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Having observed that he particularly admired a brass globe, which, by means of internal wheelwork, imitated the diurnal motion of the heavens, the rising and setting of the sun, and the phases of the moon, Tycho made him a present of it, and received in return an elegant gold chain, with his Majesty's picture, with an assurance of his unalterable attachment and protection.
He offered to give him a grant for life of the island of Huen, between Denmark and Sweden, and to construct and furnish with instruments, at his own expense, an observatory, as well as a house for the accommodation of his family, together with a laboratory for carrying on his chemical inquiries. Tycho, who truly loved his country, was deeply affected with the munificence of the royal offer.
Hipparchus and the Greek astronomers of the Alexandrian school, shaking off the vagaries of magic and divination, placed astronomy on a scientific basis, though the reaction of the Middle Ages caused even such a great astronomer as Tycho Brahe himself to revert for a time to the practice of astrology. The transparent sky of Egypt, rarely obscured by clouds, greatly favored Ptolemy's observations.
It is quite visible from the earth; and astronomers can study it with ease, particularly during the phase between the last quarter and the new moon, because then the shadows are thrown lengthways from east to west, allowing them to measure the heights. This Copernicus forms the most important of the radiating system, situated in the southern hemisphere, according to Tycho Brahe.
A similar phenomenon occurred in the year 1604, when the new star in this case appearing in the constellation of Serpentarius was explained by Kepler as probably proceeding from a vast combustion. This explanation in which Kepler is said to have followed. Tycho is fully in accord with the most recent theories on the subject, as we shall see in due course.
To avoid the possibility of further objection he carried out this demonstration separately for each of the systems of Ptolemy, Copernicus, and Tycho. For the new method he noticed that great accuracy was required in the reduction of the observed places of Mars to the ecliptic, and for this purpose the value obtained for the parallax by Tycho's assistants fell far short of the requisite accuracy.
Johann Kepler is the name of the man whose place, as is generally agreed, would have been the most difficult to fill among all those who have contributed to the advance of astronomical knowledge. He was born at Wiel, in the Duchy of Wurtemberg, in 1571. He held an appointment at Gratz, in Styria, and went to join Tycho Brahe in Prague, and to assist in reducing his observations.
On Tycho's death, which occurred soon after, an opening presented itself which gave Kepler the opportunity his genius demanded. He was appointed to succeed Tycho in the position of imperial mathematician. But a far more important point, both for Kepler and for science, was that to him was confided the use of Tycho's observations.
After treating of the distances of the various heavenly bodies, of the independent light of the sun and the fixed stars and the reflected light of the planets, among which the earth belongs, Descartes discusses the motion of the heavenly bodies. In reference to the motion of the earth he seeks a middle course between the theories of Copernicus and Tycho Brahé.
In later days two mighty swans have been seen to fly from the nest. A light shone far through the air, far over the lands of the earth; the swan, with the strong beating of his wings, scattered the twilight mists, and the starry sky was seen, and it was as if it came nearer to the earth. That was the swan Tycho Brahe. "Yes, then," you say; "but in our own days?"
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