Item 47 - William Whewell to Richard Jones

3 pp.

Trinity College - WW spent a fortnight in London - 'Lady M. [Lady Malcolm] being established in Manchester Square'. He likes the idea of RJ 'going into Cornwall about the time of our oscillations' [pendulum experiments conducted with George Airy down a tin mine shaft to measure the earth's density]. Further to the vacant Lucasian professorship: 'I am afraid we shall make nothing of Herschel's professorship. I do not think he will offer himself and I am afraid the electors will not offer the chair to him. He has got some crotchets about it; first as to what a professor ought to do, that he ought to be in correspondence and rivalry with all the mathematical professors in the world, and then as to himself that he is not so much a mathematician par excellence as he is other things'.