Pendulum experiments to be conducted at stations of Great Indian Trigonometrical Survey.
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The Sir John Herschel Collection
The preparation of the print Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Herschel (Michael J. Crowe ed., David R. Dyck and James J. Kevin assoc. eds, Cambridge, England: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1998, viii + 828 pp) which was funded by the National Science Foundation, took ten years. It was accomplished by a team of seventeen professors, visiting scholars, graduate students, advanced undergraduates, and staff working at the University of Notre Dame.
The first online version of Calendar was created in 2009 by Dr Marvin Bolt and Steven Lucy, working at the Webster Institute of the Adler Planetarium, and it is that data that has now been reformatted for incorporation into Ɛpsilon.
Further information about Herschel, his correspondence, and the editorial method is available online here: http://historydb.adlerplanetarium.org/herschel/?p=intro
No texts of Herschel’s letters are currently available through Ɛpsilon.
Pendulum experiments to be conducted at stations of Great Indian Trigonometrical Survey.
Asks help of R.S.L. in reducing all observations to 1870 in JH's catalog of nebulae. Estimates cost at £10.
Needs to know soon if R.S.L. will approve grant to expand JH's catalog of nebulae. Otherwise G. B. Airy will dismiss man employed to do those computations. [JH annotation: Sent similar letter to G. G. Stokes on same date.]
[Rough draft (1p) crossed out, followed by:] Confidential propostion that G. B. Airy submitted to Board of Visitors is inappropriate. Queen's warrant does not empower Board to consider such matters.
Objects to Board of Visitors acting as 'self-constituted Court-Martial' to examine personal conduct of Board's chairman [James South], whom G. B. Airy no longer recognizes as competent. [JH notes that he did not send this letter, but kept it because it gave the reasons behind the shorter form [TxU:H/L-0374], which he preferred.]
Plans to confer with [J. T.] Walker and F. A. T. Winnecke from Pulkovo to learn of Russian pendulum experiments before reporting to R.S.L. council. J. H. Pratt's measurement of polar axis and theory about earth's center of gravity.
Objects to plan to move Royal Observatory to site other than Greenwich, but will defer to G. B. Airy's opinion. JH's deteriorating health.
Extensive comments on the type and construction of telescope to be supplied to Melbourne University.
Supports G. P. Bond of Harvard College for foreign membership of R.S.L.; proposes H. E. Sainte-Claire Deville for the Rumford Medal, for his development of a high temperature laboratory furnace applied to metallurgy and the 'disseverance' of the hydrogen and oxygen of water.
Opposes sending expensive scientific equipment for J. B. N. Hennessey to use in India; suggests instead a variety of useful observations needing to be made, using inexpensive equipment. Discusses son's [Alexander] spectroscope observations of meteors.
Further recommendations regarding useful equipment and observations to be made in India [see JH's 1866-8-11]. Agrees that meteorological experiments there are desirable. Offers JH's son John's experience of India to ES.
In response to ES's 1866-12-6, JH sees no benefit in a great equatorial telescope in India being an itinerant instrument.
Discusses Lord [Henry ] Brougham and his optical papers. Thanks ES for kind remarks regarding JH's son [John?]. Discusses polarization of corona.
Reviews additional work of H. P. Brougham [see JH's 1868-10-1] as has been requested in preparation for an eloge . JH is critical of poorly described and poorly understood work, unrelentingly tied to Isaac Newton's corpuscular ideas.
Against changing location of Royal Observatory [from Greenwich], but will defer to opinion of [G. B. Airy] Astronomer Royal. Airy is most competent to judge situation. Still ill.
Too ill to work on anything besides nebula catalogue. Discusses recent meteorological phenomena, period of solar spots, and great pyramid.
Occupied with matters besides magnetism lately. Interest in science of Prince Consort [Albert] is praiseworthy. Discusses several observatories and letter of [T. W.?] Blakiston.
Lists magnetic books received from ES. It will be some time before JH can direct his attention to magnetic issues.
Asks for information concerning the magnetic observations and compilations made in various countries and regions.
Thanks for declination readings from photograms at Kew. Thinks meteorological observatory on Vesuvius is good idea, but not sure a magnetic one is. Includes two charts of world.