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Trinity College - WW is pleased RJ's Statistical Society has started well: 'I should have been sorry if you had not taken it for granted that I wished to be one of you'. WW would be pleased to be on the council if it is clear other people as well as RJ wish it. WW is against the University Whig reformers who want to see unrestricted admission and graduation for Dissenters: 'Their petition appeared to me very wild, except as a mere ministerial move. As to the substance of the petition, it throws down before the Dissenters the College fellowships, which they did not ask for, but which being thus offered to them they will of course claim. I think the fellowships a necessary support to the established church; and I think the church a necessary part of our social system'. WW is disillusioned with the views of Musgrave [Thomas Musgrave?], Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] and Peacock [George Peacock]. WW encourages RJ to get on with his work on wages: 'your book is of more consequence than a cart load of such petitions'.

Thanks her for sending him 'the news' and is sorry 'that it is not more completely satisfactory.' Reports that Mr [J.F.?] Wickenden called on him on Sunday and inquired after her, Mary and Edward. Explains that Wickenden came up for Sedgwick's funeral.

Discusses Sedgwick's death: he was 'knocked up by a meeting which the Chapter of Norwich took it into their heads to come up and hold in his rooms.' Claims that his death 'is a great severance of [the college's] ties with the past', and that he is 'the last "historical character" of Trinity'; he must have been the oldest man in College 'by nearly thirty years' Reports that the Master 'was much affected in reading the service.' Tells her to tell Mary that 'she may as well send [him] a Post Card presently'. Relates that Sedgwick has reportedly 'left very little property', and that his family 'have been a sad trial to him in various ways and a great drain on his resources.'

Informs her that in relation to Rugby he can only tell her that 'there are mysterious rumours', and that '[t]hey do mean to keep the secret this time'. Is sorry to hear of Edward's rheumatism, and reports that he himself has been attacked by 'something indicating disorganisation of the M[ucous] M[embrane]', but that he is taking great care of his 'M.' Reports that he had a letter from Miss Green [their old governess?] 'with much affectionate anxiety about Mary.'

Norwich - Perhaps WW should have suppressed his pamphlet altogether, 'but there was something which looked like a challenge in a part of Thirlwall's [Connop Thirlwall] which drew me on' [see WW to RJ, 12 June 1834]. WW thinks RJ's suggestion that WW's pamphlet could be seen as a defense of the Master's dismissal of Thirlwall as absurd. On the contrary, WW thought Thirlwall's opinions on chapel going could have been overcome: 'This I told his friends (Sedgwick, Musgrave, Romilly etc) from the first'. WW is clear about his own view: 'The case is the same as that of an officer in any other body publishing an attack upon the system which he has to carry into affect: or a cabinet minister declaring himself against a cabinet measure: the tutors and assistant tutors were understood by most of us to be engaged to further the observance of all college rules by the undergraduates'. This does not mean a tutor cannot hold Thirlwall's opinions about dissenters, as is clear from the case of George Peacock. RJ will find that Julius Hare 'considers that the Master could not do otherwise than he did, and Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] acknowledged that Thirlwall's declarations were inconsistent with his position'.

Refers to her recent visit to Cambridge, which she fully appreciated and very much enjoyed. Describes having been received by Dr Lightfoot after Henry was gone on the Saturday, and their meeting with Mr [Robert] Burn and Mr [Ralph] Somerset. Describes how they were entertained by 'Professor Sedgewick' [sic], who was 'as merry as ever, full of kindness....' Refers also to their visits to Mrs Prescott, Mrs Millar, and to Mr Somerset's rooms.

Reports that after they left Cambridge Annie [Sidgwick?] and she parted at King's Cross, and presumes that the former is now at Hastings. States that the 'London Expedition' with Henry's Aunt Henrietta was a failure because the heat caused Mary Sidgwick to be ill, and she came home to Rugby the previous day, while Henrietta went to Wellington College. Wonders if Henry is angry with her for having brought away 'the manuscripts', and assures him that they are safe and that she will send them back if he desires to have them. Reports on her rose tree, and claims that Arthur looks well. Admits that she does not feel up to going to 'the Schoolhouse Lunch and speeches that day' and has decided to stay at home. Reports that she met Henry's old friend Edmund T[ ] at the station some days previously, who asked after Henry. Explains tht the books 'were all taken back with the bag and the key the man at the Porter's Lodge took.'

[Sent from Haileybury]:- Remarks on the unfairness of the fact that because Arthur does not write to her, she does not write to him: Henry arrived at this conclusion from a message he got from [J. M.?] Wilson when he saw him at Trevelyan's dinner. Reports that he is 'pretty well' and 'tolerably busy'. Has been examining a school lately, and has made good progress with his Arabic. Adds that his eyes are pretty well. Reports that Trevelyan has gone down for good; his father has been appointed financial member of the Indian Council and his son is to be his private secretary. Observes that Trevelyan is the last of the friends that he made as an undergraduate, but declares that there are lots of nice men still at the university, and that he has not lost the power of making friends. States, however, that he feels that he is growing old, and 'probably appear[s] a great Don to freshmen'.

Is anxious to hear the result of the Great Ladkin case; asks 'is the monster subdued or have [they] had to "eat the [Leck]". Reports that Mrs Kingsley enquired after his mother; Mrs Kingsley has had quite a long illness, from which she is now recovered, and he has not seen anything of the Kingsleys this term. Declares Miss [Rose?] Kingsley to be 'a very nice girl.' Asks whether his mother has seen Kingsley's letters in the Times, and comments that most people at Cambridge think that he has done good by them, but observes that he has been 'as usual hasty and one-sided.' Believes that the Manchester people ought to have spoken before. States that he saw Temple's letter, which was 'very good as always', and comments on his testimony as to conduct of manufacturers.

Reports that Arthur is very well, and that he himself is staying with [A. G.] Butler in Hertfordshire. He saw Miss Mulock, who was staying with [Alexander?] Macmillan, some days previously; she 'looks pleasant and sympathetic, yet hardly capable of the powerful delineation of passion one meets with in her books'; she is said to be 'odd' and to 'come to evening parties in her morning dress'.

Attributes his mother's epistolary silence to dissipation, and asks if everybody on the Bilton Road asked her out to dinner, and whether they shall 'entertain "all manner of Dukes" as Arthur says' when they return. Asks if any family catastrophe has occurred. Tells her if she meets any Trinity man she may tell them that [J. L.] Hammond is going to be Bursar. Declares that Mr Martin is looking better every week; that Professor Sedgwick is flourishing, and is expected to lecture the following year 'for "positively the last time" as he has said any time the last ten years.'

Five letters and one piece of humorous writing from the family of Michael Angelo Atkinson and Amelia Williams, with two letters from Adam Sedgwick in April 1856 about Atkinson and Williams' engagement, to Amelia Williams and to her mother Anna Williams. With two earlier letters: a report on Michael Angelo Atkinson by James Tate to Atkinson's father Peter, dated 12 Dec. 1831, and a letter from M. A. Atkinson at Trinity College to his sister Harriet about French literature. Two more items are written by Harriet Miller, the wife of William Hallowes Miller and a cousin? of the Williams family: one, a letter to her Aunt [Anna Williams?] includes a long description of the dinner held at Trinity College in honour of the Queen and Prince Albert on his installation as Chancellor of Cambridge University in July 1847; the other, a humorous essay about water closets and the loss of the garden privy.

Trinity College - WW went to see Adam Sedgwick in Norwich: 'Sedgwick is going on in the same triumphant way in which he does in most places; making people stare and start, but making them like and admire him with a sort of enthusiasm'. AS is giving weekly lectures in geology to about 400 people. WW sends RJ a pamphlet article in the Quarterly Review ['Newton and Flamsteed: Remarks on an Article in Number 109 in the Quarterly Review', 1836] he wrote after reading Barrow's: 'You know all Trinity men must care for Newton'.

Trinity College - WW notes that the Tithe Bill is got through the Commons and is now in the Lords [see WW to RJ, 9 April 1836]: 'I hope you have now a fair prospect of success both in your public and private project'. WW has taken the opportunity in the new edition of his book to say a word about the controversy between him and the Edinburgh Reviewer ['Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology', 3rd edn., 1836]. Adam Sedgwick's Bevesleiad is reprinted: 'I am afraid that from it and Lord Lyndhurst's [John Singleton Copley] speech people will suppose that at Trinity we practice ourselves in calling names. They ought to make Sedgwick a bishop and put him against Copley'.

Trinity Lodge - WW is pleased to hear that RJ's book is being printed ['Lectures on the Political Economy of Nations', 1845?]. WW will look over his sheets with great interest. WW's interest 'does not depend so much upon any hope I have of detecting errors for you, as from my desire to see your views in their systematic shape'. WW is sure it will make its way to general acceptance: 'I believe that the promulgation of long pondered truths ought to be prepared to wait a while for the gratitude of the world, for they cannot mix themselves with popular and periodical literature or with London coteries in such a way as to find a set of ready made admirers when they publish. But this is not to be regretted, for truths of any broad philosophical kind do not admit of transmission through admirers so made. - I have been much amused, in this point of view with the success of the Vestiges of Creation. No really philosophical book could have had such success and the very unphilosophical character of the thing made it excessively hard for a philosophical man to answer it, and still more, to get a hearing [as] he did. How do you like Sedgwick's [Adam Sedgwick] in the Edinb.? To me, the material appears excellent but the workmanship bad, and I doubt if it will do its work'.

Trinity College - WW is preparing the sermons he is to give at St. Mary's in February. He is shortly departing with Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] on an expedition to Paris. He is behind in writing the sermons: 'with time enough I should not fear the greater part of the work - all the argument about the activity and omnipresence of the Deity, but when I come to the indications of benevolent design in the moral frame of society I have not such an habitual familiarity with the view of the subject in its details as merits with the confidence and vehemence which would be becoming. I have no doubt I should get on better if I had you at my elbow'. Babbage is in Cambridge canvassing for the Lucasian Chair - John Herschel is here to support him - 'but all in vain'. George Airy has been elected. WW thinks this a good choice - he 'will reside and give lectures - practical and painstaking ones - who is par eminence a mathematician - and whose reputation will all go to the account of the university'.

RJ has heard that the next Quarterly Review has been advertised with a review of RJ's book in it ['Review of An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth and the Sources of Taxation by the Rev. Richard Jones', The Quarterly Review, 1832]: 'I shall hardly believe it till I see it...Murray and C. are greater noodles still - what the deuce could they all mean with their equivocation and mystery - truly the smallness of the wisdom that governs the literary world deserves to be embodied in a new proverb in which their names should figure. I shall rejoice much to see it. I was prepared to be magnanimous if it was left out - but I knew all along that the circulation of the book depended essentially and mainly on it'. Maria Edgeworth paid RJ a visit - 'tell Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] all this. I shall be disappointed if he is not very jealous'. RJ does not know when he will be sending up the manuscript to volume two and hopes WW will not be angry at the delay - it 'is assuming a dignified and attractive shape in my mind'. He has read John Briggs 'Land and Tax in India I wish I had seen it before - but it is clear that that Indian scholars are fighting about the use of language not about facts - I have invented a neutral phraseology which will simply express the facts and avoid disputed names and I regret not to have used it in Rents'.

RJ has shown the dedication and preface ['The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time ', 3 vols., 1837] to Drinky [Drinkwater?] who has made some remarks which RJ disagrees with: 'I do not think you have spoken too much of yourself in the preface and I like it much but look at Drinky's notes'. RJ was examined in front of a committee at the House of Commons yesterday. RJ has heard that Adam Sedgwick is to made the Bishop of Norwich.

Trinity College - WW is sorry RJ has been ill. However, he is annoyed that RJ did not send his manuscript and get on with the printing of his book ['An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth, and on the Sources of Taxation: Part 1. - Rent', 1831]. RJ should think about coming to hear Adam Sedgwick's lectures - 'the first 3 days of each week at 1 o'clock'.

Seven letters.