Preston | Monday morning1
Dear Father
Yours2 was received yesterday morning. With respect to the additional expense I have been at on account of Emma’s visit,3 I think it quite unnecessary to enter into a detail of it. Whatever expenses I have incurred on her account will be liquidated in a couple of months after her departure, so that it is needless to speak to me further on that subject. All that Emma will require of you is money sufficient to bring her home when she is going. At present I’m unable to muster the sum. You ask for a full and true account of her health. I shall give you the latter at all events. Judging from the evidence afforded me, I would conclude that I never saw her in better health than she is at present. You say that my mind is set very much on America.4 It most assuredly is. This frame of mind however is no momentary impulse. My convictions on this subject have been the result of mature deliberation. The thought of going to America has more or less occupied my mind for years, but within the last nine months it has become a settled determination on my part. As for the hope held out when you say: – ‘You don’t know, nor I either, but this may be the best America for you yet’.5 It is rather illusive – rather intangible for me. I have learned the folly of trusting to such hopes, and every day’s experience strengthens the conviction of their irrationality. Man to a certain extent is the child of circumstance, or at least circumstances operate powerfully on a person like me who stands in the world without prop or stay and has nothing to depend on but his own successful exertions. And judging from the circumstances in which I am placed, and from the evidence afforded me by my short experience, I can see nothing – no argument – which can successfully oppose itself to the step that I have resolved on. I think it quite useless to make any application to Somerset House6 at present. Any emolument7 which I would receive there would not weigh against my determination of crossing the Atlantic if good hopes were held out to me beyond. So it is best to wait until we hear from Wm Wright and Wm Tyndall, and after that we will be the better judges how to act. You may read my former letter to the Dean,8 merely to show that I am alive to his kindness, but burn this, and keep its contents by yourself.
Your affectionate son | John.
RI MS JT/1/TYP/10/3297
LT Transcript Only
Monday morning: Louisa Tyndall annotation: ‘Sep. 12th, 1843’. However, 12 September 1843 was a Tuesday. Since the letter was written Monday, the real date of the letter is probably 11 September. Louisa Tyndall frequently dated letters by postmarks, which were often stamped a day or two after a letter was written.
Yours: letter missing.
Emma’s visit: John Tyndall’s sister, Emma, was visiting him in Lancashire.
You say that my mind is set very much on America: see letters 0220 and 0230 (both Volume 1) for Tyndall’s recent correspondence about America with his father.
‘You don’t know … for you yet’: not identified.
Somerset House: on the Strand in central London, the principal government offices in Great Britain; see letter 0230 (Volume 1) for further context.
emolument: advantage, benefit (OED).
the Dean: Richard Boyle Bernard, Dean of Leighlin.
Please cite as “Tyndall0234,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on 4 May 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/tyndall/letters/Tyndall0234