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Magdalene College, (Cambridge).—Sends and discusses the results of his investigations into the phrase ‘cur of Iceland’ (Henry V, II. i. 40) (see 7/2).

(With an envelope.)

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Transcript

Magd. Coll.
20 March 1880.

My dear Wright,

I have been looking after the “cur of Iceland” {1} and here are some of the results {2}, which are heartily at your service, though I am afraid they are not of much use.

I have not got Wilkin’s big edition of Sir Thomas Browne, but only Bohn’s reprint, in which Theodore Jones’s letters (given in the former) are not included, but only Browne’s summary, which is not much to the purpose, as follows:—

“Besides shocks and little hairy dogs, they bring another sort over, headed like a fox, which they say are bred betwixt dogs and foxes [bosh!]; these are desired by the shepherds of this country” [i.e. England]. {3}

Of the extracts I send herewith that from Sir Wm Hooker’s book is perhaps the best—but the others being from books very little known in this country may have some interest—and Mohr was a very careful observer. Henderson I dare say knew more about Icelandic dogs than any other Englishman, but he does not seem to mention them in his book.

I have not looked at Hamilton’s book but I doubt his having access to any more original authorities than I have given you.

When I was in Iceland in 1858 I had a commission from a lady to bring back an Icelandic dog for her, & I dare say that had I gone more into the interior I could have found a pure-bred one, but I mistrusted the pedigree of the dogs in the Danish trading stations & their neighbourhood, and I cannot be sure that I ever saw a pure-bred example. I saw enough however to know what it would be like, & you can get a very fair notion of one by looking at a “Spitz” or “Pomeranian” without going to Iceland.

It is the fashion to liken (as Hooker does) the Iceland dog to the Esquimaux dog, but I take it there is no real affinity between them—& I should be inclined to suppose the Iceland breed is cognate with the “Spitz” & the real Lapland dog—which itself is a scarce animal, and only seen in its purity (or impurity considering its usual food, at which Thienemann, in the extract I send, hints) in the interior of that country.

Since communication with Iceland has become so easy & frequent of course the breed there has got much mixed. I therefore don’t think it worth looking through the works of recent travellers, especially as none who have been published on the matter have been much of naturalists. I think however that Faber (who was a good man) may have mentioned something about dogs in his many papers on Icelandic zoology, published in the ‘Isis’—but I have never had time to study then even for my own purposes.

Believe me, yours very truly
Alfred Newton.

[Direction on envelope:] W. Aldis Wright, Esq. | Trinity College.

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There are no marks of posting on the envelope.

{1} Cf. Henry V, II. i. 40.

{2} See Add. MS b. 74/7/2.

{3} The square brackets in this sentence are in the MS.

Buck’s Head Hotel, Glasgow.—(3rd.) Has attended the prize-giving ceremony at the university. Describes the university buildings and discusses the characters of the professors.—1 Bath Street, (Glasgow).—(5th.) Describes the cathedral. Hooker has left some drawings of plants behind. Hopkirk’s encounter with striking workers in the Gorbals. (6th.) Her forthcoming engagements.

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Transcript

Glasgow. Buck’s Head Hotel. May 3d 1820.

My dear Papa

Since I have now a little leisure time while Maria is preparing our lodgings for our reception I have begun a letter to you, though most likely it will not be sent for some days, but I am glad to take every opportunity of writing home, which is, I am sure, the most agreeable employment I can have here—even more agreeable than writing out my journal. Maria and I went on Monday with Mrs Thomson to see the distribution of the prizes—a ceremony which takes place annually on the 1st of May, previously to the students leaving the College for the vacation, which might be called the long vacation with more justice than ours is, as it lasts 6 months. The distribution takes place in the common hall of the University, in which all kinds of university business is performed on week days, and Divine service on Sundays. I told Mamma in my last letter how thinly it was attended and how irreverently on that day,—but on Monday it was entirely filled by the Students and Professors, and the galleries were crowded with spectators. Two silver medals were given to young men in the Divinity Class, and a great many handsome books were distributed in that and the other classes by the different Professors. A great deal of emulation and anxiety was excited among the Candidates, and a great deal of interest was shown by their friends and relations. Nothing can be less like an English Collegian than a Scotch one—instead of a smart young man, he is usually a shabby, dirty boy, perhaps not more than ten years old—and nothing can be more different than an English University and a Scotch one (if all Scotch ones are like Glasgow) for instead of a handsome set of buildings filled by the Collegians, this College consists of two gloomy Quadrangles inhabited by a limited number of the Professors, while the Stu-dents lodge where they may in the town, those who can afford it generally boarding with Clergymen, or with one or other of the Professors. Beyond the second Quadrangle is the Hunterian Museum, a very handsome, modern Grecian building, which looks very well by itself, but rather incongruous when seen in conjunction with the remainder of the College. Several of the Professors and their wives have called on Mr Hooker and Maria,—Professor Young is the one who seems most sensible, most acute, and most gentlemanly. He is a fine, intelligent old man, and his wife and daughter {1} would be thought quite ladylike, even in England. Mr Young is much acquainted with Mr Jeffery† who came here last week and pleaded on Saturday. I had the gratification of seeing him on Monday—he is a little man with an extremely acute and intelligent, though not at first sight a very pleasing countenance,—but he can look very pleasing when he converses. Dr Wardlaw, a very celebrated preacher among the Cove-nanters or Independents and Dr Muir were also at the College on the 1st of May: but to see Dr Chalmers we must go to his Church for he rarely goes into public on any other occasion—those who do not like him, and I am sorry to say there are several of that class among the Professors, attribute his retirement to a wish to appear more virtuous than his neighbors, to pride, to eccentricity etc, while others think the great charge he takes of his flock, and the numerous works he composes are a suffi-cient reason for his declining to appear much in company. I was glad to find Dr Young of this opin-ion—he looks on Dr Chalmers with sincere respect, and listens to him without finding him, as Dr Thomson told me he did, both wearisome and unintelligible. Now as Dr Thomson would be extremely amazed at its being thought that he did not understand to the full as much as any man in the united kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and as thousands and thousands hear, understand, and almost adore, Dr Chalmers, I must conclude that Dr Thomson, and such as he, have set themselves against conviction—and if a man does this, you know that it is enough, and that he would not be persuaded, even though one rose from the dead. {2} Short as the time has been since I have been here, I have found there are schisms among this learned body of Professors. The principal one arises from the division of a certain sum from the funds of the College between a limited number of Professors instead of between the whole. This money amounts to as much as 4 or £500 annually to each of them, and they contend that since it was originally devoted to the profit of a certain number of Professors, they ought not to be obliged to divide their property with those who have been newly added to their body, but that, if the new comers are also to be endowed, new funds should be raised for this purpose. Dr Thomson is the most forward and the most unpopular among these “parvenus”, and I think he would like to draw Mr Hooker into a cooperation with him; but happily my brother has too much wish to be on good terms with his brethren to join in any scheme that might hazard their good will. At present he is extremely liked, apparently, by all, they have voluntarily made him an L.L.D. and seem to wish to give him every encouragement in their power. Dr Brown, whom you perhaps remember when you were here, has just called on him. He was Botanical Lecturer there, though the Professorship was not instituted, and has offered my brother any assistance in the way of advice which, as an experienced Lecturer, he may well be able to give. I hope Mr Hooker will be able to make his instructions amusing—he is at this time rather anxious about them. 1. Bath Street. May 5th. We are now settled in our new lodgings, and I think we shall find them very comfortable. Bath Street is quite at the western extremity of Glasgow, not very far from the Trongate, the great centre of the town, and about a mile and a quarter from the Botanic Garden. I have been to the Cathedral since I began this letter. It is situated on a little eminence on the North East of the city, which is now running away from it to the West, so that poor St Mungo is only surrounded by narrow crooked lanes, and house, some of which by their height shew that they have seen better days, but are now occupied by the lowest and filthiest in this unequal town. The front, I mean the West end, of the Cathedral is extremely mutilated—only one of the towers remain[s], and that is square and heavy and unornamented, and the central tower is also ugly enough, though it is surmounted by a spire. The south side is by far the handsomest and the least altered, though that is disfigured by a modern tomb (I think) running out where the south transept should have come, for both the transepts are but just indicated, and never were carried out, so as to form the figure of the Cross. All the windows of the Clerestory are of the earliest and simplest Gothic—those in the aisle below are much more complicated and adorned. Nothing can be more disfigured than the interior of this venerable Church. The west end is filled up with the most rigid, presbyterian aversion to whatever is grand or beautiful, and they have entirely succeeded in disfiguring it so that not a trace is left of its former magnificence. The east end has been better treated—the galleries and pews are of dark wood hand-somely carved, an elegant pulpit supplies as well as it can the place that ought to be occupied by the altar, and the painted glass is allowed to remain in the windows. The capitals of the clustered columns here are more richly loaded with leaves and flowers, and the carving is more sharp and beautiful than any I ever saw. Peter, in his letters, {3} gives an admirable description of the appearance of this desolated Cathedral with its mouldering walls, and its churchyard paved with tomb stones—a grave had been recently dug among these, and the ground about was strewed with human bones. He describes admira-bly too the modern, Grecian Infirmary filling the place of the Episcopal palace on the one side, and, on the other, the little modern Gothic church which has an infinitely worse effect than St Margaret’s by Westminster Abbey.—Mr Hooker has, in unpacking and arranging his books here, discovered an omission, which distresses him very much. He has left behind him a leather case which contains 80 or 90 magnified drawings of different parts of plants by which he meant to illustrate his lectures. On discovering this misfortune yesterday he immediately wrote to my aunt Jas. Turner {4} at Halesworth with direc-tions where to seek for the drawings, and to send them to him, but, since he had, in order to add to them, left them out, to the last, to take them in the sac†, he fears that he may have brought them on a few stages, and left them on the road. In the introductory lectures these drawings will not be wanted, but if my aunt cannot find them in time f<or> the succeeding ones, I do not know what my brother will <do>. He has, as yet, seen Mr Hopkirk, but once, and that was at his Counting house, or office, where he was taking depositions. Mr Hopkirk is a Magistrate, and one of the most respected and most active here. He had, the night before my brother called on him, been employed in taking arms from some dis-affected people in the Gorbals, and the mob had resisted those who attempted to disarm them. There was a serious scuffle, but no lives were lost. Every one says that there has been and still is a great deal of distress among the poor here, in spite of the liberal subscriptions which have been raised for them, but it was not the poor and distressed, but men who at that time received from a guinea and [a] half to two guineas a week, who refused to work and made the most disturbance. More than 100 men in one manufactory on the officers of justice entering it to find out the seditions among them, openly told the officers tha if they sought for radicals, as they called them, they might, if they could, seize them all, as they were all of that description. Their present tranquillity is attributed more to the presence of the military and the strictness with which they are watched than to a disposition to do well among the leaders of the sedition; but many of those who from ignorance and a hope to improve their conditions would have joined the radicals at first, are now, it is thought, really disgusted with their proceedings, and disposed to be quiet. May 6th I have delayed finishing my letter, dear Papa, in the hope of receiv-ing one from home, which I now fear I shall not do for some days if you waited to receive my direction. You must remember that, though it will be three weeks tomorrow since I left Yarmouth, I have had but two letters from any one yet; and though I may have more to relate that is new than those at home can have, yet certainly I who am separated from you all, must be the one who wants the comfort of letters from home the most. Give my kind love to dear Mary, and tell her that if visiting here was very amusing I am likely to have amusement enough next week. We go this evening (Saturday) to Mr and Mrs Towers; on Tuesday to Mr and Mrs Mylne—Wednesday to Mr and Mrs Walker—Thursday to Mr and Mrs Young; and Friday to Dr and Mrs Muirhead. But, alas! we shall only meet the same set of Profes-sors at the house of each, and, except the Youngs, I fear that, though they may understand Surgery, Anatomy, Moral Philosophy, etc etc, very well, they are not very entertaining companions. I hope you will not think from my saying this, or from Mr Hooker’s remarking that we thought these learned men a queer set, that either Maria or I behave as if we thought so. I am sure that, at present, they all like her very much, and really she has never given them the least cause to do otherwise; and I think that I have not either. Besides I am sure that they are a very hospitable people and we are entirely obliged to them for the desire they shew for our company, for certainly they must take us on trust. I hope you have writ-ten to Mr Lyell, and set him right in the mistaken notions respecting me; and pray remember that any news relating to any of your correspondants†, and particularly any of the Norman Letters will be high-ly amusing to me. Be kind enough to commend me very respectfully to Mr Layton when you write to him, and to remember me kindly to Mr and Mrs Brightwen. Give my best love and duty to Mamma and love to my dear sisters and brothers (in spite of Mr Cohen’s opinion against such messages) and believe me ever

your very dutiful and affectionate daughter
Eliz. Turner

[Superscription:] Dawson Turner Esqre | Great Yarmouth [In the bottom left corner:] Single Sheet—
[Postmarks:] [1] GLASGOW | A6 | MAY | 1820 | 405-<.> [2] [Indistinct.]
[Postal fee:] 1/2

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{1} See Peter’s Letters to his Kinsfolk (1819), by ‘Peter Morris’ (John Gibson Lockhart), Letter LXVII.

{2} Charlotte Turner, later Vavasour

{3} Probable reading, but possibly ‘seditions’ or ‘seditious’.

{4} Elizabeth therefore left home on 13 April.

(Two messages.)

(The works quoted from are Eggert Olafsen’s Reise igiennem Island (1772), N. Mohr’s Forsøg til en Islandsk Naturhistorie (1786), W. J. Hooker’s Journal of a Tour in Iceland in the Summer of 1809 (1811), and F. A. L. Thienemann’s Reise im Norden Europas, verzüglich in Island in den Jahren 1820 bis 1821 (1824). The passages from foreign books have been translated into English.)

Henham Hall.—Thanks him for some grouse, and expresses interest in hearing news of Dr and Mrs Hooker. The Larix repens is not worth sending to Scotland on its own.

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Transcript

Henham Hall
Monday

Lady Stradbroke begs to offer her best thanks to Mr Dawson Turner for his present of Grouse—Lord & Lady Stradbroke will always feel much interested in the health & happiness of Dr & Mrs Hooker whose absence from their neighbourhood they regret extremely.—The Larix repens is not worth sending to Scotland unless accompanied by other Plants Mr Dawson Turner may wish to send there.—Lady Stradbroke requests to be kindly remembered to Mrs Dawson Turner—

[Superscription:] Dawson Turner Esq | Yarmouth | [At the head:] Dawson Turner Esq | Yarmouth [At the head:] Wangford Oct twenty | eighth | 1822 [At the foot:] Stradbroke

(Two messages.)

(Two messages.)

Transcript

July 18th. 1817.

My dear Sir,

At last I return you with many thanks Mr. Cotman’s letters, & I can assure you I have felt satisfaction & delight in his satisfaction & delight. Very much should I have liked to [have] been with him (yourself & some others being of the party) at Shoreham & Steyning: ¿Is there any account of ichnography of these churches? I forget whether while waiting for the packet wch was to carry you to France, you looked at any of the neighboring villages.

I thank you again for the trouble you took respecting my question about Thou & You. I do not however feel completely answered or rather I should say refuted. ¿Can you tell me when Y was first substituted for Th? ¿Is there any language, Celtic or other, from wch both the Roman & our own are, {1} derived that is wanting in the Y, or never uses Th., or uses them promiscuously?

Do not forget, whenever you see a Norman arch regular in it’s ornaments, to examine whether it be not so connected with the other parts—windows—tower—buttresses &c. as to infer the probability of it’s never having been moved—And Vice versâ.

My inference respecting the brick & flint, & subsequently brick & thin stone, radiated arches over the windows of Churches is drawn rather circuitously. I have suspected this date to be from 1480 to 1540 for some time & should much like to have my supposition confirmed by your observation. The W. window in Ormesby tower is thus radiated: it was created 1490. Potter Heigham & other windows are so: I think I can ascertain by connecting the new roof there, with that at Ludham & another at Loddon (these roofs by the bye are another help,) that they were built about 1490. The East window of the Dutch Church, Elm Hill, Norwith (finished 1460) is not radiated. The W. window of St. Andrew’s Hall (part of the same Church) evidently more modern is radiated.

At present, my dear Sir, I cannot say when the Introduction to the Brasses will be finished, because I really cannot say when it will be begun. I am so involved with domestic trifles (for they who cannot hire assistance must use their own fingers) that I feel to have no time to spare & my wife has extorted a promise from me to compile a new Sermon every week & to preach it too—this takes me up time. “very good,” you say, “but perform all your promises in rotation, & you promised me while you were single.” I shall, I hope bye & bye be able to perform all my promises.

Mrs. Layton (my Mother is in Suffolk) tho’ unknown to Mrs. Turner, yet knowing her in character & feeling grateful for her kindness to me, begs to join me in expressions of respect & esteem for her, & for yourself. Speak for me to Elisabeth also & Harriet, Hannah, Ellen, Gurney & the poor little […] {3} How is he? How fares the colony at Halesworth? How are you all?

Yours faithfully
Js. Layton.

[Added on the outside:] Obtain for me some seeds of the Pap: Cambr: {4} & a root of a double tulip wch is at the corners of the squares in Mr. Penrice’s garden & I will thank you.

[Direction:] Dawson Turner Esq | Yarmouth.

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No marks of posting.

{1} The comma is superfluous.

{2} Reading uncertain.

{3} A word, perhaps ‘babe’, has been lost here where the seal was cut off.

{4} Papaver cambricum, the Welsh poppy.

(Two messages.)

Transcript

My dear Sir

Tho I can hardly hold my pen after the fatigue of yesterdays excursion & have much to do this morning I cannot resist the gratification it gives me to tell you of my pleasures & to enclose part of my treasures, I set out at 3 oClock in the morning for a distant mountain lake, which I had once before visited, at a time when I did not collect plants. on the way I walked thro a deep & curious glen, where I was delighted beyond expression at finding in a little gloomy cavern that beautiful rarity Hymenophyllum alutum I cou’d not find a single frond in fruit, I have brought home roots to plant, I placed some by a rock at one side of my flower garden where I had a morsel that I got from Killarney last year growing, so that I may expect the good roots I have now planted will flourish. {1} I have put more in another situation, I cannot enclose you a fine specimen but have some good ones for the next parcell. I suppose you got it long since from Mr Mackay. however you will not be sorry to have a little more from me. by the side of the lake I found the fine Jungermannia No. 59 which I enclose. {1} it is not the same of† any specimen I have from Mr Hooker. perhaps it may be new. {1} I have a large store of it but cou’d not find fruit, if it be any thing that you wou’d like more of I can supply you abundantly. {1} I am told that the Hymenophyllum has been nearly destroyed at Killarney, the place where it grows is so well known that any person can find it, I have a Hieracium that I cannot make out & will send you in a few days with some of the mosses that you wished to get more of. at this time you will excuse my looking for them, I heard from Mr Mackay that Mr Hookers first No. had been left with him for me. {1} I expect to have it in a few days, I suppose you met with some person who brought it to him. let me again thank you for the beautiful & valuable american mosses, I wish I coud send you so great a number of any thing, equally valuable, the best I can I am & shall ever be willing to give, indeed it is a great pleasure when I find any thing new to think it will give you pleasure, A friend near Dublin has lately sent me Dicranum polycarpum & Gym[n]ostomum microstomum. {1} I dare say you have them but if not I can share with you or get you some. Mr Mackay has just sent me a little Gymnostomum that I had not before seen. {2} it is like mic[r]ostomum but different—

You have long before this returned from Town & I hope found Mrs Turner & all your girls well, little Ellen will soon be able to call you. how does she get on? I have not answered your last kind letters, I shd have written but was disabled for some days by Rheumatism in my arm. I hope to go again into the mountains next week & if I find any thing worth sending or telling you about you shall soon hear of it for I feel as if I never cou’d send anything I find soon enough,

Ever faithfully yours
E H.

July 1t 1812

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The date ‘July 1’ has been added at the head in pencil.

{1} Full stop supplied. The preceding word is at the end of a line.

{2} Full stop supplied.

† Sic.

Transcript

Croft. May 9th 1817.

I have delayed thanking you, my dear Friend, for the beautiful collection of Engravings you sent me, from the supposition that you might be from home. I wrote, however, to the excellent Hooker, & said all I could towards expressing the grateful sense I entertain of your unremitting kindness. My ex-pressions cannot represent my feelings, which, I assure you, are very warmly disposed towards my valued friends at Yarmouth, & all their belongings. Do I not know the elegant female figure, to which no name is attached?—

In my letter to Hooker I attempted to justify my resolution of sending Cecil to Eton. It is not a good cause which demands very elaborate defence. A choice of evils only was left me, & I am not perfectly convinced that I have chosen the least. Much harm, however, cannot be done by the trial of a year. My feelings are acute enough where my children & friends are concerned, & this will render me sufficient-ly observant of whatever may have been done amiss. With good abilities & a tolerable foundation, Cecil will never make a scholar. He has no ambition that way, & the best hopes Eton holds out to me, are those which, as I have told you before, flatter me that his situation & class-fellows may excite a spark of it in him. As to myself, I am by nature of a warm constitution & {1} I sometimes think that my anxiety as a pedagogue may render me less dear to my boy as a father. In short I have done my best, & may possibly—nay very probably find, as I have often found before, that my best endeavors† & intentions have been frustrated. I assure you I tried hard to find a conscientious, able private Tutor, but could not find both qualities united. Had my search been fortunate, Cis had never gone to Eton—a place I cannot yet think of without apprehension. The die, however, is now cast, & I will endeavor† to hope the best.—

What is become of Leache’s† Crustacea? {2}—I have part of that interesting work, but am so completely out of the literary world, that, except from you & Hooker, I hear nothing about it. You now talk seriously about finishing your noble work upon the Fuci. For the public good I hope you will act seriously too. I am happy in possessing a Large-paper-copy of it, as far as it has gone, & will, sh[oul]d it please God that I live to see the finale, have it bound, as nearly as possible, as well as it deserves.

To revert to Mrs Turner’s most beautiful engravings, may I once more beg a likeness of my dear Friend Turner? by the same hand. This w[oul]d make it doubly valuable, & I will promise it a good frame & excellent—i.e worthy as well as scientific company.

I have taken a house at Hartlepool for two months, &, in July, remove the whole of my family thither. Sh[oul]d the weather prove cold & ungenial as it has been for these two months past, & still is, I shall wish myself back again, in my quiet little Study at Croft. Nothing vegetates with us—indeed things appear rather retrograde than progressive. My intentions now are to build a small Green-house (upon which subject I am in the act of pestering dear Hooker) by way of assuring, by means of fire, as little vegetation at the season when it is usual to find it. {3}

You speak cheerily with respect to the times. With us no improvement has yet taken place. The Funds, certainly, rise—but may not this be from the opulent in London not knowing exactly how to employ their capital? America will thrive upon our distresses, for many of our excellent manufacturers are emigrating, & will, no doubt, meet with that encouragement there, which here they cannot have. I cannot say, however partial to national glory, that I think it cheaply bought by national distress, starvation & nearly bankruptcy:—yet at this price does England possess it!!! Delirant reges—plectuntur &c.—Adieu! my dear & highly valued friends! Be assured that I am yours Ἐς ἀν ὐδωρ τε ῤεη, {4} δενδρεα μακρὰ τεθήλη.

I beg my best regards to Mrs Turner—who, also, has my thanks, as is most due, for the parcel mentioned above.—

[Direction:] Dawson Turner Esq[ui]re | Yarmouth | Norfolk.

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Postmarked at Northallerton. Letters missing from words abbreviated by superscript letters have been supplied in square brackets.

{1} Written as a catchword at the foot of a page and repeated, as ‘and’, at the head of the next.

{2} W. E. Leach’s Malacostrata podophthalmata Britanniae, or descriptions of such British species of the Linnean genus Cancer as have their eyes elevated on footstalks, published in 1815, with illustrations by James Sowerby.

{3} ‘by means of … find it’: this appears to be what is written, but the meaning is unclear.

{4} There is an indistinct word of two letters here.

† Sic.

(Two messages.)