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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.
[WB's] sheets [of barometer observations] are well done. Sends European latitudes and longitudes. Will send 'Engraved Squares' soon. Notes errors in observations.
The Ryans are in London.
JH is captivated by science of photography. Has blundered onto 'Calotype leaving out [W. H. F.] Talbot's principal ingredient!!' [Note added by daughter Isabella Herschel:] Papa is in hurry. Greetings to family.
Compliments MH on her poetry; JH is trying to clarify when various friends are to visit Collingwood.
The Herschels bought a Christmas tree this year; JH reports that his children loved it and that 'they will be sure to keep up the custom which is a very merry one.'
Giving reasons why he would not like his name put forward as a magistrate.
Comments on the operational and organizational details of the magnetic and meteorological observatories, and on the supervisory committee's [the Physical Committee of the R.S.L.] responsibilities.
Discusses a letter in which JH explains why JH cannot, as a British subject, accept the foreign order offered him [by the Danish king]. Asks HS to read over the letter and to decide how it should be delivered.
Supports the remeasurement of N. L. Lacaille's geodetic arc in South Africa, giving a number of reasons for his support.
Agrees to proposed meeting date [see GA's 1841-1-16], and encourages GA to come with a draft final report prepared.
Is sending him a circumpolar projection of the Southern stars. Regarding the star maps being printed by John Arrowsmith. Will visit him the following week. Has received Robert Main's paper.
Insists on inclusion of all data and graphs in the publication of the accumulated magnetic observations, made as part of 'perhaps the very greatest scientific operation ... ever ... undertaken....' Urges that funding be sought from the government.
Explains 'discordances' as contraction of damp paper. Use 'Engraved Squares' to avoid this error. Possible error in barometer observations from Montreal. Diurnal 'undulation' appearing in data. American observations arrived, may fill 'missing intervals.' Keep record of expenses incurred. Postscript on color variation in stars.
Returning some papers that should have been returned earlier. Hopes all are well.
A portable magnetometer purchased by the B.A.A.S. is now available as a loan for use in magnetic survey of British Guyana.
Advice for standardizing observations, to be given to the Physical Committee of the R.S.L.
Has not lately done much work in photography, except to work with paper treated with vegetable substances.
It will be difficult for JH to get away to Collingwood as planned as discussions [?] are slow; some family news.
A note to accompany proposals for the Standards Commission to consider [see GA's 1841-2-17]; twenty pages of proposals are appended.
Unable to give any specifics concerning Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre's new photographic process. Discovered that old paper specimens produced a much better representation of the spectrum in its natural colors than those obtained at the date of JH's paper; these results are 'light on a dark ground,' which makes JH more hopeful that colored photography will someday be perfected. Has experimented with vegetable substances.