known in later days as the first principal of the first normal school in New England.
At the age of sixteen Miss Mitchell became assistant in Mr. Peirce's school in Nantucket. This was succeeded for a time by a private school of her own; and after that she served for nearly twenty years as librarian of the Nantucket Athenaeum, doing much to direct the taste in literature of the Nantucket youth of the period. She herself, as stated by her sister, Phebe Mitchell Kendall, compiler of her "Life, Letters, and Journals," which is the source of the information that follows, was an inveterate reader.
The original investigations in astronomy, pursued by her with ardor from girlhood up to the time of her professorship, had for their most notable result the discovery on October 1, 1847, of a telescopic comet. For this discovery she received in 1849 from King Frederic VII. of Denmark the gold medal which had been offered by his father, Frederic VI., in 1831. For nineteen years she acted as computer for the American Nautical Almanac. In 1865 she accepted the chair of astronomy at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y., becoming also director of the observatory. From this time on until her resignation at Vassar in January, 1888, on account of failing health, she was an important factor in the movement for the higher education of women, a work into which "she threw herself, heart and soul," for its sake giving up " in a great measure her scientific life." Her father, with whom after her mother's death she had lived in Lynn, spent four happy years with her at Vassar, his death occuring in 1869. Although Professor Mitchell's resignation was not accepted, she declined the offer of a permanent home at Vassar, and returned to Lynn, where she died June 28, 1889.
She was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia; the New England Women's Club; the New York Sorosis; and the Association for the Advancement of Women, of which she was the president in 1875 and 1876. Referring to the two annual congresses of the Association held during her official term, one of its founders says of Miss Mitchell: "She is remembered with especial affection by those who were with her on these occasions. Her tact and ability as a presiding officer were remarkable, and her judgment regarding the matter to be presented to the public was very valuable. At the congress held in Philadelphia in the centennial year it was desired by some that the meeting should be opened with prayer. Miss Mitchell decided, to the general content of the assembly, that a few minutes should be devoted to the silent prayer of the Friends."
She was three times the recipient of honorary degrees, the third being the LL.D. conferred by Columbia College in 1887.
She made two trips abroad, the second in the summer of 1873, when she went to Russia, visiting St. Petersburg and other cities and the government observatory at Pultowa. While a true lover of her own country as pre-eminently the land of freedom and self-government, she looked for and saw the good in other lands. As she expressed it: "We travel to learn; and I have never been in any country where they did not do something better than we do it, think some thoughts better than we think, catch some inspiration from heights above our own — as in the art of Italy, the learning of England, the philosophy of Germany."
Her faith in the coming woman led her to write, " When the American girl carries her energy into the great questions of humanity, into the practical problems of life, when she takes home to her heart the interests of education, of government, of religion, what may not be hoped for our country! "
ELIZABETH HELENA SOULE, a teacher of ilramatic art, was born in Pownal, Me., being the daughter of Daniel and Mary True (Merrill) Soule. Her father is said to have been a lineal descendant of George Soule, who came in the "Mayflower" in 1620, also a descendant of the Rev. John Wheelwright, an English divine who came to this country a few years later, and who founded the town of Exeter, N.H.
The Soule luie of descent, partially verified,
