My dear Tyndall
Earnest congratulations on your success to day.2 You made your philosophy as transparent as you rendered your ice by judicious squeezing. —There are several points which you made, which the Princes3 will remember as long as they live.
…
But that is not the object of this letter—
Would you look in on us on Friday evening. Perhaps Pollock will do the same & Mrs Pollock would be but too welcome if she ventures out.4
You would meet Babbage Sir C. Fellows5 & Ly Shelly6 my very old friend, to whom I want to introduce you
Ever yours | John Barlow
RI MS JT/1/B/22
[22 January 1858]: the date is given by the reference to a lecture Tyndall gave at the RI (see n. 2). The invitation apparently refers to the following week, since on 29 January, Tyndall visited Barlow as recorded in his Journal: ‘[a] short time at Barlows after the lecture’. The lecture he refers to was William Grove’s ‘On Molecular Impressions by Light and Electricity’ at the RI (Journal, JT/2/13c/1049).
your success today: on 22 January 1858, Tyndall lectured at the RI, ‘On Some Physical Properties of Ice’.
the Princes: probably Princes Albert Edward (1841–1910) and Alfred Ernest (1844–1900), the two oldest sons of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. They had attended Michael Faraday’s recent lecture series. See letter 1478, n. 4.
if she ventures out: Juliet Pollock did attend, see letter 1486.
Sir C. Fellows: Charles Fellows (1799–1860), a British archaeologist, mountaineer, and member of the BAAS. In 1827, he discovered the modern route to the top of Mont Blanc (ODNB).
Ly Shelly: possibly Lady Frances Shelley (née Winckley, 1787–1873), daughter of Thomas Winckley and a member of the Duke of Wellington’s circle with a talent for harp and piano. In an 1844 letter from William Frederick Pollock in Personal Remembrances of Sir Frederick Pollock: Second Baronet, Sometime Queen's Remembrancer, 2 vols (London: MacMillan and Co., 1887), it is mentioned ‘This morning we have been at Lady Shelley’s. She gives matinées at Fulham, which are much the fashion, on Saturdays in June’ (vol. 1, p. 214).
Please cite as “Tyndall1485,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on