permanent instrumental outfit, including two mural circles by Simms and Jones respectively, a transit, and 7½-foot equatorial by Dollond, claimed his presence in Europe in December 1838, and while there he fell in with the movement recently set on foot by Humboldt for carrying out a connected scheme of magnetic research all over the world. Authorised by the rajah, he purchased a set of instruments of the pattern devised by Dr. Lloyd for the British stations, and on his return to Trevandrum in April 1841 a magnetic and meteorological observatory was erected for their reception. A great mass of observations was quickly accumulated, copies of which were forwarded to the Royal Society, as well as to the court of directors of the East India Company. Their publication was undertaken by the rajah, after Caldecott had made a journey to England in 1846, with the futile hope of enlisting the aid of some scientific society; and in their laborious preparation for the press he was deeply engaged until his death at Trevandrum, of paralysis, on 16 Dec. 1849.
Caldecott showed great energy in overcoming the difficulties attendant on scientific work in India, and collected materials of value despite inevitable shortcomings. His experiments (1842–5) on the temperature of the ground at various depths possessed a special interest as being the first of the kind made within the tropics (Trans. R. Soc. of Ed. xvi. 369). They showed, contrary to the assertion of Kupffer, that the earth is there 5° to 6° F. hotter than the air, and disproved the invariability of temperature at a depth of one foot, imagined by Boussingault, and used by Poisson to support his mathematical theory of heat. Caldecott presented to the British Association in 1840 a series of horary meteorological observations begun June 1837 in pursuance of a suggestion by Sir John Herschel (Report, 1840, ii. 28); and experimented, with Taylor of the Madras observatory, July to October 1837, on the direction and intensity of the magnetic force in southern India (Madras Journal, ix. 221). He first drew scientific attention to the bi-annual inversion of the law of variation near the magnetic equator, but attributed the change to the influence of the monsoon (see Trans. R. Soc. of Ed. xxiv. 670). He observed and computed elements for the great comet of 1843 (Mem. R. A. Soc. xv. 229); and his observations of that of 1845 proved available for Hind's calculations of its path (Astr. Nach. No. 540; Month. Not. vi. 215). The solar eclipse of 21 Dec. 1843 was observed by him at Parratt, near the source of the Mahé river, where it just fell short of totality, but afforded a striking view of Baily's beads (Mem. R. A. Soc. xv. 171). He was elected a fellow both of the Royal Astronomical and of the Royal Societies in 1840.
[Bombay Times, 2 Jan. 1850; Athenæum, 9 Feb. 1850; Annual Reg. 1849, p. 299; Broun's Report on Trevandrum Observatories; R. Soc. Cat. Sc. Papers.]
CALDECOTT, RANDOLPH (1846–1886), artist, was born at Chester on 22 March 1846, his father being an accountant of good standing, and one of the founders of the Institute of Accountants in England. He was educated at King Henry VIII's School in his native town, where he and his two brothers were successively head-boys. Among his earliest amusements as a child had been the cutting out of animals in wood, and as a schoolboy he won a prize for drawing. His father, however, seems to have discouraged these artistic tendencies, and in due time he left Chester to enter a bank at Whitchurch in Shropshire. The bank life of a little country place was not very exacting, nor without its relaxations, while the agricultural character of the surrounding district stimulated his inborn love of rural sights and scenes. While at Whitchurch he lodged with a yeoman-farmer in the neighbourhood, thus gaining further facilities for making the intimate acquaintance of horses and dogs, to say nothing of occasional opportunities for hunting. From Whitchurch he was transferred to the Manchester and Salford Bank at Manchester, where his advance was rapid. It had long been his practice to sketch from nature such picturesque details or animals as struck his fancy, and about 1871 he appears to have visited London with a view to begin life as an artist. Mr. Armstrong, the art-director of the science and art department at South Kensington, was one of his earliest advisers, and he recommended him to continue to study, but not to relinquish his occupation. A year later Caldecott came to London, and shortly afterwards began drawing for ‘London Society’ and other periodicals. He received much kind assistance from Mr. Henry Blackburn; and he made the acquaintance, among others, of the sculptor Dalou, in whose studio he worked and modelled. He devoted himself with great assiduity to the improvement of his artistic gifts, not only copying, but frequently dissecting, birds and animals. Some time previous to 1875 arrived the opportunity which gave him his first distinction as a thoroughly original and individual artist. Mr. James D. Cooper, the well-
