Kew
My dear Dr Tyndall
I thank you heartily for your pleasant letter,2 which came to help to cheer me and charm my thoughts from the sorrowful tidings they were dwelling on.3 Have you not remarked that Death seldom strikes a single blow? and now I am mourning the loss of a very dear cousin4 whom I loved as a sister. More sorrow is gathering in the horizon too: in truth this New Year has opened very gloomily to me.
Many thanks for your kind enquiries. The children5 are all well again I am happy to say, and myself also, for I too was amongst the invalids. Joseph6 is still coughing and I do not think he is looking very well. Still he is better. This is his busy week of examination at the India House;7 he was there yesterday and will be again to-morrow and Friday.
I am very grateful to you for the promised tickets for your lectures. I quite hope to be present both on the Friday evening8 and also at as many of your morning lectures9 as I can possibly manage to get to. Had I wished it I could not have been at Mr Faraday’s, having scarcely left the house since Christmas, and certainly not been able to get to town till yesterday when I had a busy day. I thought of you as I passed down Albemarle St.10
Why do you undertake examinations11 that you don’t like and that don’t pay much? Dr Sinclair12 sails for New Zealand next week.13 I had the amusement of helping him to choose silk dresses to take to his nieces: you know ladies always like shopping! I hope you will soon be able to carry out your intention of coming here, you know you are always sure of a welcome. When am I to be honoured with your proof sheets? This morning I have before me a long piece of writing of a very different description, relative to Dr Livingstone’s expedition.14 You asked me how I liked Newman’s15 book on the Soul.16 Now that I have finished it I answer ‘very much,’ better than his ‘Phases of Faith’17 as there is less in it to which I hesitate to assent. His books are all most agreeable to read; he writes so well and puts his arguments so clearly. It is certainly a very great treat to get hold of a well-written book, be the subject matter what it may.
Farewell, | I am ever yours most sincerely | Frances H. Hooker
RI MS JT/1/TYP/8/2557
LT Typescript Only
[13 January 1858]: the date is given by the reference to Andrew Sinclair sailing for New Zealand, which occurred after 17 January 1858 (see n. 12), the mention of Tyndall’s Friday evening lecture (see n. 8), and his morning lectures (see n. 9). LT noted on the typescript letter that it was on a Wednesday, and as this letter predates the next one from Frances Hooker (1482, she mentioned receiving the lecture tickets), the only Wednesday in January that fits is 13 January.
your pleasant letter: letter missing.
dwelling on: Frances Henslow’s great-aunt Ann Henslow died in 1857.
dear cousin: Jemima Maria Hicks Jenyns (1829–58), maternal cousin of Frances Hooker, who died at Ryde on the Isle of Wight on 9 January 1858. See Isle of Wight Observer, 16 January 1858, p. 4.
children: by this time, Joseph and Frances Hooker had four children: William Henslow Hooker (1853–1942), Harriet Anne Hooker (1854–1945), Charles Paget Hooker (1855–1933), and Maria Elizabeth Hooker (1857–63). They would go on to have three more.
Joseph: Joseph Hooker.
examination at the India House: since 1854, Hooker was a botanical examiner for candidates for the Indian Medical Service under the East India Company, which occurred at its headquarters at the East India House in London (L. Huxley (ed.), Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley, 2 vols (London: Macmillan, 1900), vol. 1, p. 385).
Friday evening: Tyndall’s Friday evening lecture at the RI on 22 January 1858, ‘On Some Physical Properties of Ice’.
morning lectures: see letter 1440, n. 8.
Albemarle St.: the location of the RI.
undertake examinations: see letter 1476, n. 1.
Dr. Sinclair: Andrew Sinclair (1794–1861), a Scottish surgeon and botanist who collected plants with Joseph Hooker in Australia in the 1840s. He served as New Zealand’s Colonial Secretary from 1845–56, and then returned to Scotland and made acquaintances with other scientific men in London, including Tyndall (ODNB).
sails for New Zealand next week: after his time in Scotland and England, Sinclair returned to New Zealand in January 1858 to collect plants, but drowned trying to cross a river in 1861. In a February 1858 letter to Charles Darwin, Joseph Hooker mentioned that ‘Sinclair sailed a month ago’ (Joseph Hooker to Charles Darwin, [25] February 1858, in F. Burkhardt, et al. [eds], The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, 24 vols [New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991], vol. 7 [1858–1859], p. 34). While the exact date of his departure is not known, it would have been after 17 January, as Tyndall recorded in his journal for that date: ‘To Kew. Took Hooker and Dr Sinclair with us and promenaded the gardens and pleasure grounds’ (Journal, JT/2/13c/1047). Thomas Huxley was among the party.
Dr. Livingstone’s expedition: David Livingstone (1813–73), Scottish missionary and explorer, travelled in central and southern Africa. He returned to Britain in 1856 to be hailed as a hero. His Missionary travels and researches in South Africa was published in 1857 (ODNB). Livingstone corresponded with Joseph Hooker (see Livingstone Online).
Newman’s: Francis William Newman (1805–97), an English scholar and brother of the well-known theologian Cardinal John Henry Newman (1801–90) (ODNB)
book on the Soul: F. W. Newman, The Soul, her sorrows and her aspirations: an essay towards the natural history of the soul, as the true basis of theology (London: J. Chapman, 1849).
‘Phases of Faith’: F. W. Newman, Phases of Faith; or, passages from the history of my creed (London, J. Chapman, 1850).
Please cite as “Tyndall1480,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on