Pièce 89 - James David Forbes to William Whewell

6 pp

Chiefswood by Melrose - WW for his long letter: 'How pleasant it is to have a good old fashioned grand epistle!' JDF is especially grateful for the attention WW gave his remarks on colours and the reference to Merimee, but thinks the diagram WW refers to has some defects. JDF prefers the triangular arrangement of Mayers to the concentric circles of Merimee [he gives the diagrams], since 'the true relations of the colours to one another and to grey are preserved'. He has received some correspondence generated by his recent paper on the application of probabilities to doublestars ['On the Alleged Evidence for a Physical Connexion between Stars forming Binary or Multiple Groups, arising from their Proximity Alone', London, Edinburgh and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, August 1849]: 'not one of whom seems to entertain any doubt that Mitchell and all his followers were labouring under a complete deception, when they considered the calculus of probabilities applicable to such a question'. JDF went to the BAAS meeting in Birmingham: 'the most prosaic that I have been at ; no marked failure, no enthusiasm or great success...The depreciated value of our Transactions strikes everyone, even the 'Athenaeum'!' JDF can give no information on the subject of the life and letters of Newton, but has heard that David Brewster wants a copyright which nobody will give. He is pleased the Trinity College MSS are to be printed. JDF has been to the Orkney and Shetland Islands with Mr and Mrs Airy.