In view of her extraordinary and long-continued work in her chosen specialty, M. Lalande was quite warranted in stating that "Mme. Lepaute is the only woman in France who has acquired veritable knowledge in astronomy; and she is now replaced only by Mme. du Pierry, who has published divers astronomical calculations, and who has deserved to have dedicated to her _L'Astronomie des Dames_, which appeared in 1786." It is gratifying to know that the beautiful Japan Rose--originally called _Pautia_, but changed to _Hortensia_ by Jussieu--was named after this distinguished woman. It is also gratifying to be assured that her engrossing work in astronomy in no wise caused her to neglect her home duties or to lose that sweetness of character and delicacy of refinement for which she was noted before she entered upon the absorbing and taxing career of astronomical computer. The wife of Lalande's nephew, Mme. Lefrancais de Lalande, proved herself in many respects a worthy successor of Mme. Lepaute. "My niece," writes her uncle, Jerome Lalande, "aids her husband in his observations and draws conclusions from them by calculation. She has reduced the observations of ten thousand stars, and prepared a work of three hundred pages of horary tables--an immense work for her age and sex. They are incorporated in my _Abrege de Navigation_. "She is one of the rare women who have written scientific books. She has published tables for finding the time at sea by the altitude of the sun and stars. These tables were printed in 1791 by the order of the National Assembly.... In 1799 she published a catalogue of ten thousand stars, reduced and calculated." This distinguished observer and computer had a daughter in whom her grand-uncle was particularly interested. "This daughter of astronomy," he tells us, "was born the twentieth of January, 1790, the day on which we at Paris saw for the first time the comet which Miss Caroline Herschel had just discovered. The child was accordingly named Caroline; her godfather was Delambre." The discoverer of the comet referred to was, in many ways, a most remarkable woman. She was the sister of Sir William Herschel, the illustrious pioneer of modern physical astronomy and the virtual founder of sidereal science, as we know it to-day. She was also the aunt of Sir John Herschel, who was the only rival of his uncle, Sir William, as an explorer of the heavens.