Some Eminent Women of Our Times: Short Biographical Sketches — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Some Eminent Women of Our Times: Short Biographical Sketches
John Stuart Mill · en
knew, and which, after all, proved of no use to me afterwards, except
what little I knew of music ... which my father took a pleasure in
teaching me—_N.B., when my mother was not at home. Amen._”
Very early in her life her brother William became Caroline’s idol and
hero. He was twelve years older than herself, and distinguished himself
among the group of brothers for tenderness and kindness to the little
maiden. Her eldest brother, Jacob, was a fastidious gentleman, and
Caroline’s inability to satisfy his requirements for nicety at table and
as a waitress, often earned her a whipping. But her brother William’s
gentility was of a different order. She narrates one instance, which
doubtless was a specimen of others, when “My dear brother William threw
down his knife and fork and ran to welcome and crouched down to me,
which made me forget all my grievances.” Little did William or Caroline
guess that in the kind brother soothing the little sister’s trouble, the
future astronomer was “sharpening the tool” that was hereafter to be of
such inestimable service to him.
The connection of England and Hanover under one crown caused an intimate
association between the two countries. William Herschel’s first visit to
England was as a member of the band of the regiment of which his father
was bandmaster. On this first visit to England, William expended his
little savings in buying Locke’s “Essay on the Human Understanding.”
Jacob made an equally characteristic purchase of specimens of English
tailoring art. These professional journeys to England led, in the course
of time, to William Herschel establishing himself as a music-master and
professional musician at Bath. This, however, he very early regarded
merely as a means to an end. He taught music to live, but he lived for
his astronomical studies and for the inventions and improvements in
telescopes which he afterwards introduced to the world. When Caroline
was seventeen years old, her father died, leaving his family very ill
provided for; Caroline was more closely than ever confined to the tasks
of a household drudge and to endeavouring to supply home-made luxuries
for Jacob. This went on for five years, the mother and sister slaving
night and day in order that Jacob might cut a figure in the world not
humbling to the family pride. In 1772 William Herschel unexpectedly
arrived from England, and his short visit ended in his sister Caroline
returning with him to Bath. She left, as she writes with some awe, even
after an interval of many years, “without receiving the consent of my
eldest brother to my going.”