Mon cher Monsieur,
Le but de cette lettre serait de vous prier à vouloir bien me donner l’idée principale d’un travail qui parait être le sujet de la Bakerian Lecture cette année de Thomson. Je n’en ai qu’une idée imparfaite ou aucune, le titre seulement, par des journaux non scientifiques et j’en suis très curieux.
J’espère qu’à cette heure-ci vous aurez déjà reçu le petit appareil et les tiges de bismuth cristallisé du Général Sabine.
Ayez la bonté de dire à M. Sabine que j’ai reçu régulièrement le Phil Mag et que j’espère qu’il aura aussi reçu régulièrement le Nuovo Cimento. J’ai donné moi même dans le dernier nº l’extrait de votre Lecture sur les clivages. Si jamais vous avez la bonté de me répondre, ayez la complaisance de m’informer si mon mémoire manuscrit envoyé pour le Phil. Transactions a été imprimé ou quand il le sera. Présentez mes respects à M. Faraday dont j’espère que la santé est bonne et veuillez lui dire qu’il a oublié depuis longtemps ses amis de Pise.
Croyez moi tout dévoué | C Matteucci
My dear Sir,
The aim of this letter would be to ask you to give me the key idea of a research that seems to be the subject of the Bakerian Lecture this year by Thomson.2 I only have an imperfect idea of it, or none, except for the title, through non-scientific journals and I am very curious about it.
I hope that by now you have already received the small device and the rods of crystallised bismuth from General Sabine.
Have the kindness to tell Mr Sabine that I have regularly received the Phil Mag and that I hope he would also have regularly received the Nuovo Cimento.3 I personally gave the summary of your lectures on cleavage in the last issue.4 If you ever have the kindness to respond, be so good as to let me know if my manuscript essay sent for the Phil. Transactions has been printed or when it will be. Give my respects to Faraday, who I hope is in good health, and please, tell him that he has long-forgotten his friends from Pisa.5
Yours faithfully | C Matteucci
RI MS JT/1/M/63
[17 November 1856]: the reverse side of this letter has on it a postmark for ‘17 Nov. 56’.
Bakerian Lecture this year by Thomson: W. Thomson, ‘The Bakerian Lecture. – On the Electro-dynamic Qualities of Metals’, Phil. Trans., 146 (1856), pp. 649–751. Read before the RS on 28 February 1856.
Nuovo Cimento: Il Nuovo Cimento, a physics journal established in 1855 by Matteucci and Raffaele Piria (1814–65), an Italian chemist, as a continuation of the journal Il Cimento (est. 1844).
your lectures on cleavage in the last issue: see letter 1295, n. 3. Delivered at the RI on 6 June 1856.
Pisa: a coastal city in central Italy to the west of Florence. Matteucci was professor of physics at the University of Pisa from 1840.
Please cite as “Tyndall1300,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on