The Sleepwalkers (139 page)

He
had
been
preparing
his
emigration
for
several
years,
and
when
he
left
Hveen
around
Easter
1597,
he
did
it
in
his
customary
grandiose
manner,
travelling
with
a
suite
of
twenty
–
family,
assistants,
servants,
and
the
dwarf
Jepp
–
his
baggage
comprising
the
printing
press,
library,
furniture,
and
all
the
instruments
(except
the
four
largest,
which
followed
later).
Ever
since,
as
a
student,
he
had
ordered
his
first
quadrant
at
Augsburg,
he
had
been
careful
to
have
all
his
instruments
made
in
a
way
that
they
could
be
dismantled
and
transported.
"An
astronomer,"
he
declared,
"must
be
cosmopolitan
because
ignorant
statesmen
can
not
be
expected
to
value
their
services."
⁹

The
first
station
of
the
Tychonic
caravan
was
Copenhagen,
the
next
Rostock
from
where,
having
left
Danish
territory,
Tycho
wrote
a
rather
impertinent
letter
to
King
Christian,
complaining
about
the
treatment
he
had
received
from
his
ungrateful
country,
and
declaring
his
intention
"to
look
for
help
and
assistance
from
other
princes
and
potentates",
yet
graciously
expressing
his
willingness
to
return
"if
it
could
be
done
on
fair
conditions
and
without
injury
to
myself."
Christian
wrote
back
a
remarkable
letter
which
soberly
refuted
Tycho's
complaints
point
by
point,
and
made
it
clear
that
the
condition
of
his
return
to
Denmark
was
"to
be
respected
by
you
in
a
different
manner,
if
you
are
to
find
in
us
a
gracious
lord
and
King."
¹⁰

For
once
Tyge
had
found
his
match.
There
were
only
two
men
in
his
life
who
got
the
better
of
him,
King
Christian
of
Denmark,
and
Johannes
Kepler
from
Weil-der-Stadt.

His
bridges
burnt,
Tycho
and
his
private
circus
continued
their
wanderings
for
another
two
years
–
to
Wandsbeck
Castle
near
Hamburg,
to
Dresden,
to
Wittenberg.
Lastly,
in
June
1599,
they
arrived
in
–
or
rather
made
their
entry
into
–
Prague,
residence
of
the
Emperor
Rudolph
II,
to
whom,
by
the
grace
of
God,
Tycho
de
Brahe
had
been
appointed
Imperial
Mathematicus.
He
was
again
to
have
a
castle
of
his
choice,
and
a
salary
of
three
thousand
florins
a
year
(
Kepler
in
Gratz
had
two
hundred),
in
addition
to
some
"uncertain
income
which
might
amount
to
some
thousands".
¹¹

Had
Tycho
remained
in
Denmark,
it
is
highly
unlikely
that
Kepler
could
have
afforded
the
expense
to
visit
him
during
the
short
remaining
span
of
Tycho's
life.
The
circumstances
which
made
them
both
exiles,
and
guided
them
towards
their
meeting,
can
be
attributed
to
coincidence
or
providence,
according
to
taste,
unless
one
assumes
the
existence
of
some
hidden
law
of
gravity
in
History.
After
all,
gravity
in
the
physical
sense
is
also
merely
a
word
for
an
unknown
force
acting
at
a
distance.

5.
Prelude to the Meeting

Before
they
met
in
the
flesh
at
Benatek
Castle,
near
Prague,
Kepler
and
Tycho
had
been
corresponding
for
two
years.

From
the
very
beginning,
the
relationship
had
started
on
the
wrong
foot,
owing
to
an
innocent
blunder
which
young
Kepler
committed.
The
episode
involved
Tycho's
lifelong
bitter
enemy,
Ursus
the
Bear,
and
makes
the
fathers
of
astronomy
appear
like
actors
in
an
opera
buffo
.

Reymers
Baer,
^*
who
came
from
Ditmar,
had
started
as
a
swineherd,
and
ended
up
as
Imperial
Mathematicus
–
at
which
post
Tycho
was
to
succeed
him,
and
Kepler
was
to
succeed
Tycho.
To
achieve,
in
the
sixteenth
century,
such
a
career,
certainly
required
considerable
gifts
–
which,
in
Ursus,
were
combined
with
a
dogged
and
ferocious
character,
always
ready
to
crush
his
victims'
bones
in
a
bear-like
hug.
In
his
youth
he
had
published
a
Latin
grammar
and
a
book
on
land
surveying,
then
entered
the
service
of
a
Danish
nobleman
called
Erik
Lange.
In
1584,
Lange
visited
Tycho
at
Uraniburg,
and
took
Ursus
with
him.
It
must
have
been
a
rather
hectic
encounter,
as
will
presently
be
seen.

Four
years
after
that
visit,
Ursus
published
his
Fundaments
of
Astronomy
¹²
in
which
he
explained
his
system
of
the
universe.