Text Online
From:
Michael Faraday
To:
William Somerville
Date:
1 October 1834
Source of text:
Bod MS Somerville dep c.370, MSF-1
Summary:
No summary available.
Contributor:
Faraday Project
No summary available.
Thanks JH for Gamma Virginis observations, which are finally in accord with his. Sends observation of the double stars JH suggested watching. Works with Richard Sheepshanks. Francis Baily delivers details on Edinburgh meeting of philosophers. Sends news from Niccolo Cacciatore, who has returned to the Observatory in Naples.
CD is unwell.
FitzRoy has dispatched two casks of bones and stones, a box with "very valuable specimens", and a large jar.
No summary available.
Extract from JH's journal on voyage to Cape of Good Hope, showing barometer and thermometer readings from 23 Nov. 1833 (Lat. 33˚20' N) to 5 Jan. 1834 (Lat 31˚30' S). Compares these to ER's thermometer and R.S.L. standard thermometer. Will accompany ER to [Cape] observatory next week. Please conduct barometer and temperature observations on ER's return trip [to India].
No summary available.
Heights of various places in Chile.
No summary available.
No summary available.
Comments on social matters, and on what JH has been observing.
Became ill two weeks before on his return from Santiago after an interesting trip and some geology – though snow kept him out of the Andes. FitzRoy has had to sell the schooner; he was discouraged by the Admiralty, and the expense was too much for him to bear personally.
Sends some packages and his Transactions. Sent through [Peter?] Stewart the first volume of Col. Mark Beaufoy's Observations. Sends copies of the Athenaeum, which contains details of the Edinburgh meeting. Will be placed on the list to receive free copies of the Athenaeum.
No summary available.
Thanks RJ for having helped J[ohn] Stewart, [JH's brother-in-law], to a job; offers to try to get some South African statistics for the Statistical Society, and along the way comments on South African political life. JH describes life at the Cape, and the beauties of the skies.
No summary available.
No summary available.
Thanks for the perusal of J. A. Lloyd's paper. Has written to him on the subject of the pendulum. Had only one letter from the Elizabeth. No satisfactory news of [Andrew?] Smith's expedition. Unable to make any circumpolar observations due to the deviation of the transit instrument.
No summary available.
Developed a method that greatly simplifies Joseph Lagrange's integration of the 3n differential equations of motion of the second order by reducing all calculations to the application of 'one principal function.' Applies the method to planetary motion.
Abstracts of barometrical pressure in various parts of the earth. Has used James South's equatorial with Richard Sheepshanks's clockwork attached. Constitution of Paris Observatory being changed. D. F. J. Arago's experiments on glass and metal. Humphrey Lloyd's experiments on reflected light. Edinburgh's Observatory site likely to be changed. John Pond (Astronomer Royal) has been asked to resign. Thomas Maclear's Cape circle. Reasons for the delay in delivery of R. A. Cauchoix's telescope to Cambridge. House of Lords and Commons burnt down.