Friday
My dear Hooker
Would you, like a dear good fellow, cast your eye over the paper2 which I send you by this post. It will give you an idea of some of my notions regarding the action of aqueous vapours. Possibly you may be able to write me a letter from your own experience pointing to some illustration of the experimental results. I should be greatly pleased to publish such a letter with the paper.3 That aqueous vapour plays a most important part in meteorology is undoubted. Herschel4 and Airy5 have both said to me that it is a grand step in meteorology! Magnus6 denies the action; but he has not a foot to stand upon.
Yours ever | John Tyndall
RI MS JT/1/TYP/8/2561
LT Typescript Only
1862: the month and year are given based on relation to Tyndall’s paper on radiant heat and aqueous vapor that was submitted on 20 November 1862 (see n. 2). This third memoir (see n. 2) is Tyndall’s first significant paper on aqueous vapour. In the paper he mentioned Hooker’s Himalayan observations (p. 9) and Hooker on hail (p. 12).
the paper: J. Tyndall, ‘On the Relation of Radiant Heat to Aqueous Vapour. Third Memoir’, Phil. Trans., 53 (1863), pp. 1–12.
I should… with the paper: Tyndall’s published paper does not include a letter from Hooker.
Herschel: for Herschel’s letter from 12 April 1862, see letter 1878, Tyndall Correspondence, vol. 7.
Airy: if Airy shared his view in a letter, it is missing.
Magnus: Gustav Magnus.
Please cite as “Tyndall1941,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on