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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.
On JH's Cambridge oration for B.A.A.S. Asks RM about weaknesses in paper, and character of people to be addressed, so that JH will not offend them. JH hopes to read speech, distrusting own extemporaneous speaking abilities.
Requests information about actinometers in JF's possession, and provides further information regarding their use.
Thanks JF for second edition of work on the Alps. Praises first edition.
Hopes to add JF's name to B.A.A.S. Meteorological Committee, and to see JF at Cambridge meeting of the committee.
Informs of B.A.A.S. proposal to encourage by 'specific pecuniary reward,' improvement of 'self-recording magnetical and meteorological apparatus.' Outlines advantages of proposal.
Cannot attend the testimonial committee meeting, but recommends that for a R.A.S. testimonial, a well written parchment would be far more effective than a bound book.
Will help with the dispute between [W. R.] Dawes and [George] Bishop, provided certain things are understood by all the parties involved; enumerates these. Will speak as discretely as he can with [W. S.] Stratford.
On Francis Baily's titles and on how to get a print with Baily's picture, autograph, and name in regular capitals. Explains remarks he made in a controversy with T. R. Robinson and published in the Athenaeum [Autumn, 1843] about JH's father's telescopes.
Thanks RS for the engraving [of JH's portrait?]. Who should receive copies? Suggests that the 'Knight of C. Hill' [Sir James South and his Campden Hill Observatory] 'is not worth your powder.'
Wishes CH a happy 96th birthday. Reports that when Margaret Herschel's brother John Stewart was in Egypt, he saw a comet. JH remarks that 'there seems to be no end of the comets.'
JH expresses pleasure in receiving and reading extracts from CH's biography. Expects to begin printing his Cape Results by Christmas. In finalizing his Cape Results, JH has found that several Southern double stars moved in the five-year span of his observations.
Provides the best values available for dispersion and separation, which will allow GA to calculate what he needs [see GA's 1845-4-4].
Is skeptical of the American observations [see GA's 1845-12-8], and reports other observations communicated to JH.
George Airy, George Peacock, and [Adam] Sedgwick are visiting Collingwood for Christmas. Airy writes JH that an American astronomer named [Ormsby] 'Mitchell' has seen Antares double. JH reports that William Lassell and W. R. Dawes have observed the 7th Saturnian satellite and also another of the six satellites of the 'Georgium Sidus' [Uranus]. JH is confident that his Cape Results will go to the presses in January.
Expresses his pleasure at RH's new position at the Museum of Economic Geology.
Asks for new observational data on Gamma Virginis [see JH's 1843-7-18].
Believes GA's measurements [see GA's 1845-10-1] seriously in error, and strenuously defends JH's method.
Details attempts to purchase Mme. Witte's lunar model for the 'Museum of Oconomic Geology.'
Will consider GA's objections [see GA's 1845-12-27] when JH works further on double star orbits.
Remarks on observation of new comet. Discord in R.A.S. follows Francis Baily's death. C. P. Smyth will leave Cape after being appointed Astronomer Royal to Scotland. Glass for Cape equatorial tested. JH has no success appealing for continuation of Colonial Survey. Southern constellation reform compromised.