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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.
JH finished his catalog of stars for his Cape Results; hopes to be finished with his nebulae and double star catalogs soon.
Thanks for RH's paper on mineralogy. JH has explored use of mercury together with iron in photography.
Some information about Charles Piazzi Smyth. JH needs information about some of RH's photographic paper, which JH has tried but without success.
Believes that the operative rays in JH's thermographic process are neither 'calorific' nor 'thermal'.
Sends GA a spectrum photograph, and explains how JH obtained it.
Sends GA two more spectrum photographs [see JH's 1842-4-10], and believes that these may lead the way to color photography.
Finished the reductions of all of the nebulae and double stars recorded at Cape Town; JH soon hopes to prepare for the publication of his Cape Results.
Sends RH a packet of photographs with a description of each type.
Remarks that he is 50 years old, and that he and CH have 'seen something of that odd and most changeable compound called Human Nature.'
Describes the total solar eclipse seen by Francis Baily at Pavia and George Airy at Turin. They were thrilled to witness three purple flames from the blocked sun emerge around the edge of the moon. Thirty more Cape Town sweeps remain to be reduced.
Reports the birth of JH's ninth child, Julia.
Read John William Draper's papers; although he believes that Draper's instruments are inconsistent, JH feels that they are still important because they are measurable. Decries [L. F.] Moser's skepticism of photography's value, calling it a 'blindfolding to some of the most interesting physical relations that have ever been discovered.'
Sorry to hear RH has been ill; JH sends some photographic examples.
Enjoyed CH's last letter.
Congratulates TM on work at Zwartland. Fears Cape Results will not be ready within the year.
Plans to calculate Gamma Virginis orbit. Received WS paper on astronomical observations. Suggests WS look for a house in Kent after learning plans to move near London.
Thanks WS for C. P. Smyth drawings of Cape monument and Gamma Virginis observations. Notes J. H. Mädler's work on double stars and the doubt that they obey the inverse square law. Discusses use of photography in astronomy.
Needs some clarification of GA's letter [see GA's 1842-9-16] before JH is ready to reply about the calculating engine.
Thanks GA for exercising GA's usual discretion in the matter of the funding of Charles Babbage's calculating machine [see GA's 1842-9-26].
Concerning Airy's papers recently submitted [see GA's 1842-1-5]. Hopes he will continue to send a report of his experiments and observations.