To George Gabriel Stokes   15th March 1862

15^th March 1862

My dear Prof. Stokes.

I have read the paper of Mr. Tomlinson¹ on the motions of camphor² referred to me by the Council.

Many of Mr. Tomlinson’s experiments are very ingenious, and the account of them is clearly and often graphically written. If published separately, the paper would probably form a brochure³ which would obtain a great many interested readers.

I think however the labours expended upon the subject, and the minuteness of detail into which Mr. Tomlinson enters, are not sufficiently rewarded by his results, if judged from a scientific point of view. And I suppose this is the point of view to be adhered to in considering the fitness of a paper for the Philosophical Transactions.

I do not entertain a doubt that by varying the conditions of experiment, a fresh reinvestigation taking up the subject would obtain many new & beautiful effects in addition to those described by Mr. Tomlinson. In fact, I should consider it extremely probable that Mr. Tomlinson himself would, if he employed his experimental ingenuity, which is very considerable, for a sufficient time be able to bring before the Royal Society, many papers on this same subject; & all containing accounts of experiments most pleasing to the eye, as many of those really are which he now describes.

Since reading the accounts of Weber’s experiments on kindred subjects,⁴ which though similar to and indeed in some cases identical with those described by Mr. Tomlinson, are not once referred to in his paper. I have myself made numberless experiments in the spreading of films over the surface of water. I have obtained images of what Mr. Tomlinson calls ‘cohesion figures’ ten feet in diameter, and in some cases exhibiting most beautiful molecular effects & the most curious motions. They may be obtained almost without aid, and I once entertained the idea of describing some of them in the Philosophical Magazine, but it did not, I confess, occur to me to send them to the Royal Society for publication in the Philosophical Transactions.

If I cannot recommend the publication of Mr. Tomlinson’s paper as it now stands it is not on account of any defects in his experiments; but I think the subject not of sufficient importance, and that the addition which Mr. Tomlinson has made to our knowledge is not sufficiently considerable to render the publication of the paper in extenso desirable. As far as experimental philosophers are concerned I think in its present state it would excite weariness rather than interest. I would not recommend its rejection by the council; but I would strongly recommend its curtailment to a fraction of its present volume. Thus altered I think it might appear in the Transactions of the Royal Society.

Believe me│Yours very truly│John Tyndall

RS RR/4/266