May they both long adorn
and augment our science, and add to their own fame already so high
and pure, by fresh achievements."
Adams was elected a Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, in 1843;
but as he did not take holy orders, his Fellowship, in accordance
with the rules then existing came to an end in 1852. In the
following year he was, however, elected to a Fellowship at Pembroke
College, which he retained until the end of his life. In 1858 he was
appointed Professor of Mathematics in the University of St. Andrews,
but his residence in the north was only a brief one, for in the same
year he was recalled to Cambridge as Lowndean Professor of Astronomy
and Geometry, in succession to Peacock. In 1861 Challis retired from
the Directorship of the Cambridge Observatory, and Adams was
appointed to succeed him.
The discovery of Neptune was a brilliant inauguration of the
astronomical career of Adams. He worked at, and wrote upon, the
theory of the motions of Biela's comet; he made important corrections
to the theory of Saturn; he investigated the mass of Uranus, a
subject in which he was naturally interested from its importance in
the theory of Neptune; he also improved the methods of computing the
orbits of double stars.
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