WCP4938

Letter (WCP4938.5374)

[1]

Broadstone, Dorset

June 2nd. 1903

J. R. Collins Esq[uire].

Dear Sir

Many thanks for your interesting letter1 & the paper & photos.2 of the Nova Persei Neb[ula].3

The astronomical criticisms of my article4 are, as you say, very weak, — while the French ones are even weaker, & both, (in this month’s Knowledge5) quote me as claiming our system to be in the exact centre of the Milky Way — a word I have carefully avoided using. The one real difficulty I feel is, that I cannot [2] show evidence for this stable position of our sun during the epoch required for the development of Life. The observed & calculated motion of the sun and stars is nothing, as all may be moving in orbits small or large, but the difficulty is to find or suggest any probable centre of attraction for part or the whole of the Stellar universe.

I have nearly finished a book on the subject,6 & the part on the earth being the only inhabited planet in the Solar System comes out very clear, & I think will [3]7 satisfy most people.

If you have anywhere met with even a suggestion of a possible orbital motion for our system within the orbit of the Milky Way, I shall be very glad if you will refer me to it at once as I shall begin printing next month.

Believe me | Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

1
See J. R. Collins to ARW, 22 May 1903 (WCP2826.2716).
2
Collins enclosed several photographic plates of Nova Persei given to the Toronto Astronomical Society by George Ellery Hale and taken by George Willis Ritchley with a Yerkes 24-inch Newtonian telescope. (Rosenfeld, R.A. 2009. Alfred Russel Wallace and the RASC. Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, 103(4): 165-168.
3
Nova Persei (also GK Persei) was a bright nova discovered on 21 February 1901 by the astronomer Thomas David Anderson of Edinburgh. (Tassoul, J. & Tassoul, M. A. 2004. Concise History of Solar and Stellar Physics. Princeton: Princeton University Press. p.630).
4
Wallace, A. R. 1903. Man's Place in the Universe. The Independent (New York) 55: 2830 473-483.
5
See: Flammarion, C. 1903. La terre et l'homme dans l'univers. Bulletin de la Société Astronomique de France. 17: 260-291; Moye, M. 1903. L'homme est-il le centre de l'univers. Bulletin de la Société Belge d'Astronomie. 8: 193-197/
6
Flammarion. C. Man's place in the universe. Knowledge, 26 (212): 121-123; Moye. M. Man's place in the universe. Knowledge, 26 (212): 131-132.
7
A pencil annotation is written at the bottom of page 3 in an unknown hand: "at the time of writing a solar orbit was not demonstrated but Plasket[t] — with others some year after was able to determine its orbit to be in the direction of Sagittarius in an elongated cometary orbit in an area where the stream of" [MS note ends here].

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP4938.5374)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Cooper, Rod [2014-02-21] Transcription checked by Benny, Ruth [2014-02-25] Transcription checked by Sherwood, Danni [2020-08-10] Transcription checked by Beros, Matt [2020-08-29]

Please cite as “WCP4938,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP4938