"I am grown much thinner than I was six months ago: when I look
at my hands, they put me so in mind of what your dear father's
were, when I saw them tremble under my eyes, as we latterly
played at backgammon together."

It has long been the reproach of England that she treats, or rather that
her Government treats, her men of science, her artists, and her
litterateurs with a disgraceful parsimony. It would appear from the
following letter that Sir William Herschel was inadequately rewarded,
and that his sister felt this keenly:--


"There can be no harm," she says, "in telling my own dear
nephew that I never felt satisfied with the support your father
received towards his undertakings, and far less with the
ungracious manner in which it was granted. For the last sum
came with a message that more must never be asked for. (Oh! how
degraded I felt, even for myself, whenever I thought of it!)
And after all it came too late, and was not sufficient; for if
expenses had been out of question, there would not have been so
much time, and labour, and expense, for twenty-four men were at
times by turns, day and night, at work, wasted on the first
mirror, which had come out too light in the casting (Alex more
than once would have destroyed it secretly, if I had not
persuaded him against it); and without two mirrors, you know,
such an instrument cannot be always ready for observing.

"But what grieved me most was that to the last your poor father