To Thomas Archer Hirst   Oct. 1. 1854.¹

Foot of Snowdon² Oct. 1. 1854.

My dear Tom

My first act on this sunshiny Sunday morning after leaving my bed is to commence a letter to you. I thought of writing to you from Liverpool³ but the confusion around me was so great, and the splashing and dashing of thoughts through my own cranium so bewildering that I was unable to settle down and do what I otherwise should have done. I met Faraday at the Euston Square station the morning on which I left London.⁴ ‘Now Tyndall’ he said ‘how do you travel? have you got your ticket?’ I said no, and that before I saw him my intention was to travel second class. You shall do so, he said, I will travel second class too. He disappeared in a twinkling and purchased tickets for both of us: Murchison⁵ and many of his friends were in a first class coupé⁶ next door, and I endeavoured to persuade him to join them – No, it was useless, with me he would travel. Tennant⁷ the mineralogist joined us afterwards and a most pleasant journey we made of it. I got a parcel of instruments unpacked the same evening.⁸

Next day I made my first communication,⁹ it excited much discussion, in which Faraday Thomson and Whewell joined. A gentleman present asked me whether I had ever made experiments upon the human body with a galvanometer¹⁰ on the production of electricity ‘of animal magnetism in other words’ he continued. My reply not appearing to satisfy him he looked at me enquiringly and demanded ‘You have seen a galvanometer you know I suppose what a galvanometer is.’ I assured him gravely that I had that felicity, and there was a general burst of laughter in the Section.

That evening there was a soiree in the magnificent new hall. Next day I made my second communication.¹¹ I was afraid to give it its proper dimensions and thus cribbed and curtailed it more than I ought to have done. Thomson completely backed out of the position which he had assumed in Belfast,¹² and completely disowned the interpretation of his views¹³ as stated in Faraday’s lecture. Thomson has in fact backed out of almost every position he has assumed in regard to the phenomena of diamagnetism and magnecrystallic action.¹⁴ And he has done so leaving the public to suppose that he had been misconstrued or misapprehended – which tact may certainly increase his reputation with the general public, but in the private opinion of me at least does not add a whit to his nobleness.

Friday evening we had an address from Owen.¹⁵ The room was crammed, in short the meeting as regards numbers has been a very successful one.

Saturday the Red Lions¹⁶ dined together and we had a specimen of the tendency of human nature to relapse into the error which it once condemned. The Red Lions were instituted as a kind of concrete protest against the formality and expense of the dinner of the President. They were instituted for the purpose of enabling a few genial souls to dine genially and cheaply together, but alas the last dinner was more than double the expense of the President’s, and the brilliancy of talent and eloquence though considerable was not in proportion. Foucault¹⁷ was my guest and Dove was Francis’s. Foucault and I have been much together. In some respects there was an affinity between us which brought us often into contact.

Wrightson and Atkinson have been at Liverpool. Wrightson enquired after you very warmly.

Sunday last I went to Preston to see Mrs Allen and met Schnackenberg¹⁸ and Dickinson there. I spent a most pleasant day. I told you some thing of Mrs Allen’s husband.¹⁹ On Sunday I saw some letters from his father to her²⁰ in which, with bitterness of heart, he tells her that her life would not be safe in the society of his [1 word illeg] that he drinks and in his drunken fits is more like a fury than any thing human. She has a sweet intelligent little girl a daughter²¹ too sweet and too intelligent, I fear, to live long in this world. We had plenty of music and I at least had plenty of laughter. The consequence was that I returned to Liverpool a far stronger man than I had departed. Dickinson desired to be remembered to his father, Schnackenberg’s countenance and demeanour pleased me: there was a quiet earnestness in each which to me was pleasant to observe.

Beddgelert,²² Monday morning

I must dash through the record of my doings and tell you at once that we crossed Snowdon yesterday. The morn was glorious – blue sky and bright sunshine. A couple of hours toil brought us above the region of the clouds which belted the hills and through which the black summits protruded, like volcanic islands through the sea. The sunlight upon these vapour masses was reflected back to us a dazzling white as if from fields of snow. Gradually as the day advanced the clouds melted and by the time we reached the summit the lakes at the bottom of the valleys were visible. We had many grand glimpses from the mountain’s beak as we ascended, but the view from the summit and the peculiar structure of the summit itself are of the grandest description. The summit is not rounded as the Brocken, but scooped out here and there, leaving a knife edge at the top and a basin more than a thousand feet below. This adjacent horror was sustained by the black boldness of the crags and peaks around. The mechanical action which upheaved and tore asunder these immense ridges must have been a most extraordinary one, sea and subterranean force must have worked together to produce the rents and scoopings. We rested two hours at the summit pondering upon the sublime doings around us and then descended: the path part of the way lay along an edge at a sharp angle, the steep sides of which were nearly half a mile in depth. Deviating from the path, to which Francis with many warnings to me clung persistently, I clambered straight down the mountain side and reached the bottom half an hour before he did.

Festiniog,²³ Monday night.

I slept late last night at Beddgelert – one of my earliest remembrances is the reading of the poem on the death of Gelert,²⁴ and this morning I stood beside the hound’s reputed grave. I remember weeping bitter tears over the dog’s fate before I was 8 years old. We had a glorious day to day – the sun clear and cloudless over head and an earth beneath worthy of his light. It is not the height of these hills, though that is considerable, that I admire, but it is their peculiar contours and grouping. They set themselves at times like prostrate vultures with their claws turned defiantly against the sky. Some of wilder shape lift their conical summits up to the firmament as if they wished to kiss the evening star. Traces of vast glacial action were every where present the rock masses being rounded by the action of water and scratched by sliding icebergs. It is long since I felt such a vigour in my muscles as I do this evening. I have gradually increased in strength since the first day, and do not know where this accumulation of force is to end. I said to Francis to day (he desires to be kindly remembered to you) I will advise Tom to come here when he gets married²⁵ instead of going to Paris: but then when I called to mind the wintry sky, the valleys wadded with mist and the sublime summits hidden by the grey clouds – when I thought of the biting air and the keen winter wind, I finally came to the conclusion that it would be better to let you carry out your own notion. Nevertheless when you have the time and money to spare you and Anna²⁶ would enjoy a trip in North Wales. Excuse this horrible rigmarole of a letter, it is written by bits and scraps whenever I can seize a pen. To night as the sun sunk amid the hills I thought of going without my dinner for the purpose of writing to you in a worthy manner, but the mountain air, a roast chicken and some choice Welsh mutton were too much for me. I dined like a hungry man and you must consequently be content with a sodden epistle. Francis is asleep on the sofa. We are perched upon the summit of a high hill at present, and tomorrow will see us facing the road to Dolgelley²⁷ and Llangollen.²⁸ Good bye Tom. I trust you are getting your house ready, it will add to my comfort when I can feel that there is a place in Broughton into which I can turn and give nobody any thanks

Affectionately yours | John

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