Page:Memoir and correspondence of Caroline Herschel (1876).djvu/100

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CHAPTER III.


LIFE AFTER HER BROTHER'S MARRIAGE.


With the second volume of "Recollections" all connected narrative and detailed relation of daily events ceases, and for the ten years from 1788 to 1798 there is not even the journal, which, however, was resumed in the latter year. All has been destroyed. An event so important as her brother's marriage[1] is only noticed as fixing the date when the "place of a housekeeper" had to be resigned. Miss Herschel lived from henceforth in lodgings, coming every day for her work, and in all respects continuing the same labours as her brother's assistant and secretary as before. But it is not to be supposed that a nature so strong and a heart so affectionate should accept the new state of things without much and bitter suffering. To resign the supreme place by her brother's side which she had filled for sixteen years with such hearty devotion could

  1. Dr. Herschel married Mary, only child of Mr. James Baldwin, a merchant of the City of London, and widow of John Pitt, Esq., by whom she had one son, who died in early youth. She was a lady of singular amiability and gentleness of character. The jointure which she brought enabled Dr. Herschel to pursue his scientific career without any anxiety about money matters.