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News concerning the bust being made of Richard Sheepshanks.

RS does not mind the college losing Fellows to marriage. He hopes Cordelia Whewell 'is reasonably well, which I fear is the superior limit in her case'.

RS sends WW two pieces of his work: 'The longitude of Brussels contains a better account of personal equation than I think you will find elsewhere'. He is disappointed with his article on the Transit: 'Still I believe it contains more on the subject of an elementary and practical nature than can be found elsewhere'. RS's 'old antagonist Sir James [James South] has issued a placard and an advertisement in the Times of Monday last, which I suppose he intends for a severe blow to the Astronomer Royal and to me'. RS believes this was induced by John W. Lubbock's 'folly in giving him a hearing by the Council of the Royal on the subject of their copies of their Transactions. This kind of notice, was pretty certain to revive his spirits and as no notice will be taken of his placard, I dare say he will feel encouraged to make another attack. It is hard that Lubbock's want of ordinary tact and sense should bring wrong on other people, for if in consequence of this, South should again assail the Society I feel certain that Sir John [John Herschel] will give small aid in quieting Sir James however easily he may be gulled by him'.

RS's views on University and Trinity College reform: 'I have always objected to the course of the commissioners [Commissioners on University Reform] in mixing up, in one report, matters so dissimilar on the university, and the private colleges. I have never had any doubt that the university belongs to the country, generally; and that when the state was opened to all religious sects, the university should have been opened too'. The university is the Senate and it is in the capacity of members of this body that the necessary arrangements must be made. RS feels with regard to the college 'that we have left the right path which were clearly marked out by our statutes. The teaching was originally by persons appointed by the master and seniors and paid by the college. This is the form to which I would return'. RS gives his scheme for reforming the standard of private tutors. He does not want the college 'having any more intimate relations or communication with the university'. The students should be more rigorously selected in the first instance: 'The college was not founded for general education, but for the best and highest kind of education, and indeed for that kind of education for which there never has been, and never will be, a money compensation'. The college should borrow at a low rate of interest and not a high one. RS's aim is 'to make the college what it ought to be, not merely the best of existing institutions, (which it is very nearly) but a 'ne plus ultra''. He thinks 'we should do a good deal (more than we do do, and that is a good deal) for our really clever men, who are slenderly provided for'. Concerning 'the present constitution of Trinity College we have succeeded so much better than any other institution, that I should not like to make any innovation, (I consider what I have said above to be merely renovations)'. RS thinks it is 'a fault in our schools and universities to draw a very tight rule, and then to wink at exceptions; just as it is the fault of almost all parents to spoil their children by seniority or indulgence, and to expect the college to cure all that'. Teaching and discipline should be in different hands.

RS congratulates WW on being made Master of Trinity and on his marriage to Cordelia Marshall: 'in the note which you sent me (I was abroad some weeks after that time and did not receive it till my return) you expressed a wish that I should come and help to administer the republic [Trinity College]. RS does not want to: 'I need scarcely say again, what long experience has convinced me of, that with the same object in view, no persons can differ more in the way of pursuing it than you and I do'. He has 'no doubt the college will go on well and prosper under your guidance. I may be doubtful whether your system is the best of all that are conceivable, but carried out simply and uniformly, it will be far better than mixed up with something quite different'. However RS feels he could be of use concerning the college statutes: 'I have always admired the original scheme and think that with a few adaptations, it is better suited to what we want than the innovations which interfered with it'. He supports his claim with examples. RS must leave the country for health reasons.

RS wrote to George Airy yesterday concerning an application from Francis Beaufort: 'The Admiralty have commissioned him to look out for an assistant for Fallows' [Fearon Fallows - astronomer at the Cape of Good Hope]. 'Judging from myself I should prefer breaking in a man to my ways rather than having one ready made who might not think my mode better than his own and therefore it seems to me that a clear headed good tempered active man who might be supposed likely to be a companion to Fallows would be better than a scrub exported from Greenwich'. Although RS thinks 'we have spiflicated Sir James [James South]' - he is only half satisfied: 'He is not only a great orator but a pathetic orator, and he will speak whether he has anything or nothing to say. Now I had him well on the hip and with a tolerably favourable audience but most unfortunately without a proper opportunity and with a chance of stopping important business. So I did not do what I ought to have done ridiculed him for his much ado about nothing trumpery exhibition'. South has retired from the Council and RS had been elected in his place. RS is currently involved in all sorts of Nautical Almanac computations. He will make another attempt to serve John Pond but if he declines he will leave him to his fate: 'I class Pond, the Church and the Universities all together...With such bodies who can't fight and don't know where the stand is to be made I will not throw in my lot but will rather go against, if I must cut at all'

RS will be coming to Cambridge in the latter half of next week. He will tell WW 'of a most ridiculous exhibition made at the Astronomical last night by Sir James South'. Will WW congratulate the Plumian Professor 'on his increase of family and dignity' [George Airy moves from Lucasian professor of Mathematics to Plumian Professor of Astronomy]. 'Are you all tolerably contented with the reform [the proposed Reform Bill]' - RS thinks 'it is the most prudent and safe measure that could now be passed'. He is 'in a vast hurry as I have thrown away my morning in mollifying and confirming my astronomical friends and in vilifying South. It will be worth while, if he stand at bay, to come to the special general meeting for I think he will either submit, make an evasive O'Connel sort of fight or be expelled and in that case he must in my opinion leave the country. I shall be at him again in the Greenwich Visitation Board'.

RS has been church hunting and gives his verdict on various churches and cathedrals in south England. RS reflects upon his experience of the architecture he encountered on his continental tour of Europe a few years back [WW is currently doing a similar tour of France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland]. RS has read most of Basil Hall's 'clever but heavy book about America. he is not sufficiently a citizen of the world even in imagination to form a fair estimate of brother Jonathan but he has done his best'. RS thinks that nothing 'can be more clear than that America is a hateful country for an Englishman all whose feelings and habits and associations must be perpetually shocked'. RS boils down much of the evil in America 'from the facility with which any man may obtain a livelihood, but still a good deal is left behind which I think with Hall must be laid upon the shoulder of the Democracy. The balance between the necessary evils of a constitution like theirs or like ours so far as we can consider evils as arising to the letter of a constitution, is a different thing and a more difficult subject than Hall would make it. I would not swop but that is still a different thing. I wish his views had been a little wider, because he has evidently had great advantages and because they will be able to criticise very successfully all his merely English notions, so that his good parts and doubts will be lost upon them and he will be set down for author of those John Bulls who travel to see evil in everything not English'.RS is getting a 'twenty inch convertible pendulum, of cylindrical rod and having the planes attached to the pendulum'.

RS thinks there is no hope of him joining WW at the audit due to his rheumatism. He dined yesterday at the Royal Society: 'Mr Gassiot [John Gassiot] complained of Sir James South's attacks upon him and the members seemed to acquiesce very cordially in the very strong language he applied to Sir James'.

RS plans to quit London tomorrow and intends to be in Cambridge on Wednesday. If the heads will allow RS 'to take charge of the observatory I can safely be responsible for the instruments and perhaps do something more'. He would like WW's and Adam Sedgwick's opinion on the best way of approaching the heads on this matter. RS is resting his eyes: 'I have put aside my calculations for a time in order to give my eyes a chance and I think with good effects' He fears he has been riding his pony 'brown Bess' too hard: 'I have changed her stables, got her a doctor and shall leave her in London till she is convalescent'.

RS has been agreeably enlightened by WW's account of his future plans [see RS to WW, 1 Aug. 1827]: 'To say the truth, I had formed an erroneous and rather rash opinion that you had made up your mind what you should like to do but were doubtful of its prudence. I never for an instant asked you to study divinity to get on as the phrase is but as a proper means of obtaining a desired end'. Contrary from 'thinking your castle building either idle or vain, it is merely a more detailed plan of what has often appeared to me desirable and feasible in a misty generality...let me tell you how I hope to be aiding and abetting in this great design of improving mankind in general and our university in particular'. His plans will be totally contingent on his eyes getting better, the fate of Robert Woodhouse [Plumian Professor of Astronomy] and the attitude of the heads: 'I intend getting leave from the heads to look after the observatory, i.e. keep the clocks going, the rooms aired, the instruments in repair etc. Now as I want no salary and have neither the impudence to aspire to nor in fact even a longing for the professorship which I would not take if offered to me; I hope (unless objections now not visible should present themselves) to carry this point'. RS has for some time wanted to do something in astronomy either by the Astronomical Society or by the government. Namely to compute from the Nautical Almanac the sidereal time of the culmination of the moon's enlightened limb at Greenwich, and 'make the computation of the longitude from moon's transits a very short and easy operation'. RS and his horse fell yesterday. Can RS borrow some money to help his 'poor riding master'.

RS had no idea of the state of Robert Woodhouse: 'I never should have suspected him of getting off the hinges but I dare say the loss of his wife disturbed him more than it would have done a soft tempered and opener mannered man'. John Herschel 'who seems to be the kindest scientific or unscientific soul breathing went down to Worcester where Babbage was indisposed and carried him a tour into Ireland. I have not heard anything of them but it was the wisest and kindest thing a friend could do'. RS congratulates 'our worthy Lucasian [George Airy] upon his promise of success and if he can destroy the influence of Venus entirely (not take a poor tithe of her) he has my best wishes'. Although RS would like the money attached to the office of head lectureship, he will not take it this year. RS thinks WW should plan his university career towards getting the divinity chair.

RS is down to his last £10. Besides his college bills he owes WW 100 guineas to be paid by Christmas. WW owes him £100 payable now. Could WW pay him if he comes to London and if possible lend him a further £50-100. Could WW thank Julius Hare for his Guesses [Augustus and Julius Hare, 'Guesses at Truth by Two Brothers', 1827]: 'I can with perfect sincerity admire the spirit and candour of his opinions and the pure language in which they are expressed, I cannot say that in my opinion he has not frequently guessed wrong. But when I think it the work of a gentleman and a scholar he will excuse me when I dissent almost entirely from his political and not infrequently from his ethical maxims'. RS thinks he should see a little more English Norman architecture before he embarks on his tour of Normandy.

RS had hoped to be in Cambridge by now but three different plans came his way. He hopes to visit Canterbury via Rochester, Eltham and Maidstone, and then on to Brighton: 'There are a number of good Norman buildings as you well know on this coast and I am desirous of knowing a little more of our own architecture before I throw myself upon that of France'. RS's eyes feel stronger. He does not think he will now be in Cambridge until August and may consider spending the winter in France. He has been reading Taylor's perspective and has purchased a camera lucida: 'I have been a good deal pleased with the theory of perspective and if I could draw at all should have no doubt of using the precepts pretty soon'. Humphry Davy has resigned the Presidency of the Royal Society. RS contemplates his successor: 'I would try to get Herschel [John Herschel] and a Society Club room where strangers could be admitted. If this latter plan could be carried into effect it would very much simplify the finding a President as it would do away with the necessity of an establishment etc belonging to him'. Hyde Hall should now be called Lost Hall.

Concerning the donation of a book in her possession created by Augustus De Morgan, recording the quarrel between Richard Sheepshanks, Sir James South and Charles Babbage, now on the shelves of Trinity College Library, shelfmark Adv.c.16.32.

RS had intended to be in Cambridge now but he finds that lectures do not begin as soon as he thought. Further, 'Tate's daughters are in town and I must ask them and help to entertain them'. He will be in Cambridge around about the 20th unless Haviland's lectures begin earlier. RS finds 'that Young [Thomas Young] has treated the Prof.'s [George Airy] speculations upon the Solar tables and their errors somewhat cavalierly. I trust he has got the wrong two by the ear and that Airy who has a back to his head will teach the [?] that errors so serious ought to be and must be immediately investigated and remedied. Happily A. appears to have no disposition to yield and if he is resolute these supercilious [?] must change their notes'.

Thanks WW for the University information. RS has put pressure on Troughton and Simms to send the 'top' as soon as possible. An update on RS's horse riding lessons. He ought to find a way of repaying the £100 he owes WW. RS 'had got a clumsy scheme in my head of supporting an invariable pendulum not by knife edges but upon a well ground steel cylinder said cylinder resting upon capital friction wheels...I am however inclined to suspect that the work of such friction wheels would be very expensive and their action a little uncertain'. A pendulum 'with a spring and with the clips invariably united to the spring would be more invariable than knife edges and Troughton [Edward Troughton] says that is the way he always asserted the experiment should be made'.

Thanks WW for the £100 [see RS to WW, 7 Dec. 1826]. RS has been riding a great deal : 'I told him [RS's horse riding master] that if I had any friend staying with me I should expect the privilege of letting him have any part or number of my lessons without subscribing for a number which he might not want'. So if WW wants to come up for a lesson or two he can. RS was about to write to George Airy to congratulate him upon being elected to Newton's chair: 'I am not afraid of his making an easy seat of as I. Milner [Isaac Milner] did, by squatting his head neck upon a pod of putty'.

Although unaffected by the recent commercial distress RS is in desperate need of cash. Does WW know what his dividend will be and could he receive the same for RS from the bursar: 'One of majesty's ministers (I believe his majesty here must be that of the people) called upon me the other day for nine pounds - being my half yearly quote to the support of the poor and I was forced to bid him call again'. RS has found out from Molyneux 'that Hardy is a little particular upon showing his clocks unless he has some hope of selling one so not intending to buy I cannot well take up his time by interrogations' [see RS to WW, 1 July 1826]. RS is not sure WW preaching at St. Mary's is a good idea.

RS has just had a letter from Simms [William Simms] requesting him to return the theodolite which WW and George Airy used in Cornwall: 'I informed him some time ago that it was so incomplete as not to answer my wants'. Will WW or Airy send it to him. RS's two sisters have gone to Bray therefore he has the house to himself - would WW like to stay? What has been done in University matters?

RS is too ill to be examiner at Cambridge. He is glad WW cannot stand for the Lucasian professorship: 'The Heads I dare say have made up their minds so that your chance would have been small...I should have felt sorry if you had tried and failed in obtaining anything else. Besides the ladies'. Edward Troughton 'has forgotten all he knew of clocks, springs etc and though he may talk about them will not of course think much now. I fear the springs but the experiment might be worth trying, only, don't expect any light from anybody as nobody knows anything about it except that it goes by a spring'. RS understands that the intended advantage of Hardy's work in the first scapement is to make the moving force constant. He got the following information from Molyneux concerning the pendulum: 'The compensation for heat and cold is contained of course in the pendulum for long and short arcs in the irregularity in the moving force in the spring at the top of the pendulum. Now the difficulties he apprehends are from the thickening of the oil upon the pallets. When the oil thickens from age the vibrations are of course smaller and then if the vibrations in long or short arise are not correct the clock may gain or lose according as the spring at the top is too tender (I fancy) or too stiff...The pendulum and its compensation are relied upon I believe to supply all occasional defects and Troughton swears that a perfect pendulum won't go well that he has made such but that the clocks went no better perhaps more with them'.

Since there was no chance of RS catching WW at Dresden he had put off replying to WW's letter. RS gives an account of the architecture of Milan: 'One thing however is certain that Gothic as a whole scarcely ever got in at all here and you find what we call Norman as low down as 1300 how old their pointed arch may be I cannot pretend to say but I should question them being older than ours'. From here he went to Venice and on to Bologna.

Thanks WW for his account of the build up to the Cambridge election. RS is surprised no date has been set for the day of the actual election: 'I don't feel quite easy at being so far off for I wish to vote though I don't like our candidate and I should not like to be left in the lurch'. RS was very impressed with the York Minster. He has also been twice to Kirkstall: 'it is interesting from being one of the earliest painted arches we have'. AS gives his views on its architecture. He is looking forward to visiting Lincoln.

RS offers his first vote to Scarlett and Grant if the former retires [see RS to WW, 31 Oct. 1822]: 'After all this is the safer way and though I don't like the principle of going through with a party one must go a certain way. If only Scarlett would retire I should be quite clear and as it is upon reflection I have not much doubt. Grant has everything but politics but then politics in an MP are almost everything'. RS will try to convert Greenwood to the same course. He will certainly vote for Scarlett, I doubt his coming down for a man who is not a whig'. Lawyers are 'a set of weak or nothing men they must either have all their own way or none. If they can't have a whig they say they won't vote and they don't see the short sightedness of such sentiments'.

RS's views on the forthcoming Cambridge election [see RS to WW, 28 Oct. 1822]. If Scarlett retires as RS trusts then WW should canvass for Robert Grant: 'To keep the speaker out is a matter of the highest importance so high that I think all other matters (now that Lens will not stand) are comparatively trifling. Only think what a triumph for the master's Toryism! He is ruined for any liberality and so are we, as far as he has any influence, if such a thing should take place. But two years in college and kicked out the Morning Chronicle and the Whig member for so he and his friends will think what may not be expected in a few years more'. AS thinks 'there must be yet time if a good majority of the Whigs vote for Grant'. 'On every ground a liberal Whig and as Trinity men you must do your best to keep out the speaker and as I said before Shore and Hervey are not to be thought of'.

The various cuttings include an article on the Chair of Natural Philosophy at Edinburgh with an article from the Madras Government Gazette on Hindu algebra dated 15 July 1830; a cutting pasted on to the first two pages of a letter to Whewell sent by an anonymous correspondent concerning the work of American mathematicians dated March 1843; another, a physics problem signed in manuscript by James Walters Jun., 25 Feb. 1848; a description of the "Astronomical expedition to North Spain" in the Times, July 1860, and two other articles about solar eclipses.

RS was unable to persuade Lens to stand as a candidate for the Cambridge election: 'what is the least of the evils presented to us. I cant help thinking Robert Grant after all. He has taken his regular degrees (which I think is a considerable point for it is high time to undeceive the young sprigs of nobility and to alter that system) he was highly distinguished amongst us, he was a fellow of a college and is I fancy a man of highly respectable character'. Besides which they can always change him when someone better comes along: 'the high church men sooner than have a saint would join us to throw him out and bring in a Xman of looser religious and (in our way of thinking) stricter political principles. The game is I fear too fine but I think something may be made of it. Scarlett will not do for a constancy and yet it would [be] awkward bringing another candidate forwards if he were once in. Now there can be little doubt that we could bring Grant in and there would be no delicacy about kicking him out again'. Edward Troughton has begun work on the 'our circle and will soon draw upon us for some money' [Cambridge Observatory].

Thanks WW for his letter full of Cambridge news: 'I shall be entirely happy to have any opportunity of showing my teeth or even hitting the heads...our opponents are the very ones of all others that I should like to hurl defiance against'. RS gives an account of his European tour: 'It was hot at Rome and so hot during our return that I think we did not travel more than one day from there to Milan'. 'Terni is as Lord Byron says worth all the waterfalls in Switzerland but together twofold'. However the 'number of beggars and idle rascals who want to be paid for sweeping and cleaning the paths and making bridges where they have never laid a finger is very provoking'. RS was not pleased with his courier who ordered a meal above his status: 'we took him on to Milan and dismissed him there as we had had a set purpose to do some time before. There too we got rid of our femme de chambre who was a sad useless idle impertinent and unprincipled little baggage'. RS gives his architectural observations of various cities in Italy. He thinks the painted arch originated on the northern side of the Alps: 'The prevalence in Italy of round arches and insulated columns in the later age as far as I can understand of all the painted arches I have yet seen makes me almost sure of this'. There is some good and early Gothic at Dijon.

An account of AS's travels in Italy. He was impressed with Pompeii: 'The architecture is in good preservation and would hold about twenty or five and twenty thousand persons'. The museum of Naples has to be seen to appreciate the beauty of its articles - statues, pictures and antiquities. However 'The truth is I find myself more English and more tied to my loves and friendships than I ever suspected before. I almost begin to suspect that I shall never like any place but Cambridge. The dirt and filth of the people quite sickens me and I have now very nearly seen as much of pictures and statues as pleases me'.