TALBOT7066

Ashmolean Museum. ¹
November. 26. 1854.

My dear M^r Talbot

I ought to have answered your letter ² of now nearly a fortnight old! I have delayed doing so in the hope of being able to say that I had tried M^r Reade’s ³ Experiment. I have however been too busy to do so. I will do it however this next week, & you shall know the result. No man, in my belief can take from you this – that you first showed that Iodide of Silver formed in the moist way (i.e. from Solutions) was capable of being made susceptible of a latent image effect under the influence of light, which a subsequent treatment with substances capable of a [illegible word] sort of reducing (deoxidizing) effect action was capable of developing into a visible effect. This I believe to be your’s & th on it, it seems to me, your patent rests & securely. I will send you back your observations ⁴ on my conversation with you tomorrow I have made one or two verbal alterations in them.

I will meet you in Town on any day, towards the end of this week that you will name. I fear Sunday week may be too late? –

I have been so very busy of late that this must be my apology for my not having answered your letters before.

I wish to see the specification of Daguerre’s ⁵ discovery as well as yours & the descriptions in the Phil^l Trans^{ns 6} before I get into the Witness box. ⁷ My own belief is that this [is] an ungenerous and immoral combination to deprive you of what the men who make it are most deeply indebted to you for their having at all.

Yours ever very faithfully & truly.
Nevil Story Maskelyne