!. LIFE AND LETTERS OF JAMES DAVID FORBES, F.R.S., D.C.L., LL.D., I.ATE PRINCIPAL OF THE UNITED COLLEGE IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ST. ANDRKWS. SOMETIME PROFK8SOR OK NATURAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EUIXBl'KOn, FORMERLY SECRETARY R.8.E., CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE, ETC. ETC. ETC. BY JOHN CAMPBELL SHAIRP, LL.D., Principal of the United College of the University of St. Andrews, PETER GUTHRIE TAIT, M.A., Professor of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, AND A. ADAMS-EEILLY, F.E.G.S. \VIT11 PORTRAITS, MAT, AX It ILLUSTRATIONS. ILonUon : MACMILLAN AND CO. 1873. »jfU of Translation « 2003 PREFACE. T.MS biography is the work of three writers, each working separately and, in a great measure, inde- pendently of the other two. This subdivision of labour has, I am aware, serious drawbacks, and would not huve been resorted to, had any one person been found who could have undertaken adequately to describe the <>us aspects of Forbes1 life and work. But, in ult of a writer who could do this, it was thought better to portion out the work to three writers, than to have it inadequately done by one. No doubt book has in this way lost something in symmetry, but it is hoped that it may have gained more in thoroughness and com]»l< •Kness. In thinking over Forbes' life and work, these natu- v appeared in several aspects, all harmoniously com- i distinct in itself. There was his work- as a sci'-utiti'- in\ .ml «li><-ovcrer ; his \\<>rk 6 vi PREFACE as an Alpine explorer, and, as* far as Britain is con- cerned, the father of Alpine adventure ; his work as a professor and a university reformer ; lastly, his character as a man. In this last aspect he was no less worthy of regard than in his other and more public capacities. 1. The description and estimate of Forbes in the first of these aspects has been undertaken by one who was his student, and is his successor in the Natural Phi- losophy chair of Edinburgh University, Professor P. G. Tait. The chapters headed 'Forbes' Scientific Work' are from his pen. Before writing them, however, he had the advantage of discussing the whole subject fully and frequently with his friend and Forbes' friend, Sir William Thomson of Glasgow University, who has a after these chapters were in proof, carefully gone over them and weighed their contents. Every statement which they contain may therefore be regarded as not merely proceeding from Professor Tait, but as en- dorsed by Sir William Thomson — a double guarantee for accuracy, which in delicate matters of discovery is of high value. 2. The . description of Forbes' travels and labours among the Alps is written by Mr. A. Adams-Reilly, himself a well-known Alpine traveller, whose conver- sation and letters on his favourite subjects were to Forbes, in his later years, like a renewal of his own PREFACE. vii youth, and to whose achievements, as an explorer and veyor of the Alps, Forbes in his letters bears BO rig a testimony. Mr. Keilly has, with much toil and ingenuity, made Forbes' journal, letters, and ings in a great measure tell their own story. The map of the Mer de Glace here given has been done under .Mr. Reilly's eye and guidance. 3. It has fallen to my share to give some account of Forbes' early life, his professoriate, and his later years ^t. Andrews. It would have been well, if this Id have been done by some one whose friendship with Forbes dated from at least his vigorous prime, for my c with him began only with his arrival in irews. Once begun", however, it soon became intimate and friendly. Though this late beginning of intercourse has been, no doubt, a disadvantage, yet I do not feel as if I had been a stranger to him even before our acquaintance commenced : so familiar to me were tin; scenes and some of the persons that surrounded irs. Of this tripartite work Chapters XIV. and XV. have writ t. -n by Professor Tait ; Chapters VIII., IX., and X. by Mr. Adams-l^iHy ; and (.'hapters I., II., III., IV., V, VI., VI!., XL, XII., and X11I. by me. Ea.-h writer is responsible for that part which lie himself lias • .•n nr put t<.-etli«T, and for that alone. viii PREFACE. As far as possible, I have tried to carry on the narra- tive by means of the copious letters and journals which Forbes left. And here let me state how large a share of the necessary labour Mrs. Forbes has taken on herself. She has selected, extracted, copied, and in many cases re-copied, all those portions which are here given from her husband's vast and methodically-preserved corre- spondence. Indeed, but for her untiring exertions in this way, I could never have overtaken my part of the task. Our best thanks are due to those pupils and friends of Forbes who have furnished letters conveying their recol- lections of him, or have forwarded letters of his which they had preserved. Among these I would offer spt thanks to the Kev. Professor Kelland for the full account, which he kindly supplied of Forbes* work in Edin- burgh University. With these remarks this Preface might have ended. It had been our hope that we might have been allowed to tell our story, without reverting to controversies which, we had thought, had been long since extinguished. But after most of these sheets were in the press, a book appeared, in which many of the old charges against Principal Forbes in the matter of the glaciers, were, if not openly repeated, at least not obscurely indicated. Neither the interests of truth, nor justice to the dc;i. FORBES Front. „ „ (AOKM m .... Vignette. PORTRAIT OF LADY FORBES 4 PORTRAIT OF SIR WILLIAM 38 THE HER DE OLACE DE CHAMOINIX "27 -J THE "DIRT BANDS" OF Tin: 284 DT8ART COTTAGE, PITLOCIIKIK KL AND SPIRE OF -1- i \Vs . . 404 MAP.— MER DE (. . At ERRATA. Page 143, line 5, for ' Albyne ' read ' Altyre.' „ 224, „ 2, „ * Collin ton ' read ' Colinton.' „ 243, „ 35, „ ' less ' read l more.' „ 258, „ 19, „ { Switzerland elsewhere/- read ' Switzer- land or elsewhere.' „ „ „ 29 (and throughout), for ' Voght ' read 'Vogt.' „ 259, last line (and throughout), ' Abswung ' read 1 Abschwung.' „ 376, line 29, for ' Pelroux ' read rPelvoux.' THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. THE LIFE OF JAMES DAVID FORBES. CHAPTER I. PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. ' ES DAVID FORBES, the youngest child of Sir William »es of Pitsligo and Williamina Belches or Stuart, was born in his father's town-house, 86, George Street, Edinburgh, on the 20th April, 1809. Each of his parents belonged to an ancient Scottish race. The Forbeses of Monymusk and Pitsligo, in Aberdeen- shire, of whom his father was the lineal representative, are an offshoot from the Lords Forbes, the chiefs of the House of Forbes. On turning to Douglas's ' Baronage/ and to Burke, I find that the second Baron Forbes, who died about 1460, had a second son, Duncan Forbes of Corsindie, who was the ancestor of the Forbeses of Monymusk and Pitsligo. A grandson of this Duncan, also named Duncan, was the first of his name who got a charter of the lands of Monymusk, from which his descendants for generations took their designation. William, the son and heir of Duncan, the first laird ymusk, married Lady Margaret Douglas, a daughter of the powerful House of Angus; and tin -ir son and heir, William, was in 1626 created a Nova Scotia Baronet B 2 THE LITE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. The great-great-grandson of the first Baronet of Mony- musk, John Forbes, married Mary Forbes, daughter of Alexander Lord Pitsligo, through whom, on the failure of the male line of Pitsligo in 1781, her descendants became nearest heirs and representatives of that noble and attainted House. John Forbes, however, died before his father, and therefore never succeeded to the Baronetcy ; but the grandson of John was the Sir William Forbes, who by his energy and character raised the family to an eminence which it had never- before attained. Sir William was the grandfather of James David Forbes, whose life the following pages will attempt to describe. The father of Sir William had married a lady of his own kindred and name, and died early, leaving his family young and poor. Left thus, while still a boy, the young Sir William migrated with his widowed mother from Aberdeenshire to Edinburgh, and there took to banking ; in which business he showed such energy and enterprise, that he in time founded the well-known banking-house in Parliament Square, which long bore his name. His birth and circumstances combined the conditions of the two extremes of society — the high bearing of an old race with that discipline of poverty and thrifty training which belong to the humblest. And perhaps no circumstances are more fitted to form an energetic and noble character. Sir William not only succeeded in restoring the decayed fortunes of his family, but was known as one of the most influential and bene- ficent men of Scotland in his day. His high character and well-used influence are not even yet forgotten in Edinburgh and in the South of Scotland. His paternal grandmother was, as has been said, a daughter of one of the attainted Lords of Pitsligo, famous for the part they took and the sufferings they endured in the '15 and the '45. On the failure of the male line of Pitsligo in 1781, Sir William, as we have seen, in right of his grandmother became representative of that ancient Jacobite House, and was henceforth known as Sir William Forbes i.] PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. 3 of Pitsligo. The Jacobite blood in their veins was visi- ble in Sir William and every one of his descendants, and coloured all their views and feelings on matters of Church and State. Old Tory and strong Episcopalian principles were part of the family inheritance. These old-world views, however, did not interfere either with Sir William's business talent, the fascination of his manners, or the warmth of his heart. Sir Walter Scott makes feeling allusion to Sir William, immediately after his death, in the Introductory Epistle to the Fourth Canto of ' Marmion,' which was addressed to one of his sons-in-law. The passage beginning — ' Far may we search, before we find A heart so manly and so kind ' — is by no means in Scott's most finished style, but it contains a fine tribute of gratitude and affection. In the Notes he speaks of Sir William Forbes as a man 'unequalled, perhaps, in the degree of individual affec- tion entertained for him by his friends, as well as in the general respect and esteem of Scotland at large. His " Life of Beattie," whom he befriended and patronized in life, as well as celebrated after his decease, was not long published before the benevolent and affectionate biographer was called to follow the subject of his narrative/ The second Sir William was like the first in all but this : that the father had made by his own exertions the fortune and position which the son worthily upheld and used. Of this gentleman, much as he was beloved and looked up to by the more intimate circle of relatives and friends, that which the world will now most care to remember is his lifelong friendship with Sir Walter Scott, and the strange way in which tin -ir fortunes were inter- twined. Walter Scott and William Forbes had known each other in boyhood; in opening manhood they had, with a number of other comrades, helped to raise a corps of volunteer cavalry, and both served together in what, i Scott's record of it, must have been a very jovial B 2 4 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. company. But just before this the paths of these two had crossed in a more delicate and tender region. Most readers of Lockhart's ' Life of Scott ' will remember the allusions it contains to a ' first love/ which ended un- fortunately for the poet. It is there told how the acquaintance began in the Greyfriars Churchyard, where rain happening to fall one Sunday after church-time, Scott offered his umbrella to a young lady, and the tender having been accepted, escorted her to her home, which proved to be at no great distance from his own. To return from church together had, it seems, grown into something like a custom, before they met in society. It then appeared that the mothers of the two young people, Lady Jane Stuart and Mrs. Scott, had been companions in their youth, though, both living secludedly, they had scarcely seen each other for many years. The two ma- trons now renewed their former intercourse. For long years Scott nourished this dream, but it was doomed to end in disappointment. ' The lady/ we are told, ' pre- ferred a friend of Scott's, who was in this also a rival,— a gentleman of the highest character, to whom some affectionate allusions occur in one of the greatest of the poet's works, and who lived to act the part of a most generous friend to Scott throughout the anxieties and distresses of 1826 and 1827/ That lady was Williamina Belches, sole child and heir of a gentleman, who was a cadet of the ancient family of Invermay, and who after- wards became Sir John Stuart of Fettercairn. The more fortunate rival was Sir William Forbes, who married the lady whom Scott so loved. The youngest child of this mar- riage was James David, whose life is here to be recorded. Lockhart adds that he has no doubt that this deep dis- appointment had a powerful influence in nerving Scott's mind to face steadily and perseveringly those legal studies which were to fit him for being called to the bar. Perhaps it may have had this effect. More subtle observers have traced to it another result deeper and more lasting. Keble in a beautiful essay on Scott more than hints a belief that it was this imaginative regret haunting Scott i.] PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. 5 all his life long which became the true well-spring of his inspiration in all his minstrelsy and romance. And there is evidence to prove that Keble divined aright. Certainly there is a purity and elevation in Scott's con- ceptions of female character which would well accord with such an experience idealized. One instance more of the old truth that poets • Learn in suffering what they teach in song.' However this may have been, it is certain that the suc- cess of his rival made no break in Scott's friendship with Forbes. Immediately after Sir William's marriage with Miss Belches Stuart, we find him serving along with Scott in that band of mounted volunteers which counted on its roll most of Scott's most intimate friends. This was in 1797, when Scott was yet an unknown man. About thirty 13 afterwards, when Scott's fame was at the full and his dark days had begun, the following entries occur in the poet's diary: — 1826, January 20, 'Sir William Forbes called, — the same kind, honest friend as ever, — with all offers of assistance.' Again, January 26, ' Sir William Forbes took the chair, and behaved as he has ever done, with the generosity of ancient faith and early friendship. In what scenes have Sir William and I not borne a share together, — desperate and almost bloody affrays, rivalries, deep drinking matches, — and finally, with the kindest ngs on both .-ides, somewhat separated by his retiring much within the bosom of his family and I moving little beyond mine ! It is fated our planets should cross, and that at the periods most interesting for me. Down — down — a hundred thoughts ! ' I .in her on in Lockhart's Life we read: * Sir William Forbes, whose banking-house was one of Ballantyne's editors, crowned his generous efforts for Scott's relief by privately paying the whole of Abud's demand irly £2,000) out of his own pocket, ranking as an ordinary en-diinr I'm* the amount, and taking care at •aim- time that his old friend should be allowed to believe that the atiair had m« T-< d quietly in the general 6 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. affairs of the trustees. It was not until some time after Sir William's death that Sir Walter learned what he had done on this occasion/ In a letter dated Abbotsford, October 28, 1828, Scott on hearing of the death of his early friend thus writes : ' Your letter brought me the afflicting intelligence of the death of our early and beloved friend Sir William. I had little else to expect from the state of health in which he was when I last saw him ; but that circum- stance does not diminish the pain with which I now reflect that I shall never see him more. He was a man who from his habits could not be intimately known to many, although everything which he did partook of that high feeling and generosity which belongs perhaps to a better age than" that we live in. In him I feel I have sustained a loss which no after years of my life can fill up to me ; and if I look back to the gay and happy hours of youth, they must be filled with recollections of our departed friend. In the whole course of life our friendship has been uninterrupted, as his kindness has been unwearied. Even the last time I saw him (so changed from what I knew him), he came to town when he was fitter to have kept his room, merely because he could be of use to some affairs of mine. It is most melancholy to reflect that the life of a man whose principles were so excellent, and his heart so affectionate, should have in the midst of external prosperity been darkened, and I fear I may say shortened, by domestic affliction. But those whom He loveth He chasteneth/ And then follow some reflections on the thought of meeting departed friends hereafter, more serious than Scott generally indulged in. There is but one allusion, as far as I know, made by Sir Walter Scott to the lady who became Lady Forbes. It occurs in his diary about a year before the above letter regarding Sir William was written. In July 1827, Sir Walter, while on a visit in the neighbourhood, drove over to St. Andrews, not having seen it for many years. And thus he notices it : ' I did not go up to St. Rule's i.] PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. 7 Tower, as on former occasions : this is a falling off, for when before did I remain sitting below when there was a steeple to be ascended ? . . . I sat down on a gravestone and recollected the first visit I made to St. Andrews, now thirty years ago. What changes in my feelings and my fortunes have since then taken place ! — some for the better, many for the worse. I remembered the name I then carved in Runic characters beside the castle gate, and asked why it should still agitate my heart. But my friends came down from the tower, and the foolish idea was chased away/ What name that was may easily be divined. An old sexton still lives who remembers that day, and points to the spot within the roofless Tower of St. Rule where Sir Walter sat on a stone, 'with a rough hairy cap on his head.' The above extracts contain incidents and allusions of so private a nature that scruples might have been felt about noticing them here, had they not already been made public, in so famous a biography. The marriage of Sir William Forbes with Williamina Belches or Stuart took place on 19th January, 1797. Their family consisted of four sons and two daughters, and of these James David was the youngest child. The following pleasing record of his childhood and early years was written by Miss Forbes, the last survivor of the family. Miss Forbes s Sketch of her Brother* early Life. He was born 20th April, 1809, at 86, George Street, Edinburgh. Though Colinton House, within four miles of Edinburgh, was the usual home of the family, his mother had been recommended to remove into town for the winter, on account of her health ; and before the end of the year she was ordered by her physician to Lymp- atone near Exeter, and was accompanied by Sir William and their infant son, the rest of the family being left at home. They took with them from Scotland two faithful attendants, for whom their young charge ever 8 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. retained the most tender regard, — his mother's favourite maid and his own nurse, Lizzie Jervis, a remarkable woman in her way ; of the old Scotch type, stately and reserved, strict and conscientious, one who never went out to walk without her small, well-worn Bible in her pocket. Writing to her daughter, his mother says : 'Dear James is a sweet, thriving, merry pet;' and again: 'He is really the dearest and the best baby you ever saw/ But he was never to be conscious of the blessing of such a mothers love and care. She died 5th December, 1810, when he was little more than a year and a half old. But though too young to know his irreparable loss, or to retain the slightest recollection of that lovely spot where his mother died, he never ceased to regard it with a sacred and almost romantic vene- ration. Witness the pilgrimage made to Lympstone in his twenty-sixth year, so touchingly described in a letter to his sister, which few could read unmoved. An intense sensibility to the associations of the past, a clinging fondness for the scenes of his youth and the memories of his early days, were among his most amiable and abiding qualities. Little relics, which many men would have despised as childish, were preserved by him with a loving appreciation of the value once attached to them. And this taste for the simplest and most innocent pleasures he retained unimpaired to the last. The return to Colinton House was melancholy in the extreme to the bereaved husband, and such of his family as could sympathise, young as they were, in the over- whelming sorrow that clouded his life even to its last day. Under these circumstances, that fair young face and joyous spirit seemed sent to brighten the nursery like a sunbeam. His father idolized him as the last precious legacy of a beloved wife ; while his two sisters and three elder brothers welcomed him home as the cherished Benjamin of the family : no shade of jealousy was ever awakened by the peculiar place he held in his father's I.] PARENTAGE AXD BOYHOOD. 9 affections; it \vashis acknowledged right, and was secured to him by the gentle sweetness of disposition that re- mained unspoiled by it all. After this sad year Colinton, charming residence as it was, was rather endured than enjoyed by its owner ; endured for the sake of his children, who found health and freedom in its airy situation, and endless amusement among the beautiful wooded banks of the water of Leith. Never were these days forgotten. Sir William's health suffered at this time so severely from the painful associations connected with his home, that his friends anxiously pressed the necessity of a nge of scene, and his sister Mrs. Skene at length succeeded in persuading him to spend a few weeks of the summer with his children at Invercanny, a quiet spot in a lovely country near Inverye on Deeside, where his i' and her husband then resided with their family. This led to a visit to his own paternal property, Pitsligo, in Aberdeenshire, where the natural tone of feeling was in some degree restored, by the interest awakened in the wants of his tenants, and the improvements on the estate. This summer (1811) was rendered memorable by the appearance of the far-famed comet, which no one who r saw can forget. Its sojourn was long, and night after night was the infant philosopher danced at the window, in full view of the glorious phenomenon, its splendid tail seeming to sweep across a quarter of the vens. His brothers and sisters pleased themselves in after years with the fanciful imagination, that some secret inspiration was thus communicated which never its iniliK-nrr, but continued ever after to lend an le attraction to the study of the heavens. Tli.-se visits to Pitsligo were repeated for many suc- cessive summers with the best effects on the whole ly, an«l among its moors and mosses and simple 1 j»M|»ulati<»n the younger brandies enjoyed a liberty •lirubly calculated to pnmuMr health and imh-jM-n- • 1.-IKM-. \nr «li«l Y..UM'_r .l;,m,.S fall behind llJS ('1<1ne more extract from his autobiographic memoir of 1861, illustrative of these things, may here find place : — 'With 1 s-.> commences a personal record of a peculiar kind, a journal <»f observations in astronomy and geodesy, continued with scarcely any interruption for seven years lie end of 1831, and extending to 6*51 pages, 8vo. On looking carefully over it now (December 1861), after ipse of exactly thirty years from its close, during which I have scarcely if ever opened it, I find in it a curious record of the development of my mind and tastes, by a process of the most purely individual and unaided study, whi< -h has a sort of interest of its own, independent 1\ <•! the charm of personal recollection with c > 18 TEE LITE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. which of course I regard it. I first commenced a rude meteorological register, which I believe is preserved, I think in February 1823; and from this time scientific pursuits occupied much of my private thoughts, though they were carefully concealed from the members of my family. Astronomy presently became a passion with me, and, having exhausted some trifling children's and school books to which I had access, I read Ferguson's Astronomy, of which my father gratified me by presenting me with a handsome copy, and also a small orrery, in 1825. The astronomical journal to which I have referred opens with the mention of a visit to the Edinburgh Observatory. The first year's record (1825), containing a great deal of puerility and showing much inexperience, is marked at the same time by a devotion to the subject and an ardour for learning which is sometimes touching. My calculations and observations (with a good achromatic of my father's, two and three-quarters inch aperture) were pursued at late hours, and also on journeys. Many of the pages are filled with elaborate (though often very inaccurate) arithmetical calculations of the positions of planets and satellites for a planisphere I was constructing. The books I consulted were Ferguson's Astronomy, " Wonders of the Telescope," Swing's Astronomy, with tables for calculation of planetary places (this book was lent me by Mr. Hunter, schoolmaster, Colinton), Keith on the Globes (Mr. Hunter's), Chambers's (folio) Dictionary ; and I seem to have ventured on an occasional consultation of Woodhouse's Astronomy, to which I had access at home. In July 1825 I commenced reading through the astronomical papers in Button's abridgment of the Philosophical Transactions. In September 1825 I became possessed (by Miss Ballingall's kindness) of a Nautical Almanac, which gave me a thrill of pleasure which I yet vividly remember. 'In October 1825 I began making rude angular in- struments. In December 1825 I made an observation on a peculiarity of oblique vision in apparently in- creasing the number of the stars, which in 1826 i.] PARENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. 19 became my first published communication to Brewster's Journal. 'In January 1826 I began to make a more elaborate quadrant of copper. In May I got hold of the tables in Yince's Astronomy. For long previously I had been in the habit of picking up scientific information in Jameson and Brewster's Philosophical Journals, which lay regularly on my father's table.' r 2 CHAPTER II. rOUTHFUL TRAVELS. TILL he had completed his sixteenth year Forbes was entirely home-trained and self-educated. The home training was such as belonged to a Scottish patrician house, whose head was not only highly honourable and refined, but more tender-hearted and serious than most men of his own order at that day. The early death of his mother, and the secluded life which he led from childhood till manhood, were influences which entered deeply into James Forbes's character, and were apparent to the last. Pure, truthful, tender-hearted to all within his own immediate circle ; not diffusive of sympathy, nor given to fraternize with those beyond it ; serious, scrupulous in all duty, intense and concentrated on whatever he had on hand, — these qualities, which in after life distinguished him, grew naturally in such a home as his. In boyhood he had no jostling with his fellows and no schoolboy friends ; and when he went to College, the daily ride home to Colinton left small time for College acquaintanceship. For his intellectual training he was indebted mainly to the processes he has himself described in his journal. His real and early educators, more than the home gover- ness and the village schoolmaster, were his meteoro- logical and astronomical records and his 'Ideas of Inventions/ By these, continued some of them for years, he trained himself to be the patient and accurate CHAP. II.] YOUTHFUL TRAl'ELS, 1826 27. 21 observer of nature and the cautious and correct reasoner which he afterwards became. In November 1825 he for the first time entered College in the University of Edinburgh, and joined the classes of Latin and of Chemistry. The latter class was then Jit by Dr. Hope ; and Sir William Forbes attended it that session along with his son. It is noteworthy that i 'iily three months before this entrance at College, viz. in August 1825, the entry in his journal * Began Euclid' o occurs. So the young physicist had been for years groping his into all the wonders of nature and astronomy by self-prompted experiments and self-taught calculations without any knowledge of regular geometry. Nothing can show more how strong was the native bias, how deep the craving to pry into the secrets of the physical world. Of his first session at College no record iv mains. Two things only are noteworthy : first, that in attending during this winter a private Greek class he made his first friendship beyond his own family circle ; other, that he must have made good use of his winter in the Latin class, as is proved by the familiarity with which he turned to the pages of Virgil and Horace when the next winter found him in Italy. About the close of his first year at College — that is, in the spring of 1826 — he entered on another stage of his self-education, which was destined to have important results. He commenced an anonymous correspondence, unknown to all his friends, on scientific matters with late Sir David Brewster. That celebrated man of science, then in the full swing of his long and untiring energy, was at this time among other work- < ; my ing hie \\vll-kno\vji J'/n'/<*oj>ltical Journal. The young enthusiast of seventeen ventured to offer him a paper for ti<»n in the Journal, and was warmly welcomed by 'On the 29th May, 1826, is recorded my tirM com- :iication un. I It was a calculation of a conjunction of Juj'itn* ami 22 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. Venus on July 31st, but owing to an accident it was not printed. All my subsequent communications were printed, and the titles and copies of most of my corre- spondence with Sir D. Brewster are duly recorded in the Journal. My letters are mostly very puerile in expres- sion, and altogether unworthy of preservation. Dr. Brewster 's on the contrary show great kindness, thought- fulness, and a warm estimation of my enthusiasm for science. Of course I have rigorously preserved the originals of these/ This interesting correspondence, once begun, went on for successive years. Two months, however, after it began — that is, in July 1826 — James Forbes started with his father and family on a journey to the Conti- nent. Foreign travel did nothing to interrupt the cor- respondence. Kather it increased in young Forbes the desire to record in so well-known a journal some of the marvels of nature and art which opened before him. A journey abroad was not then the common or easy affair it has nowadays become. Very few Scottish youths at that time had such an opportunity of self- improvement. James Forbes was not one to let the opportunity pass unused. The journey lay by Paris, Strasburg, Innspriick, on through Venice, Padua, Bologna, Florence, to Kome. On Koine he looked with young and unsophisticated eyes. Learned people may smile at the entry in his journal as trite and puerile, yet it breathes a fine boyish ardour, which those who make that visit later in life might well envy. When men see those famous places for the first time in ripe manhood, learned and fastidious criticism often will not let their feelings go freely forth. They are so repelled by the uncertainty of the old sites, by the present social degradation, and by the effects of long priestly domination, that they have no heart for the ancient glories. Not so the ardent and intelligent youth of seventeen, alive through all his pores, to see, think, and feel. ' We are now in Rome, which it has been my II.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 23 anxiety to see ever since I set out from home : all that surrounds me is interesting, from 2,000 years of antiquity. \V«- may walk with Horace, and frequent imperial resi- dences, or stray with Virgil into his pastoral shades. y are for centuries dead, but seem to live again in their works when we at the same time behold the objects j describe. Could I drink the Sabine wine with indifference which grew where Horace drew his favourite •rage? or see the "flavus Tiberis" still run yellow in its ancient bed ? or could Virgil in vain sing the '• ( 'litumnique greges," while we have under our eyes the verdant pastures ? ' In November he twice visited Vesuvius. Here is the account of his second ascent : — ' At half-past two we reached the bottom of the cone. At the top the scene was quite different from last day, the whole of the large crater being full of smoke and fumes, while the strong sulphurous smells prevailed. We • 1 and refreshed ourselves on a hot crevice for some time, where we left several eggs to roast. Advancing now by the south edge of the crater, we had a tolerably easy walk about half-way round, during which we heard occasionally noises like thunder proceeding from rocks every now and then giving way from the side in great --os, whose fall is reverberated and renewed by the «es of the vast cavern. At length the edge of the \ much lower; and here we not only went but iii towards the crater all at once, nt of 1,000 feet, exceedingly steep, but passable ••..-ilking. In this abyss Nature presented herself in a new form ; all was unlike the common state of things ; in truth in the bnwcls of the earth, where her mal riches \v« T<- displayed in their wildest form : the steep we descended was composed of minerals of the most singular yet beautiful description. * ****** in- -our steps in this descent, which pp rath ;t.-d a crevasse some way down on 24 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. the outside of the hill, opened within the last forty days, whence very hot air rushes with great rapidity and in such a degree as to make ferns blaze, though they were quite damp. Kesuming the edge on the summit, we returned as we had come, to the top of the descending path ; and having eaten our roasted eggs, which were excellent, we went down to the hermitage, where we took the cold dinner we had brought with us. Vesuvius is now, about 3,400 feet high ; formerly it was 4,250, but in the prodigious eruption of 1822 more than 800 feet of. the cone were thrown off. At eruptions in general, and that of 1822 in particular, the most tremendous thunder and lightning ever remembered by Salvatore, or his father before him, attended to give more force to the scene ; the sea retires from its troubled bed, while shells in masses are thrown from the volcano. The weight of the ail- diminishes by whole inches of mercury. There is a vast unison and sympathy of all the powers residing in the earth, and of those most especially affecting the constitution of our globe derived from the heavens. Electricity, and consequently magnetism, the equilibrium of the atmo- sphere, the level of the ocean, the effects of weather, the reservoirs of internal fire in all parts of the globe, the influence of the moon itself, are all employed, affected by, or brought to the aid of this vast production of the mechanism of nature. Surely it is not too much to say that some indissoluble bond unites these various agencies, which perhaps it is the lot of this age to dis- cover. If connection exists, and should the latent principle be discovered, it is impossible to foresee how great may be the extension of human intellect, how deep our insight into the physical economy of all that surrounds us/ On November 29th he watched and recorded the appearance of an eclipse of the sun at Naples, and De- cember 2nd has the following record : — ii.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 25 Temple of Jupiter Serapis. 'Dec. 2nd, 1826. — Being very fine, we set out to Sol- faterra. . . . We then went to the Temple of Jupiter Si i apis, a most interesting specimen of antiquity. Three pillars only stand, but the groundwork of the temple is beautifully distinct. It is a very singular tart that the sea- water stands in the court, and actually s tides in the building now about half-way up the standing pillars : the sea has at one time worn circular holes, where even now shells seem to lie ; the lower part exhibits no such friction, but a pillar which lies on its sides in the bottom has its whole surface bored in the same fashion, and full of sand and frag- ments of shells ; the present tide does not nearly go to the level of this fallen pillar. There are three totally different levels of the sea at different times, not a little singular in the physical history of our globe ; and to these we may add the fact of the sea having retired from the lighthouses now in the heart of Naples, and of its having encroached (apparently very considerably) on some ancient buildings near Sorrento. By a careful combination of the different levels with the several an- tiquities of the edifices, we may form some idea whether the sea has regularly encroached and retired on the parts of the shore elevated and depressed by earthquakes/ 'AsTRONi, December 7th, 1826. We returned to the road along the side of the lake, and, continuing it, went up a steep hill to a gateway entering \al Hunting Park of Astroni, the crater of an nrt vulrano. We immediately aud suddenly de- scended a steep riding road, and one of the most interest- and mmaiitir scenes I ever beheld was presented to our view. It was indeed a volcanic crater, as ilir precipitous sides of overhanging rocks sufficiently billed; Imt. in-trad of the horrid bare chasm which the summit of Vesuvius presents, the cliffs are wooded in 20 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. (CUAP. the richest manner with the evergreen olive, which at this season shines to the utmost advantage; and only here and there were disclosed the towering and romantic crags which had originally been the barrier of this convulsed spot. ' We were just entering the more gloomy and sunless portion of the path, when a scene shot across us so rural, so enchanted, that it seemed one of the fond images of fancy while contemplating the bliss of Paradise. A lake placid and lovely was before us, the one of whose banks, less interesting than the other, was dimmed by the mountain shadow ; while on the opposite side, where the over- hanging branches kissed the water, with small verdant banks between, the sun shot down his full enlivening beams. All around is rich, lonely, romantic. While we gazed on the scene with rapture, each feature was rendered more appropriate by the majestic eagle, which, flapping his extended pinions across the lake, alighted with that grand and solemn motion peculiar to the royal bird. The scene was one which cannot be described, scarcely imagined; which Milton might have infused with effect into his Eden or Dante into his Paradise. It reminded me of the description in the minstrel's lay in " The Lady of the Lake "'• 1 " Where shall he find ... So lone a lake, so sweet a strand ? There is no hreeze upon the fern, No ripple on the lake, Upon her eyrie nods the erne, The deer has sought the brake, The little birds scarce sing aloud, The springing trout lies still." ' Tomb of Virgil, 1826. 'Dec. 8th. — Visited to-day the small humble edifice which the general voice of the most learned men has pronounced to be the tomb of Virgil. Hallowed spot, let reverence be paid to thy humble remains! 'Twere pity that moderns should cast off every interesting association II.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 27 by doubting its authenticity. The building is a square chamber, at the side of the entrance to the grotto of Pausilippo ; it is surrounded with niches for urns rising upwards straight to a flat roof, though most of the exterior stones have been removed. In the interior are ten niches for urns, and in the centre was one containing the ashes of the poet, supported by nine small pillars, as some believe ; on it was the inscription dictated by Virgil immediately before his death, and so well known. ******* * Dec. IQth. — I shall add one or two remarks as to the authenticity of this famous spot. In the first place, tradition is unanimous in marking this place, which on such a point is of no small importance ; but the most distinct written account of antiquity is that of Silius Italicus, to whom the spot actually belonged ; — that passage is in his obscure style, and has been well dis- cussed by Eustace. ... On the whole, it is my clear opinion that we may not only frequent the place now pointed out with the fond credulity of imagination, but that there are sufficient grounds for recognizing it on an unprejudiced consideration/ ' POMPEII, March 22nd, 1827. 'March 22nd. — In Pompeii we see what could not have been presented to us without some very peculiar deviation from ordinary events, such as an eruption of Vesuvius overwhelming a city not with lava but with s. In Rome, as in other cities of Italy and those of DC, we see the remains of antiquity as Time has left i. destroy in;: all the mean or individual houses, preserving only the finest fragments of the noblest edifices. What would I'uinpeii have been under such ite? Nothing probably ini^ht have remained, as it eniitains nothing of singular notice in an architectural nd all illicit now have lieen levelled with the ground. But in Rome what li^lit have we into the manners of the ancients ? What we know of their 28 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FOA3ES. [CHAP. private customs, inventions, and civilization is only from their works, which often must mislead from a change of terms. And is it not most extraordinary to find all that ancient writers mention as the custom of their time realized in an actual Roman city laid open to our senses ? Who could have been so sanguine as to expect to see the chalked advertisements, the titles of the shops, the tickets of the theatre, the gentlemen's names on their houses, the loaves, honeycomb, soap, grain, raisins, plums, nay, the very fresh olives which the ancients had. Pompeii differs from all other towns, inasmuch as we see the smallest houses, the meanest shops, and the most trifling manners and customs of a nation of two thousand years since, of which we are ignorant and whose name carries no charm in its sound, but of a people whose history has fortunately been handed down to us, and which we are taught from our infancy as that of one of the most extraordinary and powerful nations that ever existed. These ideas struck me particularly on a second visit. The views of the streets of Pompeii are such as to our almost certain knowledge are unique, with the exception of one other city, which from its peculiar situation may probably never be excavated in the same manner/ 'ROME, Good Friday, April 15th, 1826. ' In the afternoon heard the service of Vespers in the Sistine. The whole, as well as last night, was in mourning, viz. purple ; the canopy and covering removed from the Pope's throne, which was plain wood with purple cushions ; the tapers on the altar and above the great rail which divides the chapel were dull red, and the Cardinals' seats entirely deprived of their rich carpets ; the Pope himself in red and the Cardinals in purple robes. When the Tenebrse begins (I allude to all three days), all the candles were lighted, including fifteen small ones on a branched candlestick, which are extinguished one by one as the chanting proceeds, which is varied every day with suitable Psulms and Lessons chiefly from the ii.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 29 Lamentations of Jeremiah. It is very interesting to accompany the service with a book. At the same time that artificial darkness is spreading by the extinction of the candles, the twilight increases into the shades of night, and the effect of the sun's parting rays over the frescoes of the chapel is very fine ; and by the time that the Benedicitus begins, and the fifteen candles are all out but one, the sun is probably set. At this moment two persons with extinguishers commence putting out the corresponding tapers on the altar and rail of the chapel, one at each verse of this beautiful Psalm ; and when all are gone, the fifteenth candle, which still remains, is removed from its place — probably as a symbol that our Saviour, though apparently dead, after all the desertion of His friends and the darkness which overspread His soul, still lived, though unseen. At this juncture the Pope descends from his throne, and kneels before the altar, the Cardinals and the whole court doing the same at their stations. The chapel is in perfect darkness, except some lights from the music gallery, the last shades of twilight gleaming most softly through the northern windows, and the single taper throws a faint glow from behind the deserted altar on the priests who kneel before it. At such a crisis how does the first thrilling swell of Allegri's Miserere burst upon you ! how silent the moment, when the finest piece of vocal music ever composed, and performed by the best vocal choir in the world, seems to draw to earth the notes of the angelic chorus, and exalt your thoughts to higher spheres ! When the last words, " Tune imponent super altare tuum vitulas," have died on the ear, the Pope in a low tone reads a short prayer, still kneeling ; a rumbling noise is then heard, which represents the confusion attendant on the Redeemer's death ; after which the flambeaux are introduced, and all depart in silence/ These descriptions of scenes so often before and since described will show what opportunities James Forbes had presented to him, and how he profited by them. For 30 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. a boy of seventeen his mind leapt out with, very remark- able force to meet whatever he saw that was wonderful in nature or great in history. That one so keenly appreciated day at Pompeii as a lesson in Roman manners and customs was to an eye observant as his worth several winters poring over Roman antiquities. And on one more or less familiar with the Roman poets the days he wandered over the Sabine hills and Vale of Horace, or visited first the tomb, then the birthplace of Virgil, impressed the spirit of their poetry more powerfully than several sessions in the best taught Latin class in any University would have done. Nor was he, as his journals show, less open to impressions from the mediaeval and modern aspect of Italy. On the home- ward route there are some very characteristic entries. * MANTUA, June 9th. 'The town has a fine appearance on entrance, yet nothing which can exactly satisfy the poet or gratify the curious traveller full of recollections of the master mind who immortalized his birthplace, — " Mantua me genuit." I regretted that I overlooked visiting the ancient head of Virgil, fondly cherished as original, which has been restored by the French, and is here preserved. With regard to the place of his birth, universal tradition has assigned it to the modern Pictole, and Dante, who from his early date ought to have been well informed, counte- nances this opinion. But Eustace is disposed from a con- sideration of localities to give the honour to Vallagio. In such a state of uncertainty as to what concerns the great man, we find little which can be called tangible to rouse ' O our recollections. The most pleasing way of supplying them is by the perusal of his works, that monument which will endure as long as any work of human fancy, or while a spark of civilization remains to be cultivated. I, who have lately perused his works and recited his last verses over the moss-grown ruins of his tomb, now over his favourite plains and among his hallowed groves, II.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 31 hail his shade where it may still be supposed to delight to roam/ It could not be that one so young and enthusiastic could then feel the full force of Virgil's ' single words and phrases, his pathetic half-lines, giving utterance, as the voice of Nature herself, to that pain and weariness, yet hope of better things, which is the experience of her children in every time/ It is only one who has seen much of life, and felt it deeply, who finds such meaning in his words. But in the purity and gentleness of the Roman poet there was that which came home to the tender nature of this youth of seventeen. \Vhen they had crossed the Alps, we find he made this entry at Geneva : — ' Went to Ferney, a beautiful drive of about a league ; two rooms, as it is well known, are preserved as the philosopher Voltaire left them. I took little pleasure in seeing the recollections of this detestable man, of whom perhaps one may say, the sooner he is forgot it will be the better for his character and the peace of the world in general/ Here is an anticipatory glance of what was to be : — ' July 1st. — Reached Chamouni, this most interest- ing spot, which was unknown even to the natives of Geneva, though distant only eighteen leagues, till dis- covered in 1741 by two English travellers, Pococke and udham. . . . ' July 2nd. — We set off from the inn (the H6tel do FUnion, a very comfortable house) at half-past nine to the Mer de Glace. We were furnished with excel- lent mules, spiked poles, and three guides — viz. Michel Cachet, surnamed " Le G&int " from having spent seven- teen days with Saussure on 1 1 1< • 1 1 •• mendous ridge of the Col de G&int, where more than 10,000 feet above the sea he made a long series of experiments. He ascended Mont Blanc with Saussure three times since. The second guide 32 THE LIFE OF JAMES 1). FORBES. [CHAP. was Simond, who is called " Des D'ames ;" and he has once gone to the top of Mont Blanc. The third was Jean Marie Coutet, son of the famous Coutet, lately dead. We had a delightful ride up to the Montanvert. ... In one instant we were presented with the singular view of the Mer de Glace. Its surface has much the appearance of tempestuous waves frozen ; but the wonders of its form have been too much spoken of. ... We walked some distance on the Mer de Glace, which appeared much rougher on a near approach. ... In the course of our walk I conversed with the memorable guide " Le Gdant." I considered his information as peculiarly valuable, for when he and one or two others are dead (and he is nearly 70), all living record of some of the most daring and in- teresting adventures that have ever been made will be gone. He was of the second party that ever reached the summit of the highest European Alp, and accompanied Saussure in thirty or forty other excursions. He took four days to the expedition of Mont Blanc, while most others take three. He said he did not suffer much from the rarefaction of the air, but that Saussure felt it consider- ably, especially in using his instruments. He said that on the Col de Geant they really saw red snow, in patches about two miles in length but very narrow ; but the philo- sopher could not find the cause of the phenomenon. In that expedition he described the scenery to have been the very horror of nature, a wild fortnight abode for human beings. Saussure (he said) when he visited Monte Rosa believed the highest summit to be quite practicable, but did not care to perform it, as he had a view of the peaks from one of the lower ones ; and as he had already succeeded in attaining the highest point of Europe, and proved it to be so, he did not care to accomplish one less lofty. I requested " Le Gdant " to say what he thought of the practicability of the ascent of Mont Blanc, and whether a man of ordinary strength might achieve it. He said, " Men vary so much, it is not easy to say ;" but he added, " Avec du beau temps, des bonnes jambes, un bon t&te pour passer les fentes, et surtout avec le bon plaisir ii.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 33 du Dieu, on pent le faire." .... We did not leave Cha- mouni till half-past six, and as we drove slowly down the valley I felt that it was with more regret that I left this interesting spot than any town or any scene that we had visited in our travels/ The following is the record of arrival at home : — ' We left Dunbar at twelve ; we proceeded at a rapid pace with happy hearts towards home. Before reaching Musselburgh our eyes were greeted with the sight of Edinburgh, Arthur Seat, the Calton Hill, and Inch Keith, noble objects which never can be mistaken. Without prejudice I consider that Edinburgh combines more beauty and majesty as a town, than any five cities we have visited put together. I cannot conclude this jour- nal without observing how grateful I felt for this happy return to home and all its peaceful joys, and how much more grateful for that protection and guidance from hour to hour bestowed upon us in every change of time and circumstance, to which during our long absence we have been subjected/ A year of finer, more varied, and impressive education than the one thus passed, could hardly be conceived. Forbes was at the very age when impressions come most quickly, and stamp themselves most deeply into the .^ination and character. The above extracts show how open his mind lay to influences from every side, how it enriched itself by imagery, gathered from every quarter, classical, mediaeval, and romantic. But while he was thus alive through all his being, the one master bias was never forgotten ; the undercurrent of his thoughts kept flowing strongly and steadily in that one direction in which it had l«>ng since set. The first sight of Chamouni, as we have seen, called li that scientific interest combine" I with love of adventure which was so deeply rooted in him. \\\\\ a more definite record of the fixed purpose of In.- is found in the following entry in his astronomie.d nal : — D 34 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. 'K«ME, 31st December, 1826. ' These two months have passed over my head without abating one jot those charms, or rather endearments, which the noble study of astronomy holds out to me. My utmost earthly wish for my own happiness, as far as I am personally concerned in it, is to devote my days to the study of my beloved pursuit. My imagination is not heated, nor are my fancies distended or distorted, while I write this. It is my earnest wish and prayer in my soberest moments. I shall be more sensible of my advantage when I return home, than I was when I left it. I have opened a source of great satisfaction, and what one day may be most advantageous to my advance- ment, in my anonymous communications to Brewster's Journal, which, to my almost inconceivable pleasure and surprise, appear to have been well received. This opens a vista before me, which I would scarcely have looked for in my time of life and situation. I have kept this a secret to the present time from every one. I am now preparing a packet of papers, chiefly on meteorological subjects about Naples, which I shall soon send. * My labours recorded in the past pages have chiefly been directed to the calculation of the conjunction of Jupiter and Venus, the eclipse of the moon in November, the eclipses of the sun, and the formation of my quad- rant. I have also written an essay on the apparent number of the stars, ascribing their immensity to the effect of oblique vision/ The scientific correspondence with Dr. Brewster alluded to above, which had commenced before James Forbes left Scotland, and which formed so important a stage in his scientific education, was never lost sight of during his Italian sojourn. The ascent of Vesuvius, the solar eclipse at Naples, and other sights or events presented during his travels, were recorded almost on the spot, and speedily despatched to Dr. Brewster, to appear in his Journal. On the return of the family to Scotland, among the first things that attracted the eyes of James ii.] YOUTHFUL TRAVELS, 1826-27. 35 Forbes were successive copies of the Journal lying oil his lather's table, with his own papers inserted in them. How he was affected by seeing these first products of pen in print appears by the following extracts from his Meteorological and Astronomical Journals in 1827 : — 'COLINTON, August 22nd, 1827. 'I had yesterday the pleasure of seeing Brewster's Journal and reading the two articles of mine he inserted in October last, on the apparent number of the stars, the heats and colds of last year, and elements of the lunar use among the celestial phenomena, together with all the other papers inserted or favourably noticed which I have since sent. Annexed to the first paper I sent are -»3 words : " We should be glad to hear again from the author of this article, and if possible learn his address." 'August 26th, 1827. — In Brewster's April Journal the following is among the notices to correspondents : " We have received A's very excellent set of observations made at Eome on the 15th January, a tid also his inter- esting Observations on the Climate of Naples and his 5 on Mount Vesuvius, which will appear in the next number. We shall be glad to hear from him as often as convenient." Accordingly my paper on Vesuvius appeared in ilu; July number. It would be difficult to ; -1 at the success attending my published < I liuvu communicaied llic secret to Charles, but to uo one else. I am now busily preparing a paper on the horary oscillation^ of the barometer at Rome, and reducing about 500 observations made tlieiv, her laborious, but in about ten days 1 hope it will be ready. - r S///. — Finished this morning a complete ilie Imrary o~ejllat ions "I" the barometer ..! lii<-h I sent to Brewster's Journal. It amounted to twenty-three lar^e .jiiarlo pa^es. and contained the l.'ll'.'tll. ''>. To day E»W the nc\v numbei loiirnal : it < tain ..n ihe ,-Ii- h -' 36 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. n. mate of Naples. The notices to* correspondents stated that the paper on the horary oscillations of the barometer came too late, but will appear in the next number. 'December 18th. — Ere water's Journal has been pub- lished to-day : only half of my paper on the horary oscillations has been published, owing to a small error in the table of final results, and the remainder postponed till next month, together with my paper on Monte Testaccio, which is approved and will be inserted.' CHAPTEK III. COLLEGE COURSE. WHEN the Edinburgh University session of 1827-8 opened, James Forbes, after an absence of one whole year from College, re-entered it as a student in the Moral Philosophy and Natural History classes. The former class was then taught by Professor Wilson, the latter by Dr. Jamieson. These two teachers were both eminent in their way, but very different from each other. Professor Wilson discoursed at large on his subject, if with no vast learning or keen edge of subtlety, yet with a flow of fervid and poetic eloquence, which fired youthful ima- ginations, and helped to let loose over Scotland those floods of turbid rhetoric, which from pulpit and platform have deluged it for a generation, and are only now abating — if indeed they are abating. Dr. Jamieson, plain, practical, not to say prosaic, but accurate, pains- taking, and diligent as an observer, so rarely ventured on figures of speech that the one or two metaphors in which during the whole session he indulged were well known and waited for, and when produced were wel- comed with annual rounds of applause. To both of these so different men James Forbes had a side of affinity. To the work of the Moral Philosophy he gave himself in earnest, but he contrived to weave into the subjects proper to it some of his own favourite knowledge. We firi'l him recording in his astronomical journal, December 31st, 1827:— 'One considerable astronomical work I have been engaged in which I have not yet recorded, an essay for 38 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. Professor Wilson on the influence *and advantage of the study of astronomy on the mind, with scientific illus- trations and notes at the end. It is almost finished, and will amount to sixty large quarto pages/ The sixty quarto pages must, if the poetic Professor took time to read them, have conveyed to him a mass of useful information, which was probably new to him. At the close of the session James Forbes stood first and obtained the medal in Professor Wilson's class, and the acquaintance thus begun ripened, I believe, into a life- long friendship. At the close of the session he thus records what was probably a reward for his winter's labours and success :— 'May 14th. — To-day Papa made me a present of a splendid Iheodolito, just come down from Troughton, with five inches' arcs divided on silver and single minutes. It is a splendid instrument every part, and I hope to put it to some astronomical as well as trigonometrical purposes. Dr. Troughton himself said this theodolite was packed as the best of three, and it was made by the best workman he ever had, who is now dead. It is therefore probably as fine an instrument as ever came from the hands of a maker.' The father whose kindness is here recorded was not long to be spared to his family. For some time the health of Sir William Forbes had been declining, so that even friends and acquaintances observed the change. We have seen how Sir Walter Scott amid his own calamity had been struck by seeing it. The end is thus noted in the journal of his son : — October, 1828, 1-2 P.M. — By the grace and power of God Almighty I resolve that the firstfruits of this tre- mendous blow shall be a determination to keep steadily in view, as a tone of mind, the existence of a future state, where my beloved father is now gone — a con- sideration which bears in its consequence on every iota of our actions, and of which I presently acknowledge myself wickedly forgetful. I make the resolution under -y "(/€J. in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1827-28. 39 a thrilling impression of mind, yet am not insensible to its real difficulty in general life, though now so appall- ingly thrust upon me. Yet with the aid of the Omni- potent nothing is impossible ; and I crave His power to enable me to perform this matter, so that when my time comes I may die the death of the righteous and my last end be like his, who but an hour ago since left me his example as a legacy. *JAMES D. FORBES. 'Sunday, November 22nd, 1828. — This day I had the satisfaction of receiving the. Holy Communion with our whole remaining family, being the first time of our being at chapel since our father's death. Such a judgment, if anything, was fit to prepare me for the due reception of that sacrament, and I took it with contrition and sub- sequent satisfaction. I proposed to myself the following resolutions, the first of which took its origin in the hour of my father's death : — ' 1st. To keep stedfastly in view, as a tone of mind, that I am created for a future and eternal life. ' 2nd. What naturally flows from the former : to curb pride and over-anxiety in the pursuit of worldly objects, especially fame. ' 3rd. To be diligent in the pursuit of my winter studies.' 'CoLiNTON, Sunday, November IGth, 1828. ' Feeling myself now also on my own footing, I have ]•!< I i;i nd a letter to my excellent brother Charles, my Dest friend in our present state, as to the disposal of my ]>n>] >. T! y in event of my death. In looking to future arrange1)! I mean not here to express the pangs which parting from the members of our family and leaving the spot so long our paradise fix on my mind. ' I am anxious to carry on my literary career in such a way as may possibly one day make me independent of a profession, which is undoubtedly a mn1l« T rather of necessity than satisfaction. I have commenced my l,i\\ studies, and am not without hopes that that P«.\\ « T \\ hi< -h 40 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. Bees my smallest griefs will give me steadiness to pursue them with advantage and with honour. Be this as it may, in losing my father I have lost my principal aim in the concealment of my name from Dr. Brews ter. But an ambition has come over me, I hope not a criminal one, to be early a member of the Koyal Society, which would be of advantage to my future fame, which I look to principally as the means of acquiring a name in the literary world, of which every one knows the advantage. This is one point. But another use I think of making of my incognito before I part with it is in a lucrative view, as I propose writing letters to the conductors of each of the foreign Reviews, offering to write/ The winter duties of this session (1828-9) consisted in attendance on the classes of Natural Philosophy and Civil Law in Edinburgh University. Sir John Leslie still taught the Natural Philosophy class, though now somewhat past his prime. This was the class in which were handled all those subjects on which almost from his tenth year Forbes' thoughts had mostly dwelt. All these years he had clung to them with wonderful pertinacity. His meteorological and astronomical journals, as well as other observations, had been carried on almost from childhood with unflagging zeal. That a student, entering the class of Natural Philosophy with such a natural genius for the subject, so well pre- pared, and so persevering, should succeed, was a matter of course. Here is his own record of the results : — 1 Regarding my past winter's studies at Civil Law, I have got on better than I expected, nor can it be said to be very repulsive. I expect to pass my trial at the begin- ning of the session in May. At Leslie's class I got on well, and easily got the first prize, for which I believe I shall get a gold medal. I have also attended Jamie- son's very pleasantly.' But this session contained one event more important and interesting to the young votary of science than the attendance on any class in College. in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1828-29. 41 During the middle of the session Forbes resolved to throw off the disguise he had so long worn, and to reveal to Dr. Brewster whose was the real countenance concealed under the mask of A. In the following letter he introduces himself to Dr. Brewster in his own name :— 'December 1st, 1828. ' SIR, — Many causes may have combined to inform you of my name and circumstances ; and if it has been so, I need hardly apologize for the long anonymous character which I have adopted. When I commenced my com- munications to the Journal, and they experienced a recep- tion so much warmer than I expected or deserved, I had just completed my seventeenth year, and at present am in my twentieth ; so that it can scarcely surprise you that sooner than this I did not choose my name should be brought before the public. So strong was my feeling, that at this moment no one is acquainted with my correspondence but yourself and one of my brothers. My youth you must have well known by innumerable marks of internal evidence in my compositions, and I gladly seize this opportunity of thanking you in the most heartfelt manner for your continued attention, and the many marks of kindness you have shown me, — not the least so unqualified a recommendation as your last contained. ' With regard to the Royal Society, I should not wish to be balloted for till the first February meeting, and till my name is proposed I should prefer that my anony- mous character should not be brought to light. I have thought it fair, however, after such candid and gentle- manly behaviour as I have experienced, that from you my real name should no longer be concealed. ' Very sincerely yours, 'JAMES D. FORBES/ The elder of the two correspondents welcomed the, revelation in the following terms:— 42 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ' December 19th, 1828. f DEAR SIR, — I did not know who A was till your letter informed me. Various circumstances rendered it probable that you were under the mask, and I once asked your uncle, Mr. George Forbes, if he knew any person who used a seal such as yours. But he did not. The transmission of your packet from Eome through Sir A. Wood and some other circumstances were strongly against you, but these were always overpowered by the belief that A must be older than you could be. ' Many circumstances conspired to make your letter more than agreeable to me, though, like all our plea- sures, it had its alloy of sorrow. It was a matter of real satisfaction to me that Scotland possessed a young man capable of pursuing science with the ardour and talent of A ; and that he should have belonged to a family from whom I received much kindness, and for whom I feel the most sincere affection, was a ground of the most unfeigned satisfaction. 'I trust you will not allow any professional pursuits to interrupt your studies and researches. The cultivation of science is a luxury of no common kind amid the bustle and vexation of life, and is quite compatible with the most active professional duties. Your education and the example you have had to copy will, I am sure, guard you against those presumptuous and sceptical opinions which scientific knowledge too often engenders. In the ardour of pursuit and under the intoxication of success scientific men are apt to forget that they are the instru- ment by which Providence is gradually revealing the wonders of creation, and that they ought to exercise their functions with the same humility as those who are engaged in unfolding the mysteries of His revealed will. * I hope I shall soon have the pleasure of being person- ally acquainted with you, and it will at all times give me the truest pleasure to be able to be of any service to you in your scientific studies. — I am, my dear Sir, ' Ever most faithfully yours, 'D. BREWSTER,' in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1828-29. 43 It is thus that James Forbes notes in his astronomical journal the conclusion of his anonymous correspondence : — 1 My anonymous correspondence with Dr. Brewster is now ended, and a happy termination its well as continu- ance it has had. In the beginning of March I hope to find myself a member of the Royal Society, a sort of consummation I have long looked to with faint hope. And here it may be proper to give a list of every- thing I have transmitted to Dr. Brewster for publication ; any particular account of my transactions being unne- cessary. ' October 1826. — On the Apparent Number of the Stars. '1826.— Heat and Cold. ' July 1827. — On Mount Vesuvius. ' October 1827.— On the Climate of Naples. 'January 1828. — On the Horary Oscillations of the Barometer at Kome, Part I. Eclipse of the Sun. ' April 1 828. — Caves Mount Testaccio. Horary Oscil- lations, Part II. ' July 1828. — Materials and Styles of Buildings in Italy. Meteorology, 1826-7. Notices in Astronomy and M'-teorology. Solar Spots. Radiation. ' October 1828. — Physical Notices of the Bay of Naples* —No. I. On Mount Vesuvius. Self-registering Thermo- meters. ' January 1829.— Physical Notices of the Bay of Naples, II. — Buried Cities. Self-registering Thermo- meters. Notice of Auroral Arch/ Shortly after this recognition Dr. Brewster proposed his newly discovered correspondent for admission to the Eoyal Society of Edinburgh. That society is the most ancient and distinguished scientific society in Scotland, and has long numbered among its members all that the country contains of scientific eminence, and not a little of the literary genius of each age. To become a member of it is regarded as an honour by men of ripe age and reputation. But for a youth to be elected before 44 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. he had completed his twentieth yesfr was very unusual, if not unprecedented. It is thus that Dr. Brewster introduced James Forbes : — c Mr. Forbes has a family claim of an irresistible kind ; but, even if he were the son of a peasant, his learning, his intuitive genius, and his absolute devotion to science entitle him to the warmest reception which the Koyal Society can give him. He will be one of its greatest ornaments. I must also assure you that for years he has been an anonymous correspondent of mine, and that I promised solely from his talent to recommend him, when I did not know whether he was the son of Sir W. Forbes or of a peasant. He is also a travelled person, and has surveyed with a scientific eye the classical and volcanic wonders of Italy. If you can find men of his stamp, you will do well to secure them/ 'April I9tht 1829. — This day is the last of another 3^ear. It carries me from my teens, from the important season of youth between twelve and twenty. I trust I am indeed entering on a new way of life. May God apply these serious recollections to my heart ! ' In the same month he notes that he shook hands with Dr. Brewster for the first time at the Eoyal Society. In August of the same year (1829), Forbes visited Dr. Brewster at his villa of Allerly, a little above Melrose, and on the opposite bank of the Tweed. Journeys in those days were not made so easily as now, and therefore young persons valued them more highly, and were all the more deeply impressed by them. It was his first intercourse with a philosopher of kin- dred talents, and his first sight of the Vale of Tweed and its ruined abbeys. The conversations he had with Dr. Brewster and the new sights he saw all round equally delighted him. ' We drove to Abbotsford ; unfortunately did not find Sir W. Scott at home, but saw the lobby, a perfect picture of the wonderful owner's mind. I was extraordinarily sorry in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1829. 45 at not seeing Sir Walter, as I knew from his own authority he would have treated any of the family with more than usual kindness. And Dr. Brewster wrote me that, having met Sir Walter at dinner, he expressed his regret at not being able to see me, as during my stay at Allerly he was continually occupied with company/ On turning to the Life of Sir Walter, we find that it was during this same month that he received a visit from the historian Hallam with his son Arthur, who not long afterwards was cut off in the bloom of opening genius, and whose memory is embalmed for ever in Tennyson's ' In Memoriam/ Sir Walter had, during the preceding June, suffered from the first symptoms of that disease which at last proved fatal. Yet in August he was able to accompany the Hallams to see the sights of his neigh- bourhood. Of their visit together to Melrose an affecting memorial remains in the fine lines by young Hallam, beginning,— ' I lived an hour in fair Melrose.' Probably this was the company with which Sir Walter was engaged that day when young Forbes called at Abbotsford and did not find the poet. The following letter contains some notice of this visit to Brewster : — 'ALLERLY, MELROSE, September 1st, 1830. 'DEAR SISTER, — The day I arrived, Dr. Brewster took me to Chiefswood, Mr. Lockhart's cottage, which is really a little paradise, and would, I am sure, hit your fancy. Mrs. Lockhart was not at home, for we had met her driving her own drosky. As we were going up the approach Dr. \vster said, " We shall find him smoking ; " and to be sure the first symptoms we saw of the great man were certain puffs rising above the bushes. He was walking backward and forward on his little lawn, with a little tal>l<- standing upon it, with parliamentary j »a j »ers, proof sheets, &c. lying upon it, and a glass of something or other. I was very much surprised and unexpectedly pleas* <1 with him. He was a much younger and finer-looking man 46 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. than I expected, strikingly like F. Grant. He has a tremendous pair of eyes, but his manners were highly affable and pleasing. He began abusing the plague of writing on the Greek question, and envying Dr. Brewster's Life of Newton, whilst the Doctor declared he thought nothing could be more delightful than to write what every- body would appreciate and admire, and on such inter- esting subjects. You may suppose I took Lockhart's side. . . . ' I went yesterday to leave my card at Abbotsford. I saw the great man hobbling up a plantation, apparently frightened at a visitor, a class which indeed he has reason to fly. ... So I did not see him, but I dare say that if he has time he will let me hear of him. All his family nre with him just now. I met with his factotum, William Laidlaw, who wrote many of the novels to his dictation, and who seems a remarkable man. . . / The following are some additional notes written by young Forbes during his visit : — 'After leaving Abbotsford, drove by the south side of the Eildon Hills, where the Doctor took me to see a very interesting quarry, exposing most beautiful pris- matic colours of compact felspar, an uncommonly fine display. Again set off with Dr. Brewster in his gig for Jedburgh at half-past nine o'clock. . . . Left Dr. Brewster at Dr. Sommerville's, the old minister of the place, rather a remarkable man in the literary world, and now in his ninetieth year. I persuaded the Doctor to let me see the house in which he was born, which is near the Roman bridge. I afterwards returned and sketched the house on the back of a letter of his to me, dated August 1st, 1829, marking the window of the room in the roof at which he tried his telescope/ Again, ' Dr. Brewster talked very kindly and freely of my prospects, and strenuously advised me to direct my efforts to some specific end. He assured me that, if I kept one object in view, I should soon know more ;il»i.m it than anyone else. I said that I had lately thought in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1829. 47 the relation of bodies to heat a very fertile subject ; in A\ hich he perfectly agreed, and commended the idea. I said that experiments took more time than writing. He agreed with me, but snid that nothing could be more delightful than the prosecution of successful ones/ This conversation contains the first hint that young Forbes's thoughts were already travelling towards that subject to which he afterwards gave so much attention and with such good results. Thus it was that the intercourse begun by anonymous correspondence, and maintained so honourably to both s for several years, at last passed into personal luintance. And the acquaintance was by this visit to Allerly cemented into a friendship which stood the tin of severe trials, and lasted as long as life. But this friendship, though interesting in itself, and helpful to his scientific pursuits, could not make him feel acutely the change which the last year had brought to him and his family. Though the brothers and sisters clung to each other and to their domestic life with the ity that belonged to their race, every one of them felt that when the head of the house had been removed, an irreparable change had come. The thought was now forced on them that the family home must soon be ken up, that they must soon quit the old house at ('"linton, endeared to them by all the recollections of childhood and boyhood. He says that 'the idea of this endeared spot was like a dagger near his rt.' And though for a while some of them might together and make a family home, yet it never could with them as it was before. For each one had become own master, and must regulate his movements more less on his own responsibility, without that advice and guidance on which they had hitherto in common th<-se thini!- more than the youngest and • urite son. Tl in any allusions to it in his during this |.«-riod. Thus he \vrile.-, in gn-< : — 48 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ' Every succeeding week tells me how changed is my situation since this time last year. I believe I have scarce made any notes this year on my professional views, but they have much and deeply occupied my attention, till, having done everything which information and advice could accomplish, with long and anxioua consideration, I ha.ve taken my general principles of viewing it, and leave it in humble confidence to the wise Disposer of events. My present thoughts are as follows : to devote a moderate but steady share of attention to law, which, as far as I understand, may never occupy nearly all my time, and at first will leave me very great leisure. It is my idea not to pass my Scotch law trials till spring 1831. Then, if things go on well, to go abroad for a considerable time. I confess my private views in this tour to be to examine with a much more scientific view than last time the south of Europe, to form scientific connections in France and Italy, and — I have never before had courage to record it either by word of mouth or on paper — to write a personal narrative like Humboldt, and Travels in Italy/ When the year brought round the anniversary of his father's death, his grief came back as bitterly as at the first : a whole week seems to have been kept as a solemn season of remembrance and self-examination. 'Saturday, October 24, 1829. J past 12. * With a bleeding heart I have just come out of my late father's bedroom, where I resolved to spend the recur- rence of the tremendous moment — twelve minutes past 12. Oh that my sufferings, intense as they have been, might produce some permanent change in my habits of thought ! I am horror-struck when I think how little I have done towards the great end I proposed to myself last year; how little habitual the thought of death. I poured out my soul to God upon the bed with an inex- pressible intensity of feeling. Oh may this hour be deeply engraven in my thoughts ! ' in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1829. 49 Evening of the same day. 1 .... 0 that I could indeed have that " habitual remembrance of the reality and eternal duration of a future state" which I have prayed for every morning. Shall I never, but in exalted moments of love and hope, attain any tolerably practical conviction of the great truth ? I feel it almost presumptuous to resolve again. I now resolve to devote a more divided time before going to bed for reading the Bible, which shall include a short, hut clear, self-examination. And on every Sunday I will, with devout deliberation, turn my thoughts to this day, to inquire how far its grief and contrition have worked any good. By the renewed assistance of God's grace, I trust in almighty power that my efforts may not continue to be nearly vain.' For several years the recurrence of this anniversary fills his journals with the most passionate outpourings of grief. No abridgment, nothing but the sight of the journals themselves could give any notion how deep and how enduring that grief was. Strong as were his leanings towards scientific discovery, earnest as his devotion to it was, these his ruling intellectual tenden- cies were weak to sway him compared with his home affections. The former habits, much as he clung to them, he could suspend whenever duty or a higher impulse seemed culling him to do so. Science was an instrument •ould wield, and again lay down ; a garment he could put nil', when the proper time came. These first affections f, his own proper being, and he could no more them aside than he could suspend his own identity or the beating of his own heart. As the sequel of this memoir will be mainly occupied with his doings as a man of . it is well that this ;M be understood once for all by those who wish to v what manner of man .lanp-s Forbes was. In this respect almost all m«-n fall into one of two kinds. In th«- intc'llretual or j.K.f. ,->ional inte-re.-t is so ••lit that it )•• ihe 50 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. very core. Withdraw this, and little else is left. The domestic feelings occupy but a small niche apart, and do not really colour and rule the life. In the other kind of man affection is central and paramount, the mental and scientific habits, whatever they be, seem external powers or capacities, clothed as it were upon the deeper affections which are the truer self. To this latter kind Forbes belonged. Though he had completed the college course at that time usual for Scottish students, he entered on another session of attendance in November 1829; a second course of Natural Philosophy, a second of Chemistry, and a course of Scottish Law. His professors during this year were therefore Leslie, Hope, and Bell. But, while attending these classes, his own private studies and pursuits were coming more and more into prominence. In his astronomical journal the following entry occurs :— 'December 3lst, 1829. — This is the last night of the year, and in revising the fifth year of this work I begin to be sensible that its style has considerably changed. I begin to be sensible that astronomical calculations are, as Dr. Brewster says, a great absorber of time, every spare moment of which 1 have devoted to original re- searches during the past year ; and the quantity I have written is very great. 'My diminishing periods of leisure must curtail my astronomical calculations, which I must, however, always value for the many happy years they have occupied, and the relief in periods of distress which I hope they will long continue to afford. But I am led to more original fields, and I hope to prosecute practical astronomy with my other pursuits. Having the means of making good observations in geology, I hope to continue those labours which have occupied a good many pages of this work in the two past years. My visit to Dr. Brewster I look ii| on as one of the happiest points in my life, and the account of it, which I have just read over, as one of the most interesting parts of this work. ' I shall now as formerly carry on the notes of my in.] COLLEGE COURSE, 1829-30. 51 printed publications, particularly in Brewster's Journal, the history of which I have always here inserted. 'April 1829. — Physical Notices of the Bay of Naples. — No. III. : Pausilippo and Lake Agnano. On the Defects of the Syinpesometer as applied to the Measurement of Heights. Physical Notices, No. IV. ' July 1829. — On the Solfaterra. Analysis of Schomo's Specimen of Physical Geography. ' October 1829.— Physical Notices, No. V. : Temple of Jupiter Serapis. 'January 1830. — Description of a new Anemometer. Physical Notices, No. VI. : Bay of Naples, &c. * No. II. of the Physical Notices, or Herculaneum, was in great part translated in the Bibliotheque Universelle for April, and No. I. has, I hear from Prof. Jamieson, recently appeared in German in a periodical of Leonhard. In Jamieson's Journal last year appeared an abstract of observations on the temperature of springs at Colinton : these have been translated in the Bulletin Universelle for August 1829. In the same work appeared my paper on registering thermometers, from Brewster's Journal of last year. Jamieson published in his Journal for October a r of mine to him on a boulder on the Pentlands : a notice of it, and also of my paper on Serapis, appeared in the Ed, will occupy a uld be an agreeable variation of your pursuits. I cannot toll-rate the idea of a Professorship being an object of your ambition, if you mean a Scotch one. There is no profes- sion so incompatible with original inquiry as a Scotch Professorship, where one's income depends on the number of pupils. To young men at College the Professor appears to have a reputation, when he is not known beyond the walls of the University. The Professor can obtain no fame from his teaching powers, and it is only what he does by original investigation that gives him any cele- brity ; but all this can be attained without teaching boys and half- men the elements of Euclid, or the principles of chemistry, or natural philosophy, which are often all but the functions of a schoolmaster, and much less useful to society. ' 1 disapprove also of the idea in your first letter, of making up your income by your pen. I do not object to i making money by your writings, but I am sure that ouhl l»e injurious to your happiness to rely on such a source for a permanent portion of your income. The i lent you do that you become a professional author, following the worst of all professions. You threw out an idea in your first of wishing to remain a bachelor. This I cannot approve of. The married life is more appropriate to a man of science than to any other person ; and though its unavoidable evils may sometimes rrupt the even tenor of a philosophical life, yd th« < evils, even in their worst form, an- u-eful impediments in our lot, and an incalculably overbalanced, when con- CO THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. sidered only in their bitterness, by the hourly enjoyments of domestic happiness. . . . But I would advise you not to expect too much happiness, even from the fulfilment of all your wishes. The moment you have distinguished your- self you become an object of envy and malice ; men whom you believed to be lovers of knowledge you will then find to be lovers only of fame, and haters of all knowledge that has not come from themselves. You will find that a life of science has in it no superiority to any other, unless it is pursued from a higher principle than the mere ambi- tion of notoriety, and that demagogue or a philosopher differ only in the objects of their selfishness. As you will now have experienced how unsatisfying even the pursuit of knowledge is when insulated from higher objects, I hope, if you have not been fortunate enough to begin the study earlier, that you will devote yourself to the most extraordinary of all subjects, one which infinitely sur- passes the mechanism of the heavens or the chemistry of the material world, the revelation of your duty and the destiny of man as contained in the Bible — a book which occupied the best hours of the manhood of Newton, of Locke, and of Euler.' By March 1830 Forbes's mind was made up. The course on which he had now fixed, with the reasons and views determining him to it, are thus recorded by himself :— ' On the 30th January my uncle, Lord Medwyn, wrote that happy letter which produced all the change in my views from the hopeless slavery of law to the freedom of scientific pursuit, and the approbation of my friends sealed the resolutions which my deliberate choice had so long pointed out. Dr. Brewster alone stands out. The valuable letters of Lord Medwyn, Mr. C. Mackenzie, Sir A. Wood, my brothers John and Charles, John Buchanan, and David Milne, remain in my possession, a convincing body of documents that I have not proceeded in this im- portant matter without due weight of advice ; and while 1 have returned thanks to a gracious God for a happy iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1830. 61 issue of this important crisis, I have earnestly besought His guidance in the new line of life thus set before me. My friends have all pressed upon me the propriety of as- suming the gown, and of going abroad for a considerable time. The former I am now preparing for, and hope to accomplish in June. The latter I think proper, for many reasons, to delay. * I am now permitted, under the support of those friends whose advice I have most reason to respect and esteem, to follow the bent of my mind, to cast law behind me, and, content with a small competence, to follow science at leisure. I have not patience to repeat all I have thought and said on the subject for the tenth time here. Suffice it to say that my resolution was con- summated by John's kind letter of the 2nd March, which greatly affected me. Accepting his splendid offer of 300/. a year would indeed have made me rich for life ; but I feel too much the tax I should be putting on my friends in order to support me in what the world calls idleness, to entail upon them other disagreements than the nature of my choice necessarily carried with it. I shall enjoy at least the comfort of independence. ' But enough of this. God be praised ! my mind is now at ease; and though I have the preliminary drudgery of passing advocate to go through, that is a trifle. In June I ImjM- 1 shall be free of law for ever. Then for self- cultivation ! 1 mean to study the higher mathematics, and make some original researches connected with the funda- mentals of meteorology. If things go well, I intend to go abroad the autumn of next year for eighteen months or • years. But 1 plan for the future with perfect diffi- di-ncr. God only knows how far there may be between me and misfortune, disease, or death.' H..IM -, to Completing ///// '/>>•/, //////-.t humbly ackn- 62 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. the guide and companion of my* youth. Thou hast protected me through the dangers of infancy and child- hood, and in my youth Thou didst bless me with the full enjoyment, the happy intimacy, of the best of fathers. Be as gracious and merciful then as Thou hast hitherto been, now that I am about to enter a new stage of existence. Teach me, I beseech Thee, to strengthen in my soul the cultivation of Thy truth, the recollection of the uncertainty of life, the greatness of the objects for which I was created. Revive those delightful religious impres- sions which in early days I felt more strongly than now ; and as Thou hast been pleased lately to permit me to look to a way of life to which formerly I dared not to do, let the leisure I shall enjoy enlarge my warmth of heart towards Thee. Make every branch of study which I may pursue strengthen my confidence in Thy ever- ruling providence, that, undeceived by views of false philosophy, I may ever in singleness of heart elevate my mind from Thy works unto Thy divine essence. Keep from me a vain and overbearing spirit ; let me ever have a thorough sense of my own ignorance and weak- ness ; and keep me through all the trials and troubles of a transitory state in body and soul unto everlasting life, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen/ The summer of 1830 was spent in preparation for his legal trials, studying the Calculus, and learning German. Early in July he passed advocate, and at once bade adieu to the Bar and its studies for ever. The autumn months were spent in various excursions : first on a visit to his kindred the Macdonells of Glen- firry at Carradale, a beautiful abode on the coast of antyre, looking across Kil-Brannan Sound to the peaks of Arran ; then with his brother Charles on a tour to the English Lakes, where they visited Professor Wilson, who was then living at his beautiful summer home of Ellery, overlooking Windermere. ' We were on the point of leaving Windermere for ever, when I got a note from the Professor inviting us to iv. J CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1830. 63 come to dinner. We made our arrangements to stay. We found a bachelor party, but the kind Professor was most hospitable and agreeable, and we spent a cheerful and happy evening. It was arranged that next day an excursion through a mountainous tract should be made, and we could not resist so favourable an offer. We accordingly set out, a party of six on horseback. The first part of our way was very good, but at length we came to a mountain pass called Nan-Bild, over which none of the party, and it was alleged no human being, had ever taken a horse. At great risk of the animal's legs we at length disentangled him from a great chaos of loosened, tangled rocks, bogs, and torrents, — in short the " bogs, lakes, fens, caves, dens, and shades of Death," as Milton has it. However we were not a party to stick at trifles, headed by so manful a mountain general as Mr. Wilson ; and we reached Mardale, a sequestered valley above Hawes Water, in safety, where after a due stay we returned home another road. All declared that nothing should induce us to take horse again over Nan-Bild. Our ride was nearly thirty miles. Next day was to be the Windermere Regatta ; so of course we were tied down to remaining to it : but what a day ! We went down to the ground with the Professor, where the Kegatta was agreed to be postponed, and a dinner got up among about ;ty tin-re. I had much conversation with Professor Wilson, and rode and walked much beside him, and was <•• -plainly anew delighted. He dotes upon the country, and knows every inch of it ; so I was very glad to make a mountainous excursion with him/ In October Forbes returned to Colinton House; and the following extracts give the views and interests with which he met tin- approaching winter: — for iM///. 1 s.m— Almost had this day passed i my head without a due remembrance. I !< turned only yesterday from a tour to England and Wales, and 'd. lit of Lcil)- (.Mined to date a liote l.roU-Ilt •!••• my eyes these d«< ply associated characters, iMili •lier. By a curiou- • -unii-h accident 1 had been 64 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ( reading some notes of my grandmother's in her old Bible connected with this day. I have gone through the whole of the prayers intended for the past week written last year, and with great advantage, for the carelessness incident upon travelling had made me forget much of the duty I owed to the kind Protector of my often dangerous path. My self-examination had been degenerating, my serious reading grown more scanty. ' Soon our parting from Colmton House will be among past events — God strengthen me 1 ' 'November l&th, 1830. — Kind, excellent Mr. Mac- kenzie died on the 16th September. How much I owe to that excellent man ! How sincerely I loved him God only knows. Eulogy were vain ! 'Entering now upon another winter, and relaxed by two months of varied excursion, I have commenced the delightful and engrossing studies which have now, blessed be God ! become my principal and legitimate employment, untrammelled by jarring occupations and conscientious scruples. ' I have recommenced the study of higher analysis, and have far advanced with Boucharlat's " Integral Calculus." Feeling the necessity of gaining a more practical knowledge of what I have gone over, I have commenced the Differential in Lardners work. I have begun ex- periments on heat, which occupy a good deal of my time and thought ; studying and analysing Leslie on that subject, and reading Thomson, Prevost, Pictet, &c., on the same. ' A paper for Brewstcr's Journal on the sympiesometer has occupied, and will continue to do so, a good deal of time and study. ' When I view my situation at this moment, it is one of freat comfort and satisfaction, what a year or two ago could not have dreamt of — relieved from all but the toils I delight in, receiving frequent assurances of the goodwill and support of those most in my own line of study. The fears are for my simplicity and steadiness of iv.J CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1830. 65 character. I am ever too apt to forget that my youth is the principal cause of the attention and approbation I receive. I shall soon be admitted to the Royal .Society, with the principal members of which I have the happi- ness of being on good terms. Mr. Robison in particular i >een very kind, and in a note written this summer expressed his wish that I should be some time in the Society before an opening occurred in the (Secretariat. But a more remarkable, and to me very surprising, com- munication reached me the other day ; which I confess astonished me much ; and I am afraid lest it should in- fluence too strongly my views and hopes. On Wednes- day last I went with Charles to hear Professor Leslie's first lecture. He sent for me after the class, and after apologizing for not answering my letter, said he was glad to hear I was pursuing my studies, but recommended me not to give up the Bar. He then very explicitly in- formed me that when he proposed going to the East, last summer, he had thought of getting me to officiate for him, but was afraid the public might think me too young. He then broke oft' abruptly. Such a declaration was to me a matter of considerable wonder. That he should have pitched on me, whom he could have no in (crest to serve, was equally flattering and unexpected ; especially as I had never done anything to induce him to make such a declaration, never cringed to his authority or opinion. Ever since Wednesday my imagination has been perpetually building castles in the air upon this declaration of Professor Leslie's/ The proposal alluded to in the last sentence brought out into definite relief a prospect which, though he i hardly have named it to himself, had probably been slum- bering in his thoughts for long undefined. Notwith- standing Forbes's high promise and congenial interests, Sir John Leslie does not seem, up to this time, to i. shown him any fav«.iii. or invited his confidence. Thai he should now suddenly let drop such a hint n 6 appeared all the IM..IV marked, from his previous reserve. But whatever thoughts this remark uf the 66 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. Professor's may have awakened in young Forbes, there was nothing to be done, but to keep working steadily on the line of self-improvement he had planned. During the winter, while carrying on his physical researches, making barometrical measurements, and reducing his barometrical observations made at Colin ton, he attended Dr. Chalmers* Divinity Lectures and Dr. Reid's class of Practical Che- mistry, With his experience of both of these classes he expresses much satisfaction : — ' I am attending two classes at present, with both of which I am delighted — Dr. Chalmers' First Theology, and Dr. Reid's, Dr. Hope's assistant, Practical Chemistry. I am strongly of opinion that to hear such masterly lectures by Chalmers upon Natural Theology and the Evidences is a most fitting conclusion to a course of liberal education, and singularly well calculated to pre- vent injury from the sceptical insinuations of Laplace and other modern philosophers, whose works are likely to become oracles with those treading the path of exact science. With Reid I am almost equally delighted, though in a different way/ Besides this he was con- tinuing his study of German, and taking lessons in Elocution. The month of December 1830 saw the break-up of the old family home at Colinton. To this he had looked forward ever since his father's death. And now, when it came, he had to go through that pain which has been the experience of so many in every generation. ' We leave the well-beloved place, Where first we gazed upon the sky ; The roofs that heard our earliest cry Will shelter one of stranger race.' What his feelings were Forbes thus records : — ' We are about to leave this delightful and endeared spot, endeared by its beauties and comfort, by long habit, by the associations of childhood and youth, and by the tenderest recollections of riper years. So deeply and iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 67 heavily has this event pressed upon me ever since I saw its necessity, that I am almost ashamed to confess the weakness of my feelings connected with inanimate objects/ I Quitting Colinton he removed with his two sisters and his brothers,* Sir John and Charles, to Greenhill House, on the south side of Bruntsfield Links, a pleasant abode, belonging to his family, in which he lived until Sir John's marriage. Here are the thoughts with which he closed the year 1830 and entered on 1831 :— * GREENHILL, Sunday, January 2nd, 1831. ' Farewell to the past year ! momentous in its results. How my views have changed since this time in 1830 ! How kind were the friends who have left this world of care and trial since I then wrote. "With what utter blindness can I look towards the characterless scroll of time stretched out anew before me, and soon to be im- printed with records to me I know not how important. .Much, much has there been in 1830 to call forth my warmest thanks to God ; much to accuse myself of in the neglect of my plighted adherence to resolutions of amendment. I this day received the Sacrament. I (1 my resolutions in August, and more particularly (adopted the following as being least fulfilled. 1st, Ke- solution for self-examination and religious thought. 2nd, For dependence in God. 3rd, For social love and confi- dence in my own family. 4th, For humility/ winter seems to have been an eminently happy one, in the enjoyment of newly-won liberty and unim- <>d devotion to his favourite pursuits. It is thus he speaks of himself at this time in a letter to his uncle, Lord Medwyn : — ' COLINTON, November 28f/t, 1830. * . . . Every day has convinced me more strongly .•Irrtinn TOM ii'T.-ssa rv ; and cadi day has wise convinced me that it was properly made. . . . A summer of steady, and I hope not unprofitable, labour F 2 68 TEE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP has only strengthened my ardour of pursuit, and refreshed by an ample period of relaxation I have renewed with zeal my studies, which were never wholly interrupted, and at this moment feel myself so entirely happy, alike removed from turbid excitement and monotonous dul- ness, that I should be ungrateful to God and to my kind friends, and a traitor to myself, did I not acknowledge myself so. ... I have mastered about two- thirds of Boucharlat's Differential and Integral Calculus ; and the study of some parts of this most amazing branch of human inquiry has, I confess, astonished and delighted me, and given me new views of the wonderful powers which have been confided to man. Of nothing am I more assured at present than this, that a suitable ac- quaintance with the higher analysis is the strict basis of real scientific inquiry in the present day ; and when we see everything as we do reduced to the popular scale, knowledge diffused but not deepened, and all severe mental labour received with disgust, this is the time, if any, to lay deep the foundations of those acquirements to which there opens no royal road. Both from inclination and expediency 1 therefore resolve to pursue my mathe- matical studies, always keeping the application strictly in view, and acting upon them in the course of my other pursuits. * It has long been Dr. Brewster's particular desire to engage me in some field of original research, to which I might devote my whole attention ; and that which is every way most agreeable to me, and which seems most fitted for my exertions, is Heat, in the widest sense of the word, opening a field of the widest interest. . . . ' This winter too saw his entry into the Koyal Society of Edinburgh, from which only his youth had kept him hitherto, and of which for more than twenty years he was a main stay. With the coming of spring 1831 he left Edinburgh with his sisters on a visit to London. Being well furnished with letters and introductions, he at once iv.J CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 69 made acquaintance with the chief scientific celebrities of the time, and was by them warmly welcomed. Drs. Murchison and Bnbbage, and Mrs. Somerville, he men- tions as having received him with special kindness in London. At Cambridge he spent one of the happiest weeks of his life in the society of AY he well, Sedgwick, Airy, and Peacock, from whom he received much sympathy and kindness. Oxford he visited, and was present at Com- memoration. Buckland did the honours of the place ; but Oxford of course had fewer intellectual attractions for a young physicist than Cambridge. With Drs. Buckland, Conybeare, and Phillips he went to Shotover to see the upper strata of the lias exposed, and after- wards was present in the theatre when Washington Irving and others received degrees. 'LONDON, May 1831. 'Only arrived, when Sir A. Wood came in and told us that the king was on the point of going down to prorogue Parliament in person, preparatory to its dissolu- tion. We were from accidental circumstances too late '•e him go down, but saw him leave the door of the House in state. King looking strange and nervous. Ex- nient in London very great. Turbulence in both Houses very great. Went into the House of Commons, and saw the members coming out of it, many of them trembling for their seats. Afterwards saw Lords Grey, Durham, and Brougham in carriages, and Dan O'Connell \valk ' I'.iv;ikf;isted with Mr. Lyell. Met Mr. P.al.b;ige, wlmm I had long wished to see : very much interested by my account of Brewster's analysis of the s|»c« truin, and with iv<_r;inl t«> r'raimhoWs rings. Spoke of his machine as a work of oxiety.1 'May }4th. — Breakfasted with Mr. Babbage; much and interested by him : present, Mr. I. veil, . Mr. ]>rink\vater. Captain I h ink\\ ater. Mr. bage showed to me some of his travelling instru- ments, Kaler's circle, horizons, &c. ; and some curious 70 THE LIFE OF JAMES D^ FORBES, [CHAP. notes, especially on the temple of Jupiter Serapis. He has a very fine telescope. Saw his mother and daughter. Got a letter to Professor Whewell of Cambridge. ' June 5th. — Had an appointment at one o'clock to meet Mr. Babbage at his house. Thence we went to see his calculating machine with Mr. Harris, at the place where the machine is making, near the Bethlehem Hospital, St. George's Road. A man of the name of Clement has the entire direction of it, and the mechanism is most splendid : it is almost entirely made by the turning lathe, which he has in high perfection. . . . Mr. Babbage asked me to go and dine with him. I had occasion to see a good deal of his character, which is very peculiar, and particularly interested me. ... It was with the greatest difficulty that I escaped from him at two in the morning after a most delightful evening/ The following are some notices of the visit to Cam- bridge : — 'May I7f&.— Set off for Cambridge. Called on Pro- fessors Sedgwick and Whewell, and Mr. Ramsay. Walked about the charming grounds behind Trinity and King's College. The day delightful, and the groves looking truly academic. Under the circumstances could not fail to muse a little upon the knife edges upon which a man's fate in life may turn at a critical period, ' Strolling through Trinity Court met Sedgwick, and went with him to dine in Hall, when I met Whewell. Two very interesting, indeed fascinating men. Took wine in the Combination room. Had a remarkable proof of Sedgwick's temper, kind feeling, and personal for- bearance in a miserable juggler's exhibition. Strolled through King's College by moonlight, and returned with Sedgwick to his rooms, and with difficulty escaped from his delightful conversation after midnight some time. He is a man of great and varied talent, of true self- estimation, of most liberal spirit to his contemporaries, of most kind and conciliatory manners. 'May 18th. — Breakfasted with Mr. Peacock, tutor of iv.j CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 71 Trinity, a very able mathematician : present, Messrs. Hawkin, late M.P., Sedgwick, Clavering, &c. &c. De- lightful rooms, looking into Trinity grounds. Went with Mr. W he well to Mr. Airy's lecture. These lectures by the Plumian Professor, and at present probably the ablest man in the University, are in the highest estima- tion. With great talents for perspicuous though un- adorned explanation, he is able to carry his class through propositions, especially in physical optics, of the highest profundity, and by his singular ingenuity to illustrate some of the finest and most delicate experimental truths on a most magnificent scale. The lecture was upon mechanics. . . . After it was over he exhibited a mag- nificent series of experiments on polarization with apparatus which he had taken the trouble to prepare, hearing that I was to be there. . . . Drank wine with Professor Whewell in his rooms, and had a most delight- ful party, including Airy, Sedgwick, Jarrett, Challis, and Bothman. Much delightful and brilliant conversation. Went at seven to see a boat-race of the University ; a beautiful sight, great crowds assembled, particularly of oarsmen. Went with Sedgwick and Whewell. Charm- ing evening, and enjoyed it much. Professor Sedgwick came and drank tea with me. 'Dined ill Trinity Hall. Took wine in Sedgwick's room : present, Whewell, Thirl wall, Hare, Bothman, &c. Peacock came in and had some very pleasant talk about Airy, Herschel, &c. Memorandum — Herschel in his fortieth year; Peacock the same; Whewell, 37; Airy only 30 — inimitable man 1 Average age of taking degree i ted pretty late. Went to Professor Airy's lecture on mechanics. Beautiful extempore explanation of the three axes of rotation and the cause of precession. After lecture he had tin: kindness to show me soin.- rxj.eriincnts on interferences of light. . . . Mr. Airy n« \t showed some beautiful experiments with coloured shadows of bodies thrown from a minute point of light, which he a with eye-glassea 72 TH K LIFE OF JAMES D. ^FORBES. [CHAP. ' Mr. Airy took me over to the Observatory, where he lives. Saw a very pretty polarizing apparatus on a moderate scale. The only considerable instrument is the transit — a fine ten-feet, and perhaps the best worked instrument in Britain. Airy is a wonderful man. His observations hitherto published have all been made with this single instrument, and contain a great mass of good matter, all beautifully reduced. He had the kindness to present me with the three volumes of his observations now published. 'Dined with Mr. Ramsay at Jesus College ; very plea- sant party, including Peacock, Whewell, Henslow, and Bowstead. Delighted with Whewell. 'Professor Whewell sent me his paper on mathematics applied to Ricardo's political economy, which I employed myself a good deal in reading. Breakfasted with Mr. Ramsay. Saw Jesus College Chapel ; pretty Gothic. Tomb with 1263 on it in Arabic numerals. Whewell doubts its genuineness. ' Sedgwick called on me, and I went with him to morning prayers in Trinity Chapel, being Whit Sunday. Heard Mr. Blunt preach before the University in St. Mary's Church. Dined in Trinity Hall, which was in greater style than usual, being a Feast day. Several strangers : James Hall and I went to Trinity Chapel in the evening. Delighted with the service and the appear- ance of the chapel, which was well filled with surpliced students, and the music excellent. Effect truly grand ; would on no account have missed spending a Sunday here. Took tea with Sedgwick, in company with Whewell, Romilly, Hon. - - Grey (Premier's son), and Mr. Sheep- shanks, a distinguished man and an eminent member of the Astronomical Society. Charmed more than ever with Whewell. His notions of the prosecution of science liberal, on the scale of his vast attainments. 'May 23rd. — Breakfasted at Prof. Sedgwick's, with James Hall, Mr. Thorp, a junior Fellow of Trinity, with whom I only became acquainted on Sunday; and spent half an hour with Mr. Whewell in his rooms, and saw some of iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 73 his minerals. Astonished at the vast range of his library in subjects and language. Took a kind farewell of him and Sedgwick, and went to hear Airy's lecture before setting out. It was upon hydrostatics and pneumatics. Took leave of Mr. Peacock, Mr. Ramsay, and Mr. Thorp, and proceeded by coach to London more than delighted by my stay at Cambridge. ' I omitted to mention one of the finest mechanical illustrations of an abstruse theory that I ever saw, at the Observatory, contrived by Professor Airy. It was to explain how, on the theory of undulations, the coinci- dence of two undulations will polarize light in one plane, the semi-coincidence in a plane at right angles to the former, and by a difference of a quarter of an undulation polarize it circularly. . . . * Persons to whom I was introduced at Cambridge : — Professors Sedgwick, Whewell, Airy, Henslow ; Mr. Pea- cock, Thorp ; Dr. Ramsay, Vice-Master of Trinity ; Mr. Jarre tt, Romilly, Bowstead, Ash, Turner, Bothman, Thirl wall, Hare, Sheepshanks/ A visit to Mr., afterwards Sir John Herschel, is thus recorded : — 'May 27th. — Went by appointment to Slough to see Mi. Herschel. Met Mr. Beaumont, who is setting up astronomer. Herschel was engaged most of the afternoon in putting his twenty-feet reflector in order for the even- ing, in case we should have the good fortune to have any observations. Mrs. Herschel was unwell, and I did not see h«-r. \\'e dined, and the sky Ix^an to look favour- able after a cloudy day. As soon as it was dark, we went to the telescope, just furnished with a beautiful new -li.-d .-|MTiilinn, which had not been used before. We got hold of Saturn, and, notwithstanding a very indiffer- sky, saw him in a manner which was very delightful tome. His body was l>ut mdifierentlY defined, 1 however, distinctly tin- >hado\v of hi- rin-4 and five satel- . which is all that h i been seen with the telescope. Speedily, alas ! the sky clouded 74 THE LIFE OF JAMES 2). FORBES. [CHAP. t over completely, and we were obliged to give up the night, which continued impenetrably thick with an east wind. 'May 28th. — Mr. Herschel showed me his apparatus for grinding and polishing specula, which he does himself, and with great success. ... I spoke to Mr. Herschel about a course of reading in analytics, expressing my conviction of the necessity of a good foundation in the highest mathe- matics. He considers Lacroix' Differential and Inte- gral Calculus indispensable, but to be read not through but with selection Mr. Herschel drove me down in his phaeton to Stoke Church, the scene of Gray's Elegy ; a beautiful and a most sequestered spot it is. The poet is buried under a black slab elevated above the ground by brickwork at the east end of the church. His mother's name is inserted, not his own/ On his way northward Forbes stopped at Manches- ter, and this is the most noteworthy memorial of his stay here : — ' The most extraordinary man I %met is John Dalton, whose name is better known in almost any country of Europe than his own, and in any town than in Manchester. He is generally styled by continental writers the Father of Modern Chemistry, and is one of the eight associates of the Institute. Yet this man between sixty and seventy is earning, as I had a peculiar satisfaction in seeing with my own eyes, a penurious existence by teaching boys the elements of mathematics, with which he is so totally occupied, that he can hardly snatch a moment for the pro- secution of discoveries which have already put his name on a level with the courtly and courted Davy. But the remarkable thing is that this simple and firm-minded man preserves all the original simplicity and equanimity of his mind, and calmly leaves his fame, like Bacon, to other nations and future ages/ The hearty reception he had met with from the scien- tific brotherhood in the south sent him back to Scotland with spirits braced for new exertions. And well it might : to be thus welcomed by the chief men of the scientific world, while still a mere youth, is not the lot iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 75 of most aspirants. It seemed, as if passing over the long obscurity through which the early manhood even of the most gifted has to struggle, he had at one step taken his place beside the foremost men of the time, if not yet as their equal, at least as one who was soon to become so. This autumn saw the first beginnings of what has since become a world-wide Institution, the well-known British Association. In the foundation of it Forbes bore a part which in a youth of two-and-twenty seems wonderful. The real father of it was Sir David Brewster. By him the idea of such a congress was first conceived, and its realiza- tion was mainly due to his enthusiastic and untiring efforts. Everyone who ever listened to his conversation or read his more popular writings will remember how unweariedly he dwelt on the way this country neglects its scientific benefactors, how earnestly he pleaded their claims to fuller honours and larger salaries. It occurred to him that if the scattered scientific intellect of the country were gathered into one spot, and presented in bodily mass and weight to the eye and ear of men, the crass public might be roused to recognize its existence and value, as they never would do while it appealed only to the pure intellect. The Association which he originated has grown to a size and importance which Brewster perhaps little dreamt of. But it still combines and represents what were the two master tendencies of Brewster's life — his love of science and his love of sociality. The first hint of it is contained in the following letter fn>m Brewster to Professor Phillips at York, dated from Alli-rly, 22nd February, 1831: — 'It is proposed to establish a IJritish Association of men of science similar to that which has cxistrd for eight years in Germany, and wliirh is im\v pafrnni/ed by the most powerful sovereigns of that part of Europe. Thr arrangements for the first meeting arc in progress; and it is contemplated that it shall l»c ln-lri;ition assembled m Ldmlmrgh, 76 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. said, 'On the return of the British Association to the metropolis of Scotland, I am naturally reminded of the small band of pilgrims who carried the seeds of this Insti- tution into the more genial soil of our sister land. . . . Sir John Robison, Professor Johnston, and Professor J. D. Forbes were the earliest friends and promoters of the British Association. They went to York to assist in its establishment, and they found there the very men who were qualified to foster and organize it. The Rev. Vernon Harcourt, whose name cannot be mentioned here without gratitude, had provided laws for its government, and along with Mr. Phillips, the oldest and most valuable of its office-bearers, had made all those arrangements by which its success was ensured. Headed by Sir Roderick Murchison, one of the very earliest and most active advo- cates of the Association, there assembled in York about two hundred of the friends of science/ In this account of the founders of the Institution Sir David omits only one, but that the chief name— his own. If to these words of Sir David Brewster we add those of Forbes, when in 1866 he spoke at St. Andrews in favour of the Association, then about to meet for the first time at Dundee, enough will have been said to show with what feelings that earliest meeting at York in 1831 was long after remembered by two who had taken the chief part in it :— ' . . . Mr. James Johnston, a chemist of repute and a friend and correspondent of Sir David Brewster, communicated to his scientific journal in 1830 details of the proceedings of the German Association, and their results. Sir David Brewster warmly took up the idea of introducing into Great Britain a similar institu- tion, which occurred the more opportunely that about that time a controversy took place, in which he bore an active part, as to whether the science of England, as com- pared with that of continental countries, was or was not in a condition of decline. Sir David, following Mr. Babbage, espoused the less flattering side of the debate, iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1831. 77 and attributing the alleged decline of science to defective organization and the want of support of the State, he naturally considered that an annual congress of scientific men would afford the occasion which he desired of stimulating their energies in a common pursuit, and of impressing upon the attention of Government any disad- vantages of a public nature under which the science of Great Britain might be thought to labour. * Sir David Brewster brought his proposal under the notice of his scientific friends in London, and being fortunately in communication with Mr. Phillips of York, now Professor of Geology at Oxford, the city of York, the seat of one of the most flourishing of the provincial societies, was fixed on for what was termed in the original circular "a meeting of the friends of science," which should take place in September 1831. The time appeared in one respect unfortunately chosen. The excitement of public feeling incident to the discussions on the Keform Bill was so great, that the postponement of the meeting was at one time contemplated. It however took place without the smallest infusion of political bitterness. 4 In an address, distinguished by thoughtful elabo- ration, Mr. Harcourt propounded to his select auditory at York a scheme for a British Association for the Advancement of Science, of which he described the aims and the working details with a completeness which took his hearers somewhat by surprise, but in \\hieh they found little to alter or amend ; and the constitution proposed by Mr. Harcourt remains in all its important details the working code of the Association to this day. " I propose to you," he said, " to found an Association including all the scientific stivnt»tli of Great Britain, which shall employ a short time every year in pointing out the lines of direction in which the researches of science should move, in indicating the particulars which most imme- diately demand investigation, in stating problems to be solved and data to be fixed, in assigning to every 0 of mind a d»-tinit<- ta-k. and suggcM in;_! to tin- memlM-iv* that there is here a shore of which the soundings are to 78 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. be more definitely taken, and there a line of coast along which a voyage of discovery should be made. ... I am not aware that in executing such a plan we should intrude on the province of any other institution. Consider the difference between the limited circle of any of our scientific councils . . . and a meeting at which all the science of these kingdoms should be convened, which should be attended by deputations from every other society, and in which foreign talent and character should be tempted to mingle with our own. With what a momen- tum would such an Association urge on its purpose ; what activity would it be capable of exciting ; how powerfully would it attract and stimulate those minds which either thirst for reputation or rejoice in the sun- shine of truth ! " ' Blended with such stirring appeals did Mr. Harcourt unfold his intended constitution of this new " Parliament of Science," as it has since been happily termed. Their echoes seem still to vibrate through the long interval of five-and-thirty years, the interval of one entire generation of man. Yes, gentlemen, they still seem to vibrate, for I myself, then little older than some of the senior students whom I now address, was an attendant at that meeting, and a profoundly interested auditor of this inaugural discourse. Year after year without intermission, from 1831 to 1866, has the British Association held on its course, visiting town after town, university after university, from Oxford in the south to Aberdeen in the north, and from Cork in the west to Newcastle in the east, carrying everywhere with it the prestige due to its founders and supporters, and developing in compara- tively remote districts local talent and enthusiasm, which the advent of so renowned and comprehensive an Associa- tion is sure to excite/ To this first meeting at York, Scotland sent a numerous and powerful contingent. Forbes set out in September 1831, along with Sir D. Brewster, Sir John Kobison, and others. The success of that meeting more than fulfilled the expectation of its founders. During the iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1832. 79 immediately following year*, while it was still in its infancy, the Association had to run the gauntlet of not a little ridicule. It was a butt for the shafts of the ' British Critic/ the chief organ of the Oxford movement then beginning, which attacked it with no sparing satire. And though no doubt the gala days of the savants, enlivened by good dinners, railway excursions, and abun- dant talk, may still provoke a smile, those who know best the history of these meetings seem most assured that they have really been fruitful of solid results. Of these services to science one of the most tangible is the establishment and maintenance by the Association of the Observatory at Kew, for observing the phenomena of meteorology and terrestrial magnetism. During all his active life Forbes maintained the same interest in pro- moting the work of the Association which he had shown in its first foundation. The winter of 1832 was spent in Edinburgh, carrying on the work of self-education in those scientific subjects to which he had now entirely devoted himself. At- tendance on classes and instruction from others were now past. It was by private reading and by making experiments for himself that the work of improvement must henceforth l>e carried on. The following fragments from letters and journals show how this winter was spent, and with what thoughts it was engaged, till in spring he went again to London : — To Sir Join, /{..hison, .Fr/,/-//, /,y/ 10, 1832. ' It is my intention, should circumstances permit, on Professor Leslie's resignation to offer myself as a candidate the Natural Philosophy chair. I am aware of the Hiances of disappointment, and that, if once filled up, it might not again be open during my life ; but, if circum- stances should n ml. i my chance a good one, I mean to J.ut inyn-lf in tin- way of it, without at all compromising happiness by a sanguine <1« -.-in- of success. I feel the boldness of such a project, and am humbled l»y < 80 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. parison of those who have filled that chair with myself; but I believe that under the existing state of science in Scotland — I say it without any emotion of vanity — there are few who have had the means and inclination combined to pursue the course which I have done. You must be aware of the delicacy I feel in writing of the chair Professor Kobison once occupied ; but, Sir, " there were giants in those days," and I fear we are now reduced but to a dwarfish state of science in Scotland : — this -alone is the footing on which I can place it/ This is his chronicle of the first half of the year 1832 :— 'January 1832. — Living at this time with John, Charles, and my sisters, and Miss Ballingall at Green- hill. This month made experiments with Dr. Christison at his house, on comparative readings of Royal Society's thermometers. Eesults in my pocket-book of that date. * This winter saw a good deal of the amiable Professor Louis Neckar of Geneva, living in Edinburgh. 'Feb. — Making experiments of conducting power of metals, with Fourier's thermometer of contact. The notes in pocket-book. Also on magnetic intensity with Hansteen's apparatus. ' Feb. 26. — Reached London ; Sir D. Brewster there. Saw much of him, Babbage, Captain King, Neckar, and others. Occupied in ordering instruments for foreign tour. 'April 4. — At Allerly with Sir D. Brewster. * Obtained spark from magnet. * May 1 7. — At Cambridge. * April, May, June. — Engaged with report on meteor- ology for British Association and preparations for tour. 'June. — Association meeting at Oxford. Read report on meteorology. 'June 7. — Elected into Royal Society of London/ These early years I have described more at length, and illustrated with fuller details from his own journals, than I shall think it necessary to do in the sequel. I have done iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1832. 81 so from the conviction that of all men's lives the opening rs most repay close attention, because it is then that master tendencies first show themselves, that the materials are gathered in, which pass most deeply into tho being, that the hues are laid, which colour the whole life till the end. But if this is true of all men, it is especially true of strong intense natures which take i* line early, and keep it unfalteringly. That saying, ' The child is father of the man/ though perhaps first uttered by Wordsworth, sounds like a world-old proverb. In no man was this more distinctly seen than in James Forbes. The moral habits and mental pursuits, begun in the nursery at Colinton, re- mained with him all life through. But there is another circumstance that makes those first years instructive, especially to those who have still to shape their course. Forbes may be said to have been a self-educated man. Till his sixteenth year, when he entered college, the instruction he had was of the slightest and most desultory kind. No doubt he was surrounded by a refined and intelli- gent atmosphere, one in which the tone was more than usually pure and serious. But the mental habits and the definite information which he took with him to college were not put in him by the spoon ; the habits were formed by his own self-discipline, the knowledge gathered by his own unwearied seeking ; and even during his college years this continued. The main thing was not the infor- ion furnished, nor the stimulus given by the professors' ires, but the widening of his mental horizon by the »n of his own swift intelligence and persistent effort. The journals and observations which he had begun years before he entered college continued to be his most cherished employment and his chief means of education throughout his college course. That one year spent in I taly, — we have seen what an impulse it gave to all his thoughts and early predilections. His after labours in the Alps were only continuations of habits and processes of observation then begun. To us now looking back it is clear that physical science was his no tin ent Tnw.inls it he was borne 82 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. by a tendency as strong as that which leads the duck to swim or the hawk to fly. But between these unreasoning instincts and the rational bias of man there is one great difference. The lower creature has the instinct, and the opportunity to act on it is never wanting. But men, espe- cially in youth, before they know either themselves or the world, feel many an impulse which they cannot explain ' to themselves, much less to others/ many a natural tendency for which there seems no outlet, against which all outward circumstances, — and these are one large part of the guid- ings of Providence — seem to reclaim. In such cases it is often very hard for a young man to know whether he should cling to his natural tendency at all hazards, or yield to the heavy necessities which seem warning him to aban- don it. It is many a time a great and sore perplexity. The inward bias and the outward surroundings are, we believe, both from God — which of the two is a man to follow ? No definite rules can be laid down. But something may be learnt from the case of young Forbes, and of others like him, by whom the difficulty has been deeply felt and fairly met. Before he could make science the prin- cipal and legitimate object of his life, untrammelled by jarring occupations and conscientious scruples, there are proofs enough to show that he had many an hour of anxious self-scrutiny. He pondered well all . the cir- cumstances, he sought the advice of those most entitled to counsel him, he took his motives and aims honestly into the light of conscience and of God, and he sought guidance from above. In due time the way was opened, and the result we are now to see. His period of exclusive self-education and preparation for the active duties of life was to be closed by a tour on the Continent, which he had long planned, and in which it was his intention to visit those places, in which either by converse with scientific men, or by observing striking aspects of nature, he might enrich his scientific resources. It probably was his intention to prolong this tour for some years, and not to return till he had laid up a store of facts and observations, which he might give to the iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1832. 83 world in some mature work. At the beginning of July 1832 he left London with his brother Charles. Their course lay through France and by the Rhine on to Switzerland. By the middle of November he was at Geneva. Thence he was suddenly recalled to Scotland by the news of the death of Sir John Leslie, and the conse- quent vacancy in the chair of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. It was exactly two years •re this that Sir John had made to his young pupil the announcement I have already noted, which, though it took him by surprise, must have helped to define his views for his future course. When James Forbes went to the Continent he had left instructions with his brother Charles, that if anything should befall Sir John Leslie during his absence he wished to be put in nomination for the chair. Eeturn- ing rapidly, as he passed through Cambridge on his way to Scotland, he found that his brothers and his uncle, ]\Ir. George Forbes, having already entered his name as a candidate for the vacant chair, were warmly pro- secuting the canvass, and had procured testimonials from all quarters. Besides James Forbes there were four other candidates in the field — Dr. Ritchie, Professor of Natural Philo- sophy in the London University ; Mr. Thomas Galloway, Professor of Mathematics in Sandhurst College ; Professor Stevellc ssor of Natural Philosophy in I id fast ; and, last and greai'-t. his firm friend and adviser, Dr. aftcr- ds Sir David Brewster. But young Forbes was in the field and had fairly committed himself, before he know that I >a vid was to come forward. The tone which Brewster had always held about the work of professorships, as fatal to original investigation — an opinion which is expressed in a letter already given — led Forbes to b« li« \« tha-t he would not now think of the chair. It was th. T< •fore with surprise, but not dismay, that some time after he had returned iVmn the Continent he learnt that I'.K \\ster was really to be a candidate. T<> have such «'i rival as 1 h\ vster, \\\> elder in years, hi- MI|>« ri«>r in rej.ntat inn. die 84 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. whose achievements in science he so greatly admired, to whose friendship he owed so much, must have been a severe trial to Forbes, and would have made many men shrink from the contest. But while he admired the per- formances of his elder friend, he had confidence in his own powers, and was not a man to be daunted by any reputation however great. I have before me a volume in which Forbes collected the printed testimonials of all the candidates. It is interesting now to read over some of these, and to observe the way in which the same Cambridge magnates testify to the performance of Brewster and to the promise of Forbes. Professor Airy, the Astronomer Royal, in writing of Sir David expresses his conviction ' that there is no person of the present day to whom his (Brewster' s) country owes so much for its scientific character as himself/ He adds, that if the choice of the electors is to be determined by an estimation of past services, it must fall on Brewster. He consoles himself in the end with the thought that, * whatever the decision of the electors between Brewster and Mr. Forbes may be, it cannot be unfavourable to the University/ Dr. Whewell said of Sir David that ' in the department of optical science he had brought to light more new facts and new principles than any other person in any country, and he might almost say than all other observers together/ Nothing could well be stronger than these testimonies. Comparing them with the language employed by the same men when speaking of Forbes, we find them testi- fying that Forbes's performances were already important in themselves and very remarkable as coming from one so young, and they drew from these and from their knowledge of himself an augury of a brilliant future. From among the numerous testimonials which Forbes produced from men of the highest scientific name, Whewell, Airy, Peacock, Buckland, Vernon Harcourt, Chalmers, Sir William Hamilton of Dublin, and many more all speaking one language, the following words of iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1833. 85 Sir John Herschel need alone be quoted. He speaks of Forbes ' as marked by Nature for scientific distinction, if he should continue to aim at its attainment/ ' I adhere/ he adds, ' to the expression ; and having, in consequence of the interest attaching to this matter, been led to an attentive re-perusal of his meteorological and magnetic researches, as well as of many of his earlier papers, I must say that I find this impression greatly strengthened and confirmed by the evidence they afford of a most valuable union of careful diligence in the observation of facts, and just philosophic views in combining and reasoning on them, together with a remarkably extensive knowledge of the investigations of predecessors and con- temporaries in a great variety of different branches of inquiry It would be the height of absurdity to think of raising any objection on the score of standing, to one who has already brilliantly distinguished himself, and whose .talents and application can only be rendered more precious by the vigour of age — youth he means — to which they are attached.' Excessive youth was one of the main objections urged against Forbes. These words of Herschel must have done something to repel this foolish charge ; for in truth there can be no more foolish objection urged against a candidate, who is otherwise well qualified. Wln-iv ( liaia< t« r and genius are found, as they some- times are, combined in a very young man, he canuot, when once he has attained his majority, too soon be placed in the chair for which his gifts have evidently designed him. It cannot, however, be doubted that, if the election had been decided solely by achiev< -.1 n suits, Brewster must have been successful. I have heard it saiosition of Professor ;ral Philosophy \n Kdinlmridi, to which 1 was cl. <-ted on the :}oth ult. May it be for my <>\\ n welfare, t«mp.,ral and eternal. It is under this condition alone prayed for it. To-day I received the ( (om- lion, and expressed my wants and wishes in such words : n most powerful and gracious God, look ii with on the infirmities of Thy .-ervant. d the ehanLrin.L,r scenes of life give me firmness to ly lix< d on the ^nvat object of that .vhieh Thou ha~t -iven me. I trace the workings of idence in Thy fecenl dealings with me. Let my 88 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. object be BO to use the endowments* and temporal advan- tages wherewith Thou hast blessed me, as may most redound to Thy glory, and to my own spiritual and eternal welfare. Take from me all fear of the world's frowns, all elation at its smiles. Enable me to fulfil with integrity the new duties placed before me, to act becomingly in the wider sphere to which Thy good- ness has extended my exertions. Aid me to cultivate Christian charity, to lay aside all feelings of animosity, and to cherish a principle of universal benevolence. I beseech Thee to preserve me from an undue anxiety in temporal matters, to which I am so prone, and to strengthen my faltering confidence in Thee, which I ac- knowledge has been sinfully and ungratefully imperfect. Grant me, I pray, health for the pursuit of my under- takings, yet not a slavish love of life. Grant that I may take a fearless view of my latter end. If I be not so grossly forgetful of the uncertainty of life, let me not mistake the very fault of too much thoughtfulness of the morrow for the saving conviction of the thought of a last judgment. Teach me not merely to number my days, "but so tp number them that I may apply my heart unto wisdom." Further all my good resolutions, however imperfect, and give effect to the weakness which, unassisted, would render them unavailing. This, and all I ask is through the merits of Jesus Christ. Amen/ Our senses are impressed when we see high and energetic character in men, and we say that nature has made them vigorous or persistent or conscientious. We say so, and in part truly. But there is another and deeper side which we do not see. The inward struggles, the self-scrutiny of motives, the self-dedication, the casting of self back on a higher strength, these are things hidden from all eyes. Only when, as here, some secret record long after comes to light, do we get a glimpse of the inner springs whence that strength was fed, whose outward results men saw for a time, and approved. iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1833. 89 This chapter, which attempts to sketch the growth of Forbes's mind and character from childhood to manhood, may perhaps be fitly closed by the following auto- biographic letter, written at a later date than we have yet arrived at. One thing only must be noted. While touching on some peculiar circumstances of his youth, already alluded to, he gives an estimate of his own cha- racter, which, if it have a side of truth, seems certainly drawn with too severe a hand : — ' SUNDAY, November 3rd, 1839. ' I was born 20th April, 1809, whilst my mother was in very delicate health. She went to Devon- shire, taking me with her, and died there the fol- lowing year. My poor father, as I have reason to know indirectly, was almost distracted by his loss : a man of the most virtuous, amiable, high-minded, and singularly unobtrusive disposition, he was evidently formed for the complete enjoyment of domestic happi- ness. He had, it appears, so concentrated his affections on my mother, that with her loss he was a changed man : he lived as a Christian ought to do, striving to fulfil his duty to his family and to mankind by the most active but generally secret benevolence ; but from the time of my mother's death I suppose no one shared his entire confidence. To his family the most affectionate, con- . and uniformly indulgent parent, he yet spent but little time in their society, though he lived always at home, never, I believe for years together even dining out, until the increasing age of my sisters induced him to mix in society for their sake, and live part of the year in Edinburgh. Till th' n we ;J\vays lived at Colinton in absolute seclusion. On good terms with everybody, he had no intimacy with any person in the neighbourhood, 1 consequently we hud none. In all the time I knew him he never mentioned my mother's name in my hear- ing but once or twice at the most. I, the youngest and ite of the family, was IMS peculiar favourite, ami never being sent to school or anywhere rise, was 00 THE LIFE OF JANES D. FORBES. [CHAP. scarcely separated from him till tie day of his death. You must not suppose him sad or moody — it was not so ; he lived in the very hearts of his children, and it is now, as I look back, that I clearly perceive that as his treasure was not in this world, so neither was his heart. 1 was educated with my brother Charles at home, my two elder brothers went to school in England. Even when living in Edinburgh we rode out every day to the schoolmaster at Colinton for private lessons, so that we formed no acquaintances even amongst our nearest relatives until we were almost grown up, and literally knew nobody beyond first cousins, and few of them. This was no doubt a great mistake, and you cannot fail to have observed the effects of it in my brothers and sisters as well as myself. In due time I went to College, having been abroad for a year, but my habits were by this time too much formed voluntarily to seek for acquaintances. My single playfellow, Charles, was withdrawn to other employments, and my habits, which were always solitary, became confirmedly so. About my thirteenth year tastes for reading and inquiry had spontaneously developed themselves, without altogether the means of gratification, for our reading was very rigorously regulated, and my first essays in science, which were soon after, were indulged with almost criminal secrecy, and of course, if discovered, shared the usual fate of being laughed at by my brothers. This still more increased my reserve. One friend I took a fancy to at College, but it was not altogether happy ; my reserved manners told too truly then what they have done ever since ; he is now alive and well, but he never knew what I felt for him. When seventeen, I commenced writing anonymously in Brewster's Journal, and soon after went to Italy. My taste for science always grew, but my shyness made me conceal it still more sedulously. For years I made observations every hour of the night on two days without anybody in the house suspecting it, except my brother who slept in the same room ; even he did not know of my printed Essays. I am not going t«» iv.] CHOICE OF A PROFESSION, 1833. 91 give you a history of my progress, because that is not to my present point, except in so far as it illustrates the system of education under which I was brought up. My eldest brother died in 1826, whilst we were abroad, and my poor father never had a day of health after. I need not dwell on the two years that he lingered, rendering himself more and more beloved by his family till it pleased God to remove him just eleven years ago. I need not say that we lived secluded these two years and for long after, living entirely at Colinton. For myself, being quite keen on my studiep, I never missed society, and but for the catastrophe of my father's death, I could spend those meditative years with delight again. At twenty-one I knew almost nobody, and was oppressed by dyspepsia, against which I had never been warned, and had carried the seeds from infancy. Though I had long enjoyed independent thought, I had but little notion of independent action, and felt an awkward- ness and diffidence in my dealings with people in general, ami women in particular, of which no doubt you have remarked the traces. This diffidence did not extend to intellectual society, and I often wonder at •If when I think of the memorable epoch in 1831, when just twenty-two, and furnished with a great number of letters, chiefly from Dr. Brewster and others, whose acquaintance I had made for myself, 1 made my it in London, Oxford, and Cambridge. 1 wonder, I . .-•• the self-poeaeasioi) J then felt, at the in- 16 enjoyment I felt at beinle to communicate on subjects bottled up in me so many years, and I was immediately a new man. 1 had thus, you will see, a world of thought and of int* llectual intercourse opened up to me which became my world : my familiar world \ imt alten-d. My friends, and they soon proved themselves really Hich, v. •.••rally double my Whilst my, n<. ' limiher WBfl iimviiiv;- at the >ame time in tin- U-t circles in Lnndmi, I had im wish to il iv.jiiiivd many y< ars nf the intel- n:il society into which I had literally \\mkcd m\ 92 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. iv. to give me leisure to think of any other. I fully indulged, and secretly prided myself on my indepen- dence of society. In Edinburgh I could not find what I had in London and Cambridge, and therefore I had little or none. In 1832, I travelled alone abroad, and fully worked out a taste, which you will see was natural to my then state of mind, for solitary travel- ling, and the independence which it confers and in- dulges. These unsocial journeys, which you profess to like me to make, are the very evidence and food of the reserved temper in ordinary society which, because you observe it most where you feel personally inter- ested, you sometimes lament. Since I have acted for myself I have ventured to do so very independently on the subject of associates. I have formed my own ac- quaintances, maintained them without consulting other people's opinions or prejudices ; and on the other hand, I have treated with mere civility those accidentally thrown in my way. The consequence is that if I have offended a few, I have gained much time and a solid phalanx of useful allies, who like me and I like them simply because we have something in common, however we may differ on other points. General mixed society never had charms for me. As I ask no homage from it, I have nothing to stoop for, and it asks as little from me. . . . ' I should add that in childhood, partly from con- stitution and partly from indulgence, I was in a high degree timid, excitable, and nervous ; that as a more independent spirit came over me I became energetic and ambitious; this stage continued from my seven- teenth to my twenty-seventh year; since that some mellowing ingredients have softened some of the aspe- rities of my character, and the providential goodness of God which made me acquainted with you made that friendship in many senses blessed, for which I desire to thank Him as I ought/ CHAPTER V. PROFESSORIAL LIFE. JAMES FORBES'S election to the Chair of Natural Philo- sophy took place oil the 30th January, 1833, and as he had not to enter on its active duties till next November, he had nine months to prepare for the new task that awaited him. When he was elected he was under twenty- four, and he had to take the place of a professor who had made himself a name in his generation. But to the work before him he girt himself with all the energy and courage of opening manhood, and with a methodical and sober wisdom beyond his years. His feelings of satisfaction at success were well tempered by thoughts which do not often occur to one so young. The way in which he viewed his then situation is seen in a confidential letter to his sister, written in the May alt- r the election: — 'PARIS, MayZQth, 1833. ' DEAR SISTER, 4 ... Were I asked whether I derived more unmixed pleasure from my recent appointment, or from my tour in Switzerland, I must answer, from the T; for however intense and piquant the pleasures derived from one's position in society may be, they undoubtedly fall far short in singleness, purity, and charm in retrospect to intercourse with nature — where we have nothing to regret, — where the pursuit is the 94 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. pleasure, and the delightful elasticity of mind and body contrasts strongly with the opposites which almost inevi- tably accompany the pursuit of the other. I feel assured that my recent success will be beneficial to me in a way which, on a superficial view, may not be appa- rent. ... I have now the arduous task of fulfilling expectations before me, which, while it is humbler, is more wholesome than that of creating them. The chief danger of courting praise or gratifying ambition is either when a man is mean enough to wish to have more than his due, or unhappy enough to combine a feverish love of ambition with an adverse fortune which makes his whole life a struggle to obtain his due, and upon which he therefore naturally puts a fancy price. Let a man take once his true level, and it is not likely, other things being equal, that either the prosperous gale or storms of the world's ways will readily overset him. At least this is my view of the subject, and I feel that Providence has put me in a situation less tempting to the sins that most easily beset me, than if it had left me to buffet my way against opposing circumstances.' While he was thus girding himself for his work, and cheered by the congratulations of his friends, it must have been felt as not a little painful that there was one of the oldest and most hearty of his friends who could not join in these congratulations. Contests for professor- ships, as for higher posts, sometimes bring with them not painless collisions. But seldom has the irony of destiny been more conspicuous than in the cir- cumstances which pitted James Forbes and Dr. Brewster against each other as rival candidates for Sir John Leslie's chair. It was not in ordinary human nature but that the success of the younger candidate should cause some soreness in the elder. At the height of the canvass, in anticipation of such a result, Forbes had written to his uncle : ' With Sir D. Brewster I am re- solved not to quarrel. With him I believe it is difficult to quarrel, except by one's own fault. I hope and v.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 95 expect that, however this business may turn out, I shall find myself on the same footing as ever with him/ If this amiable expectation was not exactly fulfilled, it is pleasing to know that after a few years the old intimacy was resumed, their correspondence renewed, and that their friendship continued steadfast till the close of their lives. Me -an while, when, during the preparation for his first ; 's course, he found himself in need of a counsellor, he was obliged to turn, not as of old to Brewster, but to some one of his many scientific friends at Cambridge or in London. Chief among these was Dr. Whewell. Forbes had hardly set himself to write his lectures before he found the urgent want of simple text-books in some of the most important departments of Physics. This want was the more felt, because he knew that text- books used at Cambridge would be useless for his class at Edinburgh, owing to the then low state of mathematical knowledge among Scottish students. In this strait, he turned at once to invoke the aid of Dr. Whewell : — 1 March Zlst, 1833. '. . . It is most urgently pressed' upon me during my present laborious task of writing lectures, upon micu I have been six weeks at work, that the diffi- culty lies, not so much in that of the subject, as in the very elementary manner in which it must be taught, the state of preparation here being low to a degree which, with your high academic notions, fostered by the spirit of your noble university, must appear almost incredible. From the moment of starting for the Chair, I resolved that, should I be successful, I should make a sacrifice, at least a probable sacrifice, of my popularity, to an avour to raise the stain lard of science, and to rescue the noblest walks of learning from the exclusive domi- nion of the penny literature. ... In introducing into my lectures a cautious mixture of pure d« in<.nMiati..n with experiment and mllaferal illustration, I have felt that all my labours are likely to be rendered useless for 96 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. want a fit text-book — I mean for theoretical mechanics. Notwithstanding the number of works on the subject, without, I hope, being fastidious, which my qualifications do not entitle me to be, I have found no work to my mind. ... In writing on a subject so vitally important, I need not assure you that compliment is wholly foreign to my thoughts, when I state that your Mechanics has appeared to me far the best book I have met with for teaching from, both from its admirable arrangement, which I have hitherto almost strictly followed in writing my lectures, its mixture of geometry and analysis, its subdivision into clear propositions and illustrations. But for my purpose it is too long : it is, on the whole, rather too difficult. ' What I want you to be prevailed upon to do is to publish a sort of abridgment of the work requiring a grade less mathematics, and introducing into the dyna- mical part problems from your new Introduction to Dynamics, which, by the way, I mean to teach at a separate hour to more advanced students. I would have nothing farther than the very elements of the calculus, and that part printed in a smaller type. . . . Your labours are most properly devoted to your own noble institutions; nor would I venture to ask you to do anything which would employ much time. Such a text- book as I want would be almost composed by the easy art of clipping from your own writings, and if you would add a short system of Hydrodynamics, it would be an important addition. The whole should not exceed 300 pages octavo, as I can hardly devote three months of my course to it/ One cannot but wonder at the boldness with which this youth of three-and- twenty approaches the great Cambridge Don, one of the chief scientific celebrities of the time, to lay upon him so exacting a demand. It is still more surprising to find the Master of Trinity quietly submitting, and setting himself to execute the imposition. From time to time, during the preparation of his v.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 97 lectures, as difficulties arose, or interesting questions suggested themselves, Forbes gave his thoughts to Dr. Whewell, as in the following letter : — ' July 20th, 1833. ' . . . Since I came home I have been at work upon fundamental principles of Dynamics. I confess I am half afraid to write to you upon your hobby, but T do want to put one or two questions to you about Newton's laws. ... I have read, I believe, all that you written on the subject, which is saying something, :ig that it is scattered through seven volumes, and I feel convinced with you, that the composition of velo- cities and the proportionality of velocity to pressure must be separately proved. What appears to me is this, that Y<>ur three laws do not correspond to Newton's three a, though you lead one to suppose so. My notion is that Newton's third law is not included in yours ; that he speaks simply of action and reaction in the ordinary, accurate, and statical sense of the word. No one can, I think, read his second law without seeing that it contains two distinct propositions. . . . You will find, I think, that all who follow Newton closely, find this double meaning in this second law, and reduce the third to the literal statement of action and reaction. I have no doubt that but for a little love of the numbers three and seven, Newton would neither have so divided his laws of motion, nor his spectrum. According to my view his laws of motion would have been four. 1. Inertia ; 2. Com- position of Velocities; 3. Proportionality of Force to Velocity; 4. Equality of Action and Reaction. The :<•!), like you. consider the last a necessary truth, and rcdiic»- tin- iirst principles to Newton's first laws; do the same, but break them up into three. I am <|uitc convinced that action and reaction can l»e argued it priori satisfactorily, at least human minds are no means clear upon it, and Robison well ol»s« i ' no one before Gilbert seems to have thought that a magnet was attracted by iron, as much as iron by the H 98 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. magnet. ... I cannot tell you what a weight is off my mind since you agreed to modify your Mechanics. I am so fully convinced that no inexperienced person can undertake to write a good systematic text work, that I had resolved that nothing should induce me to do it at present. The same reason makes me very cautious in offering any suggestions, which I might, on mature reflection, repent of ; but if you will permit me, I should like to send you my copy of your last edition, in which I have marked in pencil on the margin the portions which occur to me as suitable for the first volume of the two into which you mean to divide it, according to the ideas I have of utility in my own department. 1 trust you will make every exertion to have the first volume out by the middle of October ; and I hope you will induce your bookseller to make the price as low as possible, whirl) would much increase its utility.1 ' August 8th, 1833. '. . . Any doubt as to the propriety of viewing mixed mathematics as belonging to a natural philosophy class is at this moment peculiarly untenable ; for the whole progress of general physics is happily so fast tending to a subjection to mathematical laws of that department of science, that in no very long time mag- netism, electricity, and light may be expected to be as fully the objects of dynamical reasoning as gravitation is at this present moment/ But while he was giving his main strength to these weightier matters, which are fundamental, he did not neglect the lighter accomplishments which tend to make the perfect lecturer. When in London in May he took lessons in elocution from Mrs. Siddons. At an earlier date he had studied this art under other teaching, but from the great actress he received, we may believe, some finishing touches in the art of speaking. In the case of many men what they learn from such instructors seems to be a very doubtful gain. The clearer pronunciation and more effective delivery thus acquired are bought at v.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 99 too high a price in the loss of naturalness. But nothing of this kind was to be seen in Forbes. His nature was too strong and serious to be open to the inroads of affectation. To the last his pronunciation and tone of voice continued to be, what it had always been, unmis- takably that of a refined, but entirely Scottish gentleman. But he had absorbed into his own nature whatever the rules of art had taught him ; and the result was that r and well-articulated utterance in which no syllable was lost, and that impressive and graceful delivery which none who have heard it will forget, and which made him one of the most winning and effective lecturers of his time. In the midst of preparation he found time to turn his thoughts to other interests of science than those con- nected with his future class-work The British Associa- tion was to meet in the summer of 1833 at Cambridge, and before this meeting took place it was necessary to fix on a place of meeting for the ensuing year. Dublin was putting in strong claims ; but to Forbes much stronger seemed the claims of Edinburgh, which he urged, not in vain, in the following letters written in the spring of 1833 :— ' MY DEAR SIR THOMAS BRISBANE, ' . . .It appears to me that it is little short of the duty of the Royal Society to convey to the meeting of the British Association an invitation to make Edinburgh place of their next meeting. Since you, as well as Sir D. Brewster and myself, have been both at Oxford and at York, you will not wonder that I feel this strongly. :as always been considered that the origin of the Soci s in a great measure Scottish, and Sir .D. Brewster, Mr. Robison, and yourself have always been looked upon as among its founders. Consequently, at both the late meetings a very strong feeling has been hat Edinburgh should have the honour of an l>id it lie cntinly with the Council of the A«8< , we should naturally wait till an oiler SO II L» 100 THE LIFE OF JAMES I). FORBES. [CHAP. advantageous to Scotland was made to us. Circum- stances which took place at Oxford will, however, at once occur to you as showing that a more decided part is necessary. With a view to put another place between the two Universities, Liverpool, certainly the best place in Britain, was suggested. When, however, it was found that no offers had been made — no representation from the existing provincial Society, — the idea was abandoned. Since the place and time must be fixed within a few days after the meeting of the body, there is no leisure for preliminary inquiry, and the promptitude of the Provincial Societies, to which the Association chiefly looks for support, must decide the matter. You may remember at Oxford a most pressing application on behalf of Ireland was made by the Astronomer Royal of Dublin, but was set aside on the feeling that Great Britain should first be visited, and, most specially, that Edinburgh had a prior claim to Dublin. When I think of all this, when I remember the strongly expressed desire of some of the first scientific men in England to visit or re-visit Edinburgh, and when I think of the immense advantage which such a reunion could not fail to produce upon scientific men here — an advantage which but a year or two ago might have appeared chimerical — I am convinced that you will join with me in thinking that we are in every point of view bound to send a warm invitation to the Cambridge meeting. From the feeling which was shown towards Scotland at both the preceding meetings, I have no doubt that the offer would be accepted, though I am sure it will be met by others from various parts of the kingdom, and par- ticularly from Dublin, the Association now enrolling among its number the most distinguished members of the Royal Irish Academy. ' The Association is above being patronized now : the honour conferred is on their side, the advantage on that of the places of its annual migration. Both indi- viduals and societies will now be ready enough to give the aid which is no longer required, and which was v.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 101 withheld whilst the success of the Association was problematical 'At all events of this I feel perfectly assured, that the ucil of the Royal Society, as representing the interest of science in Scotland, ought to offer such accommoda- tions as it may be in their power to procure, if the Association will honour Edinburgh by making it the place of meeting for 1834. . . .' On the same subject he makes this energetic appeal to afterwards Sir Roderick Murchison, who seems to have favoured the claims of Dublin in preference to those of Edinburgh :— 'Mr DEAR MURCHISON, * I cannot delay an hour in writing to you about the Association, having taken the deepest interest in its coming here next year, and being horrified at your pro- posal to put it off for three years. I entreat you as a personal favour to keep the matter open, and in the mean time I can prove to demonstration that your reasons are null and void. You say that Dublin has secured a prior claim to Edinburgh. This I positively deny. It was specifically understood, both at York and Oxford, that Edinburgh, from having to a great extent originated the meeting at York, should have the first visit ; this, you will see, I distinctly expressed in the enclosed letter to Sir T. >aiio, which I send for your private perusal. ' 2nd. Thru as to Bristol, the idea is a new one. • rpool \ .ken of, but, as far as I recollect, not lordo I tli ink it a gond position. But putting the (jucsiinii, what I object to is your calling a University town, and therefore that it ought not to follow ( 'ambrid^p. This is cjnitc a mistake. Tnivrisity gives no character to Edinburgh, and I will Lrivc little to the meeting. You must be ]>«i- v awaiv that it is not an academical place, and that nollmi" . It 1 102 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORMES. [CHAP. funds, no power. In short, you must never think of the University when you come here, nor compare it in the remotest degree with Oxford and Cambridge. I assure you you are proceeding on a fallacy. . . . My dear friend you are a Scotsman, and though a deserter, you should not quite desert what is due to your country. Only look back and remember what Scotland did for the Association. Was there any talk of Dublin then ? My dear Murchison, do not commit yourself. I daresay you think I am mad. . . / A few months later we find him writing, through M. de la Kive, of Geneva, the following invitation to his foreign friends to attend next year's meeting, which had now been secured for Edinburgh : — * August 26th, 1833. * ... The scientific meeting is to take place next year at Edinburgh, and I do earnestly hope that my Swiss friends will come en masse in September 1834. Pray present my warmest invitation to the whole of them. In particular my best respects and grateful recol- lections to M. de la Kive-Boissier, and to M. Gautier, who, I hope, are quite well. * I am exceedingly occupied with my preparation for iny winter's course, which must be my excuse for this short letter. I have been almost obliged to give up correspondence altogether. . . / Even in the press of immediate work his thoughts turned at times to the scenes of his foreign travels, as is seen by the following letter addressed to Mr. William Burr :— 'September ±th, 1833. 'I think it would really be most interesting if you could prepare a correct sectional plan of the Cloaca Maxima of Ancient Eome. As you know, I have in vain sought in different books for it ; and now the more regret that when in Eome I omitted what I intended to do, namely, to make a sketch by actual measurement. v.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 103 Most authors treat of the arch as if it were circular. My recollection leads me to think that it is oval, as I i< member that I intended to determine its mathematical figure by offsets from a vertical line. The place where I should wish it particularly examined is where it ; 4 »]»<•; irs at the Arch of Janus, not far from the Forum. Its indubitable antiquity — Pliny says it existed 800 years before his time — gives it a very high interest — merely antiquarian ; but my present inquiries are rather con- nected with the history of the Arch as founded on scientific principles, and it would be difficult to find in any age or country a more striking work of its kind than the massive triple arch of the Cloaca Maxima/ Of the rest of the summer of 1833, the following short entries in a diary of retrospect are the only record :— ' In May and June I went to London and Paris. Very kindly received in Paris, more so than even in June at Cambridge. Meeting of British Association. Worked hard during summer and autumn writing lectures at Greenhill. Elected to Athenaeum Club by Committee, July 5th. My brother Charles married at Blair Va-dock on Gareloch. He then went to live at Hermanstone, and for some years I paid him many pleasant visits re. In September to Fettercairn. Back by St. Andrew's, and visited Dr. Jackson there/ This was probably the first time he had seen St. Andrew's. Dr. Jackson here mentioned was at that time the not undistinguished Professor of Natural Philosophy in that University. the college session 1833-34 opened at the be- of November, F«>H><,s made his first appearance as a 1'rofessor. As is usual on such occasions in our Scottish universities, he had to deliver an inaugural ire. Such lectures, as they are supposed to strik< key-note of the n« \\ Professor's course, are occasions of no little interest to academic persons, and of some anxi.-ty to a yum;: Professor. As he succcnls in the audience or not, men an- apt to draw 104 THE LIFE OF JAMES I). FORBES. [CHAP. auguries of his future career. To Forbes Js first ap- pearance circumstances added something more than common interest. He was succeeding to one distin- guished man ; he had been preferred to another equally or more distinguished. His youth, reckoned by some a fault, was to all an attraction ; his promise was high, greater than that of any other young Scotsman of the time. He was sprung from a race well known and highly esteemed in Edinburgh and throughout Scotland ; he was of a tall commanding figure, of a fine and impivs- sive countenance, his delivery was clear and resolute, yet conciliatory. Altogether, it is not often that a man, who combines with so many inward gifts such outward attractiveness, addresses an audience from a Professor's chair. The impression left on all who heard that first lecture was, I believe, that he was in the place where he had a right to be. The following is the short notice of it in his own diary :— 'November. — Delivered my first lecture. Owing to the struggle about the election, considerable excitement, excessive crowd. Passed off well. The attendance ,-ij my subsequent Monday lectures was also distinguished. Well pleased with my success/ A friend of his, the venerable Archdeacon Sinclair, who heard that first lecture, still survives to write of it thus: — 'I remember well his appointment to the chair, and I attended his inaugural lecture. My expectations were high, but he surpassed them. I can still with pleasure call to mind his tall, thin, elastic figure, with a long wand in his hand, pointing to various diagrams, and pouring forth interesting information in clear language and in a condensed form, with as much facility as if he had been lecturing for years/ Within a fortnight from the beginning of this his first course, we find him writing thus to Dr. Whewell :— 'November 15th, 1833. *I am giving weekly lectures, besides the usual ones, on the study of Natural Philosophy, in relation v.] PROFESSORIAL LIF1-. 105 to its present advanced condition, which are largely attended by non-professionals, and I hope that the success which has attended them may in some small degree be of use in retarding, for we can do no more, the downfall of solid literature. ' I was much interested by your account of the Poissonian demonstration, I knew it was remodelled, but have not examined the book, though I have it. J, too, have been dabbling lately in rotation, and a con- founded subject it is : though I have only studied it •le.ntarily: I shall be very glad to see what light you throw upon it. I discovered a most notable error, which my learned predecessor annually inculcated, on rolling bodies ; and as I learned from his assistant, annually tried to illustrate by experiments, and fancied he succeeded ! ' Not long before the close of his first session, he thus n writes to the same correspondent :— 'March 29fA, 1834. ' I find the greatest advantage from having been obliged to study these subjects in a way necessary to convey a precise idea of them to others ; which I feel that almost no other circumstance would have induced me to spend so much labour upon. And I find what is natural enough, that in the course of last summer, wh«-n I worked very hard, I had prepared such a treatise <»n Mechanics as would almost have required a course to n-,i through, without anything else. . . . But to return to your paper. In general, 1 think lie much at one. 1 am still disposed to adhere much y<>ii in a lettein^ '•;d methods with which the student. Lmeo to IM- familiar; which ^ave what I called the definite amount ol FoFC .' and which 106 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. expression you may remember you objected to. ... A month hence, I shall have finished my course, and then propose to escape for a little relaxation. I shall probably go to London, and hope to see you. I am certainly relieved at having got well through so much of my course. The responsibility I felt was oppressive. But my labours have been more than rewarded by the efforts of my pupils, and the obvious improvement in the method and degree of study which has been the consequence. I have given about twenty lectures to the more advanced, going as far as * Poisson's Demonstration of the Direct Problem of Central Forces,' which, humble as it may appear to you, is a step among us ' hyperborean sages/ He might well feel a sense of release and exhilaration at the prospect of the close of his first session as a Professor. In any case, it is something to feel that the strain of six months' continuous lecturing is nearly at an end. But to feel that his first year's course was achieved with satisfaction to himself, with benefit to his pupils, and with the approval of all, was more than a common joy. Whatever misgivings he may have had as he entered the Natural Philosophy Class-room in November were now well over. Whatever doubts as to the fitness of his appointment others may have entertained on the ground of his youth and inexperience were silenced by the test of fact. Henceforth he must have felt he was fully ' master of the situation,' and, as long as health lasted, his work there was not an oppressive burden, but an ample field for his abundant energy. It was not, however, self-complacency, but feelings of quite another kind that the retrospect of the session so successfully closed called up within him. This is the entry of his private journal : — < Greenhill, April 20th, 1834. — I will not let this day pass without recording my deep and heartfelt sense of the special goodness and protecting power of God, which I have experienced during the past fifteen months of v.J PROFESSORIAL LIVE. 107 almost incessant labour, a share of bodily and mental vigour which has enabled me to pass, with comparative ease and credit, through the first session of my profes- sorial career. I have had the happiness to satisfy my friends, and to have my toils more than rewarded by the zeal and application and gratitude of my pupils. I desire to acknowledge God as the source of all this good fortune, and to bless Him that I am yet spared to pursue the course in which He has so parentally guided and strengthened my exertions. Having attained the summit of my wishes in a worldly point of view, I hope that I could now, with a reasonable share of resignation, say if required, Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace/ The life of most Scottish Professors ,^as then as now divided into six months of unbroken work in College and six months of vacation. To strangers unac- quainted with the ways of Scotland and the habits of its students, so long a vacation appears a strange anomaly. But there are reasons enough grounded in our social facts and habits which have justified it for generations, and which satisfied the late University Commissioners when they carefully inquired into all the bearings of this question. It must not be supposed that these six months are either to student or Professor times of idleness. The former is often employed in some useful work for self-support, as well as in carrying on his College studies. The latter, when he has recruited himself after the toils of the session, finds full employ- ment in preparing new lectures or recasting old ones for the approaching session. Besides this, whatever Scottish Professors have done for Science, Philosophy, or Literature, has been the fruit of their summer leisure. No man ever employed his summers more methodically and energetically than Professor Forbes. I n< !<<st through tlir village without seeing anything like a communicative face. I almost fancied I should have 11 received as a known face, instead of being an object of not a little curiosity. At length I inquired inl- ine church, whi< h is not very conspicuous, ami, ;is I expected, found an old sexton who, I thought, mi^ht i chronicler of more than twenty-four years back. I soon entered into conversation with him, found that 110 THE LIFE OF JAMES 1). FORBES. [CHAP. he recollected the individuals in question ; nay, the first thing he told me was that he had with his own hands tolled the bell at four in the morning on our poor mother's death. Like most of his trade, he was not of very fine feelings, but he was very communicative, and you may imagine the impression which his little anecdotes, as fresh as if of yesterday, made upon me. I made him take me to the top of the church tower, and show me the house where they lived, and those of the neighbours, about the fate of some of whom I inquired. I made him show me where they sat in church, and I walked from the church to the house by the very path leading also to the Parsonage, which they had often trod. It seemed a sort of hallowed ground. The house has nothing very prepossessing in its exterior, except in plain neatness. I wished I could have had my mother's letters to collate them on the spot. You may recollect the interest I took in them, when you were so good as to send them to me. I copied them with such a species of veneration, that I retained not merely word for word, but page for page and line for line. Of course I felt a peculiar and additional interest in every thing on the spot, considering that I was not visiting these places for the first time, that I had been the almost unconscious inhabitant of this very house ; nor could I help speculating upon what identity subsisted between my then and my present state of existence. The old sexton recollected the baby, and certainly was somewhat moved when I said, 'I am that baby/ I strolled from the church to the house, and from the house to the church, and could hardly tear myself away, which I did too late to avoid an impending thunder- storm. It may not be amiss if I join a sketch of the position, in case, when the next person goes on the same errand, the old sexton should be dead, and other wit- nesses too/ In September 1834, the British Association met at Edinburgh. It was in a great measure owing to Forbes' v.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. Ill i tions that the meeting took place there. During its stay he entertained in his house at Greenhill, Dr. Whewell, Mr. Peacock, and Mr. Vernon Harcourt. Of the latter he says in a letter to Professor Phillips about this time : ' I learn every year to look with more admiration and affection on that remarkable man ; nor shall I ever cease to look back with peculiar satis- ion on that meeting at York which brought me first into connection with him and with yourself.' With the success of the meeting Forbes was well pleased. The Association had now quite established itself as a national institution, and the gathering at Edinburgh, which was the third since its origin, attracted foreigners of distinc- tion, among whom was M. Arago. Of this eminent man Forbes writes: 'The impression he has left here cannot be forgotten, and I look upon my improved ac- quaintance with him as a very happy event in my life. I trust before very long to extend it on the other side of the Channel/ CHAPTER VL PROFESSORIAL LIFE (continued}. . HAVING so entirely succeeded in his first year's course, Forbes no doubt entered on his second (1834-35) with full confidence that like success would attend his future efforts. Henceforth, session followed session with thnt uniform success and that energy and devotion to his work, which never flagged, as long as health lasted. Nothing can be more uniform than a Professor's winter's course — so uniform, that to lookers-on from without it may appear monotonous. But from this it is saved, at least in the case of a vigorous and advancing teacher, by the deeper insight and wider range which he is year by year obtaining in his own field of inquiry. And the sense that the teacher is one who is not merely retailing old knowledge taken from books, but by dint of mature reflection or original research is opening Up fresh fields, and adding something to the store of human thought or knowledge, adds a wonderful charm to all his intercourse with his students. Such a charm gene- ration after generation of students felt, at least those who could appreciate these things, as they sat in the Natural Philosophy Class Room, while Forbes was in his prime. But though such impressions, received in youth from some master of thought or science, are among the most lasting and delightful which men ever partake, they furnish little that can be told in narrative. What these impressions were I shall have occasion to show in the vi.] PROFESSORUL LIFE. 113 words of those who once felt and still vividly remember them. But as one session in outward appearance was much like another, as the incidents "in them were few, and the adventures none, I shall not attempt to describe them in detail. The main thing to notice will be the course which Forbes' own investigations and thoughts during each winter were pursuing, and this will be best seen in selections from his wide correspondence. What events or adventures his life contained were reserved for his summers. Of these, I shall notice in part of the narrative those which he spent in Great Britain. His foreign tours and Alpine explorations will be given in some chapters devoted to themselves. In November 1834, Forbes left his second home at Greenhill, and went with his sisters to live in Melville Street. His two brothers, each on his marriage, had before then quitted the family home : his brother Charles had married in July 1833, and taken up his abode at Hermanstone ; Sir John, in August 1834, had gone to live at his country seat, Fettercairn. James lived in Melville Street only one winter. In May 1835 he and his sisters removed to Dean House. This, which was then an old country house, has since been removed to make way for the beautiful cemetery of Dean. The following letters will show what subjects were engaging Forbes* thoughts during the winter session of 1834-35 :— To PROFESSOR POWELL. ' Decemljer Ixf, 1834. • 1 writ i- to I- 11 you, as you particularly interest your- self in the affair of radiant heat, that I have worked a great deal since I saw you, with Melloni's Multiplier, and i entire success. It is a most inana^mblo, com- parable, and satisfactory instrument. I have succeeded peating some of his more dcli«-atr rxpnmiri.is. such as the refraction of tin- h<-at <>f boiling rofcer, \\ith the most ample success, and have shown many of them to other Professors here. 114 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ' But what I principally write abdut is to tell you that I have proved to demonstration, by its means, the pola- rization of non-luminous heat, and have now to look to further anxious results connected with it. So that I consider the question for the first time decided. . . .' To M. QUETELET, Brussels. 'EDINBURGH, December 5th, 1834. '. . . I have recently been experimenting with Melloni's Thermo-multiplier, and have been much delighted with it. Very lately I have been enabled to establish beyond a doubt the polarization of non-luminous heat; and have verified Melloni's experiment of the refraction of the heat of boiling water. ' To-day I commenced a register with a particular view to you. I have got an apparatus for weighing and measuring men, and shall collect annually as many results from the students of my class as possible, and also their strength by Kegnier's Dynamometer. I dis- tinguish their age and native country. . . . Amongst my many other pursuits, as I mean to begin on optics this winter, I have been studying the undulatory theory with great admiration. We are, I am sure, much indebted to you for putting Herschel's Treatise on Light into a more convenient form than we can find it in England/ To PROFESSOR AIRY, Cambridge. 'EDINBUBGH, December \\th, 1834. ' I have at length found leisure to read with great attention, and consequently with very great pleasure, your undulatory tract, which quite fulfils my expectation as to the nature and extent of the evidence on this marvellous subject. I have been getting sundry pieces of apparatus made, and can now profit by your valuable practical lessons, as well as by the papers with which you have from time to time favoured me, and which I am now better prepared to appreciate. Allow me to ask you a few practical questions. ... I hope you will not vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 115 be overwhelmed by ray questions. I have been working lately with Melloni's Thermo-multiplier, and have verified some of his most curious results regarding radiant heat, which in their connection with light are extremely remarkable. It is unfortunate that that point to which his researches chiefly tend is the most obscure in the theory of light, namely, absorption. I have lately succeeded in establishing, as I think for the first time demonstratively and quantitatively, the polarization of non-luminous heat. I abandoned the method of reflec- tion, which is the only one hitherto employed, and adopted that of transmission through piles of thin mica plates, for which the Thermo-multiplier is well adapted ; and with entire success. I have also been endeavouring to determine numerically the refrangibility of non- luminous heat. I discovered, what I now find that M« lloni had previously done, that the tourmaline trans- mits almost as much heat when two pieces are placed with their axes crossed as when parallel. Melloni saw quite as much as I also at first found, but I afterwards detected a slight difference/ To the KEV. DR. WHEWELL. ' EDINBURGH, January 1st, 1835. '. . . I am hall read it on Monday to the Royal Society, when it will be I 2 116 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FOItSES. [CHAP. immediately printed. I have proposed Airy as our honorary F.K.S.E., and hope sooifc to communicate his election. Pray tell him I shall be happy to have the polarizing grinder any time before the middle of March. . . . Have you anything to say about the Rumford Medal ? I think Melloni ought certainly to get it, for his two masterly papers in the Annales de Chimie. There have been few of the adjudications for researches so accurately fulfilling the founder's intentions. . . .' To SIR J. F. W. HERSCHEL, at the Cape of Good Hope. 'EDINBURGH, February 5th, 1835. 'I had a letter from Whewell the other day, com- municating your obliging message to me about your very interesting meteorological results. Still I am a little at a loss what to say about them. The oscillation appears very small. My formula : '1193 cos * 0 — '0150 gives "060 Eng. inches. Mr. Whewell mentioned to me only *025 of variation from 9 to 3. The permanent low pressure at Cape Horn observed by Captain King is confirmed by Foster's voyage. The annual variation of mean pressure and also of hourly oscillation you mention is noticed by Humbolt in equatorial climates. Is the barometer highest in summer or winter ? I fear we are likely to find little analogous to your observations at the Cape in the Mediterranean. The oscillation is undoubtedly greater : and I do not think the barometer is highest in bad weather. The variable pressure in different latitudes is a very important and to me, till lately, an unexpected fact. I hope that you will be able to bring your barometer safely home again, and so determine the height of your observatory. I hope you have your actinometer with you ; here it has a sinecure, there being no sun worth measuring. ' I am very much to blame for not having written to you sooner. In truth, I have been in an almost constant state of exertion since we parted at Cambridge. The result of my last labours I enclose, and should be anxious vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 117 at your leisure to have your opinion upon it. Setting on foot a six months' course of experimental lectures has been, you will believe, a laborious task. It has occupied most of my time since I saw you last, but is now nearly over. I made a short tour in England summer, but was kept in a state of excitement by preparing for the Association meeting here, which went off well, and which you may believe interested me much. I suppose your Cambridge friends supply you with news from head -quarters, which would make it pre- sumptuous in a hyperborean like me to offer you any. ..." To the REV. DR. WHEWELL. 'EDINBURGH, February 22nd, 1835. '. . . I feel quite gladdened at the interest you are disposed to take in the subject — polarization of heat— for as there is not an individual here capable of fully appreciating it, it is naturally to England, and especially to Cambridge, that I look for that sympathy which is a superadded enjoyment to that of the mere perception of truth. . . . I was sorry to see that Trinity lost the Senior Wrangler, as in May last Goulburn was very confidently pointed out to me. . . . I was so engrossed during the earlier part of our session with my experiments on heat, I am obliged to work hard with the business of my course, and am soon to begin optics, which I have not yet lectured upon. I shall imitate Airy in polarizing and tormenting light on the large scale. I continue my tice of lecturing on the higher branches to those who choose to attend, — and though often not to more than ten or twelve, I feel myself well repaid. I shall thus be able to introduce the undulatory theory for the first in Scotland. Airy's Polarizing Grinder, as he calls 'Your plan of a fusil >!<• surface for detecting rings had OU will see by reading my pap«T, Id be hopeless from the extreme minuteness of the quantities with which we have to do.1 118 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CITAP. The summer of 1835 was spent abroad, and therefore falls to be noticed in another chapter. On his return to England after a visit to Fettercairn, he thus writes from Edinburgh to Sir John Herschel, who was then engaged in scientific observations at the Cape of Good Hope :— ' EDINBURGH, October 25th, 1835. 'The results of your table appear to me very satis- factory and interesting. One thing strikes me as requir- ing new investigation, viz., what are really the hours of maxima and minima, which in your fine climate might be easily fixed ; for I have no doubt that the diurnal curve is very different from ours. I argue this rom the circumstance that the barometric pressure at noon, instead of being the mean of the day, coincides very nearly in your table with that of 9 A.M., which therefore in all probability is not the hour of maximum. 1 1 assumed the hourly variation to be a function of the latitude, simply because the tables of observation seem to indicate it ; and, whatever may be the true theory, it does not seem to me that the mere distribution of sea and land can be regarded as the main cause of the y;t nation. In conformity with your wish, conveyed by Mr. Who .well, I endeavoured to get observations es- tablished at Malta ; and wrote to Dr. Davy for the purpose. ... He has returned, however, to England, but I will try to get new ones set on foot here at the College. The formula given by me was empirical. . . . The Asso- ciation is itself the best Meteorological Society that ever was formed, and capable of doing almost anything. ... 1 have been led to study the undulatory theory, particularly lately in reference to my own inquiries and lectures, and have received from it the same pleasure which everyone must do who approaches the subject with perseverance and candour. ... I have exhibited all the chief phenomena of polarization upon screens on the large scale to my class, for the first time in Scotland. You must have heard so much about the comet, that I need not add my account of it. It has really been a fine object/ vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIVE. 119 To the REV. DR. WHEWELL. THE DEAN HOUSE, EDINBURGH, November 12th, 1835. '. . . I liavc got a fund of new experiments on hand, and a famous supply of rock salt from Cheshire. ' I blame myself for not having sooner taken up your suggestions about tides, whilst you have been so attentive to my small matters. I feel confident that nothing of the kind exists here, but I will endeavour to get it established. ' I s Professor Airy at Greenwich \ He did me the honour of requesting from me information and advice. I gave him very little of the former, though I adventured of the latter. ... 1 spent a day with Mr. Harcourt on my way down. 1 [tressed upon him the necessity of mak it exertions to secure a good attendance at tol. I think the place ill chosen, but yet that it may •lie of the best in point of science. ... I fully pro- pose being there, and also being in Scotland in the early Mimmer. Do arrange to come down and make your visit to Orkney : my sisters earnestly second my cordial invi- tation to pay us another visit. You will find us in an old chateau to the north west of the town, with gloomy walls, winding stairs, and painted ceilings, but a hearty welcome. By a curious accident we lived here thirty nd my si st. TS were born here. . . . I do not know whetln T 1 have anything to recommend specifically about your Mechanics; at least it will be some time before leisure to examine it. Only pray don't enlarge I have no doubt you will improve it. My class is enlarging. I have issued a programme for a prize essay <>n the u nd ula tory theory, which I will send you. I like clasa and my work very much, and already perceive •in improvement and a desire to improve. I still propose publishing on tin- Pyrenean hot waters. . . .' To the Same. 'EDINBURGH, January 7th, 1836. '. . . My special thanks for Jlopkin>' paper, \\hidi at an admirable moment. I wafl rending a paper 120 THE LIFE OF JAMES 1). FORBES. [CHAP. to our Royal Society about Auvergne, and particularly upon elevation craters, which was <|uite in point. I am writing a paper just now which T intend for the R. S., London, on the Pyrenean springs, their temperature, geological relations, &c. ; and on the former point, temp., I am vain enough to hope that it may prove a sort of model to future observers : at least no one has hitherto so observed, I believe. I have also in hand a little Gothico-mathematical speculation which perhaps you may laugh at ; but I give you leave beforehand. * But these are only secondary occupations, which, with my lecturing labours, only revolve round my primary, the polarized heat. I have managed to magnify the effects so as to be, I hope, beyond cavil. ... I think that experiment is a quietus for Biot. . . . Excuse this very long story, and pray come down and see my experi- ments. When I have finished what I am doing I should be most happy to look into your conductivity. ... If Mr. Airy is with you, pray give him the above numerical results.' On February 2nd, 1836, we find him writing thus to Dr. Whewell on the first blush of a new discovery he had just made :— ' EDINBURGH, Feb. 2nd, 1836. ' I cannot help writing two lines in a hurry to tell you that I succeeded yesterday in making the most curious discovery respecting heat, it seems to me, that I have yet arrived at, and one quite decisive of the identity of its character with that of light. I found that dark heat is copiously reflected within rock salt at an angle too great for its emergence. This I had foreseen last summer before I was aware that Melloni had actually tried it, and at the same time I conceived the possibility of trying whether two total reflections would produce the same effect in the case of heat as in that of light. I have had a Fresnel's rhomb made of rock salt with angles of 45° — one of the critical ones, nearly, calculated by this formula, giving //, its proper value for light. I vi. J PROFESSORIAL L1F1-. it between polarizing and analysing plates of mica, as described in my last. When the plane of total reflection coincided with that of primitive polarization, or rather was perpendicular to it, the heat was as much polarized as before the rhomb was interposed ; when it was inclined 45° it was wholly un polarized, apparently, or even the longer axis of the ellipse turned a little the other way, corresponding to p for heat. This I made 11 with a very imperfect rhomb, and with heat wholly unaccompanied l»y light. ... I congratulate Scotland upon {Smith's distinction. . . .' 1 EDINBURGH, March I0th, 1836. 1 . . . Pray be the depository of these facts in case Biot and Melloni, with the odds of two men at leisure Insl one man with his hands full, take them from me. .... Since writing the above I have solved, partly, '••iibt which has much puzzled me. The action of mrtal gives a maximum polarizing angle for heat greater i for light, whence I concluded that the index of iction must be greater for the former than, the latter, contrary to my general views. I have just found in Brewster's paper that a precisely similar fact occurs in tin- n"iion of metals on light ; the red ray is polarized at i- incideiiee tlian the blue. It is most satisfactory thus to find the truth of experiments confirmed by 1 anomaly, as has several times occurred to in*' lately.' The following letter to Mr. Leslie Ellis, before he ••«•<] on his ( amhridov eanvr, will interest many who l«'\rd and admired that remarkable man: — INIJUROH, February Utk, 1836. ... I assure you also that I had been long looking to tin- fulfilment of your promise to write to me, began to f« el some anxiety as to your state of health. Let no stimulus of fame or advantage induce you to .e a sacrifice of the first of earthly blessings. I hope will not go to Cambridge, unless you are equal to 122 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. the fatigue of such a career as your tastes and talents would enable you to pursue. ' 1 hope that under any circumstances you will not lose sight of your physical pursuits in purely mathe- matical ones, which are of a comparatively narrow character. It is in the field of contingent truth that O the triumphs most congenial to the human mind in a healthful condition are to be gained. The disposition at Cambridge strongly aims in this direction, and I am convinced that you will reap as much credit and more advantage by studying mathematical physics as pure mathematics. I cannot conceive a better exercise than Airy's tract on Light, which contains some hard mathe- matics, but the acquisition of the clear physical views it presents is much harder. I am glad you should feel any interest in so unpopular a subject as polarized heat. I have now greatly extended my experiments, made the effects much more obvious, and made some new singular discoveries. * The Royal Society of Edinburgh have done me the honour to award me their Keith Medal. * My summer was chiefly in the Pyrenees and Auvergne. In the former I studied hot springs, in the latter volcanos. I do not wonder that you were appalled by the difficulties of the measure of absorption of the atmosphere, which in fact involves the same difficulties with the theory of refraction, which has been a celebrated problem amongst mathematicians. . . .' When his third professorial session was over his cor- respondence was resumed. To M. QUETELET, Observatory -, Brussels. 'Mayllth, 1836. ' . . . I have been so much occupied with my experi- ments upon polarized heat, and with several papers which I have communicated to our Royal Societies, as well as with my annual lectures, that I have had but little time for correspondence or for reducing old obser- vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 123 rations. I have, however, got a pupil to calculate my magnetic intensity observations. I have weighed and -uivd 800 individuals myself. I have had the mortification to discover that the construction of the dynamometer was extremely insufficient, but this can •ely affect the relative results. I have separated the Ji.sh, Scotch, and Irish. The ages are chiefly from to twenty-four. 'On the 15th the solar eclipse was most admirably seen here. ... I observed with a 7-feet reflector the immersion and emersion of the spots, of which tin 're sev.-rul, but I could not observe the slightest • >rtion produced by refraction upon those delicate ; ,. < . .nr]ude that the sun's light is originally >-nt in those rays.' To the REV. DR. WHEWELL. «EDiNm-H«;ii, May 20th, 1836. ' . . . One interesting point which seems to me to f proof required as demonstration by the human mind in diH'en-nt ages. That the educated part .lankind aiv more acute than they were a century ago .rohahli'. Paradoxes cannot be so successfully now as they \\viv then ; ;inn -40, and which ntal int< -n>ii i< ^. From • ditr»T.-Mt series of observations, made with two • lies, I find always a negative c<>< ilici< nt «»f the IK i-lii indicating, at a mean, a diminution of oo I of h. 128 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. intensity for 3,000 feet of vertical ascent. If, as Hum- boldt states, the dip diminishes in*ascending, the dimi- nution of total intensity will be somewhat greater. You will judge of the extent of the inductions upon which this is founded when I mention that the sum of the heights to which I have carried Hansteen's apparatus exceeds 160,000 feet, or thirty vertical miles, twelve lieues. ' I have lately been engaged in procuring thermometers similar to those at the Observatory at Paris, to be sunk to different depths in various soils. I have three sets from three to twenty-six feet long ; one set to be sunk in trap-tufa, a second in sandstone, a third in pure loose sand. . . The observations in the Lead Hills are being continued/ To the REV. DR. WHEWELL. 'Jan. 31^, 1837. ' . . . I feel gratified by the prominent place you have given to my experiments as bearing upon the theory of Heat, in wThich you have done me full justice. . . . But I must mention for yourself, if not for your book, that the discovery of the polarization of heat was not the necessary consequence of applying the thermo- multiplier to the investigation, which would have been a poor achievement, seeing it was another man's invention ; but that Melloni had first applied the instrument to the tourmaline question, and answered in the negative (Ann. de Chimie, vol. 55); then Nobili, the inventor, attempted to repeat Berard's experiment with the most improved piles, and with results quite null (Bib. Universelle). So that I conclude that, when I published my experiments, the question of polarization was negatively answered by persons operating with every advantage which I possessed, and indeed seemed to be set at rest. My discovery was the application of mica as a polarizing substance, first by transmission, then by reflection ; and I have shown that repeating Nobili's experiment — the same as Berard's and Powell's — the quantity of heat reflected from glass is so excessively minute that the errors might well equal the vi.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 129 total effect. I think you have not mentioned total re- flection and circular polarization. 1 As to simple reflection, Melloni should be mentioned alone, but I claim double refraction/ The following extract from a letter to Professor Airy shows what his occupations were, and how closely his lectures and researches were combined : — To G. B. AIRY, ESQ. ' THE DEAN HOUSE, March 15, 1837. * I have been exceedingly busy, and not very well, which have been the causes of my silence. Amongst other occupations 1 have had to read five essays, which I have received in competition for a medal I proposed, on the Undulatory Theory of Light, a new subject in Scotland, which I am delighted to find has stirred up our youth, and I have got some really respectable composi- tions. This is a proof to me that things arc mending, and that exertion, private and personal, is not thrown away, ix feet ire conduction. Shall you be eer- ily at Given wich the last days of April ? ' The following letter, written about this time, proves that the intercourse with Sir David Biv \vstn-, for a time suspended, was now cordially renewed : — >IR DAVID, 'EDINBURGH, April 28(h, 1837. '. . . . Your ex]H-i-ini( nis on absorption must be [ think Wrede, the first pages of whose / bas lat<-!y translated, has done something ;»! kind y<>u allude to, if 1 untand it con < •« -tly. If I ivrolh'1-t well. In- imitates the phenomena of absorp- l»y rnmltin, ••(' thin mi«-a plates that i<, by tlio, colour- "f thin |»la: 130 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ' I will do my best to capture a Wolf's lens for you, on condition that you will not require an affidavit that I saw the wolf make use of it. To stare a wolf in the face in the Black Forest would be enough to throw any optical philosopher into a fit of reflection. 'With best regards to Lady and Miss Brewster, be- lieve me, my dear Sir David, yours most sincerely/ Forbes was not a man who, while he belonged to a corporation, could confine all his energies to his own peculiar subjects, without regard to the working of other departments and to the general well-being and well-work- ing of the whole body. He had not been long established in his chair before his action began to make itself felt, be- yond the bounds of his own class, on all the machinery of the University. The Scottish Universities, like those of the sister kingdom, had suffered from a long torpor, "which lingered somewhat later in our northern seats of learning, after it had passed from Oxford and Cambridge. No doubt, during the last century and the first three decades of this, there had arisen, here and there in the four northern Universities, men of real genius, lights of their times, not likely to be surpassed by those who now fill or may in future fill their places. Principal Robertson, Dr. Thomas Eeid, Dugald Stewart, Sir John Leslie, Dr. John Hunter, Professor Wilson, and many more, were men of whom any university or country might be proud. They not only communicated life and energy to the students who heard them, but they enriched the litera- ture, the philosophy, the science, and the scholarship of their country. But their action was wholly isolated and individual. It began and ended in their own classes, stimulating, or, it may be, only delighting their hearers, but not necessarily producing in their students any solid or certified attainments. Of the several functions of a university life, the professoriate was the only one which was really alive, and it had swallowed up all the rest. Graduation was as good as dead, a mere form, little vi.J PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 131 valued, and seldom sought for. But the teaching of able professors, excellent as a mental stimulant, requires, if it is to produce solid fruits, to be supported by three additional conditions. It must be received into minds previously prepared by adequate school training; it must be supplemented and solidified by careful and methodic getting up of books during the college course ; and lastly, -ult of professors' lectures and private reading requires to be tested by thorough examination. In Scotland, when Forbes became a professor, these three necessary buttresses to the professors' lectures were wholly \vanting. The professoriate reigned solitary and unsup- ported. Consequently, of the large amount of mental force annually let loose from those Scottish Chairs, who shall say how large a proportion lost itself in air ? In Oxford the system of systematic examination for degrees had been revived as early as the first decade of this century, when Sir Eobert Peel was an undergraduate. Slowly the sense of the need of a like revival crept north- wards : and by the fourth decade, when Forbes entered the iral Philosophy Chair, he took it up and pressed it on his colleagues with characteristic energy arid perseverance. For the following sketch of his exertions in this direction I am indcl.ti'd to the kindness of Professor Kelland, who has for more than thirty years filled the Mathematical Chair in Edinburgh University, and done so much to promote thorough jnid accurate teaching, not only in his own class, but throughout Scotland. If the general reader finds in it some details which may nut interest him, I must hope r with thriii, in consideration of the value h these possess to the many who, from their interest in the further improvement of Scottish education, will y li'jlit which may !><• thrown on the history by which it has iv.idied its present condition. rVing that in the early years <»!' this century 668 in Arts ha<: •> little in demand, that it. almost a t'av.Mir c«.nfrnvd <>n the lTniver.-iiy when an able student proposed to graduate, Professor Kelland goes on to state that as early as 1814 the University 132 TEE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. of Edinburgh made an attempt to frame some very ru- dimentary rules for graduation, and again in 1824 there was an endeavour still more to shape these rules into a system. Both of these attempts, however, proved abor- tive, and a third made in 1831 had no better result. ' Up to the date of Forbes' appointment to the chair of Natural Philosophy, things continued in the old loose and unsatisfactory condition. * It was reserved for Forbes to institute that complete working system of examining by means of printed papers, and of judging the results by marks, which is in force at the present time. To Forbes belongs the merit of having grouped the subjects of examination under three heads — the Classical, the Mathematical, and the Philosophical. The effect of this grouping is, though perhaps this result hardly came into Forbes' calculation, that a moderate amount of knowledge at any rate is exacted of one, at least, of two or three kindred subjects. The system was a well-devised and admirable one. There was, however, one error of detail, arising no doubt from the fact that seven separate interests were involved. The requirements were too high, and the amount of Greek demanded was more than an average student could bring up ; and in other departments, Natural Philosophy among the rest, there was an indefiniteness of programme which must have operated to alarm the conscientious candidate. * The first trial of the new scheme .took place in April 1836, when six candidates presented themselves for examination, and all passed. Next year, 1837, Forbes was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Arts, as not only well qualified in all respects for discharging the duties of the office, but more particularly as having taken so prominent a part in maturing and establishing the new system. It was thought fitting that he should have the chief care of watching over the success of what might be called his own experiment. ' Immediately on his appointment he introduced some important modifications into the scheme for estimating a vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 133 candidate's proficiency. These need not here be detailed. Spite, however, of the excellence of these regulations, candidates for the degree came forward but in small numbers. In 1837 there were seven candidates ; in 1838, six; in 1839, one only. The Faculty agreed to recom- mend this gentleman for a degree without examination. In the two following years there were five and two candidates respectively. ' These numbers show that the first effect of the new •m was rather preventive than encouraging. But however great the difficulties, Forbes did not lose heart. Various modifications were from time to time introduced into his scheme, chiefly by himself, such ;lie allowing the different branches to be taken in separate years, and awarding honours in the several departments. To Forbes belongs the credit? of having ised and brought into working order this well- appointed scheme, and for this the University owes him a lasting debt of gratitude. * It will be seen from the above that one great feature in his character was order or method. He was on •in a thorough disciplinarian, as well in his own class as in University matters. He was orderly in the extreme. His class examinations were fixed year after year for corresponding days, and his colleagues were compelled to accommodate themselves to his unbending requiivin. -nt-. It must not, however, be inferred from this that there anything harsh or unkindly in Forbes' dealings with colleagues. On the contrary, he was thoroughly ily, though somewhat cold in manner. His principle of action was * straight forward ' — a principle admirable in itself, but apt to carry its bcaivr rather sharply againM an opponent, who, even if adopting the same principle, have thought fit to travel to it by a different route. ry great question lie had thoroughly niar Forbes is so justly celebrated. They hope to see tlii- undulatory theory of heat as fully demonstrated as thr u inhibitory theory of light, and Professor Forbes' name raised to the highest eminence among the philo- rs of the day.' However cordial may be a professor's relations with his whole class, there will always be some with whom, either i circumstances or from congeniality of pursuits, the : course of the class-room will lead on to closer friend- ship. Of such intimate student friends Forbes had a lly number; and I ran ivmrmbrr the peculiar t< n- LC88 with which, either in public addresses or in itc conversation, he alluded to these in later life. 138 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. A few of liis letters about this time will illustrate the nature of his intercourse with these young friends :— To THOMAS CLEGHORN, ESQ. 1 THE DEAN HOUSE, Oct. 22nd, 1836. "... When I had the pleasure of seeing you here in May last, .you suggested the possibility of establishing a society of an academical character for the special object of encouraging a taste for physical science. You may perhaps not have thought much on the subject since, but I assure you that the more that I reflect upon the chances of success of such an undertaking, and the im- portance of which it might ultimately prove, the more I feel disposed to encourage any well-devised scheme for attaining the object in view. I have often and ma- turely thought of it since, and I write to say that if you feel disposed to prosecute your own suggestion, you may reckon upon my cordial co-operation. * So far as I recollect, the desideratum which you and some of your companions have felt was of a purely academical character. It had no similarity to those societies of which one or two already exist, and whose object is to imitate exactly the great scientific asso- ciations of the country. Your object seemed to be to have a society which should encourage the taste and give facilities for physical studies by the union of kindred minds, rather than to pretend to the more arduous task of extending the boundaries of human knowledge. . . . { I have thought of no means so fit as your suggestion of a society which might act energetically in two ways : (1), by inducing a careful study of experimental essays — Newton's Optics, for example — in order to take a share in a discussion which might be raised upon any disputable point in experimental investigation, of which there are thousands ; and (2), by providing from the funds of the society instruments of a simpler kind, but which are yet too costly for the easy purchase of an individual ; for instance, a barometer and an electrical machine. Also, vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 139 the union of several individuals may accomplish AY hat one might want zeal or leisure to perform. For example, Sir John Herschel has desired the co-operation of observers to note the barometer, thermometer, &c., for thirty-six successive hours occasionally. My own occu- pations prevent me from undertaking this labour, and I believe that it is not done in any part of Scotland, — when I was your age, or younger, I used frequently to make hourly observations for twenty-four successive hours without assistance. — but I would willingly furnish nmiittee of such a society with the necessary instru- ments, and assist in the use of them. . . . * As the suggestion was your own, so I wish the execu- tion to be ; but you may make me of use in any sub- ay manner that you please, and in conversation or by writing I will endeavour to further your objects/ To J. T. HARRISON, ESQ. 'EDINBURGH, September llth, 1838. ' . . . There has been a considerable break-up, of course, amongst your associates in the Nat. Phil. Class. Still, however, I have kept my eye pretty well upon ith whom yen were more particularly associated, and the Physico-Mathematical Society prospered last winter remarkably well. I -kitten is now at home in Somersetshire, but comes to London in winter to study . having entered at the .Middle Temple. I hear from ntly, and I hope that, if you ever ivsihips which my position as a teacher and culti- icncc may enable me to make, than to any v which I may acquire in th.r , lineiit. a Worldly man, 1 am gratified by your having dedicated your •'!'!. is1 to me, rather than to many «»ther persons 142 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. whose countenance might have been professionally useful to you. As a man of feeling I am infinitely more rejoiced at the expressions of personal attachment which it contains. ' Believe me, my clear Cleghorn, ever most sincerely your friend, MAMES D. FORBES.' To H. G. GUMMING, ESQ. ' EDINBURGH, November 22nd, 1840. ' I was very much gratified by your letter of the 27th October, and now that a month has nearly elapsed I should like much to hear more particularly what you are doing. I have not very precise notions of what a broker's business is, and I will thank you to enlighten me. I am given to understand, however, that it does not very materially differ from a merchant's as far as learning the profession goes, and therefore I hope that even if you should be unable to make up your mind entirely to like it you will yet be able to bear with it. There are two very good grounds on which you may be encouraged to do so : first, that things the dullest and most repulsive, steadily pursued, gradually and insensibly, and in spite of one's self, become interesting in a certain way, chiefly from the satisfaction which always attaches to a sense of steady effort to do right ; and secondly, from the consideration of alternatives, namely, that in this world a majority of people are compelled to find happi- ness as they best may, in doing what they cannot alto- gether help, and in choosing what appears in prospect the lesser of the two evils, though it may ultimately turn out a very real good ; whilst on the other hand the few who really get their own way and have all externals and full luxury of choice for procuring happiness, may much oftener fail in doing so than those for whom some inevi- table destiny or strong motive has chalked out their course of life. I am not writing from theory, but from very real observation, which I could substantiate by instances of A, B, and C. . . . vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 143 ' I wish I could send you any news worth having ; but you know my winter habits are not such as to furnish me with much chit-chat. ' Young Mackintosh, of Geddes, is attending my lec- tures. He brought me a letter from Albyne. I like him extremely. He tells me that he is acquainted with von. and he had heard somehow or other that you did not like your present situation, and, like me, he was sorry for it. We had a very pleasant walk together The summer of 1837, from May to October, was spent in an extended tour through North Germany and Austria, and in the summer of 1838 he returned to the same country for a less extensive tour and for a shorter time. The summer of May 1839, from May till August, was spent in the South of France and more or less among the Alps. In August he was recalled by the meeting of the ish Association, which took place at Birmingham. These foreign summers fall to be noticed not in this, but in another chapter. The winter of 1837-8 was busy with experiments on radiant heat, till these as well as his lectures were inter- rupted for a time by an attack of scarlet fever, in March 1838. Th< rinit nts were, however, again recom- menced, and continued to engage him during the winters S38-39 and of 1839-40. At the close of the latter winter .-L.ssion they were dropped for a considerable .ill of time, and though afterwards taken up, never received a long and undivided attention, following letters belong to this period, and bear on this subject : — To M. <1AUCHY. ;.M:rn<,ii, December 11M, 1839. ... I receive with the #r- ntrrest your sugges- aubject of radiant heat, and your promise to Dry, In my third paprr I ha\v proved ration, I think, that all kinds of radiant i 144 THE LIFE OF JAMES V. FORBES. [CHAP. are not equally polarized — contrary to the opinion of Mr. Melloni — and consequently it is possible, as I have suggested at page 9 of that paper, that there are normal vibrations combined with transverse, and more abun- dantly, as the temperature of the source is lower. . . . I see no difficulty in constructing graphically the ellipse in the case of heat. AVould not this be the most satisfactory way ? Can you suggest any mode of deter- mining the length of the wave in the case of heat ? In depolarization we only get the ratio of ^-? . I have sometimes thought of applying the ellipticity of the ray in the case of Fresnel's rhomb, when the angles do not give circular polarization, to this purpose. . . / To PROF. PHILLIPS, York. < EDINBURGH, December 11*7*, 1839. 1 . . . I believe in my conscience that I am better employed now than in writing reports. I have fields, not of untrodden snow, but of untrodden heat, before me, all promising a rich harvest. Cauchy has just set me a task to which I must buckle myself. . . . ' To PROFESSOR POWELL. 'EDINBURGH, December '27th, 1839. * ... I own that I should be very glad to see a good synopsis of what has been done during the last eight years, well aware that, so far as my own contributions are concerned, they were published in a form repulsive to the generality of readers, and even to many men of science who would willingly glean from your critical pages how much has been established, and on what kind of evidence, without troubling themselves about details. . . . 'I hope that you will not treat Melloni's papers so slightly as you propose. His earlier ones are full of interesting and original experiments. So far as I am concerned, 1 have nothing to wish but that everything Melloni Jias done should be fully and accurately known, for by a rare good fortune there is not a single debate in point <>f priority between us, and every experiment we have in vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 145 common, with a single exception — the variable polariza- bility — confirms each other's results. It is for you as a critic to judge how far, if in any case, my right con- clusions were founded on false grounds, for this is the sum of Melloni's captious criticisms.' To the ASTRONOMER ROYAL. ' EDINBURGH, January llth, 1840. * Enclosed is a memorandum about some experiments on heat, which are new and unfinished, and I hope you will think important. I cannot help thinking this affec- tion of heat by mechanical surfaces and textures one of the most singular and important yet noticed. For ince, is there any way in which we can trace the >n of striae on transparent surfaces upon heat or light different from physical interruptions or spare spaces like fine wires ? Has anyone thought of proposing this question in the case of light, viz.: "Is the illumination of a screen by parallel rays of light passing through a grating, always determinable by the area of the interstices compared to the whole area of the grating ? " Can you refer me to any investigation of this ? Is there any nd facie absurdity in supposing it should not be so ? If strict? or scratches act really as opaque lines would do, my experiments lead me to think that in the case of heat the interrupting power of the screen depends on X. But 1 have not succeeded in getting any wire gauze fine igh to test it in that case/ To PROFESSOR WHEWBLL. 'EDINBURGH, February 8th, 1840. . I have lately been making a few preliminary experiments on the form of the elliptic vibrations of heat, in verification of some formulae of Cauchy, which he wrote to me to endeavour to test, and I find no diffi- culty in doing so. The results seem to come out well, and by a graphical process I can readily project the ellipse, find the direction of the greater axis, the excen- iy, &c. You will believe that I truly rejoiced in my J46 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. CHAP. friend Ellis's success, as well as in tie honour of Trinity. I fear I shall scarcely know Cambridge soon, if my old friends take wing as they have lately been doing. Gregory gives me the hope that if I go to Cambridge in May, which I have some thoughts of doing, I shall find you lecturing on Moral Philosophy/ To the Same. 'EDINBURGH, February 22nd, 1840. ' You cannot gratify me more than by leading me to imagine, what I wish I could persuade myself of, that I can ever render you any service worth giving. . . . I look forward with much interest to the appearance of your book, and on several accounts. Some views you once stated to me as we walked down the north bank of the Cam, some two years ago, have been sticking by me since, and I expect to see them developed. Will it be one volume ? If so, it must be nearly complete. ' I have not quite, but nearly done tormenting heat with gratings and dusty diaphragms. All I can do, all kinds of heat get through the finest gratings (metallic) in precisely equal proportions, and that equal to the area of interstices ; and yet grooved surfaces exert a powerful specific action. I am reluctantly forced to the conclusion too, that pure metals may be reduced to powder so fine as to affect the quality of the heat transmitted, though the thinnest gold leaf permits no appreciable portion of heat to pass/ To SIR J. F. W. HERSCHEL, BART. 'THE DEAN HOUSE, EDINBURGH, March 9^, 1840. ' . . . I should like very much to know the degree of sensibility of your paper to heat ; whether, for instance, the heat of the hand affects it. It has long been an object with me to get a surface capable of detecting heat pictures, such as those which polarization and diffraction would indicate. Mr. Talbot gave me hopes at Birming- ham of providing me with such, and he actually sent me a primrose- coloured paper which was transiently affected vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 147 by a pretty violent heat ; but it was far too insensible to be of the slightest use. It was, I think, iodide of silver. Is the impression on yours permanent, and would you allow me to try a small piece of it ? . . . Have you ever applied photography to the beautiful figures of polariza- tion and diffraction ? The only experiment I ever made on the subject — which I have purposely avoided spending i;iv time upon, seeing that it is in much better hands- to fix the splendid image of calc spar rings nn]>e and guide of action. I am now about to cehl.iate tin i.nih anni- L 2 148 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. versary of my father's death : sinae that event I have advanced one vast irretrievable step towards the grave. I have great doubts whether I shall ever form earthly attachments closer than those I at present possess/ It may be worth while here to note a piece of prac- tical counsel as to the observing of the Sunday rest which he offered to his students in the lecture with which he opened the session of 1839-40 : — ' By earnestness in your studies during the week, I advise you to reap the enjoyment of that beneficent provision of the Almighty, and by a sedulous abstinence in thought, as well as in act, from your ordinary occu- pations, to restore the tone of your minds and the capa- city for vigorous exertion. None who have not made a strong effort are aware of the admirably tranquillizing influence of twenty-four hours studiously separated from the ordinary current of thought. Monday morning is the epoch of a periodic renovation/ Sir Andrew Agnew, who at that time was prominent as a defender of the religious observance of Sunday, was so much pleased with these words that he applied to Pro- fessor Forbes for leave to publish them. Forbes replied that as they had been publicly spoken they were public property, but that if they were printed he should prefer their being given as a report of part of his lecture, rather than as a communication made directly by himself. For this would argue a love of notoriety from which he rather shrank. Just before the close of the session, in April 1840, his eldest sister, Eliza, died at Dean House, and left him with only one home companion, his sister Jane. The summer of 1840 was spent at home, and then for the first time we meet with allusions to his own health. In the retrospective journal written in 1850 he writes that he was very ill all the summer of 1840, and we hear of his consulting Dr. Chambers when he visited London and Cambridge in the June of that year. In August he made with his sister Jane a tour through vi.J PROFESSORUL LIFE. 149 Dumfriesshire and Kirkcudbright, of which there remains a diary written in a lighter and more frolicsome vein than was usual with him. Having no glaciers or other great object to study, he amused himself with noting the peculiarities or follies of the natives he met. On going to visit the mausoleum of Burns in the st kirkyard of Dumfries, he notes : — ' If there is anything characteristic in Dumfries, it is the sepulchral magnificence with which the churchyard alxnmds. Scarce a tailor can die without leaving his sure for a stately monument. The only gradation of rank acknowledged in the cemetery is the geological dis- tinction of the primitive granite, which rises over the e of the border chief, and the modern spongy red •1 stone, which not less strikingly and more gaudily covers a clockmaker, Mr. - — , who was one of the chief ites in the year 18 — .' Again, in journeying up Nithsdale, when they slept at Dun score, he notes : ' We had tea, but mine host had ,iken of something stronger, for he slapped me on the back, and was sure that if we came from Edinburgh I must be travelling in the grocery line, and be perfectly minted with Mr. Brown, the Leith tobacconist Bending his best care on us and on our steed, >e mouth he affectionately wiped with his pocket .kerchief, he reluctantly let us go/ In Nithsdalr he amused himself besides with watching meeting of the graywackr and red sandstone. journal throughout is written in a more jocular usual with him, here and there forsaking prose narrative for comical verse, like the following : — The banks of the Xith are both fertile and green, An-1 haymakers merry on all nicies were * -eon. at i I'ul riittsi.nr.s nowhere one can see tho-f \\lii. li has built for his fancy, I ile in excellent style; So, paxftinjr the Castle, we drove for a mile, • r Shaw, • at had iiiccetM'c"! in finding the law 150 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. Of the growth of the salmon, the^par, and the smolt, And showed how each nat'ralist has been a dolt. This gained him this year the Keith Medal and prize, Whilst Knox, Wilson, and Jamieson opened their eyes At finding the gamekeeper's salmon so far Advanced to a premium, and theirs below par I ' As they traversed the Galloway coast to the west of Nith, and explored the Piper's Cave and Needle's Eye, while thinking of Dirk Hatteraick and Meg Merrilies, he not the less had an eye on the syenite or felspar rocks interfused with the stratified slate. In ascending Criffel he found first Little Fell : some- what further on the Great Fell, and then Criffel above both. The undoubtedly authentic origin of these names as handed down by tradition he thus records : — 'The devil, having collected the scrapings of the earth, came to lay them down in Galloway. The first pickle made the Great Fell, the next the Little Fell. Then he couped the basket over and left it, to form the Creel Fell, or Criffel ! ' Further west in Galloway he met a geologist with redundant locks, beard, and moustache — a thing then very unusual. On him he made the following epigram : — * Medusa's head of old turned all to stone, Her snake-encircled eyes did light upon. But times are changed : now C 's keen glance Would stare the mountains out of countenance ; The rocks resent the unaccustomed stare, And Gorgonize his golden head of hair.' The only other record of this summer which remains is that contained in the retrospective journal so often already alluded to. 6 September. — Short visit to Arran — alone. British Association at Glasgow. Presided at Physical Section. Thence to Pitsligo, and along Banff coast to Dumphail and Altyre. Met Agassiz and Buckland there. Agreed to visit the glaciers with him in 1841. In October went to London to consult Dr. Chambers/ vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 151 In November he was elected Secretary of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, a post which he continued to fill with characteristic energy and business-like exactness, till the failure of his health obliged him to resign it. The following letter of this date will interest many, wrre it only for the sake of him to whom it is addressed : — To R. LESLIE ELLIS, ESQ. 1 EDINBURGH, December 2hy>ies ; and allow me first to say, that I hope that in doing so you will continually bear in view that your tastes, talents, and position alike give us reason to hope that you are to be an extender as well as an occupier of tin- domains of science. In selecting amongst the sub- jects to which you have referred, and your enumeration Inch almost supersedes my offering advice, I would suggest that you should pursue that department to which your taste most naturally leads you, and which you think y«'ii would choose to make your own by substantive addi- tions to our knowledge. ' Your keen interest in physical reasoning and your clear notions about experimental evidence, happily preceded spontaneous act of your mind the acquisition of the admirable analytical .-kill which your brilliant Cambridge tonne has rendered available to you; so that it is speaking very much within bounds to say that very few so well placed as you for entering on the mixed an«l inatlieiiiatieal investigations which so rarely are E ully cultivated together. So far as I can form a ji ;. amongst the subjects you mention, the • •I' elictricily is less adapt* <1 ibr your study than "thers. M; [a \-.-ry good. But though much e done by following out Gauss' method bnth • ntal and j.raetieal. il .e < \]>riini< nts are not such \\o\ihl thii.k <•!' uinVitakinu, nor Midi as in the n n and purity of their natures. The intimacy which arose 1" ilem quickly ripened into a dee]) and mMiij). At the close of the session, in y 1841, they made a short tour together in A nan, 154 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. then together travelled to London, and thence to the Continent. In June and the early part of July they were travelling companions among the Pyrenees. After traversing these, they parted at Grenoble — John Mackin- tosh to return to Scotland, Forbes to meet Agassiz on the Aar glacier and to ascend the Jungfrau. For the next ten years they two kept up by letter an interchange of true and tender affection, to be closed only by the last letters which shall be given at the proper time. Returned from this, to him, eventful Alpine summer, Forbes employed what remained of the autumn before his winter work began in throwing his observations and reflections on what he had seen, into the shape of an article on Glaciers for the Edinburgh Review. This article appeared in April 1842, and was well received, and almost at once translated into French. He was at the same time invited by Murray and Lockhart to write for the Quarterly on the same or on kindred sub- jects ; but this he appears not to have done, though, in his general views of things unscientific, his sym- pathies went more with the Quarterly than with the Edinburgh. In May 1841 he and his surviving sister left their old home at Dean House, in which they had lived since 1835, as it was to be pulled down to make way for some large changes in that neighbourhood. They took up their abode for a time in a house in Ainslie Place, in which, however, they passed only two winters. The winter session of 1841-42 was, if possible, a more than usually busy one. Besides his class work, his spare hours were given to the preparation of a paper on astronomical refraction, uhich was to be read before the Royal Society of London. He also prepared and delivered in his class-room some lectures on Glaciers, which, being open to the public, were numerously at- tended. He was, in addition to all this, preparing for a new and still more vigorous campaign among the Alps next summer. As soon as the close of the session 1841-42 allowed, vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 155 he set off for London, and after a few weeks spent there he proceeded to Paris. Just about the time of his arrival there he was elected a corresponding member of the Institute of France, — an honour which is regarded, I believe, by all European men of science, as one of the highest which they can receive. Of the eventful summer of 1842, as of all his other foreign summers, the full record will be found in another chapter. I shall only here give the entry in his journal when looking back to it in 1860, at a time ii In1 know that for him Alpine adventure was over : 'This was the most active and, except the summer of 1833, when writing my lectures, the busiest summer I ever spent. It was also, I believe, the happiest. It still thrills me with delight to look back to it.' When this energetic summer was ended, he left ( hamouni on the 29th September, but did not return to Edinburgh till October, a short time before the session opened. All the next winter, ,1842-43, he was in- tensely occupied in writing his book of Alpine travels and in reducing his observations. Murray, the well- known publisher, had undertaken to bring out the book, but some misunderstanding arose between the author and tin- publisher. On New Year's Day 1843, we find him in London conferring with Murray and trying to settle differences that had arisen. I>ut this attempt did not succeed; for in the end the book was published, not by Murray, but by the Edinburgh firm of Messrs. Black and Co. On returning from London, all the spare hours of the following sprinir were devoted to the book. It is curious to remember now, that this was the nx»t ^itntrd winter whirl, Scotland Jiad seen for many a year. Kdinlmpjji was absorbed with the turmoil and e\< iti-nn-nt which • I the disruption of the National Church. Cndis- turlicd by the din of ecclesiastical collisions, !•'•• '••nlly on with the work he had set himself. \\\ the close of the session the bnok was nearly completed ; and in the end of April he jefn shed himself from his 156 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. winter's labours by a visit to Makerstoun and by a journey thence on foot to Melrose and Peebles. On May 18th we find this entry in his diary : ' Wit- nessed disruption of the Church of Scotland at Assembly in St. Andrew's Church. Same day asked Alicia Wau- chope to be my wife.' On July 4th his marriage took place with the lady here mentioned — the eldest daughter of the late George Wauchope, Esq. The last lines of his Travels in the Alps had been written on the immediate eve of his marriage. The dedication to his travelling companion, M. Bernard Studer, is dated 1st July, 1843, and his marriage took place on the 4th. Having therefore completed his work and committed it to the publishers, the critics, and the world, he set off with Mrs. Forbes on his marriage tour to the Continent. The following letter, addressed to Mrs. Forbes, from the Astronomer Royal and President of the Royal Society, which, though bearing a recent date, is mainly a retrospect of intercourse with Forbes during these early years, will form a fitting close to this chapter : — * ROYAL OBSERVATORY, GREENWICH, LONDON, ' DEAR MADAM, ^t>rU i \th, 1872. 1 When I wrote last to you, I hoped to have a little time at command for bringing together some notes regarding my late friend, as soon as the short refreshment which I required should be terminated. But I have never had my thoughts free, and now I fear that the very few ideas that 1 can put together may be too late. * I cannot certainly say when or how my acquaintance with Mr. Forbes began. I have some obscure idea of having seen him before my marriage, which took place in March 1830. But I certainly saw him at the meeting of the British Association in Oxford in 1832, on terms which implied established acquaintance. In the latter part of that year he was candidate for a professorship— I believe the same which he subsequently obtained — and I had the pleasure of offering to him my certificate of vi.] PROFESSORIAL L1FI. 157 competency. At the beginning of 1834 he was candidate for a different office ; and I think that I then attempted to take a step in his favour as before. 1 In the years from 1830 to 1835 I was much employed on physical optics, in its two divisions of diffraction and polarization. ' Professor Forbes took great interest in these subjects, and 1 had much correspondence with him. 1 had arranged for my lectures at Cambridge a rather rude machine for ! at ion between plane-polarized light and circularly or elliptically-polarized light, and Professor Forbes entered heartily into this matter, and requested me to furnish him with a duplicate of my machine. * The undulatory theory of light was then struggling into existence, or at least into reception ; and the clear understanding and hearty support of it by Professor Forbes must have contributed materially to its successful establishment in the locality with which he was more imnu'd lately connected. * In 1S35 the question was raised by me of the esta- blishment at this Observatory of a system of continuous . ations. I had from the first the advantage of frequent correspondence with Professor Forbes on the various points entering into consideration. 1 In 183G Professor Forbes communicated to me, as one of the fiivt persons, I believe, his splendid disco^ of tho polarization of radiant ! ' Prom ; iii- lime almost every important step made by or in this Observatory, Was made known to Pro- fessor Forbes, and almost every scientific entei prise undertaken by him, and his iM-neml proceedings at ihurgh, were soon ronminnieated to me. I forget in ear it was that I testified oflieially to the im- portance of the magnetic determinations wlnYh he bad \\ith so much labour at different elevations he sea* 'The record of his exp< on the conduction of lodged, at his ropiest, in this ' 158 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. ' An early copy, I believe the first, of Professor Forbes's Travels in the Alps was presented by him to me ; and I read with great interest the observations on glaciers, especially the part beginning with the chapter which bears the appropriate motto, "The glacier's cold and restless mass Moves onward, day by day." 'And I have often contrasted, in my mind, the well- directed and careful observations there detailed, and the cautious deductions from them, with the paltry and doubtful objections that have been made to subordinate points of the theory. As a whole, this essay must hold a very high place. * No person, perhaps, could testify better than myself to Professor Forbes's scientific character. In every investi- gation of his which I saw, he was careful, accurate, and truthful. He would not change an idea or a term for any consideration but his own conviction. 'This uprightness and manliness of character was impressed on all his transactions, and in time insured to him the respect of all who had sufficient opportunity of witnessing it It was matter of great pleasure to Mrs. Airy, as well as to myself, to enjoy the hospitality of your house, or to offer our own, to take part with him in an expedition for sight of a solar eclipse (1842), or in an excursion to our northernmost islands, or to put ourselves under his guidance in Scotland or in Savoy. ' In the systematic pursuit of science, and in prepa- rations for accurate geography and topography, Professor Forbes prepared himself with powers which sometimes almost assumed the character of the lighter accomplish- ments. His mapping of the Mer de Glace of Chain ouni is an excellent specimen of surveyor's work. In con- templation of an excursion, I found that he was taking regular lessons in drawing, and the fruit of these appeared in those most admirable depictions of Alpine scenery which adorn his book of Travels in the Alps. I suppose that it may be asserted that the present popularity of vi.] PROFESSORIAL LIFE. 159 Zermatt, a place which was before -scarcely known, is almost entirely due to Professor Forbes's picture of the Mutterhorn. The power thus obtained was of course used also for other purposes, and I know of at least one excellent sketch of scenery and antiquarian remains which still adorns a lady's portfolio. ' It is needless for me to say after this how much the loss of my valued friend was felt by Mrs. Airy and myself. ' I am, doar Madam, very faithfully yours, ' G. B. AIRY/ CHAPTER VII. M.1RKIED LIFE. FORBES and his newly-married wife had not advanced far on their wedding tour when they met with an unlooked-for interruption. Scarcely had they reached Bonn on their way up the Rhine, towards Switzerland, when he was seized on July 20th with a severe fever, which brought him very low, and detained him there till the end of August. During this detention at Bonn, the first tidings of the reception his book on Glaciers had met with at home reached him in the shape of an article on it in the Edinburgh Review, from the pen of Sir David Brewster. That this article must have been a tonic to his spirit, the following letter acknowledging it seems to show :— To SIR DAVID BREWSTER. 'GENEVA, August 3rd, 1844. * Having now first had the opportunity of reading your article upon my volume of Travels in the Edin- burgh Review, you will understand that it is impossible for me to rest until I have expressed to you some small share of the glowing feelings of pleasure with which I read it. 'During my short scientific career I have had yet ample occasion to know the rarity of well-weighed praise, the still greater rarity of well-timed support. Even the best of us are apt to commence from friendship rather CHAP, vn.] MARRIED LIFE. 161 than from a studied conviction of merit, and to spend that commendation in generalities and circumlocutions, until a decided and general opinion in favour of a new view or discovery shall have placed the wary advocate on the sure ground of participating in a victory, and not, even by remote possibility, of being plunged in the con- sequences of a defeat. ' You have done three things for me, any one of which would deserve my sincere thanks. 1. You have read my book carefully, and really studied the theory you undertook to judge. 2. You have allowed yourself to be convinced by arguments, unswayed by the force of opinion against them. 3. You had the moral courage to stand forth, whilst most if not all hesitate, to express your convictions with a force and clearness which alone must carry much weight in public opinion, and exactly at a time when such assistance and public acknowledg- ment are most valuable and most hard to be had. 'The flattering terms in which you have expressed yourself as to the difficulty and importance of this and such like generalizations, exaggerated as they will no doubt appear to many persons, are such as find an echo in the heart of the person most immediately interested, who feels his own travail of mind portrayed with a force and reality which seems more like a dream of egotism than the public sympathy of a kindred spirit. It was this which so deeply touched me, and you know by ex- ence tin- value of so rare and entire a sympathy. It is impossible for me to express all I have felt on the subject, and I will not attempt it, but conclude by assuring you that you have added a very deep debt to n wliirh I already o\\c you. I was quite struck by apparent facility with which you had seized the bearings <>f this intricate subject, but which must, I know, cost you much time and labour. The tabular \i add much to the clearness. ' I have had a j.n-tty extensive correspondence on the subject with different continental philosophers, who 1, proposed tonic their difficulties with much frankness; M 162 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. and though the progress of the theory is slow, it seems to be solid, and the answers I have given have been generally well received. Several of these I have em- bodied in supplementary letters published, or to be published, in the Edin. Phil. Journal, which I hope you may have leisure to look at. The most interesting cir- cumstance occurred to me, however, two days ago. I called at Bex on M. de Charpentier, who, you are aware, is old, and is usually supposed to be sufficiently wedded to his own opinions, and last year I found him quite indisposed to admit the smallest scepticism as to the truth of his dilatation. Now, however, he received me with great warmth, and told me that he had read my book and visited the Mer de Glace, and he believed that every fact admitted of being as well explained by my theory as by his ; that, moreover, he expected soon to be able to announce his entire conversion. He even presented me with a book inscribed from " son bientot convert! serviteur et ami S. de Charpentier."' The substantial merits of Forbes' book of 'Travels through the Alps of Savoy ' will be discussed in another part of this work. Only one word concerning it which occurs in Canon Kirigsley's Miscellanies may here be given : — * We have heard Professor Forbes' book on Glaciers called an Epic Poem, and not without reason. But what gives that noble book its epic character is neither the glaciers, nor the laws of them, but the discovery of those laws ; the methodic, truthful, valiant, patient battle between man and nature, his final victory, his wresting from her the secret which had been locked for ages in the ice-caves of the Alps, guarded by cold and fatigue, danger and superstitious dread.' By the end of August he was so far restored as to be able to go on by easy stages towards his beloved Alps. A month was spent among them partly in showing to Mrs. Forbes the more accessible of his favourite haunts, partly in cany ing forward some of his old work at vii.] MARRIED LIFE. 163 Chamounix, and on the glacier of the Grindehvald. On returning to Bonn to consult Dr. Nasse, the physician who had attended him with much care and skill during his late illness, the advice he received was that to under- take his winter's work was inexpedient, and might prove dangerous, and that to ensure recovery he ought to winter in Italy. On receiving this advice, he acted, as he did so often afterwards, and at once surrendered to the judgment of his physician. He wrote to the then Lord Provost of Edinburgh, as the representative of the Town Council, the patrons of the University, telling the state of his health, and the advice of his physician, and applying for leave to appoint a substitute to teach his - during the ensuing winter. The request was at once granted, and Forbes set out with his wife for Italy. Naples was reached about the middle of November, and Rome by the beginning of January, which places were their head-quarters till the end of May. September 1844 was far advanced before they reached the first home of their married life, at 15 Ainslie Place, Edinburgh. Soon after his return he received the following warm welcome from a former pupil, whose words no doubt expressed the feelings of many besides himself: — From MR. RANKIN. 4 November 14//<, 1844. — My heart leaped when I saw your well-known handwriting attain ; often while you were in the South I thought of you, and longed and prayed that you might soon be restored to health and professional duty. . . . However. I was ^ratified by seeing in the public prints that you had returned much benefited by your sejour in the South. . . . Allow me to thank you for your kind interest in my well-bein^. I feel indebted to your kindness more than can be ex- pressed, for it was this kindness which first awoke my s into energy, and enabled me to taste the j.l.-a- sures flowing from their lively « Indeed, often since my settlement here, win n some extra work was accomplished by dint of extra application, 1 have thanked M 2 164 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP you in my heart for teaching me wftat difficulties steady mental energy can overcome/ He had, however, scarcely returned, and before he had time to settle down, than he was called away to attend the gathering of the British Association, which that year, towards the end of September, took place once again at its earliest meeting-place, York. Some of the incidents of that meeting as they occurred to Forbes are given in the following letters written at the time to his wife :— * BISHOPTHORPE PALACE, Wednesday evening. 6 . . . We arrived here to-day at twelve — I mean at York, in company with Sir D. Brewster, Lord Enniskillen, Dr. and Mrs. Alison, Sir A. Agnew, and many other stars. It is very cold. My cold is not better. The people staying here are all most pleasant. We have Brewster, Murchison and Mrs., two Archdeacons Wilber- force, Liebig, Peacock (Dean of Ely),. Lord Northampton, &c. &c. Whewell and Mrs. were at dinner. The Arch- bishop is wonderfully well. The William Harcourts are a very charming family, Mrs. very, and one of the sons a most amiable youth. How I wish you were here. I am so sorry I can't send this to-night. ' Thursday morning. — I am better to-day. Tell me all about yourself. I have had some talk with Whewell about glaciers ; he said my note expressed exactly his opinion about Hopkins and his papers. I have not settled whether to make a communication or not : I want to avoid a collision with Hopkins, who is here/ * BISHOPTHORPE PALACE, Sept. 27, 1844. ' I have received your two kind notes. I wish you were with me. I am better to-day. The first evening meeting and opening of the Association was last night ; I did not go, but stayed cosily with the Archbishop. We stayed cracking for three hours, and then he went and fetched me lozenges for my cold. ' 5 P.M. — I am much better to-day. We have had such a lively discussion in the Section on Glaciers. Lord vii.] MARRIED LIFE. 1(55 Fitz william gives a grand dinner to 200 people ; I am just going to it. ' Saturday, Sept. 28, 1844. — I wrote you very hurriedly yesterday. Thanks to the previous evening's repose and the Archbishop's lozenges, my cold was much better, and I was able to get well through the day. My notice on Glaciers was, I do think, very well received by a " select and fashionable" audience, not to say a learned one, which it was ; and the impression seemed general that viscosity was established. Whewell explained my theory of the Veined Structure and the Frontal Dip very clearly. ' Monday. — My cold is much better; but we had a postponed discussion on Glaciers on Saturday morning, when Hopkins and I did battle, and I am sorry to say I felt it exceedingly ; it discomposed my nerves, and made me very uncomfortable indeed, until I was soothed by the Minster service yesterday, which was beautiful. But I see it will be