74.
Ibid., 81.
U. J. J. Le Verrier, “Lettre de M. Le Verrier à M. Faye sur la théorie de Mercure et sur le mouvement du périhélie de cette planète,” Comptes Rendu 59, 379 (1859).
U. J. J. Le Verrier, “Theorie du mouvement de Mercure,” Annales de l’Observatoire Impérial de Paris (Mémoirs) V, 78 (1859). Hereafter “Theorie.”
Ibid., 99.
Le Verrier, “Lettre à Faye,” 381.
Ibid., 381.
Cited by Hanson, 369.
The authors are indebted to Professor Donald E. Osterbrock for the lucid explanation given here.
Le Verrier, “Theorie,” 105. Hanson considers it possible that in the mid-1840s Le Verrier may have considered the existence of a sun-obscured planet, i.e., a planet in line with the Earth and Sun, hence never visible like the old antichthon of the Greeks. However, this straight-line configuration would be unstable, as demonstrated by Le Verrier’s colleague J. Liouville, “Sur un cas particulier du problem des trois corps,” Comptes Rendu 14, 503–506 (1842). See Hanson, 368 and 377–378.
Le Verrier, “Theorie,” 105.
Le Verrier, “Lettre à Faye,”383.
J. H. Schroeter, Beobachtungen über die Sonnenfackeln und Sonnenflecken (Erfurt: Georg Adam Keyser, 1789).
See “Extract of a Letter from M. Schwabe to Mr. Carrington,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 17, 241 (1857); also “Address Delivered by the President, M. J. Johnson, Esq. on Presenting the Gold Medal of the Royal Society to M. Schwabe.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 17, 126–131 (1857).
Schwabe, “Extract,” 241.
Ibid.
Joseph Ashbrook, “Julius Schmidt: An Incredible Visual Observer,” in Astronomical Scrapbook, 253.
E. C. Herrick, “Lettre de M. Herrick à M. Le Verrier,” Comptes Rendu 49, 810–812 (1859).
See also Herrick, “Supposed Planet between Mercury and the Sun,” American Journal of Science, Series 2, 28, 445–446 (1859). Herrick notes p. 445, “In this connection it may be worthwhile to state that there are already on record observations which make it highly probable that there exists an intra-Mercurial planet with a satellite.” He then quotes Wartmann p. 446, “that Pas-torff, of Bucholz, an attentive observer of the solar spots, saw twice in 1836 and once in 1837 two round black spots of unequal size, moving across the sun, changing their place rapidly, and pursuing each time routes somewhat different.” In 1834 Pastorff also claimed to have seen two small bodies, suggesting a planet and its satellite, pass across the Sun no less than six times; they required only a few hours for their transits. “They had the appearance... like that of Mercury in its transits” (p. 446).
R. Wolf, Mittheilungen über die Sonnenflecken (10), (1859).
T. Dick, Celestial Scenery: Or, The Wonders of the Planetary System Displayed; Illustrating the Perfection of Deity and a Plurality of Worlds (London: Thomas Ward & Co. 1838), pp. 279–280.
Remark attributed to Benjamin Peirce as having been made at the Three Hundred and Forty-first Meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, January 7, 1851. Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences II, 251 (1852). See also ibid. IV, 411 (1854).
D. Kirkwood, “On a New Analogy in the Periods of Rotation of the Primary Planets,” American Journal of Science and Arts, 2nd series., 9, 395–399 (1850).
For historical overview see R. L. Numbers, “The American Kepler: Daniel Kirkwood and His Analogy,” Journal for the History of Astronomy IV, 13–21 (1973).
J. Babinet, “Mémoire sur les nuages ignes du soleil considérés comme des masses planétaires, Comptes Rendu 22, 281–286 (1846).
“Lettre de M. Buys Ballot a M. Le Verrier,” Comptes Rendu 49, 812–813 (1859).
Tisserand, Traité de mécanique céleste (Paris, 1888–1896), vol. IV, preface.
Adams, “Address,” p. 356.
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© 1997 Richard Baum and William Sheehan
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Baum, R., Sheehan, W. (1997). Le Verrier’s Unfinished Business—Mercury. In: In Search of Planet Vulcan. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-6100-6_10
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