As Astronomer Royal his great work was the systematic observation of the positions of the moon through an entire _saros_. As is well known, a period of eighteen years and ten or eleven days brings the sun and moon very nearly into the same positions relatively to the earth which they occupied at the commencement of the period. This period was well known to the ancient Chaldeans, who gave it its name, since they had noticed that eclipses of the sun or eclipses of the moon recurred at intervals of the above length. It was Halley's desire to obtain such a set of observations of the moon through an entire _saros_ period as to be able to deduce therefrom an improved set of tables of the moon's motion. It was an ambitious scheme for a man so much over sixty to undertake, nevertheless he carried it through successfully. His desire to complete this scheme, and to found upon it improved lunar tables, hindered him from publishing his observations, for he feared that others might make use of them before he was in a position to complete his work himself. This omission to publish troubled Newton, who, as President of the Royal Society--the Greenwich Board of Visitors having lapsed at Queen Anne's death--drew attention at a meeting of the Royal Society, March 2, 1727, to Halley's disobedience of the order issued under Queen Anne, for the prompt communication of the Observatory results. That Newton should thus have put public pressure upon Halley, the man to whom he was so much indebted, and with whom there was so close an affection, is sufficient proof that his similar attitude towards Flamsteed was one of principle and not of arbitrariness. Halley, on his side, stood firm, as Flamsteed had done, urging the danger that, by publishing before he had completed his task, he might give an opportunity to others to forestall his results. It is said--probably without sufficient ground--that this refusal broke Newton's heart and caused his death. Certainly Halley's writings in that very year show his reverence and affection for Newton to have been as keen and lively as ever. Halley's work at the Observatory went on smoothly, on the lines he had laid down for himself, for ten years after Newton's death; but in 1737 he had a stroke of paralysis, and his health, which had been remarkably robust up to that time, began to give way. He died January 14, 1742, and was buried in the cemetery of Lee Church.