The Athenaeum | Monday
My dear Tom.
I have read your letter2 with great sorrow. It was not your friend John Tyndall who thus passed through Kingstown3 but some other of the Tyndall tribe.—I have lectured this morning4 & am now preparing with a very bad head to lecture again tonight,5 but as far as I can see at present it would be wise to give up your post at University College6— Your health must be attended to above all things.
Yours affectionately | John Tyndall
RI MS JT/1/T/952
RI MS JT/1/HTYP/526
[4 April 1864]: the date is given by relation to letters 2083 and 2084, both dated 5 April 1864 (a Tuesday).
your letter: letter missing. Hirst had left London for Ireland on 22 March, returning home on 12 April (Brock and Macleod, Hirst Journals, p. 1667–8). Tyndall hoped to be able to join him (see letters 2083 and 2084).
Kingstown: a coastal town and major port near Dublin, Ireland (previously named Dunleary and now Dún Laoghaire). It was named ‘Kingstown’ in 1821 to commemorate the visit of King George IV.
I have lectured this morning: Tyndall delivered weekday lectures for students at the Royal School of Mines (see letter 1987, n. 4).
to lecture again tonight: also through the Royal School of Mines, Tyndall delivered a series of six lectures to working men in April and early May 1864.
it would be wise to give up your post at University College: Hirst taught at University College School from 1860–4, and did indeed give up his post at that point in order to focus upon both his mathematical research and health, as he shared in his journal entry for 17 April 1864 (Brock and Macleod, Hirst Journals, p. 1667–8). The following year he was appointed Professor of Physics at University College London.
Please cite as “Tyndall2080,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on