TALBOT767

19^th May

My Dear Henry

You seem so mathematically inclined that I ought en bonne mere ¹ to send you to Oxford to counteract it that you may not grow into a Rhomboidal shape, walk elliptically, or go off in a tangent. all which evils are imminent if you go to Cambridge. What do you think of the new method invented at Edinburgh by Professor Leslie, ² of freezing water, it seems very ingenious by the account I read of it in the Morning Chronicle. ³ Here is for you an Impromptu by Voltaire,⁴ sur la Beauté du Ciel, dans une Nuit d’été – ⁵

Tous ces vastes païs d’azur & de lumiere ⁶

Tirés du sein du néant vuide & formés sans matiere ^<7>

Arrondis sans compas, & tournant sans pivot ⁷

ont a peine coûté la depense d’un mot. ⁸

I thought this would suit your present astronomical taste. I saw last night at Sir Humphry Davy’s ⁹ a M. Biot ¹⁰ just arrived from France to measure the variations of the Pendulum. Many other Savans were there, as well as Bowles the Poet ¹¹, who I believe you have seen at Bowood, ¹² he lives near there. “Sans Matiere” in Voltaire’s Impromptu must be taken in the sense, I suppose, of without Materials, not without matter.

There is no stand for M^r F’s ¹³ glasses, which will make them awkward for you to use

don’t you think so?

I send you the 1^st Number of the Guardian a new paper edited by M^r Brougham. ¹⁴ Nothing shews more strongly the power of Eloquence than M^r Canning’s ¹⁵ Speech the other day in his own defence. Numbers that went down to the House of Commons predetermi[ned]¹⁶ to vote against him or to go away before the Division & not vote at all staid & actually voted for him. Tho’ they afterwards when they cooled thought it still a scandalous job. This is something like the extraordinary effects of Grecian oratory, & is seldom produced in Modern times amongst our duller perceptions & slower feelings. Bob Eden ¹⁷ goes to Cambridge because his Brothers thought Oxford an Idle place, where they only forgot what they had learnt at Eton Think of Lord Milton ¹⁸ voting for M^r Canning!!!! O Eloqüence [sic] first born of Heaven!

London May twenty 1817 Auckland ¹⁹ –
H^y Fox Talbot Esq^re
Normanton
Stamford –