42 Montagu Square, W.1.—Is looking forward to meeting him again at her lunch party.
Is looking forward to meeting her for lunch (see 1/385).
JGL has received WW's note: he does not know when he will be back in town or whether he can undertake anything new for WW's collection [of hexameters]. If WW does not proceed rapidly JGL still hopes to participate in the work.
Regent's Park - On the possibility of JGL's son going to Trinity College.
Regent's Park - JGL's good friend Sir John McNeill, late minister in Persia, was educated at St Andrews and now writes on a subject connected with his alma mater. Comments regarding the Greek Chair at Glasgow.
Swansea - GA will be 'extremely glad' to have Neale as a pupil. However, further to his correspondence with Myers, he does not know whether Mr Hare had or had not already engaged a tutor for Neale. Could WW answer some questions further to the fellowship examination - 'In the first place must I sit at all? In the next place supposing that I sit, by what time must I be at Cambridge?'"
Observatory - Henderson [Thomas Henderson] is with GA: 'I intend to bring him to hall; pray dine there if you have nothing better to do'. GA gives the two things which need correcting in his Venus paper.
Observatory - Gives a note on perturbations intended for John W. Lubbock: 'If perturbations are applied to x y & z, there is no practicability of dividing the time of an apposition into different parts, as the calculation does not give the means of correcting the elements for the beginning of each part. Consequently the series used must be such as will apply from the beginning of an apposition to the end. It seems to me very probable that 5th or higher powers may be wanted'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - Thanks WW for his History of Induction [The History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Time', 3 vols., 1837]. The next time WW is in London he should come and see them.
Flamsteed House, Greenwich - Thanks WW for the ale [see GA to WW, 10 October 1839]: 'we shall consume it I believe before time has done it justice'. GA has not seen WW's lecture to the Philosophical Society on tides: 'I should much like to see it; and shall be glad if you can send it to me. I have not duly consulted Herschel, but I remember his general notions about forced oscillations and so far in application to tides they must agree with mine. By the bye, my correlative terms are forced tide wave and free tide wave. In the simplest cases which can be conceived, the two are mixed together so as to produce phenomena that, viewed as observations from which empirical laws are to be deduced must appear inextricably confused. In one case only, namely when a limited space is very small, the tide becomes a simple tilt, like that of water in a basin. This cannot be the case in a sea so large and (comparatively) shallow as the Pacific, but upon one supposition one of the waves there may predominate, and there may be phenomena something like Fitzroy's. But I should like to see what you have said'.
Flamsteed House, Greenwich - Could WW send him a tracing of the Kamschatham waves? - preferably the whole course of the water in rising and falling.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA has looked at the account of [John Scott] Russell's Forth tides in the Athenaeum and 'think you will find that Russell's notion of the southern and northern waves exhibiting themselves separately is wholly untenable, both from theory, and from the consideration that they ought to shew themselves as well in the coast tides; but in fact if there are two they become one inseparable tide. The real explanation I have no doubt is in the theory of deep waves in shallow canals'. GA gives the formula and coefficient (for the rise of tide / depth of channel) showing the height of the water after running over a shallow bottom for a certain distance. GA has looked over WW's tide paper and has a problem with the figures and arrangement of the data given in the tables of Plymouth observations.
Flamsteed House, Greenwich - It was GA who brought the tide disturbance of January 3 to the attention of the Admiralty: 'The tide in the Thames was 6 feet lower than it ought to have been. I have received several of the Admiralty observations: the tide at Leith seems to have been scarcely affected' [see GA to WW, 21 January 1841]. GA gives a long descriptive and mathematical answer to WW's query regarding oblique arches.
Flamsteed House, Greenwich - GA returns 'Hewett's papers (letter, table, and picture) for which I am much obliged'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA has put [Pierre-Simon] Laplace's theory of tides 'in a shape in which other people can read it, and a very beautiful theory it is. But as Laplace left it is so atrociously repulsive that I do not think that any person ever mastered it (for no body refers to it) and I imagine that no person living but myself has fairly attempted it. In this I think I have done good service to the literature of mathematics'. GA gives a solution to the age of the tide: 'The time of high water is accelerated, but more for the moon than for the sun. Consequently (referring to solar time) the moon's high tide on any day, happening earlier than corresponds to the moon's position, does happen at s solar time corresponding to the day when the moon's transit was earlier - that is to a preceding day; the solar tide corresponds equally (in solar time) to all days; and therefore their combination corresponds to an earlier day. Thus we have age of the tide'. Can WW give any accounts on the height of waves, experiments on waves generally and a notion of the changes which WW's 'researches will make in your old cotidal lines?'
Weymouth - Is in Weymouth on part of his journey of tide observation: 'I have found more than once that a great deal of good is done by going to see with one's own eyes things which other people's words have made mysterious... And it has answered well. The tides appear to be all shallow-water-tides'. Although GA's theory of tides is in an unfinished state - 'it is in a state which any body else can complete who will take the trouble'. GA went to observe the surf at the Chesil Bank at Weymouth: 'The surf is the most majestic thing that I have seen'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA now remembers that he has heard something of one of the Oxford candidates [see GA to WW, 27 March 1842]: on referring to a letter he finds 'that Donkin has written 4 articles' in Gregory's mathematical journal on the subject of analytical geometry, signed M.N.N (1839, vol. 1 and 1841, vol. II). He has also written a paper on Greek music in 'Taylor & Walton's Dictionary of Antiquities': 'The mathematical papers are doubtless within your reach & you can therefore judge'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - If WW is in London can he come and dine 'at our visitation dinner on Saturday next'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA has persuaded Lamont of Munich [Johann von Lamont] - an astronomer and magnetician - to stay a few days more and come with him to Cambridge: 'I have known Lamont some years, and have a high opinion of his acuteness and originality and singular good sense'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA acknowledges a letter WW recently sent concerning the Smith's Prize paper: 'As regards the paper and your comments on it, first I was glad to find that you think lightly of [William?] Hopkins's attempt to force in mathematics where [they?] have no business. In my opinion, Hopkins has done more to injure the credit of mathematics than any person that I know. This is the fault of the geologists (who would praise without attempting to understand), and I think, primarily the fault of Sedgwick.. In the next place , I was glad to see a question concerning the mathematical theory of waves. This is a subject which ought, I think, to be in some way brought into the curriculum of the university'. Although he has not yet settled the longitude of Valentia [see GA to WW, 2 Nov. 1844], 'I expect it will turn out an excellent work of its kind. We are much more puzzled in making the geodetic computations to compare with it (in large triangles upon a spheroid of assumed dimensions) than in the astronomical and chronometrical part: but after repeated trials I think we have managed to compute round the three sides of a triangle nearly or more than 100 miles each and to return within two or three feet to our starting point. This was to be the criterion of our method'. GA's paper on Irish tides is being printed. Similarly the printing of the Reduction of the Greenwich Planetary Observations 1750 to 1830 is finished. The reduction of the Greenwich Lunar Observations (1750 to 1830) is in the main finished: 'I am preparing to correct the elements of the Tables: and this I think upon the whole one of the greatest works that has ever been done in Astronomy'.
Flamsteed House, Greenwich - GA is taking a vacation in France: 'my nervous system seems I think more than usually shaken'. Regarding high academical instruction in mathematics: 'I have no doubt of the want of a Code. Yet it will not do to make this exclusive or suppressive of novelties - not because it would not be best if it could be maintained, but because it cannot be maintained for an unlimited time, and the more pestiferously it is kept up for a time, the more sudden and complete and anarchical will be its fall at some period... Therefore my general notion would be, to define subjects which ought to be kept, leaving a fair space for others which may be introduced as new tastes or the influence of individuals may prevail, and not to risk the chance of such a treatise as Babbage proposed "On the principles of d-ism, in opposition to the dot-age of the University"'. As to particular authors, GA recommends Newton, Lagrange and Monge, and reluctantly Laplace's Mechanique Celeste - though 'this is by no means so systematic a work as those above'. Regarding the works of [Leonhard] Euler GA is not very familiar: 'But to some of these which I did read, there is this objection, that Euler gives the whole course of his ideas, dilating upon his crude notions in a way which requires great labour for following him, and then quietly informing you that it is all useless and that he can give you something much better'. GA agrees with WW in emphasising 'the great standard works of all times rather than to the last steps made'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - Adams [John C. Adams?] has invited GA to the Johnian dinner on Monday. Due to a long standing agreement GA has written to Sedgwick [Adam Sedgwick] to dine with him on the Tuesday, hence he has not put in an application for WW's hospitality.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA thanks WW for WW's paper on Hegel ['On Hegel's Criticism of Newton', 1849] and on the Curve equation (intrinsic): 'Truly the German organ of "Pure Reason" must have altered its shape since the time of Kant. - As to the latter subject you ought, I think, to bear the title of high-priest of rigmarole. This method of representing a curve is on the face of it almost necessarily unfit for Forces, but it is conceivable that it might come in in Kinetics'. GA is putting together some early details of the Cape Observatory and needs some information concerning Fallows [Fearon Fallows].
Royal Observatory Greenwich - All that WW says about the diurnal tide at Plymouth is quite accurate. The gale from the North on Friday 28th was 'the wind which commonly raises the tide'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA is 'in the agony of mounting the great transit circle... I fully expect that it will do well'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA corrects a common misinterpretation of a Greek word (the sense of which is 'reverence' and not 'modesty') - 'a favourite language with me'.
Playford near Ipswich - Edward Sabine has told GA that there should be a meeting of the BAAS in mid-January: 'The connexion of this with your Tidal proposal is not extremely close, but it suggests to me to ask you how far you have got the whole affair into shape. I do not think it right towards the Government or politic towards ourselves to make application till we know pretty exactly what is to be done, and can thus put them in a state to judge well of the magnitude, duration, and expense of the expedition'. GA agrees that the character of the expedition should be exclusively tidal.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - Further to his last letter and the approval of WW's memorial on tides, GA subsequently sent a paper copy to Lord Rosse at the Royal Society for his approval; 'but I have heard nothing more about it (A non-resident President is a great evil). However, it will come I should think before long'.
Royal Observatory Greenwich - GA had WW's 'Tide scheme' copied and sent to Francis Beaufort 'to ask if it required nautical corrections'. GA has just heard from Beaufort: 'I inclose it. Therefore I send the suggestions to the Secretary of the Admiralty today; and I refer him to you for further correspondence'.