Queenwood College. | July 16th 1853
My dear John.
I had somewhat anxiously expected the letter2 from you which arrived only this morning. It is just as I expected you have not used Berlin medicinally and I am well pleased to see you have the courage to leave it and try to strengthen yourself.3 If you did not do so it would be a neglect of duty for which no scientific discovery could, in my eyes, compensate. The letter which is to offend me4 has not yet arrived. I defy it to do so however. For I never consider myself answerable for my past letters, they were true at the moment when written, that I can answer for, but to day I should never write the same. I may not understand you as you say, but if so it is in points of some intricacy that with others would never come into discussion. One thing satisfies me I understand a vast deal of thee & thank God for it, if I misunderstand the rest, I will patiently submit to a thrashing for it.
If there be a duty for you to fulfil at present it is to get strong and healthy again, and keep from you all discouraging notions of your body’s weakness. Your body would with justice at all times reply that it has been badly used. I don’t care to tell you that Health is better than all Honours though I believe it to be, but I may tell you, that sickness will react upon your work fearfully, and as a matter of pure prudence your duty is to give yourself a free fling and relaxation. Du willst es thun nicht wahr!5 First of all then Dickinson is not in Paris, he is here in England on a visit. If you stop a month in Paris you had better go at once to the Hotel Corneille6 close by the Odeon,7 it is now vacation and they are sure to have room, you will find it reasonable and convenient. If you do not like that you might stop a few days at the Hotel de Normandie,8 Rue St Honorè9 until you could meet with lodgings to suit you. Near the Odeon I can tell you a place where you may get a good plain dinner at a reasonable cost. It is the corner house10 facing into the Streets Mr Le Prince11 and Dubois.12 From the Odeon you pass down the Rue Voltaire13 until it joins the Rue de Mr Le Prince and you will see the corner house immediately opposite you. If you see Verdet and Ebersheim14 remember me kindly to both, tell the former I was much disappointed at not seeing him before I left.
I have heard from duBois15 inviting me to step up to London and see him and his wife. I think I shall.
There are some 65 or 66 boys here now and still more coming, we are beginning to find it difficult to accommodate all at meal times. I have some fine lads to teach and daily I love my task more for daily I feel my influence upon them increases. This I know you will be pleased to hear, and I hope we shall not only retain all we have got but next half year increase our number, we will see.
Enclosed you will find the £1516 it will go somewhat further than £10 and save the trouble of sending again for I should like you to run about and spend it all. The dinner bell rings. Good bye
Thine affectionately | TA Hirst
There are 3 letters17 here for you. Two are unmistakeably circulars which I shall keep. The third may be something else I shall enclose it with the next half notes.
RI MS JT/1/H/179
16 [August] 1853: while Hirst misdated this letter as July, it was clearly written in August as it directly responds to Tyndall’s comment that he will soon leave Berlin and references Tyndall’s warning that Hirst is to receive a ‘shocking letter’ (letter 0795, n. 14; also see letter 0793).
the letter: letter 0795.
well pleased … strengthen yourself: Tyndall was planning to retreat to the Harz Mountains for some fresh air (see letter 0795, n. 1).
The letter … offend me: letter 0793.
Du willst es thun nicht wahr!: a German statement, serving as both a request and an order, translates as ‘You will do that, won’t you?’ It refers to Hirst’s insistence that Tyndall get some rest.
Hotel Corneille: see letter 0769, n. 3.
the Odeon: L’Odéon, one of France’s national theatres, located in Paris. Designed by the architects Marie-Joseph Peyre (1730–85) and Charles de Wailly (1730–98), the theatre opened in 1782 and was originally built to house the Comédie-Française (F. H. Londré, The History of World Theatre: From the English Restoration to the Present [New York: The Continuum Publishing Company, 1999], pp. 117–19).
Hotel de Normandie: a well-known hotel in Paris.
Rue St Honorè: Rue Saint Honoré, a street in Paris located near the Seine River.
the corner house: not identified.
Mr Le Prince: Rue Monsieur le Prince, a street in Paris located near the Odéon Theatre.
Dubois: Rue Antoine Dubois, a street in Paris connected to Rue Monsieur le Prince.
Rue Voltaire: Rue de Voltaire, a street in Paris that connected the Odéon Theatre to Rue Monsieur le Prince.
Ebersheim: not identified.
duBois: Emil du Bois-Reymond.
Enclosed … find the £15: although Tyndall only requested £10 to be sent in two portions of £5 (see letter 0795), Hirst sent him £15 all at once. At this point, Hirst had not yet received letter 0796, which was a request from Tyndall to instead send £20 through two successive posts.
3 letters: not identified.
Please cite as “Tyndall0798,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on