Queenwood College | Nov[em]b[e]r 7th 60.
My dear John,
Your kind letter1 was duly received yesterday morning, and read by me with great pleasure.
It is difficult to say what kind of substance was absorbet2 by the caustic potash, without knowing something about the way how you prepared the nitrite of potash or making some experiment on the subject. Carbonic acid, laughing gas (NO) ammonia, nitrous acid or nitric oxide (NO2) might have been present. If sulphuric acid had, as you say, no effect on the gas so as to alter your results, ammonia, or nitric oxide (NO2) can not have been present, because both are absorbed by HOSO3.3 Nitrous acid is of an intense red colour and I have no doubt, even a very small quantity might be perceived. Laughing gas is a little absorbed by caustic potash.
Now I suppose you prepared the nitrite of potash by passing nitrous acid into solution of potash and afterwards adding chloride of ammonium to this liquid. The question here occurs, was this liquid acid or alkaline? If alkaline then the nitrogen would most probably be contaminated with carbonic acid and the action of the caustic potash would be comprehensible. However I cannot be certain about this point without knowing all the conditions under which the N4 was prepared.
as for volatile liquids I give you a bit of those I possess and shall be most happy to let you have as much of them as is at my disposal. Or if you have your eye on one I will have it prepared for you.
Methylic alcohol—boils at about 60oC
Amylene—boils at about 30o
Bisulfide of carbon
Bromide of ethyle boils at 44oC
Chloride of acetyle, boils at about 55o but is affected very much by moisture and metals.
Bromide of ethylene boils at 129oC
Sulfocarbonate of ethyle boils at 200oC
acetate of glycol boils at 180oC
chloroacetate of glycol boils at about 140o
chloride of Benzoyl boils at 200oC
nitrite of ethyle boils at about 17oC
I am greatly delighted with the splendid results you have lately obtained and shall be right glad to listen to you, and have them explained to me. Very likely I shall come to town either on Thursday next week or on the Thursday a fortnight later.
I beg to return the little paper concerning William Tyndale’s monument.5 If the man belongs to your family you may be proud of him, and if he does not, then you may at least look up to him with high reverence and be pleased that the name of Tyndale has had already so worthy a representative. It is a curious fact, and I believe one to little understood and examined into, the fact that peculiarities and tendencies of the father are inherited by the son and very often are even met with for several generations. How is this to be accounted for? It is perfectly true I have often noticed in you a tendency to examine into religious questions and you certainly know much more about them than I do. —
Miss Tribe6 has been staying at Broughton during September and part of October and I went sometimes down to spend the evening there. On such an occasion I met the Miss Nicol and Miss Betsy Nicol7 and they inquired most kindly how Dr Tyndall was, and seemed to remember him very well. Mr Tribe8 is engaged to Miss Lander9 and as soon as he has obtained a more lucrative position he is going to marry her. I only saw the lady from some distance at church on Sunday evening last, but from all I hear she is likely to make an excellent wife to Tribe. With my kind regards to Tom.
Always your | H. Debus.
RI MS JT/1/D/27
Your kind letter: letter 1738.
absorbet: absorbed. Debus betraying his German heritage.
HOSO3: sulphuric acid (now written H2SO4).
N: nitrogen.
I beg to return the little paper concerning William Tyndale’s monument: missing. The paper is not mentioned in letter 1738. A monument to the martyr William Tyndale, Tyndall’s supposed ancestor, was erected at Nibley Knoll, north of Bristol, in 1866. It is a 100ft tower, still standing today overlooking the valley across to the River Severn.
Miss Tribe: not identified. Tyndall’s journal mentions meeting Tribe’s sister (see n. 8) on 6 September 1857 (Journal, RI MS JT/2/13c/1032). At the time of the 1841 Census, Tribe may have had three sisters, Jane, Elizabeth and Ann.
Miss Nicol and Miss Betsy Nicol: not identified. According to Tyndall’s journal, Nicol was a clerical friend of Tribe (see n. 8) and these may have been his sisters (Journal, RI MS JT/2/13c/1032).
Mr Tribe: Walter Harry Tribe (1832–1909) had been appointed to teach classics at Queenwood in July 1855. He took holy orders in 1857 and was Rector of Stockbridge (1860–7). He served on the north-west frontier of India (1867–85) and was Archdeacon of Lahore (1885–92). He ended his days as Vicar of Awliscombe in Devon. His daughter Mary (1865–1937) became the 11th Duchess of Bedford. See Tyndall Correspondence, vol. 3, letter 1245, n. 7.
Miss Lander: Sophy/Sophia/Sophie Lander married Walter Tribe in 1861. Tribe does not seem to have waited for a ‘more lucrative position’.
Please cite as “Tyndall1742,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on