No summary available.
No summary available.
Missed JH at the R.S.L. meeting. Has some experiments on which he seeks JH's opinion regarding presentation at the Society. Enclosing report.
No summary available.
Ask JR to advise the Queen to issue Her Royal Commission of Inquiry into the best methods of securing the improvement of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge.
No summary available.
Regrets letter read the night before at the R.A.S. of JH's wish to resign and hopes JH's health allows him to come occasionally and be a nominal member. Discusses Piazzi Smyth's preparations for voyage to Teneriffe.
Regarding JH's question about formulae for intensities of reflected light, BP encloses a paper concerning G. G. Stokes's conclusions about the direction of the plane of vibrations.
CD is pleased by BP’s appreciative opinion of Origin. He never intended to claim that he originated the doctrine that species have not been independently created. The only novelty in his work is the attempt to explain how species became modified and how the theory of descent explains large classes of facts. If he has taken anything from BP, he has done so unconsciously. Gives names of those he would have mentioned in any account of authors who maintained that species have not been separately created.
CD greatly admires BP’s Philosophy of creation.
To avoid possible misundertanding of his letter [2654] of that morning, CD wishes to make clear that he did not wish to imply that BP’s essay and the Vestiges of creation were in the same class. The more he thinks of it the more difficult he feels it would be to give a fair account of the authors who have maintained the modification of species. CD finds that he referred to BP’s views in the preface to his larger work [Natural selection], which was replaced by the Origin.
Glad to hear JH feeling better. Enclosing a 'shorter and simpler' explanation of some experiment by Léon Foucault, asking for comments.