It was a work of devotion to a father's memory and greatness, executed with untiring zeal and sometimes at the risk of broken bones. She was unable to read this record of the splendid work her nephew accomplished, when four years of laborious research, and a longer period of study were at last crowned with presenting to the world a book, of which "it may be safely said, that no single publication, during the last century, has made so many and such considerable additions to our knowledge of the constitution of the heavens." What she could not read herself, another read for her, as her nephew recommended when he sent her a copy of the work.
As the end of life and activity drew nearer, there is no longer the same desire to live she felt in previous years: "I have been very ill and confined to my room now three weeks, but it seems the Destroying Angel has passed away, at which I am very glad, because I wish to be a little better prepared for making my exit than I am at present." She was then eighty years of age. A few years later she began to feel more keenly the sadness of life, and the longing for something better than it ever gives. Many of the best and brightest minds have felt as she felt when she wrote these words: "The whole of yesterday I had no other prospect but that it would have been the last of the days of sorrow, trouble and disappointment I have spent from the moment I had any recollection of my existence, which is from between my third and fourth year. . . . In the night I fell out of one fainting fit into another, and when I came to my recollection, between six and seven in the morning, I found Dr. G. sitting before me talking loud in his usual nonsensical
