William Thomas Brande to Faraday   17 February 18351

Mint, Tuesday

Dear Faraday,

I am not very well today or would have come to you upon the subject of your note. I always consider it a part of my duty to aid & assist you as far as his [sic] in my power, in your arduous task of providing for the Friday Evenings. I have not the least objection to Friday the 27h provided Mr Baber2 will be prepared with his apparatus, and as he has but little to furnish which is not already in his Manufactory I have no apprehension of delay on his account. I would myself write to him, but I think a line from you will be more effective, to tell him that we have settled for next Friday week, and that I will wait upon him, or meet him at the Institution whenever he pleases, to make final arrangements - perhaps he would appoint Saturday next after my lecture for the purpose.

It has occurred to me that all these new things out of wood - I mean kreosote pittacal3 &c if they do not end, as they originated, in smoke, might furnish us, through the aid of Morson, who is working hard at some of them, with matter for an evening. I also thought of Manufacture of Lead - Shot pipes - &c helped out by Messrs Maltbys4. I am quite sure how much better you do all these things than I, but I anxiously wish to relieve you as far as I can of your laborious duties - and therefore any thing you can suggest in which I can assist you I will willingly & cheerfully undertake.

Yours very faithfully | Wm. Thos. Brande

1
Dated on the basis that this letter refers to Brande's Friday Evening Discourse of 27 February 1835 "On the manufacture of floor-cloth". For an account of this lecture see Rec.Gen.Sci., 1835, 1: 396-7. In this lecture Brande was assisted by workmen from the manufactory in Knightsbridge (p.396).
2
Of Smith and Baber, floor cloth manufacturers in Knightsbridge. Robson (1835), 687.
3
Reichenbach (1832, 1833) respectively.
4
Maltby. Lead merchant of Laurence Pountney. POD. Although Faraday did not give a Friday Evening Discourse on lead, he discussed Maltby's work extensively in his lecture on lead on 16 May 1835 as part of his course "On the chemical and physical properties of the common metals". See Faraday's notes RI MS F4I M1835, p.11.

Bibliography

ROBSON (1835): London Commercial Directory, 15th edition, London.

Please cite as “Faraday0764,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday0764