Queenwood College. | March. 12th 1854
My dear John,
I have just received a printed form from the ‘People’s Assurance Society’1 which I as an ‘intimate friend’ of Geo. S. Phillips am to fill up by stating what I know of his health and habits &c. I have done so as favourably as I conscientiously could. I am rather surprised he should refer them to me seeing that I have seen him so seldom during the last few years. It is a wise step however and I was glad to assist him. The Hampshire Independent2 contains an absurd notice of my lecture at Southampton.3 These fellows hide their ignorance in fulsome flattery and what is worse they do so with a kind of pretension. They are not able to give a simple report of the lecture and its subjects, but they administer a few hackneyed praises so worded as to tickle the lecturer and to bamboozle the reader into the notion that the Editor was able to criticize the lecture if he liked. He concludes his bare announcement of the lecture with the following high-sounding sentence. ‘The learned lecturer, as might have been expected from his high scientific acquirements, evinced a perfect mastery of his subject, and at the conclusion of his lecture he received a hearty vote of thanks from the audience’. The report of the Romsey lecture4 was modest and satisfactory. ‘The experiments were beautiful and successful and they were explained in a lucid manner’.
At Salisbury5 several people wished I had made a few remarks about Electro Biology6 and such sciences, which are at present far too popular in this neighbourhood. On Tuesday next I intend doing so in my introduction at Lymington7 and I will give the Secretary8 this introduction to insert in the Hampshire Independent. In my last letter9 I just mentioned that Mr Heathfield10 had been down to see Alex. Cumming. He appears to be a kind hearted man and to have had a praiseworthy purpose in his visit down to Queenwood. He is a Chemist half scientific & half manufacturing. He hoped to find Alex a chemist for then he thought he could have been of some service to him in the branch he himself followed. He seemed too much of a one-idea man, he appeared to think he could have cut out a little business for Alex, and plant him down in it to make money & prosper. I told him I thought any such notion would be premature at present, that in Alex, we could notice a tendency only or rather a capability to follow any intellectual pursuit with perseverance. That this tendency which at present takes a mathematical direction should be carefully developed now and in so doing it would find its own applications, a profession would in good time present itself. He agreed with me perfectly. At present Alex would like to be an Engineer; for my own part I think I would send him to a German University for a year or two after leaving Queenwood, and then think about a Profession. From our own experience we know that without some university education he would find it difficult to acquire that sound & broad theoretical knowledge which distinguishes the present from former professional men. There is plenty of time yet to consider these things, and in the interval I shall not neglect to study his best interests, and to cultivate an interest for such knowledge in him. Who knows he may turn to pure Science in the end, and for my part I should be best pleased to see him do so. Henry Hill writes still in good spirits, he has sent me copies of all Booths letters.11 We have had beautiful weather for the last fortnight and internally also Queenwood is brighter. I hope you have used the fine weather too and that you have kept yourself at any rate as strong as you were if not stronger. This week you must not neglect to write to me and tell me all the news concerning yourself.
Yours affectionately | T.A. Hirst.
P.S. Mrs Simpson has got a little boy.12 Miss Martin has written me one or two excellent letters lately.13 I have some notion of paying a [pop] visit to Dublin either at Easter or Midsummer. You might be inclined to suspect the juxtaposition of the last two sentences did you not know by this time that I am a wary fellow. | T.A.H.
RI MS JT/1/H/194
RI MS JT/1/HTYP/325–325a
‘People’s Assurance Society’: an insurance company in London, that presented itself as working with the Equitable Provident Institution to ‘offer the most sound and complete system of Life and Health Assurance that modern science and experience have hitherto been able to produce’ (The Register Insurance Directory and Almanac. 1854 [London: William Tweedie, 1854], p. 22).
The Hampshire Independent: a weekly Liberal newspaper founded in Southampton, England, which ran from 1835 to 1923 (R. Preston, ‘Thomas Leader Harman: A Gentleman of Fortune in Mid-nineteenth century Southampton’, Southampton Local History Forum Journal, 16 [2010], pp. 3–27, on p. 8).
notice of my lecture at Southampton: not identified. As indicated in Hirst’s journal, the lecture was delivered at the Victoria Rooms, Southampton, Hampshire, England on 8 March, on the subject of Heat (Hirst, ‘Journals’, 12 March 1854).
The report of the Romsey lecture: not identified. Hirst noted in his journal that he had delivered a lecture ‘on Heat to a large audience at Romsey’ on Tuesday, 7 March (Hirst, ‘Journals’, 12 March 1854). Romsey, Hampshire, England, a small town northwest of Southampton.
At Salisbury: reference to Hirst’s lecture at Salisbury (see letters 0874, n. 5 and 0889, n. 12).
Electro Biology: ‘a branch of biology which deals with electrical phenomena in living organisms’ (OED).
my introduction at Lymington: a port town in Hampshire where Hirst was to give a lecture on 14 March.
the Secretary: not identified.
my last letter: letter missing.
Mr Heathfield: possibly W. E. Heathfield, Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and Fellow of the Chemical Society in London.
Henry Hill … copies of all Booths letters: letters not identified.
a little boy: not identified.
one or two excellent letters lately: not identified.
Please cite as “Tyndall0898,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on