Stanley Terrace January 4th/54.
My dear Tyndall,
I am exceedingly obliged for your kind note1 and wishes.
I assure you, you were not forgotten on the opening of the new year, my warmest wishes were expressed for your happiness & success.
It was only a day or two ago or at least before I received your note that I had been working over some of your epistles and wondering what was the reason I did not hear from you as usual. I presume the wish to hear has been mutual, and had it not been for circumstances I should have [restated] a line trusting to Providence for its safe arrival.
The world I think is using me rather severely – You will be sorry to learn that my beloved Sophy2 is in a similar condition to that in which you saw my beloved Charley.3 Consumption that bane of all that is lovely is nipping my last cherished flowers, I have no hope given me of her restoration; thus I shall be left desolate, joys depart one by one but those of sorrow, perhaps because they pierce so deeply, last. Anything like happiness appears for ever to have taken flight – but it will not do to repine and therefore I must not indulge in a strain which is becoming more & more familiar to me. I feel I have a very great deal of matter that I should like you to be acquainted with – I had almost hoped that the revolving year would have brought my friend with it, the time appears long since you last visited us; but it is a mercy you are still alive, and not forever unnerved as your last note but one made me rather apprehensive would ever be the case. Dear John I have almost taken a final determination that I shall never join Robert4 again; you know well that matters may often reach that climax when forbearance no longer holds good as a motto. I feel it is a difficult subject to deal with, in paper but I believe if you knew what I could tell you, you would say ‘you do right my girl.’ I will answer any questions you propose to not be afraid of grieving me by any of them for they will not – I feel I have scarcely a particle of even Esteem left for him, it has taken time to work this change, as you well know some of my thoughts in an opposite direction. ‘Tis a bitter feeling, but it must & shall be endured – I do not hate but I love not, I esteem not. I am only complying with the advice of his own Father, who is ashamed of his Son, and regrets almost that he was born. This will give you some little insight into my present position, far from an agreeable one and you will also judge what has been the conflict of mind which I have been called to endure. Often in the deepest sorrow I have thought of you, of your kindness your brotherly kindness to me, I know I have reason to be grateful to you, you have my gratitude, and I trust the time will come when my mind will be relieved of the burden which ought long since to have been discharged. I trust you will soon be quite at home in your new sphere of duty5 – I am obliged for the syllabus of the lectures.6 I thank you also for a number of the ‘Critic’7 and I also thank you, and the young gentleman8 who directs the Queenwood Observer9 to me. I have been highly delighted with those translations by Hannchen.10
Believe me | Yours sincerely | Margaret A.
RI MS JT/1/A/73
your kind note: letter missing.
Sophy: the daughter of Robert Copeland Allen and Margaret Allen; Sophy (sometimes spelled ‘Sophie’) survived this bout of illness and was mentioned again in letters 0872; 0975; and 0976.
Charley: Charles Edward Allen, who died of consumption on 11 January 1853 (see letters 0698, n. 5; 0699; and 0700).
Robert: Robert Copeland Allen (see letter 0779, n. 2).
your new sphere of duty: reference to Tyndall’s position as Professor of Natural Philosophy at the RI, which he took up at the end of September 1853.
the syllabus of the lectures: the list of the twelve lectures on Heat Tyndall would give at the RI, as well as the six lectures on Electricity and Magnetism he would give at the London Institution in 1854 (A. S. Eve and C. H. Creasey, Life and Work of John Tyndall [London: Macmillan & Co. Ltd], p. 44). Also see letters 0726; 0783; and 0789, n. 2.
the ‘Critic’: The Critic of Literature, Science, and the Drama, a London-based literary magazine which ran from 1843 to 1863, and was edited by the journalist and translator, James Lowe (d.1865) (ODNB).
the young gentleman: likely Thomas Archer Hirst.
the Queenwood Observer: see letter 0816, n. 2.
Hannchen: see, for instance, Hannchen, ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, The Queenwood Observer 9 (15 December 1853), pp. 70–1.
Please cite as “Tyndall0865,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on