Ɛpsilon

WCP2304

Letter (WCP2304.2194)

[1]

Meteorological Office.

116. Victoria Street.

London. S.W.

April 8 1874.

Dear Sir

Will you pardon my writing to you about your remark in "Nature"1 of Jan 22 in your review of Belt's2 book.3 It is evident that JW-Belt has not read all Meteorological Literature, or he would have found that his theory of the [2] origin of cyclones has formed the subject of a special work by Prof Reye4 of Strasburg called "die Wirbelstürme."

I cannot say which man was the first to broach the theory, but it is certainly not novel.

I was much interested by your remark, but could not see the book till last night.

Would you mind sending a note to Nature to set Reye right before the world?

Yrs faithfully | Robert H Scott5 [signature]

1
Wallace, A. R. 1874. Belt's "Naturalist in Nicaragua". Nature 9 (22 January): 218-221.
2
Belt, Thomas (1832-1878). British geologist and naturalist.
3
Belt, Thomas. 1874. The Naturalist in Nicaragua. London: John Murray.
4
Reye, Theodore (1838-1919). Professor of mathematics at the University of Strasbourg.
5
Scott, Robert Henry (1833-1916). Irish meteorologist. President of the Royal Meteorological Society 1884-1885.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP2304.2194)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Siewert, Betsy [2019-12-17] Transcription checked by Chua, Christine [2026-04-18]

Please cite as “WCP2304,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP2304