Stanley Terrace January 21st
My dear John,
Perhaps you will just think that is very familiar, certainly you will think rightly, but at the same time I trust you will also think with me that some degree of the formality which has existed in our addressing each other may very sensibly be dispensed with. From your own permission I am allowed to call you Brother, from that permission I have thus addressed you and I trust for the future, I shall receive a similar mark of your respect by your dispensing with the title you generally commence your notes with.
I am exceedingly anxious to learn concerning the success of your first lecture.1 I remembered the day, marked the hour, and in fancy beheld you expounding some of the great laws of Nature, to I hope an interested and delighted audience. Yours must certainly be an enviable position, just imagine how you have the great, the learned, the noble of the land, at the [hest] of one man, listening to and discussing the topics of your lectures. I cannot but think this must be some repayment however slight for the many days and nights of study you have spent. I should not mind if I heard the same declaration concerning you which the Pythian oracle uttered concerning Lycurgus ‘Beloved of the gods, and rather a god than a man.’2 You are elevated to a high position, and I rejoice in it; but sometimes in pondering the matter over I feel just as infinitely small as the little mite which has to be [viewed] with the microscope, in comparison to the great cheese of which it once made part. Do not smile. I often pour a profusion of regrets on the senseless air and after all I might just have contented myself and sat quietly down with my book, but I have read somewhere, that only mankind together makes the true man, and that that individual is the most happy who can with courage view himself in the great Whole. Thus you see your little [mouse] finds some consolation. It would appear from your letter that I have a friend3 I know nothing of I perhaps should not say ‘nothing’ for I was aware he had taken your place at Queenwood and where he had studied and moreover that he was a great friend of yours, but did not know that he was acquainted with me, I assure you I sincerely thank him & hope he will still fulfil his self-imposed duty – I wish you would come to Preston4 this summer & bring him with you, we shall be able to accomodate you, as we are leaving Stanley Terrace5 in May for a very large house on the Moor close beside the Broughton Toll bar,6 you will remember the situation on the road to Goosnargh;7 now when you do come to Preston remember you are not to make Mr. Hebdon’s8 your home.
I feel your kindness to me is very great but with respect to the last subject of your letter9 – I am at a loss what to write – when I consider what is past and how ungrateful some people have been I shudder and this was the matter I reffered to in my last, but you will not be angry with me; though I have at present no hope of what shall I say – repaying you I trust someday will find matters adjusted. You are well aware of the position in which I am placed,10 I shall therefore leave the matter entirely with you – Did I know your thoughts concerning myself as well as I know my own concerning you – I should say do this, or that – but not knowing I leave the matter as I said before to yourself. I have long had a project in my head which I think would bring me a considerable amount of happiness were it accomplished; and would make me independent of my Father. I have certainly no need, but you know me well enough to believe that my present position is most irksome in many respects – however happy I may be there is the continual feeling of obligation – & then again if I could be actively employed many disagreeable subjects of thought would be banished. When you have a little leisure just think the subject over & give me your thoughts. Send me word if those shirt collars are all worn out, you will say you can buy them in London cheap – yes, I know but they are not well made, say if you like them rounded or with points. You will be gratified to hear that my little Sophy is considerably better, and we have some little hope of her getting strong again.11 This epistle being written without premeditation you must excuse all defects, from
Yours Sincerely, Gretchen.12
RI MS JT/1/A/74
your first lecture: see letter 0867, n. 1.
the Pythian oracle …‘Beloved of the gods, and rather a god than a man’: in Plutarch’s biography of Lycurgus, the famous law-giver of Sparta, a priestess at the Oracle of Delphi speaks these lines to Lycurgus (J. Langhorne and W. Langhorne [eds.], Plutarch’s Lives, Translated from the Original Greek; with Notes, Critical and Historical, and a Life of Plutarch, 6 vols [London: Davison and Whitefriars, 1809], vol. 1, p. 129).
a friend: Thomas Archer Hirst.
Preston: see letter 0698, n. 4.
Stanley Terrace: see letter 0699, n. 1.
Broughton Toll bar: a location at a road or bridge where a toll is collected in Broughton, a village in the borough of Preston, England.
Goosnargh: a village in the borough of Preston, England.
Mr. Hebdon’s: possibly John Henry Hebdon (b. 1822), a friend of Tyndall who lived in Preston and worked as a banker’s clerk.
your letter: letter missing.
the position in which I am placed: this is likely in reference to her husband, who was an irresponsible husband and father (see letters 0779, n. 2 and 0865, n. 4).
Sophy … getting strong again: Allen had written to Tyndall regarding her concerns about Sophy’s recent bout of consumption (see letter 0865, n. 2).
Gretchen: a nickname for Margarethe, the German form of the name Margaret. By taking up the nickname Gretchen, Allen seemed to be aligning herself with the character Margaret – nicknamed Gretchen – in the legend of Faust. In the tale, Gretchen is the woman Faust seduces, and whose life he ruins. In the end, though, Gretchen is saved and goes to heaven. Allen’s relationship with her husband (see n. 10), and the recent deaths of two of her children (see letter 0701, nn. 2 and 3), likely caused her to identify herself with the misfortunes of the character Gretchen. It was clear that Allen was familiar with the story of Faust (see letters 0699, n. 5 and 0918, n. 7).
Please cite as “Tyndall0872,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on