PROFESSOR CHARLES AUGUSTUS YOUNG

THE return to our College community of Professor Charles Augustus Young, after occupying the chair of Astronomy for twenty-eight years in Princeton, is a fitting occasion for placing before the alumni and friends of' Dartmouth College a brief sketch of his life, which through personal interests or those of his relatives has been for nearly a century closely woven into the affairs of the College. It is also well to note some of the investigations and discoveries which so frequently attracted the attention of the scientific world to Hanover, while he was Professor of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy in Dartmouth.

Since his resignation from Princeton .men of science have told of the high place they give Professor Young as one of their number, while poets, statesmen, the trustees of the University and the faculty have expressed their admiration and appreciation; the townspeople of Princeton have shown their fondness whenever his name was spoken ; and the students have manifested their esteem for "Twinkle" Young. One and all have tried to show their indebtedness for some good that he has brought into the life of each, for his simple life free from all conceit and ostentation has been a lesson to all about him, as they have seen him quietly and modestly come and go thinking and speaking good of all. As teacher, investigator, adviser, friend, and neighbor, Professor Young has been loved.

Professor Young's resignation from active service was submitted to the trustees of Princeton University in December last to take effect in June. It was accepted, and a minute expressing the high regard of the trustees for him and .their sincere regret at his departure was entered on their records, while he was made Professor Emeritus with a liberal salary. At once the entire University began to show its feeling. Professor Young's class in astronomy called at his home and presented a loving cup, while members of the faculty and board of trustees joined with some friends in giving at the Princeton Inn a formal dinner, at which Dean Andrew F. West was toast-master and the toasts were responded to by members of the faculty and board of trustees who had been invited to speak.

President Wilson and Ex-President Patton spoke of the fame that Professor Young had brought to Princeton, and of his remarkable scientific attainments, coupled with his extreme modesty and piety. Mr. Cleveland found it impossible at the last moment to attend the dinner, but he sent the following letter, in response to the toast, "He never sold the truth to serve the hour:"

PRINCETON, May 17, 1905.

Professor Andrew F. West, My dear Professor:

I feel that I am deprived of a great gratification by my inability to personally participate in the occasion which is to voice the affectionate farewell of the Faculty of Princeton University to the most distinguished of their number.

I hope, however, I may be allowed to express to those who love and admire Professor Young, my sure conviction that nothing can be said by them more completely embodying the exalted nobleness of the man they have assembled to honor, or more prophetic of his everlasting fame, than the words:

"He never sold the truth to serve the hour." His scientific achievements will during a long future illumine the world of progress and research: thousands whom he has guided to the height of knowledge will remember him and bless him ; his kindly nature and beautiful example will bear fruit in the lives and character of all brought within the circle of their ennobling influence; but in the infallible and indelible record of God, and on the hearts of those who in all time to come shall learn his life, there shall be written this clearest and most conclusive testimony to his greatness and goodness; "He never sold the truth to serve the hour."

Yours truly, GROVER CLEVELAND.

M. Taylor Pyne, speaking for the trustees of Princeton University said in part:

"Professor Young has been with us twentyeight years, and he is leaving with the esteem and best wishes of every one of us. Never has his name been mentioned in my hearing except with respect, love, and admiration. I hardly think he knows how very fondly he is esteemed by us all, and how much we appreciate him. I hope he will some day realize what it means to the students who have come out from under his instruction and have watched him studying and mastering great problems, keeping always a firm faith in his Maker."

Professor W. F. Magie spoke as a former pupil of Dr. Young, and paid a high tribute to his skill as a teacher, and Professor Henry Van Dyke recited the following poem which he had written for the occasion:

STARS AND THE SOUL

TO CHARLES A. YOUNG

"Two things," the wise man said, "fill me with awe:

"The starry heavens and the moral law." Nay add another marvel to thy scroll, — The living marvel of the human soul.

Born in the dust and cradled in the dark, It feels the fire of an immortal spark, And learns to read, with patient, fearless eyes, The splendid secret of the unconscious skies.

For God thought Light before He spoke the word ;

The darkness understood not, though it heard: But man looks up to where the planets swim, And thinks God's thoughts of glory after Him.

What knows the star that guides the sailor's way, Or lights the lovers' bower with liquid ray, Of toil and passion, danger and distress, Brave hope, true love, and utter faithfulness?

But the frail heart that, bearing good and ill, Holds fast to virtue with a loya-1 will, Lends to the law that rules our mortal life The star-surpassing victory of life.

So take our thanks, dear reader of the skies, Devout astronomer, most humbly wise, For lessons brighter than the stars can give, And inward light that helps us all to live.

The world has brought the laurel leaves to crown The star-discoverer's name with high renown; Accept the flower of love we lay with these, For influence sweeter than the Pleiades.

For though the hour has come when we must part, That influence long shall live within our heart, And we shall know thee travelling on thy way Into the brightness of a heavenly day.

Professor Cyrus F. Brackett spoke of Dr. Young's place in science, and on behalf of the faculty presented to him a handsome silver loving cup, with many admonitions that the form of the faculty's token should not give license for riotous living. Then the toast of the evening was proposed standing, Professor Young expressing his thanks in a few characteristically modest words, during which he took occasion to pay a graceful compliment to his successor in the chair of astronomy, Dr. Edgar Odell Lovett. The dinner closed with the singing of Auld Lang Syne and Old Nassau, and a triple cheer for Professor Young.

At Commencement in June the degree Doctor of Laws was conferred by Princeton on Professor Young, who was thus introduced by Dean West:

"Charles Augustus Young, until to-day the Professor of Astronomy in Princeton University. A pioneer in astronomical spectroscopy and photography; discoverer of the bright line in the spectrum of the corona; observer of the flash-spectrum at the beginning and end of totality, thus becoming discoverer of the 'reversing layer' of the solar atmosphere; preparer of a catalogue of bright lines in the chromosphere spectrum; first observer of remarkable solar eruptions; demonstrator of the resolution of Lockyer's 'basic lines' and of the sun-spot spectrum; author of books and many papers, some of them translated into various languages; observer or conductor in eight astronomical expeditions in this and other lands. His work is an enduring part of the history of astronomy;— a great discoverer, a great teacher, our dear and venerated colleague, whose knowledge is inferior only to his gentle modesty. And so, dear friend, hail and farewell! In the old words: Di tibi dent annos; de te nam ceterasume's,— God grant thee many years. All else thou shalt have in thyself.'"

As 'he came forward to receive the degree, the students in the body of the house arose and gave a triple cheer for Professor Young.

Professor says that teaching has been his vocation and research his avocation. But among the many who have been his students or profited by his encouragement and advice, several of whom hold high positions as directors of observatories, probably very few can hope to contribute more to science by invention and discovery than Professor Young, to say nothing of his teaching. He has taught Astronomy to fifty-one classes of college students, and thousands have heard his lectures or read his text-books.

It has been said- that Professor Young "was to the manor born." His maternal grandfather, Ebenezer Adams, one of nineteen children, was born on a farm at New Ipswich, N. H., in 1765, and because of the moderate circumstances surrounding him delayed until nearly twenty-two years of age his entrance to Dartmouth College, from which he graduated with honor in 1791. After teaching eighteen years, he was in 1809 called to Dartmouth as Professor of Languages, but in the following year was made Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy. This position he held until his resignation in 1833, when he was made Professor Emeritus. Besides being a faithful, patient, earnest teacher of varied attainments, personally interested in the welfare of his students to whom he imparted information clearly and easily, he in no small way aided in bearing the burdens of administration and defense of the College while its fate was in the balance, and for more than two years during, the sickness and after the death of President Brown he acted as president of the College; while his public spirit further manifested itself in his interest in town and church affairs, in questions of slavery, foreign missions, and temperance, and, as if looking for more opportunities to give service, he held the office of trustee and treasurer of Kimball Union Academy. At his resignation in 1833, he was succeeded in the professorship by the father of Professor Charles A. Young, Professor Ira Young, who soon after his appointment married Eliza,, youngest daughter of Professor Adams.

Professor Ira Young was born at Lebanon, N. H., in 1801. His father was a "builder" of considerable repute who erected the old "Academy," which has been developed into the present Chandler Building. His want of means and his father's refusal to allow him time before his majority prevented the son from entering the College before twenty-three years of age, although he was allowed to teach district schools after his sixteenth year. He graduated from Dartmouth with high rank in 1828, having received no financial assistance since entering preparatory school at Meriden; and after teaching for two years he was in 1830 made tutor in Dartmouth College, and in 1833 he accepted the Professorship of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, giving up his earlier plans to enter the ministry. In 1838 his chair was changed to that of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy, a position which he held until his death in 1858.

He was a master of the science and literature of his department to which he had given special attention while in College. A thoroughly earnest seeker for truth, he developed a like spirit in his pupils, and like his predecessor he was a born teacher, possessing the power of clearly stating his knowledge and, mindful of his own youthful difficulties, he was habitually patient in presenting his facts after reducing them to their simplest terms. Besides his interests in the College he had at heart the religious interests of the town. He was deacon in the College Church for twenty years and, like his predecessor, held the office of treasurer of Kimball Union Academy.

In 1853 he visited Europe in the interests of Shattuck Observatory, which was built with funds obtained largely by his own efforts, and many a rare volume in our library was purchased by Professor Young at this time, as were also the barometer and meridian circle now at the observatory. He was accompanied by his son, Charles A., then in his senior year in Dartmouth. Professor Ira Young died rather suddenly in 1858, and was succeeded by the late James W. Patterson as Professor of Astronomy and Meteorology, who was in turn succeeded by Professor Charles A. Young as Appleton Professor of Natural Philosophy and Professor of Astronomy, in 1866.

Professor Charles A. Young was born December 15, 1834, at Hanover in the house now known as the Proctor House, which until 1902 stood on what is at present the site of the Tuck Building. In the same house were later born his brother, Rev. Albert A. Young, of Chicago, and his sister, Mrs. Adeline E. Proctor, wife of the late John C. Proctor, who was for nine years, until his death in 1879, Professor of Greek in Dartmouth College.

Professor Young fitted for college at the old "Academy," a private school. Unlike his grandfather and his father he was ready for college at fourteen, having been his father's assistant in surveying and in the chemical and physical laboratories since ten years of age. He entered Dartmouth in 1849 with a class of thirty-six, a class smaller in numbers than any following or immediately preceding. Owing to a migration to Dartmouth from Waterville College (now Colby), the class was increased, and Professor Young graduated in 1853 with honor at the head of his class of fifty men. While a student he was not interested in college politics and society matters. His nickname was Adulescentulus. He was a member of the Social Friends, the Theological Society, corresponding to our Y. M. C. A., and the Society of Inquiry, which was composed of students interested in missionary work. As before stated he visited Europe with his father during the spring and summer of 1853, thus being absent from the Commencement exercises of his class, but his diploma was granted with the rest as his work had been "made up" in advance. Soon after graduation he made his first contribution to scientific literature by publishing in a volume entitled "New Hampshire As It Is" the article on "Climate," for which he received ten dollars. From 1853 to 1855 Professor Young taught classics at Phillips Academy, Andover, when he entered Andover Theological Seminary where he spent one year, giving part time for half a year to teaching classics in the Academy. In 1856 came the call to Western Reserve College at Hudson, Ohio, and Professor Young gave up his plans for missionary work to accept the Professorship of Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, and Astronomy, at that institution, beginning his work in January, 1857. In the following August he married Miss Augusta Mixer, grand-daughter of Hon. Samuel Morrill of Concord, N. H., With whom she had lived since the; death of her father soon after her birth. To Professor and Mrs. Young were born while at Hudson three children, Mrs. Clara Y. Hitchcock, wife of the late Hiram A. Hitchcock, who was for eight years until his death in 1895 Associate Professor of Civil Engineering in the Thayer School; Charles I. of Philadelphia, who is an engineer in the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company, and Frederick A., assistant in the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey.

At Western Reserve Professor Youngfurnished time-service for Cleveland, his system being one of the earliest in the country, and during several summers worked in the U. S. Lake Survey in determining telegraphic differences of longitude. For one year he held his only political office as common councilman of Hudson, from a ward composed largely of students. In 1862 in response to a call from the governor of Ohio for three months' volunteers, the students' military company offered its services which were accepted, and it became Company B of the 85th O.V.I, with Professor Young as captain. For a time it did duty at Camp Chase in guarding Confederate prisoners, and later went as escort for two thousand prisoners to be exchanged at Vicksburg. "Captain" Young returned to academic duties with impaired health.

As early as 1863 he was offered the Professorship of Mathematics in Dartmouth College, which he declined; but in 1866 came the call to become Appleton Professor of Natural Philosophy and Professor of Astronomy, a position which he accepted and returned to the home of his boyhood to occupy the chair held by his father until 1858. During his professorship at Hanover he owned and lived in the "Emerson" house, which then stood where Wheeler Hall now stands. At about this time, that keen mechanical ingenuity so characteristic of all his work manifested itself in the independent invention and publication of plans for a printing chronograph.

At this point begins the conspicuous period of his career. Upon returning to Dartmouth he began at once his investigations in spectroscopy to which he brought enthusiasm, untiring energy and devotion to work, keen powers of observation and analysis, a vigorous active mind, and that rare mechanical skill which one might almost say was the direct result of his father's training at the carpenter's bench. He saw the opportunity in spectroscopy and advised that the comparatively large Appleton fund, established in 1845, be spent in equipment rather than buildings. His advice was followed, and within a few years there came that series of investigations and discoveries which placed him at once where he still remains, among the most distinguished astro-physicists of the world, and brought upon the observatory and laboratory an international reputation. Though following the developments of mathematical astronomy, with which his interests are ever present, so that he is a master in analyzing and stating complex ideas there involved; and though his "true eye" has brought him a high rank as an observer with micrometer and transit instrument, yet it is above all as an astro-physicist and authority on the sun that Professor Young is celebrated and for which he has been most highly honored.

After corresponding with Professor Cooke of Harvard, Professor Young ordered from Alvan Clark the spectroscope now doing duty at Wilder Laboratory; and correspondence with Professor Alexander, who at that time occupied the chair of Astronomy in the College of New Jersey, .gained for Professor Young an opportunity to observe the eclipse of 1869 at Burlington, lowa, with Professor Charles F. Emerson as assistant. They took with them a telespectroscope made up of the four-inch comet-seeker, now at the observatory, and parts of the spectroscope just mentioned. Professor Young's work consisted in spectroscopic observations of the contacts, first made at this eclipse by him, and his discovery of the green line of the corona spectrum—seen also by others with less powerful instruments — which he wrongly but quite naturally identified with Kirchoff's "1474," a line which he had independently discovered not long before in the chromosphere spectrum. This error remained uncorrected until the eclipse of 1898 when Sir Norman Lockyer and Professor W. W. Campbell independently showed that the wave length of the real corona line was slightly different.

This success resulted in the immediate construction, according to plans suggested by Professor Young, of our "prominence" spectroscope, and an invitation to observe the eclipse of 1870 at Jeres in Spain, where with the new spectroscope on the six-inch telescope at that time belonging to the College, he observed the "flash spectrum" and discovered the "reversing layer," the most prominent event of the eclipse, thus described in his own oft quoted words,"As the crescent grew narrower . . . . . . the dark lines of the spectrum, and the spectrum itself, gradually faded away,until all at once, as suddenly as a bursting rocket shoots out its stars, the whole field of view was filled with bright lines more numerous than one could count."

The wholesale reversal of the spectrum was long questioned, and especially by Sir Norman Lockyer, so that for more than a quarter of a century Professor Young waited for confirmation, which finally came from a photograph by Mr. Shackelton, one of Sir Norman Lockyer's assistants at the eclipse of August 9, 1896. Just before the eclipse Sir Norman had said in Nature, "To my mind the reversing layer is dead and buried already, but may the fates be propitious on the 9th and enable us to place the wreath on its tomb." After the reversing layer had been established by Mr. Shackelton, Sir William Huggins in writing Professor Young took occasion to quote from "Old Mother Hubbard," how she' "Went to the joiner to get him a coffin And when she came back the dog was a-laughing."

The same year (1870) also saw the first photograph of a prominence, which was made with our spectroscope at Shattuck Observatory, by Professor Young assisted by the late Mr. H. O. Bly, at that time village photographer.

After his return from the Spanish eclipse of 1870, Professor Young raised the funds necessary for equipping the old six-inch mounting with a nineinch telescope, which forms the instrument now at Shattuck Observatory, while the old lens is still doing duty in a far western college. In 1871 he published an explanation of the spectrum of the solar corona which is accepted to-day, and on September 7, 1871, he observed the most remarkable outburst on the sun which had been seen up to that time. In the following summer he, with Professor Emerson as assistant, undertook under the auspices of the United States 'Government an investigation of the advantages of observing stations of high altitude. They visited Sherman, Wyo., where one hundred and seventy new chromosphere lines were added to the one hundred already catalogued at Shattuck Observatory, and at this station were also observed those solar disturbances which when compared with the magnetic records at Greenwich did much to establish the probability of some connection between terrestrial magnetism and solar conditions.

The first application of the diffraction grating to astronomical work was made by Professor Young in 1873. In 1874 he was asked to take charge of a party which was to visit Kerguelen Island for observations of the transit of Venus,, but this he was unable to accept because of the long absence from the College which would be necessary. He was, however, able to join the party of Professor Watson, which successfully observed the transit at Peking, a large number of photographs being secured; but hardly had the observers finished their work when there appeared clouds which together with a dust storm closed in upon them, entirely obscuring the sun. One possible disaster had been escaped by a narrow margin, but not all dangers had yet been passed, for within a few days the Emperor of China fell ill with small pox, and the astronomers from America were advised by the American legation that inasmuch as the foreigners who had been dealing with spots on the sun might be held responsible for the spots on the Emperor's face it was advisable that the party leave as soon as possible. They therefore immediately began their journey homeward in carts in which they travelled seventy miles, for the most part by night, to Tientsin.

While at Peking, Professor Young, in observing transits for time with a "broken" transit instrument, detected certain -residuals in his results which he finally traced to flexure of the axis of the transit instrument, a matter which has since received theoretical treatment. In 1876 Professor Young first measured the rotation of the sun by means of the diffraction grating from displacement of lines in the solar spectrum.

Professor Young had been at Dartmouth little more than a decade when he was called to Princeton as Professor of Astronomy, a position which he accepted. During his years at Dartmouth, besides accomplishing what has already been recorded together with teaching, he had written perhaps one hundred papers, for the most part on scientific subjects, and had published his first book "The Sun," the reproduction of a lecture delivered at New Haven in 1872. This book is not to be confused with that of the same name published nine years later. He had begun in 1868 his lectures on physics and astronomy (each given in alternate years) at Mount Holyoke Seminary (now College), which were continued until 1883, after which until 1903 he lectured biennially on astronomy. About 1870 he began those public lectures for which he has since become so famous. From 1872 until 1898 he lectured biennially at Bradford Academy. In 1873 and again in 1875 he lectured on physics at Williams College, and he has lectured at numerous schools for young women both before and since leaving Dartmouth. While at Dartmouth several offers of professorships were received from leading colleges and universities. In 1869 he was elected an Associate of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and about 1872 he was made an Associate of the Royal Astronomical Society, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and also of the American Philosophical Society, and in 1876 he was VicePresident of Section A of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He received the degree Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania in 1870, from Hamilton College in 1871, and in 1876 Wesleyan conferred upon him the degree Doctor of Daws.

At the time of his call, Princeton's chief astronomical equipment was the three-inch Fraunhofer lens now used as a collimator, but within a year the student's observatory was built and liberally equipped with the best instruments for teaching, including a telescope by Clark slightly larger and much better than the one left at Dartmouth, together with the necessary spectroscopic apparatus, and in 1882 the large Halstead Observatory was equipped with a telescope of twentythree inches aperture, by Clark, and the most powerful spectroscopic apparatus then to be procured. From 1878 to 1880 he undertook an examination of Sir Norman Lockyer's "basic lines" and showed that they were double and not to be attributed to the same element. In 1878 he conducted a party of Princeton men to Denver to observe the eclipse of that year. The weather was good but no especially important results were obtained. In 1887 he visited Russia to observe the eclipse near Moscow, but rain entirely prevented observations, and again in 1900 he organized a party which successfully observed the eclipse at Wadsboro, N. C.

Among other investigations which have engaged his attention at Princeton are spectra of sun spots,form ation of sun spots, spectra of comets, the spectrum of Venus, the spectrum of Nova Aurigae, revision of his catalogue of chromosphere lines, color correction of certain objectives, polar compression of Mars, polar compression and belts of Uranus, and measurements of double stars (not yet published), and in 1882 the transit of Venus was elaborately observed, both visually and photographically, at Princeton in co-operation with the various government parties. Early in his work at Princeton he completed his plans, already begun at Dartmouth, for a clock escapement which should unlock and receive its impulse at that point in its oscillation where disturbances have least effect on its natural period. This escapement has been giving good service in the standard clock at Princeton for twenty-eight years. A modification of a suggestion by Professor Young has been adopted in the driving clocks used on many recent American telescopes. Professor Young's observational work ceased only when his own failing health and that of Mrs. Young made his frequent visits to the observatory impossible.

In 1881 he published in the International Scientific Series his book entitled "The Sun." This book, containing a complete summary of existing knowledge of the subject, has run through numerous editions and has been translated into several languages. In 1889 he published his first text-book "General Astronomy," in 1890 he published "Elements of Astronomy" and "Uranography," in 1891 "Lessons on Astronomy," and in 1901 his "Manual of Astronomy." All except the last have run through numerous editions and the total sales amount to approximately 130,000. He has published a large Lumber of scientific papers, with many magazine and newspaper articles, and from 1890 to 1903 he gave perhaps a dozen courses of university extension lectures as well as many single lectures.

He received the degree Doctor of Laws from Columbia in 1887, Western Reserve 1893, Dartmouth 1903, and Princeton 1905. In 1884 he delivered the address of the retiring president at the meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 1887 he attended the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science and was made a foreign correspondent, and at about the same time became an honorary member of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society. In 1896 he became a member of the Cambridge (England) Philosophical Society ; but his greatest honor came in 1891 when he received the Janssen Medal from the French Academy of Sciences for his spectroscopic investigations, and especially for the discovery of the reversing layer.

Professor Young has accomplished much in the world of science and has been highly honored but, as throughout all his life, which has not been unshadowed, he still retains a simple faith. Now he returns to grace our village and halls, to inspire those who watch his coming and going, and to occupy the place of honor on our academic occasions, but not to rest for he still tells of work to be done. In the words of Dean West at his departure we repeat at his return:

"God grant thee many years. All else thou shalt have in thyself."

PROF. CHARLES AUGUSTUS YOUNG