WCP774

[1]

1 A Wilson Street

Hillhead

Glasgow

25—2—[19]07

Dr. A. Russell Wallace F.R.S.

Dear Sir

You will perhaps allow me to further trespass on your time to point out a few points which you have apparently missed in my letter. We may pass over the rotation of Venus (though I hold the matter is still sub judice) and come to my main point, the structure of the Universe. I would like to say that it is not I, but you who have attempted to draw some theory of structure from the parallaxes mentioned. I merely assert (and think I have proved my assertion as reference to my letter will show) [2] that the figures, if they are strong enough to from any hypothesis on (and I do not think they are), show the exact opposite to what you claim they show in your book. The objective existence of D^r Gould's¹ Solar Cluster, resting as it does on strong spectroscopic and proper—motion evidence, I do not question for a moment. What I further dispute is the existence of a further differentiation into a ring (or shell) and a smaller cluster of which the Sun is a member; and I maintain that Newcomb's² table of parallaxes has been erroneously used in your book (page 303) to support such a structure. It is with some astonishment [3] therefore that I read a statement in your note, to the effect that these figures are too few and uncertain to give evidence of structure and that I have erred in so using them!

Then again, I do not attribute to you the statement that light is the sole source of benefit to vegetation. On the contrary, I was careful to sate that radiative effects from stars and Sun alike are proportional to the amount of light received from the two sources. For example, if we ultimately found that the total effect of Sun radiation was say 10 times greater than sunlight alone, then sun radiations would also be 10 times starlight. The proportion [4] 25 million to one, given in my letter, would therefore represent the relative strength of solar and stellar radiation as well as light. There has been no evidence so far that starlight contains radiation that sunlight doesn`t; which would benefit vegetable growth.

Trusting you do not think me too insistent

I am | Yours Respectfully | Peter Doig [signature]