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SILVANUS  PHILLIPS  THOMPSON 


The  Life  of  John  Payne 

By  THOMAS  WRIGHT,  Author 
of  "  The  Life  of  William  Cowper," 
etc.  With  1 8  Illustrations.  Cloth, 
28/-  net. 

Few  great  authors  appeal  more  to  the  imagina- 
tion than  John  Payne,  the  hero  of  "  The  John 
Payne  Society,"  who  shrank  from  the  limelight  ot 
"interviewing."  Recognised  as  a  true  poet  by 
Swinburne,  he  was  probably  the  most  skilful 
translator  of  the  nineteenth  century,  for  we  owe 
to  him  a  version  of  Villon's  poems  which  is  itself 
a  poetic  work  of  coasummate  art,  the  first  com- 
plete translation  of  the  "Arabian  Nights,"  the 
first  complete  verse  rendering  of  Omar  Khayyam's 
quatrains,  to  say  nothing  of  translations  of  '"  The 
Decameron,"  etc.  Among  his  friends  were  Swin- 
burne, Sir  Richard  Burton,  Dante  Gabriel  Rossetti, 
Arthur  O'Shaughnessy,  French  authors  such  as 
Victor  Hugo,  Banville,  and  Mallarme,  and  the 
artist  who  ventured  to  depict  "  God  with  eyes 
turned  inward  upon  His  own  glory."  For  twelve 
years  before  Payne's  death  in  1916  Mr.  Wright 
was  his  most  intimate  friend,  and  as,  during  all 
that  time,  he  had  in  view  the  writing  of  Payne's 
Life,  he  lost  next  to  none  of  his  opportunities  for 
obtaining  at  first  hand  the  facts  and  opinions 
needed  for  his  work.  Moreover,  Payne  made 
him  a  present  of  a  MS.  autobiography  and 
supplied  him  with  valuable  material  from  his 
letter-files. 

T.  FISHER  UNWIN,  LTD.,  LONDON 


[Frontispiece 


SILVANUS 
PHILLIPS  THOMPSON 

D.Sc.,  LL.D.,  F.R.S. 

HIS  LIFE  AND  LETTERS 


BY 

JANE    SMEAL    THOMPSON 

AND 

HELEN  G.  THOMPSON,  B.Sc. 


WITH  ILLUSTRATIONS 


LONDON :  T.  FISHER  UNWIN,  LTD. 
ADELPHI  TERRACE 


First  published  in  1920 


ALL   BIGHTS    RESERVED 


PREFACE 

MEASURED  by  years,  the  life  of  Silvanus  Phillips  Thompson 
was  not  a  long  one  ;  but  each  day  and  each  year  was  full, 
and  in  that  sense  long.  He  was  essentially  a  man  of  action. 
Passing  away  as  he  did  while  still  at  the  height  of  his  activi- 
ties, no  leisure  had  come  to  him  to  sift  and  sort  his  accumu- 
lated papers,  and  his  biographers  have  had  to  deal  with  an 
immense  mass  of  material  relating  to  his  work  and  to  his 
hobbies,  only  a  small  fraction  of  which  is  presented  here. 

He  was  too  busy  a  man  to  keep  any  autobiographical 
journal,  or  even  brief  daily  diary,  his  "  little  blue  note- 
books "  of  the  last  fifteen  years  being  the  nearest  approach 
to  one.  Nor  was  he  after  his  marriage  in  1881  a  regular 
writer  of  letters,  save  to  his  wife  on  the  exceptional  occasions 
when  she  was  not  with  him. 

We  wish  to  thank  many  of  his  friends  whose  letters  are 
quoted,  and  Mr.  John  Hassall  for  permission  to  reproduce 
the  caricatures  of  "  Brother  Magnetizer."  We  are  most 
grateful  for  the  kind  way  in  which  our  request  for  the  loan 
of  his  letters  has  been  met  by  his  friends.  Of  course  we 
have  to  deplore  that  some  of  his  correspondents  either  have 
not  been  able  to  find  his  letters  or  have  not  kept  them, 
for  some  of  the  missing  ones  would  have  been  the  best 
revelation  of  the  playful  side  of  his  nature  so  difficult  to 
present,  and  which  so  endeared  him  to  the  circle  of  his  family 
and  his  intimate  friends.  Again  and  again  we  have  been 
conscious  of  the  extreme  difficulty  for  us,  standing  in  such 
close  relation  to  him  as  his  wife  and  his  daughter,  to  see 
the  man  in  his  true  perspective. 

As  we  endeavoured  to  portray  him  through  his  work,  it 
seemed  that,  for  the  most  part,  the  material  was  best 
adapted  for  arrangement  according  to  subject  rather  than 
in  strict  chronological  order  :  thus  Chapter  V  covers  work 


vi  PREFACE 

achieving  early  distinction  and  continuing  throughout  his 
life,  and  Chapter  XII  deals  with  other  work  begun  as  early 
but  reaching  its  maximum  in  the  latter  part  of  his  life.  By 
confining  the  more  technical  matter  to  a  few  chapters  which 
can  if  desired  be  omitted,  we  have  tried  to  represent  the 
man's  life  in  its  fulness,  without  making  it  tedious  to  those 
lacking  knowledge  of  science. 

J.   S.  T. 

H.  G.  T. 


CONTENTS 
CHAPTER   I 

PAGE 

ANCESTRY,  BIRTH,  AND  EARLY  TRAINING        ,         .        1 

CHAPTER   II 
COLLEGE  LIFE  AND  SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING         .         .       10 

CHAPTER   III 
LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL  ;  EARLY  RESEARCHES       .      28 

CHAPTER   IV 
PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION     .        .      47 

CHAPTER   V 

CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE  .        .62 

CHAPTER   VI 

TELEPHONE    RESEARCH   AND   FIRST   BIOGRAPHICAL 

WORK     ........     108 

CHAPTER   VII 

REMOVAL  TO  LONDON  ;   TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,  FINS- 

BURY      .        .        .        .        .         .         .         .     124 


CHAPTER 

LIFE  IN  LONDON.    BIOGRAPHY  OF  FARADAY,  UNI- 

VERSITY REFORM     ......     152 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   IX 

PAGE 

RESEARCHES     ON     LIGHT    AND    RADIATION  ;     THE 

ROENTGEN  SOCIETY 183 

CHAPTER  X 

WORK  FOR  THE  INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL 
ENGINEERS  AND  INTERNATIONAL  ELECTRICAL 
CONGRESSES 204 

CHAPTER   XI 

THE  GILBERT  CLUB  :  THE  LIBRARY  AND  LITERARY 

EXCURSIONS 226 

CHAPTER    XII 
OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION      .         .         .         .         .253 

CHAPTER   XIII 
THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY       .        .     278 

CHAPTER   XIV 
HOBBIES  AND  HOLIDAYS 296 

CHAPTER   XV 
RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      .         .         .318 

CHAPTER   XVI 
LATER  YEARS 338 

LIST  OF  HONOURS  AND  DEGREES,  ETC.    .        .        .356 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 357 

INDEX  .         .  367 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


PORTEAIT  OF  SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON    .         .         Frontispiece 

FACING  P1GK 

SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON  STANDING  BESIDE  HIS  ELDER 

BROTHER,  W.  H.  THOMPSON 6 

From  a  daguerreotype  taken  in  1859. 

PROFESSOR  TYNDALL  LECTURING  TO  A  JUVENILE  AUDIENCE 

AT  THE  ROYAL  INSTITUTION,  1876    .         .         .         .22 

From  a  pen-and-ink  sketch  by  S.  P.  T. 

SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON  AT  THE  AGE  OF  TWENTY-FIVE       .       34 

BRITISH  ASSOCIATION,  TORONTO,  1897 ;   DISCUSSION   ON 

THE  HOMEWARD  VOYAGE         .....      34 

CARICATURE  PORTRAIT  OF  SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON  LECTUR- 
ING AT  FlNSBURY  COLLEGE         .  .  .  .  .138 

THE  "  DOCTOR  "  AMONG  HIS  APPARATUS         .         .         .     148 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  J.  Russell  &  Sons  about  1910. 

CARICATURE  OF  SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON  AS  A  "  FLY  IN 

AMBER"        .         . 244 

By  John  Hassall. 

"A  MANY-SIDED  CRYSTAL" 252 

By  John  Hassall. 

A  NATURAL  ICE  ARCH  ON  THE  GLACIER  D'ARGENTIERE  .    306 

From  a  water-colour  by  S.  P.  T. 

THE  AIGUILLE  VERTE  FROM  "  LE  PLANET  "     .         .         .310 

From  a  water-colour  by  S.  P.  T. 

SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON  LECTURING  TO  A  JUVENILE  AUDI- 
ENCE AT  THE  ROYAL  INSTITUTION,  CHRISTMAS  1910    .     338 

From  a  photograph  taken  for  the  Daily  Mirror. 

SILVANUS   P.  THOMPSON   AND   HIS  FIRST  GRANDCHILD, 

GULIELMA  MARY  AGGS 352 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  T.  Edmonds  Hull  in  1914. 

ix 


PHILLIPS  THOMPSON 

HIS    LIFE    AND    LETTERS 

CHAPTER  I 

ANCESTRY,   BIRTH,   AND    EARLY  TRAINING 

THE  family  of  Thompson  of  Morland,  Westmorland,  to 
which  Silvanus  Phillips  Thompson  belonged,  trace  their 
ancestry  to  one  Thomas  Thompson,  a  yeoman  farmer  of 
Strickland  in  Westmorland,  whose  grandson,  John  Thompson 
of  Barton  in  the  same  county,  came  and  settled  at  Morland 
in  the  later  years  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Of  him  it  is  recorded  on  his  tombstone  that  he  was  a 
highly  educated  gentleman,  "  a  great  admirer  and  well 
versed  in  the  politer  sort  of  literature,"  and  that  in  1699 
he  kept  a  Grammar  School  at  Morland.  The  house  which 
he  built  there  bears,  carved  over  the  doorway,  the  initials 
of  himself  and  his  wife,  and  the  date  1722,  and  still  belongs 
to  one  of  his  descendants.  He  died  in  1736,  and  the  Parish 
Register  states  that  he  was  "  an  eminent,  worthy,  and  in- 
genious schoolmaster." 

He  left  one  son,  Thomas,  whose  three  sons,  about  the 
middle  of  the  century,  became  members  of  the  Society  of 
Friends,  or  Quakers,  who  were  at  that  time  a  very  numerous 
body  in  Westmorland.  These  young  men  all  suffered  the 
penalty  of  dismissal  from  their  father's  house,  a  fate  not 
uncommon,  in  those  days  of  intolerance.  However,  at 
the  father's  death  the  eldest  son,  John,  succeeded  to  the 
house  and  property  at  Morland,  where  he  lived,  and  became 
a  worthy  minister  of  the  Society  of  Friends. 
1 


2       .         LIFE  OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

The  second  son,  Thomas,  great-grandfather  of  Silvanus 

Phillips  Thompson,  settled  at  Appleby,  where  he  started  as 

a  grocer  and  later  became  a  highly  respected  banker  in  the 

tqwn.     (•)!  hija  it:  was  said  that  he  was  of  a  very  pacific 

:  disposition,  and  if  he  heard  quarrelling  or  profane  language 

*  £BL'  &h£* paavrket;p''lace;,-he  would  rush  out  and  try  to  reconcile 

those  who  disagreed.     He  is  remembered  at  Appleby  as  the 

rebuilder  of  a  bridge,  which,  being  swept  away  by  a  great 

flood  in  1812,  was  reconstructed  by  him  at  his  own  expense. 

Carved  on  the  bridge  are  his  initials:  T.  T.  1813. 

In  the  later  years  of  his  life  he  was  almost  ruined  by  a 
disastrous  fire  which  burned  down  the  bank.  He  behaved 
with  the  greatest  generosity,  especially  to  the  poorer  de- 
positors. 

The  arms  of  the  Thompsons,  though  not  used  by  the 
early  Quakers,  were  preserved  in  a  sketch  which  came  down 
to  the  grandson  Silvanus  Thompson  of  York.  They  were 
a  stag's  head  cabossed,  on  a  shield  argent,  wavy  a  crescent 
or.  The  crest  was  a  dexter  arm  embowed  with  hand  hold- 
ing three  ears  of  corn  or.  Motto  :  "  Industrie  Munus." 

When  Silvanus  P.  Thompson  was  writing  notes  for  the 
Life  of  Lord  Kelvin,  he  records  that  in  1899  he  received  the 
f oflowing  letter  from  him  regarding  the  Thompson  arms : 

"  It  is  interesting  to  find  that  you  too  have  ears  of  corn, 
though  with  a  different  motto.  No  doubt  your  family  with 
the  '  p '  and  mine  without  are  of  common  origin  in  the  north- 
west of  England  and  south-west  of  Scotland,  I  suppose. 
Our  shield  also  has  a  stag's  head  on  the  lower  part  of  it.  It 
has  three  stars  above  the  stag's  head." 

The  family  to  which  Sir  William  Thomson  belonged  had, 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  dropped  the  "  p  "  out  of  their  name 
when  they  went  to  reside  in  Scotland,  adopting  the  more 
common  way  of  spelling  the  name  in  that  country. 

Thomas  Thompson  of  Appleby  left  several  sons  and 
daughters.  The  youngest  son,  also  Thomas,  had  begun  his 
studies  as  a  doctor,  but  had  to  abandon  that  career  after 
the  misfortune  of  the  fire.  He  went  to  London,  where  he 
took  up  the  study  of  pharmaceutical  chemistry  under 


ANCESTRY,   BIRTH,  AND   EARLY  TRAINING   3 

William  Allen,  a  Quaker,  then  head  of  the  famous  firm  of 
Allen  &  Hanbury.  As  he  showed  himself  a  young  man  of 
great  scientific  ability,  he  soon  became  acquainted  with 
some  of  the  men  of  science  of  those  days.  Among  them 
were  the  Quaker  brothers — Richard  Phillips,  physicist  and 
intimate  friend  of  Michael  Faraday,  and  William  Phillips, 
geologist  and  Fellow  of  the  Linnean  Society,  both  also 
Fellows  of  the  Royal  Society.  They  were  of  a  Welsh 
family  which  came  originally  from  Swansea,  and  had 
numerous  branches.  Thomas  Thompson  married  their 
sister,  Frances  Phillips,  and  started  a  business  as  pharma- 
ceutical and  manufacturing  chemist  at  Liverpool.  This 
business  still  exists,  and  is  being  carried  on  by  his  great- 
grandson,  Edwin  Thompson. 

A  learned  man,  and  much  interested  in  antiquarian 
studies,  Thomas  Thompson,  during  his  long  life  of  eighty-six 
years  (he  died  in  1861),  made  various  collections,  of  coins, 
autographs,  minerals,  and  old  books,  especially  of  those 
relating  to  the  early  history  of  chemistry.  Some  of  these 
latter  afterwards  became  part  of  the  library  of  his  grand- 
son, Silvanus  Phillips  Thompson. 

Frances  Thompson  shared  the  intellectual  tastes  and 
pursuits  of  her  husband,  and  their  home  was'  occasionally 
visited  by  her  brothers.  She  was  very  vivacious,  bright, 
and  clever,  and  was  described  once  by  the  late  John 
Bright  as  a  "notable  woman."  They  had  a  large  family, 
many  of  whom  inherited  the  Celtic  quickness  and  strong 
sense  of  humour  of  their  mother.  The  eldest  son,  George, 
succeeded  to  the  family  business ;  two  others  emigrated  to 
Canada,  where  they  founded  families  in  the  province  of 
Ontario.  The  youngest  son,  Silvanus,  chose  tlie  teaching 
profession  as  his  vocation  in  life. 

The  antiquated  regulations  of  the  older  Universities  of 
Oxford  and  Cambridge  made  it  impossible  for  a  Quaker 
to  benefit  from  them  at  that  time,  so  Silvanus  Thompson 
proceeded  to  London  to  finish  his  studies  at  University 
College,  and  worked  at  Mathematics  under  the  father  of 
William  de  Morgan. 

He  obtained  a  post  as  Master  at  the  Friends'  School  for 


4  LIFE  OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

boys  at  York  in  1841,  and  in  1848  married  Bridget  Tatham, 
daughter  of  John  Tatham  of  Settle. 

The  Tathams  of  Settle  belonged  to  a  family  which,  in  the 
person  of  Richard  de  Tatham  of  the  Parish  of  Tatham  in 
Lancashire,  was  ennobled  by  the  King  for  his  services  as 
leader  of  the  archers  at  the  Battle  of  Flodden.  Their  arms 
were  a  shield  argent  and  azure  with  three  martens  sable  ; 
and  crest  of  a  hand  holding  three  arrows,  with  motto  "  Pro 
Deo,  Pro  Rege,  Pro  Patria." 

At  the  time  of  the  rise  of  the  Quakers  in  the  seventeenth 
century  some  of  his  descendants  joined  that  body,  and  one, 
Marmaduke  Tatham,  the  direct  ancestor  of  the  Tathams 
of  Settle,  was  imprisoned  in  Lancaster  Castle  in  1660  during 
the  persecutions  which  took  place  at  the  beginning  of  the 
reign  of  Charles  II. 

The  first  John  Tatham  who  went  to  reside  at  Settle  was 
the  fourth  in  succession  to  Marmaduke,  and  was  the  grand- 
father of  Bridget  Thompson. 

The  second  John  Tatham  conducted  the  old-established 
business  of  grocer,  druggist,  and  draper  in  the  Market 
Square  of  Settle,  and  built  a  house,  known  as  Castle  Hill 
House,  under  the  shadow  of  the  Castle  Rock  which  dominates 
the  little  town.  Here  his  family  were  born.  His  first  wife 
was  delicate,  and  only  two  of  her  children,  Bridget  and  a 
sister,  survived  to  maturity.  He  married  a  second  time, 
and  had  other  children  ;  two  sons  grew  up,  but  both  died 
young.  John  Tatham  was  a  very  noted  botanist  in  his  day, 
and  corresponded  with  botanists  all  over  the  kingdom. 
He  discovered  many  rare  plants  and  ferns,  and  was  an  ardent 
collector.  His  collections  at  a  later  date  went  to  form  part 
of  the  National  Collection  at  Kew.  His  daughter  Bridget 
shared  his  enthusiasm  for  botany,  accompanied  him  on  his 
rambles  over  the  Pennines,  and  became  a  keen  student 
and  collector  of  plants.  It  was  in  connexion  with  this 
pursuit  that  she  became  acquainted  with  Silvanus  Thomp- 
son. They  were  married  at  the  old  Friends'  Meeting 
House  at  Settle,  and  went  to  live  at  York  at  a  small  house, 
43,  Union  Terrace,  adjoining  the  playing-fields  of  Bootham 
School  to  which  they  had  access  by  a  gate  from  their 


ANCESTRY,   BIRTH,   AND   EARLY  TRAINING   5 

back  garden.  Afterwards,  when  their  family  became 
numerous,  they  took  the  house  next  door,  No.  45,  and 
opened  doors  of  communication  between. 

Silvanus  Thompson  was  a  quiet  man,  of  gentle  manner, 
intellectual  tastes,  and  a  religious  disposition.  As  a  teacher 
he  was  clear  in  presentation,  and  enriched  his  lessons  with 
a  wealth  of  historical  illustration.  In  appearance  he  was 
tall  and  thin,  and  resembled  his  mother  in  colouring,  in- 
heriting also  her  strong  sense  of  humour. 

Bridget  Thompson  was  petite,  fair,  and  of  delicate  con- 
stitution, but  full  of  energy  and  charm.  Their  eldest  child, 
a  son,  William  Henry,  was  born  in  1849,  and  the  second, 
Silvanus  Phillips,  on  June  19th,  1851.  Three  other  sons 
and  three  daughters  followed,  of  whom  one  boy  died  in 
infancy.  This  little  flock  was  most  carefully  reared  and 
trained  by  the  father  and  mother.  Bridget  Thompson  had 
a  wonderful  gift  in  educating  children.  Long  before  the 
ideas  of  Froebel  or  Montessori  had  reached  the  educational 
world  in  this  country,  she  trained  her  children  in  drawing, 
nature  study,  and  handicraft,  and  taught  them  at  a  very 
early  age  to  reproduce  what  they  had  seen. 

The  little  Silvanus  showed  a  scientific  bent  when  very 
young,  and  began  to  draw  when  he  was  scarcely  more  than 
a  baby.  His  mother  used  to  tell  many  stories  of  his  preco- 
city, and  treasured  his  early  paintings  and  little  objects 
made  of  wood  or  cardboard,  which  already  showed  the 
neatness  and  capacity  for  taking  pains,  which  were  of  such 
service  to  him  in  his  later  scientific  studies. 

Silvanus  was  a  very  good-tempered  and  merry  little 
child  ;  he  resembled  his  Celtic  ancestors  in  the  blue-grey  eyes 
and  black  curly  hair,  but  was  slightly  built  and  small  like 
his  mother.  He  was  very  thoughtful,  and  ione  day,  while 
watching  a  baby  sister  on  his  mother's  knee,  he  asked  her, 
"  Mother,  are  baby's  brains  hollow  tubes  for  the  instinct  to 
flow  through  ?  "  His  sister  Maria  was  most  like  him,  and 
was  always  a  favourite  playfellow.  She  wrote  in  later 
years  : 

"  I  came  next  in  age  to  Silvanus,  and  was  eager  to  share 
his  fun  and  mischief,  and  patiently  endured  when  the 


6  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

scientific  experimenter  had  need  of  a  victim.  Silvanus 
would  make  wonderful  cranes  and  lifts,  and  haul  me  up 
and  down  in  them,  and  though  they  often  broke,  and  bumps 
resulted,  his  active  mind  was  always  ready  to  plan  a  new 
and  improved  method.  Once  he  had  been  reading  in  a  book 
of  travels,  a  description  of  how  tatooing  was  done.  When 
left  alone  in  the  nursery  he  borrowed  nurse's  darning  needle 
and  pricked  into  my  wrist  a  star.  Nurse  returned  to  find 
him  rubbing  ashes  from  the  grate  into  it.  Forty  years 
after,  it  could  still  be  faintly  seen." 

Their  father's  duties  at  the  school  kept  him  very  closely 
occupied,  but  he  drew  his  children  into  pursuits  which  he 
enjoyed  himself,  the  collection  of  coins  and  autographs, 
the  study  of  heraldry,  and  the  reading  aloud  of  poetry  and 
fine  prose.  They  were  brought  up  on  Dickens,  and  often 
quoted  his  writings.  When  the  grandfather  died,  in  1861, 
his  collections  of  coins  and  autographs  came  to  the  family, 
and  the  older  children  much  enjoyed  them. 

At  the  age  of  ten  Silvanus  coloured  a  drawing  which 
he  had  designed  himself,  impaling  the  coats  of  arms  of  the 
Thompson  and  Tatham  families,  the  only  heraldic  mistake 
he  made  being  that  he  put  the  arms  of  his  mother  on  the 
wrong  side.  This  drawing  was  preserved  by  her,  and  is  still 
in  existence. 

When  the  two  elder  boys  were  five  and  three  years  of  age, 
they  suffered  from  a  severe  attack  of  scarlet  fever,  which 
had  bad  effects  on  them  both.  The  eldest  was  seriously 
retarded  in  development,  and  Silvanus  was  left  with  a 
delicate  throat,  which  rendered  him  liable  to  attacks  of 
laryngitis. 

Often  when  ailing  the  children  were  sent  to  their  grand- 
father's home  at  Settle,  and  sometimes  also  the  school 
holidays  were  spent  there.  They  grew  up  with  a  great  love 
for  the  beautiful  mountain  scenery  which  surrounds  the 
little  town  in  the  middle  of  Ribblesdale  where  their  grand- 
father lived.  They  became  familiar  with  crag  and  water- 
fall, and  their  interest  in  botany  was  stimulated  by  searching 
for  the  rare  Tatham  fern,  or  some  other  plant  first  discovered 
by  their  grandfather.  They  learned  to  take  long  tramps 


SILVANUS  P.   THOMPSON  STANDING  BESIDE  HIS  ELDER  BROTHER,  W.  H.  THOMPSON. 

Prom  a  daguerreotype  taken  in  1859. 


ANCESTRY,   BIRTH,  AND  EARLY  TRAINING   7 

over  the  moors  and  fells,  and  Silvanus  all  his  life  preferred 
this  form  of  exercise  to  any  other. 

In  August  1858  the  two  eldest  boys  were  sufficiently 
advanced  in  their  education  to  enter  Bootham  School  as 
day  boys,  where  they  were  placed  in  the  lowest  class.  For 
four  years  Silvanus  remained  the  youngest  boy  in  the 
school,  though  it  was  not  long  before  he  was  promoted  to  a 
higher  class. 

Bootham  School,  begun  as  a  private  enterprise  and 
taken  over  by  a  committee  of  Yorkshire  Quakers  to  provide 
a  good  education  for  the  sons  of  their  members,  has,  through 
the  eminence  of  some  of  its  old  scholars  and  the  ability  of 
its  headmasters,  made  a  name  for  itself  in  the  annals  of 
those  who  are  pioneers  in  education.  In  1 858  it  was,  however, 
quite  a  small  school  of  about  fifty  boys,  and  though  occupy- 
ing its  present  site,  was  very  different  from  the  fine  building 
which  has  since  been  erected. 

John  Ford,  its  first  headmaster,  was  at  that  time  still 
connected  with  it.  He  was  an  original  and  able  educator. 
As  in  the  present  day,  one  of  the  great  objects  of  the  school 
was  to  give  the  boys  a  wide  outlook  on  the  world  around 
them,  and  to  teach  them  to  make  good  use  of  their  leisure, 
by  the  encouragement  of  all  kinds  of  handicrafts  and 
natural  history  hobbies.  Careful  training,  too,  was  given  for 
the  attainment  of  that  self-control  which  is  the  mark  of  the 
Quaker,  and  was  a  constant  aim  in  the  minds  of  the  masters. 
John  Ford  did  not  at  that  time  reside  at  the  school,  and  the 
actual  superintendence  fell  upon  his  second  in  command, 
Fielden  Thorp,  B.A. 

The  Head  was  a  very  enthusiastic  advocate  of  the  joys 
of  natural  history  studies,  and  used  to  give  half-yearly 
addresses  to  the  boys  on  that  subject.  His  Sunday  evening 
discourses  were  very  impressive,  and  certainly  had  a  most 
powerful  formative  influence  upon  his  hearers. 

He  and  his  wife  were  childless,  and  became  very  much 
attached  to  the  clever  children  of  his  colleague  Silvanus 
Thompson.  Especially  after  his  wife's  death,  John  Ford 
almost  adopted  some  of  them,  and  the  four  little  brothers 
often  stayed  with  him  in  St.  Mary's  near  the  Abbey. 


8  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

In  an  article  entitled  "  A  Scientist  in  the  Bud  "  which 
appeared  in  the  school  magazine,  James  Edmund  Clark, 
a  former  schoolfellow,  gave  an  account  of  Silvanus  as  a 
schoolboy.  He  was  fond  of  games,  but  not  very  proficient, 
and  never  reached  the  school  cricket  eleven  ;  he  was  therefore 
not  a  hero  with  the  boys.  His  lessons  never  gave  him  any 
trouble  or  seemed  to  present  any  difficulties.  In  class 
time  he  used  to  amuse  himself  with  sketching  in  his  note- 
books. His  productions  were  the  envy  of  his  class  mates, 
who  strove  to  outdo  their  impish  ugliness  in  vain.  In  later 
years  he  still  sketched  in  notebooks,  and  the  record  of  many 
a  scientific  lecture  or  international  committee  was  enriched 
by  clever  pencil  drawings,  sometimes  by  way  of  caricature, 
of  people  present.  Silvanus  very  early  became  a  con- 
tributor to  the  school  magazine,  one  of  his  first  essays  being 
on  "  Electricity,"  a  subject  which  was  to  absorb  so  much 
of  his  future  life.  He  also  gained  a  prize  for  a  botanical 
collection  made  at  the  age  of  twelve. 

The  school  was  fortunate  in  having  a  very  clever  visiting 
art  master,  Mr.  Edwin  Moore,  brother  of  the  famous  Henry 
Moore,  R.A.,  and  of  Albert  Moore.  Silvanus  profited  much 
by  his  teaching,  and  continued  his  studies  under  him  after 
school  days  were  over. 

In  1865,  when  he  reached  the  senior  class  at  the  school, 
he  took  up  the  study  of  astronomy  with  great  enthusiasm, 
and  with  J.  E.  Clark  spent  much  time  in  the  school  observa- 
tory. "  Probably  his  earliest  printed  scientific  observa- 
tions will  be  found  in  the  '  Luminous  Meteor  Committee's  * 
Report  to  the  British  Association,  1867." 

At  the  age  of  sixteen  he,  with  some  of  his  schoolfellows, 
was  taken  to  London  to  sit  for  the  Matriculation  of  the 
University.  The  examination  in  those  days  was  very 
comprehensive,  including  Greek,  Latin,  French,  German, 
Chemistry,  Hydrostatics,  and  Mechanics,  besides  English 
subjects.  Fortunately  for  Silvanus,  his  splendid  memory 
and  the  ease  with  which  he  learned  languages  carried  him 
triumphantly  through  the  ordeal. 

They  stayed  with  their  master  "in  one  of  those  quiet 
streets  between  the  Strand  and  the  River," 


ANCESTRY,   BIRTH,   AND   EARLY  TRAINING   9 

The  following  letter,  on  June  24th,  1867,  written  from 
Angus's  Hotel,  tells  a  little  of  the  eager  interest  of  the  boy 
on  his  first  visit  to  London. 

"  MY  DEAR  FATHER, 

"  Perhaps  you  will  have  curiosity  to  know  why  I 
am  so  long  in  London  without  telling  you  what  has  befallen 
me  there,  and  perhaps  more  would  have  befallen  me  if 
I  had  been  in  London  all  Sunday  :  but  to  tell  my  story  : 

"  Ye  scene  of  ye  action  of  ye  Drama  :    The  Great  City. 

"  Act  I :    A  walk  to  St.  Paul's — magic  effect. 

"  Scene  I  :    Fleet  Street ;   Scene  II  :    The  Strand,  etc. 

"  Act  II  :    Registration. 

"  Scene  I  :    Burlington  House — in  waiting. 

"  Scene  II :   An  Upper  Room — Doctor  Carpenter. 

"  Scene  III,  IV,  etc.  :  St.  James's  Park,  Horse  Guards, 
Westminster. 

"  Scene  VIII :   Royal  Academy  (magical). 

"  Two  happy  hours  among  the  works.  An  invitation 
to  Croydon. 

"  Act  III  :  The  Country.  Scene  I  :  John  Morland's, 
where  J.  E.  C.  and  I  stopped  till  eleven  o'clock  this 
morning. 

"But  the  long  and  short  of  it  is  that  both  the  Latin 
papers  have  been  very  easy,  and  we  are  much  encouraged 
for  the  future.  Both  Jim  and  I  finished  the  Grammar  in 
an  hour — only  one-half  the  specified  time.  We  are  rather 
afraid  of  the  Greek. 

"  Croydon  is  a  very  nice  place  and  much  spread  out 
into  the  country.  It  is  very  hard  to  sleep  here  from  the 
roar  of  the  trains  from  Ludgate  Hill  to  Blackfriars  which 
wakes  you  up  about  every  twenty  minutes." 

The  letter  was  embellished  with  a  drawing  of  one  of  the 
Latin  examiners.  "  I  got  him  before  the  papers  were  given 
out."  Walks  in  the  London  parks,  steamboat  excursions 
on  the  Thames,  and  a  visit  to  the  Polytechnic  to  see 
"  Pepper's  Ghosts,"  were  all  a  joy  to  the  eager  lad,  who 
never  forgot  his  first  visit  to  London, 


CHAPTER   II 

COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING 

A  LONG  holiday  of  three  months,  much  of  which  was  devoted 
to  sketching,  followed  the  last  term  of  schoolboy  life.  Then, 
in  September,  Silvanus  entered  the  Quaker  training  college, 
at  Pontefract,  Yorkshire,  called  the  Flounders  Institute. 
Here,  being  only  sixteen  years  of  age,  he  was  again  the 
youngest  among  the  twelve  students  who  were  being  trained 
as  teachers,  some  of  his  old  schoolfellows  being  included 
among  the  number. 

"  Thompson's  capacity  for  work  was  enormous,"  wrote  one 
of  his  college  mates.  Set  free  from  the  trammels  of  school 
life,  he  studied  late  into  the  night,  and  rose  early  to  work 
before  breakfast.  As  he  was  a  very  sound  sleeper,  he  in- 
vented a  system  of  pulleys  to  drag  off  the  bed-clothes 
when  his  alarum  clock  went  off  at  a  certain  hour. 

At  that  time  he  was  devoting  himself  to  classical  studies, 
a,  training  which  in  after-life  he  greatly  valued,  and  he  never 
joined  in  the  depreciation  of  the  attention  given  in  schools 
to  Greek  and  Latin  which  has  so  often  been  indulged  in  by 
some  advocates  of  a  more  modern  training.  Curiously 
enough,  in  the  diaries  kept  while  at  college  there  were  more 
entries  about  cricket  than  about  any  other  subject. 

The  Flounders  Institute  was  situated  not  far  from  Ack- 
worth  School,  one  of  the  oldest  and  most  famous  schools 
of  the  Society  of  Friends,  which  had  a  boys'  and  a  girls' 
department.  On  Sundays  the  children  were  allowed  to  meet 
and  walk  with  sisters  or  cousins.  The  young  students  from 
Flounders  also  came  to  meet  their  relations,  and  as  Silvanus 

10 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND  SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    11 

had  two  sisters,  Maria  and  Rachel,  attending  the  school,  he 
often  came  down  on  Sundays  to  see  them.  There  were 
also  some  little  cousins  there,  and  of  one  of  them  he  became 
very  fond,  and  wrote  sentimental  short  poems  and  acrostics, 
which  he  dedicated  to  her.  Many  young  folk  of  sixteen 
perpetrate  poetry,  but  Silvanus  never  gave  up  making 
verses  during  the  rest  of  his  days. 

He  was  expecting  to  sit  for  his  B.A.  examination  in  the 
summer  of  1869,  but  in  March  that  year  he  and  several 
other  students  were  attacked  by  a  severe  epidemic  of 
typhoid  fever  caused  by  a  contaminated  water-supply. 
One  young  life  of  great  promise  was  cut  off,  and  for  many 
weeks  Silvanus  Thompson  lay  in  a  state  of  delirium.  For- 
tunately for  him  the  illness  began  while  he  was  at  home, 
so  his  mother  was  able  to  nurse  him  herself,  the  younger 
children  being  sent  away.  He  was  very  weak  for  a  long 
time  after  the  attack,  and  stayed  at  Ilkley  on  the  moors, 
where  he  worked  at  his  favourite  hobby,  sketching  in  water- 
colours,  during  long  summer  days.  Later  on  he  went  with 
his  sisters  to  the  Lake  District,  and  made  some  sketches 
there  which  showed  great  promise. 

In  fact  for  a  time,  owing  in  part  to  his  delicate  health, 
he  was  in  doubt  whether  to  continue  his  training  as  a  teacher, 
or  to  devote  himself  to  an  artistic  career.  However,  by  the 
autumn  Silvanus  was  well  enough  to  return  to  college,  and 
even  to  pass  his  examination  for  the  B.A.  degree  of  London 
University. 

Many  years  later,  when  speaking  at  the  opening  of  the 
John  Bright  Library  at  Bootham  School,  Silvanus  told  an 
amusing  episode  about  himself  at  this  period: 

"  I  was  a  student  at  Flounders  College  when  first  I  saw 
John  Bright,  but  did  not  get  to  know  him  on  that  first 
occasion.  It  was  at  Ackworth  General  Meeting,  after  I  had 
left  the  Flounders — I  think  the  year  was  1869 — that  I  was 
introduced  to  John  Bright.  I  was  introduced  by  the 
revered  headmaster  of  this  school,  John  Ford.  I  had,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  just  a  few  months  before,  passed  my  examina- 
tion for  the  degree  of  B.A.  in  the  University  of  London, 
and  I  suppose  a  lad  of  nineteen  in  that  position  is  rather  apt 


12  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

to  betray  a  good  conceit  of  himself.  I  was  introduced  to 
John  Bright  by  John  Ford  with  the  words  :  '  John  Bright, 
allow  me  to  introduce  to  thee  a  son  of  thy  old  friend 
Silvanus  Thompson  ;  the  young  man  is  a  Bachelor  of  Arts 
of  the  University  of  London.'  John  Bright  took  in  the 
situation,  tipped  his  nose  a  little  into  the  air,  looked  at 
me  through  his  blue  eyes,  gave  a  sort  of  sniff,  and  this  was  all 
he  had  to  say  to  congratulate  me  :  '  Nature  provides  a  very 
convenient  safety-valve  for  knowledge  too  rapidly 
acquired  !  '  Can  you  imagine  a  more  complete  dressing 
down  for  the  young  hopeful  of  nineteen  ? — no  doubt  im- 
measurably well  deserved.  But  the  crestfallen  young  man 
lived  to  thank  John  Bright  for  the  good  service  he  had  done 
him  in  that  somewhat  brutal  manner." 

The  following  year,  1870,  he  went  as  junior  master  to 
Bootham  School,  where  his  father  was  still  senior  master  ; 
to  avoid  confusion,  he  was  at  that  time  always  called 
Phillips,  which  the  sisters  and  brothers  shortened  to  Phil. 

But  the  work  of  a  junior  master  by  no  means  satisfied 
the  extraordinary  intellectual  energy  of  the  student.  He 
immediately  took  up  the  study  of  science,  particularly 
chemistry,  and  at  the  end  of  three  years  succeeded  in 
gaining  the  post  of  science  master  in  the  school.  One  of  his 
colleagues,  Alfred  Kemp  Brown,  writes  :  "  His  lessons  at 
York  were  admirable,  illustrated  with  diagrams  prepared 
with  his  special  artistic  talent."  He  taught  chemistry, 
physics,  and  electricity,  and  much  of  the  electric  apparatus 
constructed  by  him  was  in  use  many  years  afterwards  in 
the  school  laboratory. 

Caring  little  for  games,  he  was  not  very  popular  with  the 
boys,  except  those  who  went  in  for  making  scientific  collec- 
tions, or  shared  his  taste  for  art ;  these  found  him  a  tremend- 
ously stimulating  companion.  He  continued  to  take  lessons 
from  Mr.  Edwin  Moore,  and  in  a  letter  to  a  former  school- 
fellow he  wrote  in  1873  : 

"  The  school  seems  to  be  going  on  pretty  much  as  usual. 
A  football  match  with  Scarboro'  to  come  off  in  about  a 
fortnight  is  now  all  the  talk.  E.  E.  Boorne  is  now  the  only 
one  learning  oil-painting  with  me.  R.  Fox  does  a  Uttle  at 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    13 

fruit  in  watercolours.  Joseph  West,  a  younger  brother  of 
4  Tuffins,'  learns  painting  with  Moore.  He  is  a  clever  little 
chap  with  his  hands — draws  animals  beautifully." 

The  Joseph  West  here  referred  to  is  the  well-known 
artist  J.  Walter  West,  R.W.S.,  who  in  later  years  painted  a 
portait  of  Silvanus  P.  Thompson  in  academic  robes. 

Besides  his  taste  for  painting,  the  young  master  was 
becoming  very  much  interested  in  the  study  of  music.  Owing 
to  the  objection  to  that  art  which  was  still  maintained  in 
those  days  by  many  Quakers,  the  subject  was  not  taught  in 
any  of  their  schools.  At  home  the  young  Thompsons  had 
no  piano,  and  it  was  not  until  Silvanus  rebelled  against  this 
prejudice  that  the  opposition  of  the  parents  was  gradually 
broken  down.  Brought  up  almost  un4er  the  shadow  of 
one  of  the  most  glorious  cathedrals  in  England,  and  taught 
to  understand  and  love  its  splendid  architecture,  it  would 
have  been  strange  if  Silvanus  had  not  also  learnt  to  love  the 
magnificent  music  of  York  Minster.  He  often  attended 
Evensong,  though  his  doing  so  was  not  looked  upon  with 
favour  by  the  authorities  of  the  school.  As  soon  as  he  had 
saved  up  some  money  he  bought  a  second-hand  piano,  and 
taught  himself  to  read  music  and  play  accompaniments, 
though  he  never  achieved  any  technical  mastery  over 
the  instrument.  He  also  learned  to  sing,  and  had  a  pleasant 
baritone  voice  which  he  produced  well. 

During  these  years  the  Temperance  Question  was  much 
discussed  and  promoted  among  the  Members  of  the  Society 
of  Friends  in  York,  Joseph  Rowntree  being  one  of  the 
prominent  advocates  of  the  movement. 

Silvanus  was  attracted  by  the  work  of  the  Good  Templars, 
and  for  a  time  his  absorption  in  it  was  very  great.  He 
became  a  member,  not  only  of  the  Local  Lodge,  but  of  the 
District  Lodge,  and  later  of  the  Grand  Lodge.  In  1873  he 
was  doing  much  writing  for  them,  and  with  his  usual  keen- 
ness to  get  at  the  beginnings  of  a  movement  or  an  invention, 
he  studied  very  fully  the  whole  history  of  the  rise  of  the 
Good  Templars  in  America,  and  collaborated  in  writing  a 
book  on  it  which  was  published  in  1873. 


14  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Meantime,  also,  he  was  working  for  his  B.Sc.  degree  of 
London  University,  the  preliminary  examination  for  which 
he  passed  while  still  teaching. 

But  the  monotony  of  work  in  a  small  school,  then  badly 
equipped  for  teaching  science,  became  very  irksome  to 
Thompson,  and  only  the  desire  to  be  of  assistance  to  his 
father  kept  him  in  this  position.  Silvanus  Thompson 
senior  was  at  that  time  suffering  in  health  from  the  result  of 
a  railway  accident  in  which  his  head  had  been  injured,  and 
it  was  with  a  great  effort  that  he  managed  to  continue  his 
work  until  1874,  when  he  retired. 

About  this  time  the  death  of  John  Ford,  who  left  most 
of  his  property  to  Silvanus  and  his  wife,  who  had  daily 
visited  him  in  his  declining  years,  and  "  been  more  than  son 
and  daughter  to  me,"  made  financial  matters  rather  easier 
for  the  family.  The  following  year,  too,  John  Tatham  of 
Settle  died  at  the  age  of  eighty-three,  leaving  a  widow  and 
two  daughters,  Bridget  Thompson,  and  Hannah  Maria, 
who  continued  to  live  in  the  old  family  home  with  her 
stepmother. 

In  the  long  summer  vacation  of  1874  Silvanus  junior 
went  for  his  first  visit  to  the  Continent.  During  his  journey 
he  kept  a  journal  letter  for  the  benefit  of  his  invalid  father, 
which  is  full  of  delightful  details  of  what  he  saw,  and  his 
many  amusing  experiences. 

Starting  on  June  17th,  he  sailed  from  Hull  to  Antwerp, 
then  journeyed  via  Brussels  to  Basle,  visiting  Luxembourg 
and  Metz  en  route.  From  Basle  he  travelled  mostly  on 
foot  through  the  Juras,  carrying  a  knapsack  and  sketching 
materials.  He  found  the  Swiss  German  of  the  peasants 
in  those  days  very  difficult  to  understand,  and  several  times 
was  misdirected  when  inquiring  his  way  from  village  to 
village.  But  his  excellent  French  generally  helped  him 
along  whenever  that  tongue  was  understood. 

During  his  tour  of  nearly  six  weeks  he  made  dozens  of 
sketches,  of  which  perhaps  the  most  charming  is  one  of  the 
little  walled  town  of  Laufen,  which  he  came  to  on  first  leaving 
Basle.  He  wrote  from  there  : 

"Altogether  I  enjoy  the  oddity  of  the  place  extremely. 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND  SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    15 

It  is  now  seven  o'clock,  and  I  am  now  going  out  for  a  walk 
in  the  fields  (Isaac  like)  at  even.  I  will  and  must  make  a 
sketch  of  this  main  street  before  departing.  It  is  most 
wondrous." 


While  commenting  on  the  strangeness  of  all  around  him, 
he  writes  : 

"  One  thing  seems  utterly  unchanged  ;  and  that  is  human 
nature.  I  find  people  polite  and  attentive  as  a  rule,  when 
one  is  polite  and  pleasant  to  them.  The  French  are  of 
course  superficially  polite  always.  The  politest  person  I 
have  come  across  was  the  most  hideously  ugly  Frenchman 
you  can  imagine,  at  the  Luxembourg  Station  at  Brussels. 
Except  in  these  external  things  and  in  general  national 
characteristics  that  I  have  not  yet  learned,  I  find  that 
physiognomy  is  really  a  wonderfully  true  guide.  A  huge 
Prussian  official  at  Mulhausen  had  a  big  kindly  face,  and  on 
making  some  inquiries  of  him,  I  found  him  as  gentle  as  a 
lamb  and  as  polite  and  obliging  as  the  most  exquisite 
Parisian  could  be." 

In  this  passage  we  see  revealed  the  secret  of  the  great 
success  of  Silvanus  Thompson  in  his  subsequent  inter- 
national relationships.  A  few  weeks  later  the  young 
traveller  wrote,  with  a  great  glee,  that  he  had  been  mistaken 
for  a  Frenchman. 

His  first  view  of  the  High  Alps,  where  he  was  so  often 
in  later  years  accustomed  to  revel  in  the  glory  of  glacier 
and  snow  peak,  was  obtained  from  the  Weissenstein. 

"  Ah,  what  was  that  ?  What  is  that  sharp  unearthly  streak 
of  light  that  shoots  up  clear  above  the  clouds  into  the  blue  ? 
It  is  the  Jungfrau — and  now  I  see  them — there  they  are, 
clear  out  above  the  white  piles  of  cumulus — the  Aletsch 
Horn,  the  Monch,  the  Eiger — in  fact  the  whole  range  of  the 
Oberland — and  then  further  to  the  South  the  peaks  of  some 
unknown  heights,  the  sharp  flat  top  of  Monte  Rosa,  and 
then  the  Matterhorn.  Going  over  the  prospect  again,  I 
jotted  down  a  hasty  outline  of  the  peaks.  Then  I  took  a 
final  gaze  upon  those  ethereal  crests  of  unimaginable  pearl, 


16  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

and  turned  to  descend.  Do  you  ask  me  why  I  did  not  paint 
them  ?  You  might  as  well  ask  me  why  I  do  not  paint  the 
sun  shining  in  all  his  brilliancy.  Both  are  alike  utterly 
unapproachable. 

"  Well,  one  of  the  dreams  of  my  life  has  been  at  last 
fulfilled.  The  snow  peaks  of  the  Alps  are  stamped  into 
my  mind  for  ever.  After  this  has  been  permitted,  who  can 
tell  what  other  dreams  may  not  have  their  realisation  in 
the  unknown  hereafter  ?  " 

Returning  to  York  refreshed,  he  plunged  into  his  work  of 
teaching,  experimenting,  studying,  with  a  renewed  zest, 
but  at  the  end  of  the  year  he  decided  that  he  must  leave 
the  school  and  go  to  London  for  further  help  if  he  wished 
to  take  honours  in  chemistry,  as  he  aspired  to  do,  in  his 
examination  for  the  B.Sc.  degree. 

During  several  of  his  shorter  holidays  previous  to  this 
time,  Silvanus  had  paid  visits  to  some  of  his  uncles  and 
aunts  on  his  father's  side,  who  lived  at  Liverpool  and  Birken- 
head.  Here  he  found  a  delightful  circle  of  cousins,  rather 
older  than  himself,  but  many  of  them  greatly  interested  in 
science,  art,  and  music,  who  gladly  welcomed  him  as  a  sharer 
in  some  of  their  lively  reunions. 

Two  of  them,  William  Phillips  and  Isaac  C.  Thompson, 
had  with  some  other  friends  started  a  magazine  entitled 
Bachelor's  Papers  for  the  discussion  of  scientific  and  other 
problems,  and  they  persuaded  Silvanus  to  contribute  to  this. 
It  ran  for  a  few  months,  and  then  apparently  died  out. 
His  articles  were  entitled  "  The  Sixth  Sense,"  "  The  Pro- 
gress of  the  Theory  of  Natural  Selection,"  "  Our  National 
System  of  Weights  and  Measures  "  in  two  parts,  "  The  Present 
Chaos"  and  "The  Proposed  Reform,"  "The  Poems  of 
Morris,"  "  Religion  and  Science."  He  had  then  already 
in  the  early  seventies  achieved  a  certain  distinction  of 
literary  style,  and  his  arguments  on  scientific  questions 
were  put  with  great  clarity  and  conciseness. 

The  end  of  the  summer  term  1875  saw  the  severance  of 
his  connexion  with  Bootham  School,  where  he  had  spent  so 
many  years. 

During  the  vacation  he  took  the  post  of  holiday  tutor 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND  SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    17 

to  the  sons  of  Richard  Fry  of  Bristol,  which  brought  him 
into  touch  with  many  influential  Quakers  in  that  part  of 
the  country,  a  circumstance  which  proved  very  useful 
about  a  year  later. 

On  the  result  of  his  Intermediate  Science  Examination, 
Silvanus  had  gained  a  bursary  at  the  Royal  School  of 
Mines,  South  Kensington.  He  therefore  decided  to  take 
up  Chemistry  and  Physics  there,  in  preparation  for  his  final 
examination.  Owing,  however,  to  some  red-tape  regulations 
about  subjects  of  study  with  which  he  was  unwilling  to 
comply,  he  was  not  able  to  make  full  use  of  his  bursary, 
so  during  his  stay  in  London  he  had  to  exercise  the  most 
rigid  economy. 

In  October  he  took  rooms  at  83,  Robert  Street,  South 
Kensington,  sharing  his  sitting-room  with  another  Quaker 
student,  Ernest  Westlake  of  Southampton.  He  began 
work  at  once  in  the  laboratories  of  the  Royal  School  of 
Mines  at  South  Kensington.  The  Professor  of  Chemistry 
at  that  time  was  Edward  Frankland,  F.R.S.  (afterwards 
Sir  Edward),  and  Thompson  at  once  attracted  his  attention. 
The  following  letter  describes  his  first  impressions  of  the 
novel  surroundings  : 

"  Saturday  afternoon, 
"October  19^,  1875. 

"  MY  DEAR  FATHER, 

"  You  will  have  wished,  I  don't  doubt,  to  have  heard 
a  little  more  concerning  my  occupations  than  as  yet  I  have 
written. 

"  Now  that  I  am  fairly  settled  to  work,  and  with  the 
extra  work  of  my  approaching  Exam.,  it  is  difficult  to  find 
a  time  to  write  letters  except  late  at  night ;  and  then  those 
cannot  go  until  the  next  day. 

"  Westlake  and  I  breakfast  at  8  a.m.  punctually.  By 
half -past  nine  the  laboratories  are  open,  and  so  I  go  early 
three  days  a  week. 

"  The    other    three    days,    Mondays,   Wednesdays,   and 

Fridays,  it  is  not  worth  while  to  go  early,  as  Frankland 

begins  to  lecture  at  10,  and  it  is  too  much  trouble  to  get 

things  out  for  half  an  hour  or  rather  less,  and  then  lock 

2 


18  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

them  up  while  one  goes  down  to  the  Lecture  Boom  five 
stories  below,  down  103  steps.  As  soon  as  the  lecture  is 
over  the  Laboratory  work  begins.  As  yet  I  have  been 
doing  only  simple  analysis.  .  .  .  The  more  I  see  of  the 
students  the  less  I  like  most  of  them.  I  am  a  little  older 
than  the  average,  but  many  of  them  are  quite  oldish  men 
(mostly  the  teachers  in  training).  I  go  at  one  p.m.  to 
Professor  Guthrie's  Lectures  (six  stories  below)  on  Physics — 
at  first  on  Hydrostatics  and  Pneumatics,  but  now  just 
beginning  Sound.  He  lectures  every  day  except  Saturday. 
He  is  a  ponderous  Scotchman,  and  puts  in  '  of  course ' 
about  thirty  times  each  Lecture.  Frankland  is  a  much 
neater  and  tidier  lecturer.  His  experimental  illustrations 
are  all  most  excellent. 

"  I  have  quite  given  up  the  idea  of  University  College  at 
present.  It  is  so  far,  and  the  lecture  times  are  so  awkward 
that  while  I  am  paying  so  high  a  fee  for  the  Laboratories 
it  will  be  worth  my  while  to  devote  my  time  pretty  exclu- 
sively to  Chemistry  at  present.  When  the  Exam,  is  over 
I  hope  to  get  a  little  painting  done.  Now  good-bye  for  the 
present. 

"  I  am,  thy  ever  affectionate  son, 

"S.  P.  THOMPSON." 

One  of  those  with  whom  he  made  acquaintance  during  his 
first  term  was  Mr.  Raphael  Meldola,  then  working  under 
Mr.  Lockyer  (afterwards  Sir  Norman)  at  solar  and  spectrum 
photography.  In  November  he  writes  : 

"  Meantime,  I  mean  to  make  the  best  use  in  the  present 
of  the  chances  of  the  hour.  Mr.  Meldola  gives  me  freely  the 
welcome  to  slip  in  and  out  of  his  place  during  the  next  few 
days.  I  shall  learn  something  practically  of  the  rare  arts 
of  solar  and  spectrum  photography,  and  of  the  graphic 
methods  by  which  the  photographs  are  reduced  to  scale 
on  to  the  accurate  charts  now  being  constructed." 

In  a  month's  time  Professor  Frankland  had  recognised 
the  gifts  of  young  Thompson,  and  told  him  that  he  ought 
to  aim  at  the  highest  walks  of  the  profession,  and  look  out 
for  a  Professorship  in  a  few  years'  time.  Advising  him  to 
attend  the  Lectures  at  the  Royal  Institution,  he  promised 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TEAINING    19 

him  tickets  for  the  Friday  evenings,  when  the  session  began 
after  Christmas. 
In  a  letter  dated  December  10th  Thompson  writes  : 

"  MY*  DEAR  FATHER, 

"I  have  just  come  in  from  the  Royal  Astronomical 
Society,  to  which  I  was  admitted  a  Fellow  this  evening. 
Fellows  have  not  only  to  be  elected  l  but  '  admitted '  in 
formal  style.  I  didn't  get  admitted  last  month,  because 
I  wanted  to  wait  to  see  how  the  operation  looked.  At  a 
certain  stage  of  the  business  the  Secretary  announced 
that  the  present  is  the  time  for  receiving  newly-elected 
Fellows.  Thereupon  the  new  Fellow  rose  from  his  seat 
amongst  the  mass  of  persons  facing  the  President,  walked 
demurely  up  the  dais,  signed  his  name  in  a  big  roll-book, 
with  all  the  customary  embellishments  of  flourish,  and  was 
handed  over  to  the  President,  Adams  of  Cambridge,  of 
Neptune-discovery  renown,  who  grasped  my  hand  as 
gingerly  as  if  it  had  been  a  dead  fish,  and  calmly  mumbled, 
'  Mr.  Thompson,  in  the  name  of  the  Royal  Astronomical 
Society,  I  admit  you  a  Fellow*  thereof.'  And  the  newly- 
admitted  Fellow  returned  to  his  place." 

When  the  lists  of  the  B.Sc.  examination  came  out, 
Silvanus  found  himself  bracketted  first  in  Honours. 

Owing  to  his  own  and  his  father's  position  at  Bootham 
School,  he  had  many  introductions  to  members  of  the 
Society  of  Friends  in  London.  Attending  one  of  their 
largest  meetings,  situated  in  St.  Martin's  Lane,  and  known 
as  Westminster  Meeting,  he  was  very  soon  a  welcome  guest 
in  many  of  their  homes.  Alfred  W.  Bennett,  a  noted  botanist 
and  lecturer  at  University  and  Bedford  Colleges,  made 
his  home  a  centre  for  students  of  the  Quaker  faith.  One  of 
the  Tatham  cousins  also,  daughter  of  Joseph  Tatham  of 
Leeds,  who  was  the  wife  of  J.  Bottomley  Firth,  M.P.,  lived 
in  South  Kensington,  not  far  from  Robert  Street.  Sir 

1  Thompson  was  elected  because  "  he  was  a  most  promising  student  to 
become  an  astronomer,  and  a  very  suitable  man  to  join  the  Society. 
At  that  time  the  claims  of  candidates  were  scrutinised."  As  to  his  claims 
see  p.  8.  He  had  also,  whilst  a  master  at  Bootham,  given  a  special  course 
of  lectures  on  astronomy  at  one  of  the  other  boys'  schools  in  York. 


20  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Jonathan  Hutchinson  the  surgeon,  Sir  Edward  Fry  the  judge, 
and  John  Bright,  also  attended  the  same  meeting. 

Almost  every  Sunday  was  spent  in  some  hospitable 
Friend's  home,  and  he  became  a  member  of  a  small  literary 
and  artistic  circle  called  the  Friends'  Portfolio  Society,  to 
which  he  belonged  to  the  end  of  his  life,  frequently  attending 
the  monthly  gatherings. 

Through  the  interest  of  Professor  Guthrie  he  had  been 
attending  some  of  the  meetings  of  the  Physical  Society, 
and  about  the  middle  of  December  he  was  elected  a  member.1 

The  Society  was  then  comparatively  new,  but1  rapidly 
increasing  in  popularity.'  Its  president  that  year  was 
Dr.  John  Hall  Gladstone,  F.R.S.,  Professor  at  the  Eoyal 
Institution,  and  a  renowned  chemist.  Unlike  so  many  of 
his  contemporaries  he  was  a  man  of  deep  Christian  faith, 
and  young  Thompson  found  in  his  home  a  most  congenial 

1  Silvanus  Thompson  was  in  later  years  Resident  of  the  Physical 
Society  for  two  successive  years,  1901-2.  In  his  first  presidential  address 
he  gave  the  following  account  of  the  Society's  inception  and  purpose : 

"  Our  Society  was  originated  by  teachers  of  physics  at  the  instigation 
of  the  late  Professor  Guthrie,  our  founder,  whose  memory  many  of  us 
cherish  with  a  personal  regard  and  affection  that  goes  far  beyond  the 
high  esteem  in  which  his  name  is  deservedly  held  for  the  good  work  which 
he  did  as  an  experimental  investigator  of  great  originality.  From  its 
inception  the  Society  has  been  actively  supported  by  the  teachers  of 
Physics  in  the  Schools  and  Colleges  of  London,  as  well  as  by  the  Professors 
of  Physics  in  the  Universities  and  University  Colleges  of  the  United 
Kingdom,  and  by  the  Lecturers  in  Physics  of  the  great  Public  Schools. 
While  we  would  all  acknowledge  our  great  indebtedness  as  a  Society,  and 
in  the  pursuit  of  Physics  generally,  to  those  non-professional  members 
who  have  contributed  so  much  to  the  advancement  of  science,  and  who  in 
Great  Britain  have  ever  held  so  striking  a  position  as  scientific  pioneers, 
there  is  a  special  sense  in  which  we  may  appeal  to  all  teachers  of  Physics, 
from  the  most  elementary  to  the  most  advanced,  to  make  use  of  the 
Physical  Society,  and  to  give  it  their  active  support.  It  was  mainly  in 
the  interests  of  teachers  and  students  that  the  Physical  Society  originally 
undertook  the  publication  of  the  Abstracts,  the  purpose  of  which  was  to 
keep  English  students  of  physics  informed  of  the  latest  steps  in  scientific 
advance  wherever  published.  The  teachers  of  Physics  throughout  the 
country,  by  coming  into  membership  in  the  Physical  Society,  will  find  in 
its  meetings,  its  discussions,  its  Journal  of  Proceedings,  and  in  Science 
Abstracts,  a  real  help  in  following  the  progress  of  research,  and  may  derive 
many  suggestions  of  the  most  direct  service  to  them,  both  in  their  daily 
work  in  the  lecture-room  and  the  laboratory,  and  in  any  original  investiga- 
tion in  which  they  may  be  engaged.'* 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    21 

atmosphere.  He  frequently  visited  there  on  Sunday  after- 
noons, and  sometimes  joined  a  Bible  class  of  young  men, 
which  Dr.  Gladstone  taught  in  his  own  house. 

As  soon  as  the  Royal  Institution  opened  for  the  session, 
Thompson  hastened  back  from  his  Christmas  visit  to  York, 
where  there  had  been  a  happy  family  reunion.  He  attended 
diligently  Tyndall's  course  of  Lectures  on  Electricity,  and 
in  a  letter  to  his  mother  of  January  6th,  1876,  he  says  : 

"  Tuesday  brought  Lectures  and  Classes  '  as  usual,'  except 
that  I  had  to  run  away  in  the  middle  of  Guthrie's  discourse 
on  Electricity  to  be  in  time  to  hear  that  by  Tyndall,  who, 
very  curiously,  was  on  precisely  the  same  part,  and  per- 
formed the  very  same  experiments : — but  oh  !  with  such  a 
difference.  There  is  a  dash  and  an  ease  about  Tyndall's 
speaking  and  manipulating." 

Again  he  writes  : 

"  Tyndall's  Lectures  concluded  last  Saturday.  I  have 
made  very  full  notes  and  embellished  them  with  about 
eighty  scribbles  of  apparatus,  experiments,  and  portraits. 
They  were,  as  examples  of  popularized  science,  admirable  ; 
the  illustrations  brought  forward  being  most  excellently 
adapted  to  teach  the  subject.  I  have  learnt  a  good  deal 
of  the  method  and  '  technic  '  of  lecturing  by  them,  and  have 
had  the  opportunity  of  seeing,  what  we  do  not  get  at  all  in 
Guthrie,  and  very  little  in  Frankland,  the  swing,  the  ease, 
the  dash,  that  makes  all  the  difference  between  the  easy  and 
the  tedious  lecturer." 

A  few  days  later  he  went  to  hear  another  of  the  famous 
lecturers  of  the  day,  Professor  Huxley,  "  Upon  the  Compara- 
tive Anatomy  of  the  Lower  Vertebrata."  He  writes : 

"  May  I  never  hear  an  uglier  man  discourse  worse  upon 
as  unpromising  a  topic.  The  flow  of  language  was  perfect, 
and  the  whole  manner  most  graphic,  perspicuous,  and 
simple.  As  a  speaker  he  beats  Tyndall  hollow." 

He  also  attended  Dr.  Gladstone's  Lectures,  chiefly  on  the 
past  history  of  chemistry,  which  he  greatly  enjoyed.  The 


22  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

historical  side  of  Science  always  appealed  to  him,  and  in 
later  years  he  spared  no  pains  to  trace  its  obscure  origins, 
his  good  linguistic  equipment  being  invaluable  for  this 
purpose. 

On  January  21st  he  wrote  : 

"  To-morrow  morning  I  go  to  Dr.  Guthrie' s  room  in  the 
Physical  Laboratory,  where  we  are  going  to  give  the  day 
to  investigations  upon  a  new  form  of  electricity  lately 
discovered  (by  Dr.  Beard  of  Baltimore  ?).  It  will  be  very 
pleasant  to  be  associated  with  Dr.  Guthrie  in  this  work. 
What  it  will  lead  to  I  scarcely  can  tell  yet." 

A  few  days  later  he  wrote  to  his  eldest  sister  Maria : 

"  Monday  night,  and  all  my  spare  time,  has  been  given  to 
the  investigations  that  I  am  assisting  Professor  Guthrie 
with.  I  shall  be  at  work  with  him  to-morrow,  and  probably 
all  Saturday.  We  cannot  yet  say  that  much  result  has 
followed  our  experiments  upon  the  new  electrical  force,  but 
we  hope  to  get  on  a  good  stage  on  Saturday  morning." 

To  his  father  on  February  4th  : 

"  My  work  with  Dr.  Guthrie  came  to  a  temporary  lull  on 
Saturday  afternoon  last,  when,  having  completed  for  the 
time  the  investigations  in  hand,  I  communicated  the 
substance  of  them  to  the  Physical  Society  in  a  paper  which 
you  will  find  briefly  reported  in  this  week's  Athenaeum. 
We  had  a  very  interesting  discussion  about  the  new  mani- 
festation afterwards.  It  is  originally  an  American  dis- 
covery, but  the  men  over  there  fancy  it  to  be  a  new  force, 
while  our  experiments  go  to  show  that  it  is  simply  a  variety 
of  induced  electricity." 

This  was  the  first  published  research  of  Silvanus  P. 
Thompson,  and  was  afterwards  reprinted  under  the  title, 
"  On  some  Phenomena  of  Induced  Electric  Sparks  "  in  the 
Philosophical  Magazine,  September  1876,  and  the  Proceedings 
of  the  Physical  Society,  vol.  ii. 

Thompson  had  carried  out  a  series  of  experiments  in 
which  he  obtained  sparks  from  conductors  placed  near  the 


" 


s! 
sf 


d^ 

Si 

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P      PJ 

^  s, 


81 

C5 
I 

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COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    23 

coil  of  an  electromagnet  at  the  moment  of  interruption  of 
the  current  in  the  coil.  He  was  trying  to  account  for  the 
production  of  these  sparks  in  terms  of  the  already  known 
laws  of  electricity,  not  ready  to  accept  the  hypothesis  of 
a  new  force  if  an  old  one  would  suffice.  The  apparatus  was 
several  times  altered  in  design  to  give  increasingly  powerful 
sparks,  such  as  could  be  discharged  through  vacuum  tubes, 
and  the  discharge  observed  in  a  rotating  mirror,  when  its 
alternating  character  and  irregularities  became  apparent. 
It  was  established  that  the  charges  on  the  conductor 
were  obtained  on  interrupting  the  current  only  in  circuits 
in  which  there  was  an  air  gap,  however  short.  Thompson 
believed  that  he  could  account  for  the  momentary  charge 
in  the  conductor  as  being  induced  by  the  temporary 
accumulation  of  electricity  which  was  necessary  to  produce 
sufficient  electromotive  force  to  break  down  the  resistance 
of  this  gap. 
A  week  later  he  wrote  : 

"Dr.  G.  has  left  me  now  almost  alone ;  he  was  with  me 
about  five  minutes  on  Saturday  in  fact.  I  am  glad  to  say 
that  further  investigations  are  very  satisfactory,  and  that 
I  have  now  been  able  to  frame  a  theory  that  will  account 
for  the  entire  series  of  phenomena." 

He  communicated  this  to  the  Physical  Society  about  a 
month  later. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  Mr. William  Crookes  (afterwards 
Sir  William  Crookes,  O.M.,  and  President  of  the  Royal 
Society)  gave  his  memorable  lecture  on  the  "  Mechanical 
Action  of  Light  "  at  the  Royal  Institution.  He  then  showed 
his  radiometers,  "  marvellous  little  mills  of  pith  and  glass, 
which  revolve  by  the  action  of  light  alone,  in  a  perfect 
vacuum."  So  Silvanus,  who  was  present  at  the  lecture, 
taking  numerous  notes,  described  them.  Shortly  after 
he  went  as  a  visitor  to  a  meeting  of  the  Royal  Society,  where 
he  was  introduced  to  Mr.  Crookes,  and  "  had  a  chat  with 
him  on  radiometers." 

The  Friends  of  Westminster  Meeting  were  in  the  habit 
of  arranging  social  gatherings  during  the  winter  at  which 


24  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

lectures  were  given.  That  year  they  had  already  had  two 
by  Alfred  W.  Bennett  and  by  Sir  Edward  Fry,  and  Silvanus 
Thompson  was  asked  to  give  them  one  on  a  scientific  subject. 
He  chose  the  subject  of  "  Comets  :  their  Purpose  in  the 
Universe  in  the  Light  of  Recent  Research,"  showed  many 
diagrams,  and  used  various  illustrations,  including  some  of 
the  newly  discovered  radiometers.  In  his  letter  describing 
this  to  his  father  he  writes, : 

"  Monday  was  a  hard  day  with  me.  After  Dr.  Frank- 
land's  lecture  I  was  working  all  day  with  the  mercurial 
air-pump  exhausting  a  Radiometer  I  had  devised.  I  got 
special  leave  to  stop,  and  went  on  till  half-past  nine  at 
night,  when  the  exhaustion  was  fairly  completed — when  to 
my  great  annoyance,  in  sealing  off  the  vacuous  tube  with 
the  blowpipe,  the  glass  cracked  and  spoilt  the  day's  work, 
besides  precluding  the  possibility  of  having  the  thing  to 
illustrate  my  lecture  as  I  had  hoped." 

Next  day,  however,  he  managed  to  borrow  two  of  the 
novel  instruments  from  a  scientific  shop  in  the  Strand. 
He  wrote : 

"  Happily  I  had,  for  the  sake  of  brevity,  written  out  in 
complete  pithy  sentences  the  introduction,  which  dealt 
with  the  general  constitution  of  the  Universe  and  the 
places  therein  occupied  by  stars  and  planets  ;  and  also 
I  had  a  similar  written  conclusion.  These  I  found  a  gieat 
help,  as  they  certainly  saved  time.  My  audience  listened  as 
though  they  would  eat  me,  especially  during  my  remarks 
on  the  reign  of  law.  I  don't  mean  they  looked  ferocious, 
but  so  perfectly  attentive." 

Among  the  audience  was  a  young  girl  who  had  just  left 
school,  who  was  later  to  become  the  wife  of  the  lecturer. 
She  was  the  eldest  daughter  of  James  Henderson,  a  member 
of  the  congregation  with  whom  young  Thompson  had 
already  become  acquainted.  She  was  interested  in  Science, 
and  had  already  heard  Huxley,  Spottiswoode,  and  other 
good  lecturers,  but  she  much  appreciated  the  powers  of  the 
young  lecturer,  and  especially  admired  the  beautiful  perora- 
tion with  which  he  closed. 


COLLEGE  LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC  TRAINING    25 

After  Easter  he  wrote  : 

"  MY  DEAR  FATHER, 

"  I  sent  off  a  card  at  5  p.m.,  in  which  I  said  something 
about  writing  concerning  a  post  now  vacant.  There  is  a 
new  University  College  now  being  established  at  Bristol 
of  which  I  heard  a  good  deal  last  summer.  It  will  open  in 
October,  and  they  have  been  advertising  for  a  Professor  of 
Chemistry.  I  saw  the  advertisements  about  a  fortnight 
ago,  but  felt  inclined  to  pass  the  matter  by  as  rather  beyond 
my  sphere  at  present. 

"  However,  a  few  days  ago  Mr.  Lodge,  Prof.  G,  C.  Foster's 
right-hand  man,  with  whom  I  was  having  some  chat,  said  : 
4  Why  don't  you  go  in  for  Bristol,  it's  the  very  place  for  you.' 

"  After  thinking  the  matter  over,  we  agreed  that,  clearly, 
nothing  could  be  done  without  consulting  Dr.  Frankland. 
Accordingly  this  morning  I  waited  upon  the  doctor,  and 
asked  his  opinion. 

"  He  told  me  that  one  other  gentleman  had  been  to  him 
on  a  similar  errand,  and  he  would  give  me  the  counsel  he  gave 
him,  to  wait  and  try  to  find  out  who  was  intending  to  apply. 
I  could  not  gather,  though  I  suspected  it  from  his  manner, 
that  he  had  someone  in  the  corner  of  his  mind. 

"  Then  he  spoke  of  his  satisfaction  at  the  way  I  had  been 
working  since  taking  a  place  there,  and  his  belief  that  I 
should,  when  a  little  better  known  in  the  chemical  world, 
have  no  difficulty  in  taking  a  good  place,  as  he  thought  I 
had  capabilities  for  the  work  of  the  best  posts.  I  cannot 
report  all,  but  I  left  the  doctor  with  a  respect  for  him, 
certainly  heightened  by  the  manner  in  which  he  had 
expressed  himself ;  and  certainly  gratified  at  the  cordial 
way  in  which  he  had  spoken  of  his  appreciation  of  my  work. 
I  am  quite  sure  that  I  shall  have  his  hearty  good  will  in  the 
future  whenever  I  have  to  apply  to  him  for  testimonials, 
whether  this  matter  come  to  nought  or  no. 

"  I  had  a  very  hard  day's  work  on  Saturday  last ;  for 
instead  of  going  to  see  the  Queen  drive  up  to  the  Exhibition, 
I  was  putting  together  apparatus  for  my  final  discourse  to 
the  Physical  Society  upon  the  newly  investigated  electric 
sparks.  I  have  got  to  the  end  of  the  matter,  and  won  my 
spurs  in  Physics.  Prof.  Adams  of  Cambridge,  and  his 
son,  Prof.  Adams  of  King's  College,  were  present — and  about 
two  dozen  other  Professors — also  a  lot  of  miscellaneous 
members." 


26  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

He  decided  to  apply  for  the  chemical  post  at  Bristol, 
and  began  collecting  testimonials  from  the  scientific  men 
whom  he  had  met,  and  who  appreciated  the  work  he 
was  doing.  He  had  already  received  some  good  ones  when 
another  opportunity  came  to  him  to  show  his  powers  of 
lecturing,  as  he  described  to  his  father : 

"  I  was  met  with  an  urgent  message  from  Dr.  Guthrie. 
I  went  to  him  and  found  him.  He  told  me  he  had  just  been 
telling  Major  Festing  that  I  would  give  a  twenty  minutes 
discourse  on  Radiometers  at  the  Exhibition  !  My  astonish- 
ment may  be  imagined.  It  appeared  that  someone  was 
advertised  to  explain  the  instruments  at  .1.30  p.m.,  and 
could  not  come.  Major  Festing  had  come  in  a  hurry  to  Dr. 
Guthrie,  who  had  forthwith  assumed  that  I  could,  would, 
should  perform  the  work.  It  was  now  1.15  p.m.  Just  a 
quarter  of  an  hour.  I  rushed  over.  Some  of  the  people 
in  authority  got  the  various  apparatus  out  of  the  cases. 
People  were  dropping  into  the  Conference  Room  in  anticipa- 
tion. Half -past  struck.  Then  I  marched  into  the  room  with 
Major  Festing,  who  briefly  introduced  me  to  the  audience. 
Right  opposite  me  the  only  man  of  the  company  I  recog- 
nised was  Father  Perry,  the  celebrated  astronomer  of 
Stonyhurst.  I  am  told  there  were  about  eighty  people 
present,  including  Professor  James  Thomson  of  Belfast 
(brother  of  Sir  William).  My  discourse  of  twenty  minutes 
was  listened  to  with  great  attention,  and  the  experiments 
were  in  every  way  successful.  Then  I  rushed  back  to  the 
Museum  to  swallow  a  mouthful  of  lunch,  and  prepare  for  the 
Physical  Society's  Meeting,  which  was  well  attended  and 
interesting.  My  description  of  the  Hep  worth  Clock  (electric) 
lasted  just  five  minutes — the  discussion  which  followed 
nearly  ten.  Major  Festing  came  up  and  wanted  to  know 
whether  I  would  consent  to  repeat  my  discourse  on  Radio- 
meters on  Monday  and  Tuesday  next  at  the  same  hour. 
I  considered  whether  I  would  and  could  repeat  the  discourse, 
and  finally  consented.  It  is  lucky  that  I  knew  something  of 
these  new  instruments  and  their  history ;  and  of  course 
this  is  a  good  advertisement  of  oneself  without  much  labour. 
So  on  this  ground  I  accepted  his  offer.  I  only  wish  he  would 
ask  me  to  give  an  evening  lecture  of  an  hour's  duration  on 
'  Induced  Electricity '  to  astonish  the  natives." 

About  the  middle  of  June,  by  the  advice  of  some  of  his 


COLLEGE   LIFE  AND   SCIENTIFIC   TRAINING   27 

Bristol  friends,  he  went  down  there  and  visited  several  of 
the  Members  of  the  Council  of  the  New  University.  Among 
them  was  Dr.  Percival  of  Clifton  College,  who,  as  he  wrote, 
"  received  us  courteously." 

"I  am  a  little  afraid  of  Dr.  Percival,  as  he  looks  the  kind 
of  man  who  is  able  to  look  you  through,  and  reckon  you  up 
at  a  glance.  His  questions  were  straight  to  the  point,  but 
few.  When  he  asked  me  if  I  had  taken  honours  at  my 
degrees,  it  was  a  comfort  to  say  that  I  was  first  in  honours 
at  the  B.Sc.  As  he  is  a  great  friend  of  Edward  Fry's, 
however,  I  do  not  dread  him  much,  as  Edward  Fry  has 
(like  Dr.  Frankland)  given  me  his  card  and  permission  to 
use  his  name  as  a  reference  in  respect  of  general  culture  and 
scientific  standing." 

Thompson  did  not  succeed  in  obtaining  the  appointment 
of  Professor  of  Chemistry  at  Bristol,  which  went  to  Dr. 
Letts  of  Belfast.  Almost  immediately  after,  however^  the 
Council  of  the  College  advertised  for  a,  Lecturer  in  Physics, 
and  he,  at  once  applying  for  that,  was  duly  appointed  to 
the  post. 


CHAPTER  III 

LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL  AND  EARLY  RESEARCHES 

WHILE  awaiting  the  news  of  the  result  of  his  application 
for  the  Bristol  post,  Thompson  decided  that  in  preparation 
for  it  he  would  carry  out  a  plan,  already  made  some  weeks 
before,  to  visit  the  University  of  Heidelberg.  One  of 
his  former  colleagues  of  Bootham  School,  Alfred  Kemp 
Brown,  had  proceeded  for  further  study  to  that  University, 
and  correspondence  with  him  had  suggested  to  Thompson 
the  idea  of  spending  a  summer  vacation  there.  He  wished 
to  watch  the  working  of  the  laboratories  of  the  University 
and  also  to  perfect  his  knowledge  of  German. 

He  spent  the  first  part  of  his  time  abroad,  going  leisurely 
up  the  Rhine,  for  he  was  very  fatigued  by  his  strenuous 
year's  work.  Again  he  wrote  journal  letters  home  describing 
what  he  saw  and  learned  on  his  travels.  This  time  the 
pages  were  illustrated  by  clever  little  pen  and  ink  sketches. 
On  reaching  Bonn  he  visited  Doctor  Geissler,  the  maker  of 
the  celebrated  Geissler 's  tubes,  and  of  Radiometers  of  various 
kinds.  He  found  him  very  ready  to  explair.  everything, 
and  was  able  to  acquire  some  of  the  newest  appliances  for 
illustrating  his  future  lectures.  He  also  saw  the  University 
and  was  taken  round  the  Chemical  Laboratory,  where  he 
reported  that  he  found  nothing  new,  worthy  of  remark. 

He  stayed  at  several  of  the  little  places  on  the  Rhine — 
Rolandseck,  Bacharach,  Boppard — enjoying  the  novelty  of 
being  among  people  of  such  different  manners  and  customs, 
which  he  described  with  many  humorous  touches. 

On  arriving  finally  at  Heidelberg  he  took  lodgings  in  a 
pension,  and  settled  down  to  attend  every  day  the  lectures 
of  the  Chemical  and  Physical  Professors. 

28 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  29 

After  receiving  his  first  letters  from  England  he  sent  the 
following  news  to  his  former  master,  Professor  Guthrie,  F.R.S. 

"  HEIDELBEBQ, 

"  July  2Qth,   1876. 

"DEAR  PROFESSOR  GUTHRIE, 

"  I  have  learned  to-day,  and  hasten  to  tell  you,  that 
the  Council  of  the  University  College,  Bristol,  have  decided 
the  Lectureship  in  Physics,  and  that  the  election  has  fallen 
upon  myself.  I  feel  that  I  cannot  allow  a  day  to  pass 
without  sending  you  this  news,  together  with  my  most 
cordial  thanks  to  you  for  the  assistance  you  have  rendered 
me  in  obtaining  this  post — assistance  without  which  my 
candidature  would  have  been  one  with  little  prospect  of 
success.  I  shall  have  cause  to  thank  you,  not  indeed  for 
this  alone,  but  for  the  unvarying  kindness  I  have  experienced 
at  your  hands,  and  for  the  many  ways  in  which  you  have 
assisted  me  in  my  studies. 

"  I  hope  on  Monday  to  place  in  the  hands  of  Herr  Geheim- 
rath  Bunsen,  the  letter  of  introduction  you  have  so  kindly 
furnished  me  with." 

Silvanus  was  delighted  with  the  free  and  unconventional 
life  at  Heidelberg,  and  with  the  pictures queness  of  the  old 
town.  He  wrote  to  his  father  : 

"  Bunsen  the  chemist  is  a  well-known  man,  and  is  worth 
hearing.  Let  me  describe  one  of  his  discourses. 

"  Lecture-room,  a  stuffy  hole  with  high  table  all  covered 
over  with  bottles,  flasks,  and  glasses — semicircular  rows  of 
forms  to  accommodate  about  ninety  students  rising  opposite, 
and  a  great  noise  occasionally  coming  up  from  the  street 
outside. 

"  Punctually  at  9  o'clock  by  the  little  Dutch  timepiece 
clacketty-clack-ing  away  against  the  wall  I  enter.  There 
are  two  students  present.  I  take  a  seat  and  look  round. 
Presently  an  officious  looking  young  man  brings  in  three  very 
respectable  and  sedate  gentlemen,  evidently  not  English- 
men, and  very  much  sunburnt.  One  of  them"  has  a  long 
grey  beard,  and  another  a  beard  of  black,  grizzled,  and 
they  take  seats  in  the  front  row.  The  officious  young  man 
bows  deeply  thrice  and  retires.  Six  minutes  past,  and 
there  are  two  more  students.  Then  a  distant  bell  rings, 
and  a  troop  of  thirty  more  pour  in  through  the  door  and 


30  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

scramble  to  their  seats,  two  or  three  of  them  smoking  cigar 
ends.  Nine  minutes  past  the  officious-looking  young  man 
reappears ;  looks  at  the  clock ;  vanishes.  A  few  more 
students  come  dropping  in,  and  each  as  he  comes  in  is 
greeted  with  a  shuffling  of  the  feet  and  a  few  gentle  hisses. 
Fourteen  minutes  past  nine  and  a  farmer-like  looking  man 
with  a  dirty  collar,  slovenly  coat,  untidy  hair,  and  a  much 
wrinkled  but  benevolent  face,  slouches  in  at  the  doorway, 
and  steps  behind  the  table.  Everybody  rises  about  six 
inches  from  his  seat  to  acknowledge  the  bow  of  the  Lecturer, 
and  there  is  partial  noisy  applause. 

"  Without  a  moment's  delay  the  Lecturer,  for  this  is 
Professor  Bunsen — Herr  Geheimrath  Bunsen — begins  his 
discourse  in  an  off-hand  way  without  any  preliminary 
words.  Meantime  the  officious  young  man  crawls  behind 
the  Professor  and  crosses  to  the  other  side  of  the  room, 
when  he  proceeds  to  put  back  the  hand  of  the  clock  to  ten 
minutes  past  the  hour.  The  discourse  proceeds,  interrupted 
only  by  the  shuffling  and  hissing  that  salute  a  late-coming 
student.  The  style  is  without  either  affectation  or  dignity  ; 
the  discourse  never  stopping  for  want  of  a  word,  and  never 
rising  beyond  the  commonplaces  of  chemical  description, 
not  even  ceasing  when  a  little  liquid  has  to  be  poured  into  a 
glass,  or  a  specimen  of  an  ore  taken  from  its  place  on  the 
table,  and  handed,  via  the  officious  young  man,  to  the  nearest 
student  on  the  front  row.  All  goes  on  without  a  hitch  or 
hindrance  until  the  clock  strikes  ten  solemn  and  almost 
inaudible  strokes.  With  a  deep  bow  the  Professor  finishes 
his  discourse  and  retires  through  the  door.  And  then  we 
learn  that  the  Emperor  of  Brazil,  he  of  the  long  grey  beard, 
was  the  stranger  present." 

With  Professor  Quincke,  whose  courses  on  physics 
Thompson  attended,  he  formed  a  lifelong  friendship  which 
was  afterwards  frequently  renewed  at  various  international 
gatherings.  In  later  years  Geheimrath  von  Quincke  visited 
London  on  several  occasions  ;  he  was  a  most  genial  man, 
and  much  liked  by  some  of  his  English  colleagues. 

The  Summer  Semester  at  Heidelberg  was  all  too  soon 
over,  and  Silvanus  returned  to  England  in  time  to  attend 
the  British  Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science  held 
that  year  at  Glasgow.  Very  soon  after  he  went  to  Bristol, 
where  he  found  comfortable  rooms  at  St.  Michael's  Terrace, 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  31 

Gotham,  and  began  to  get  ready  for  the  Session  at  Bristol 
University  College. 

The  Council  for  the  University  College  had  not  waited 
for  a  building  to  be  erected,  but  had  started  the  classes  in 
temporary  premises  consisting  of  some  dismal  old  houses 
in  Park  Row.  To  the  Lecturer  in  Physics  was  allotted  a 
damp  cellar  as  a  store-room  for  his  apparatus,  and  two 
rooms  on  the  second  floor  as  lecture-room  and  laboratory. 
Professors  and  students  of  modern  times  would  be  horrified 
at  the  inconveniences  which  had  to  be  put  up  with. 

The  first  few  letters  which  he  wrote  to  his  father  give  such 
an  excellent  picture  of  the  beginning  of  his  work,  and  of  his 
introduction  to  Clifton  society,  that  it  will  be  best  to  quote 
from  them  with  but  few  omissions. 

His  father  had  apparently  been  warning  him  that  he  had 
been  spending  money  rather  freely,  and  he  justifies  himself 
on  spending  only  what  was  absolutely  necessary  for  his 
work,  certain  pieces  of  apparatus,  etc. 

"  The  other  source  of  expenditure  has  been  books.  While 
in  Heidelberg  I  spent  nearly  £2  on  French  and  German 
books,  and  got  some  most  helpful  ones  for  my  work  here. 
On  my  return  to  London  I  got  some  more,  including 
Ganot's  Physics,  Professor  Tait's  excellent  new  book, 
Recent  Advances,  two  books  on  Physical  Measurements 
and  a  book  on  higher  Mathematics  at  which  I  am  taking 
daily  doses.  Since  coming  here  I  have  got  several  books. 
I  had  purposed,  a  little  while  ago,  getting  Guillemin's  two 
beautiful  volumes  the  Forces  Physiques  and  the  Applications 
de  Physique,  but  they  cost  20s.  each,  and  so  while  I  was  in 
London  I  made  up  my  mind  not  to  buy  them.  I  took  also 
at  Kensington  a  last  fond  look  at  Helmholtz's  splendid 
work  on  the  Sensations  of  Tone,  a  perfectly  wonderful  book 
of  which  I  there  read  a  good  deal  in  the  spring.  Books  are 
expensive,  and  there  is  such  a  thing  as  knowing  where  to 
stop. 

"  I  finished  yesterday  reading  another  interesting  book 
that  I  have  got  lately — Balfour  Stewart  on  the  Conservation 
of  Energy,  quite  a  readable  book,  and  one  teeming  with  the 
latest  information.  I  will  bring  or  send  it  home  some  time, 
as  I  should  like  you  to  see  it. 

"  I  am  finding  '  reviewing  '  profitable.     The  Friend  has 


34  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

11  p.m.     This  dinner  too  was  ceremonious,  and  the  table 
decorated  most  beautifully  with  flowers." 

To  the  same  : 

"  October  IZth,   1876. 

"  On  Sunday  last  I  walked  over  to  Westbury  and  spent 
the  afternoon  with  Edward  Grubb,  and  attended  with  him, 
in  the  evening,  the  Redland  Meeting.  On  Monday  I  was 
busy  with  preparations  all  day  for  my  opening  Lecture, 
which  I  found  was  expected  to  be  a  set-piece. 

"  On  Tuesday  morning  the  College  opened,  Mr.  Bousfield 
giving  a  quiet  ordinary  mathematical  lecture  at  9  a.m.  We 
had  not  a  grand  inaugural  field  day — the  Council,  in  spite 
of  our  gentle  suggestions,  not  seeing  their  way  to  this. 
However,  the  dpening  address  by  Professor  Rowley  (on 
Modern  History)  was  understood  to  be  the  opening,  and  at 
11  o'clock  the  largest  of  our  lecture-rooms  was. packed. 

"  We  had  a  very  interesting  lecture,  the  subject  being 
chiefly  a  glorification  of  the  advantages  to  be  derived  from 
the  study  of  History.  Towards  the  close  the  Professdr  made 
a  smart  attack  on  the  popular  idea  of  the  culture  to  be 
derived  from  the  study  of  natural  science,  of  which  I 
instantly  '  made  a  note.'  The  audience  were  pleased  with 
the  lecture,  and  I  was  congratulated  by  Mrs.  Percival  and 
Miss  Winkworth  on  the  rap  I  had  got.  I  laughed  and  said 
I  should  see  about  that.  In  the  evening  I  was  to  dine 
with  the  Misses  Winkworth.  Miss  Catherine  Winkworth, 
poetess,  and  active  supporter  of  the  Female  Educational 
Movement,  is  a  lively  and  very  affable  lady  of  some  five  and 
forty  years.  Her  elder  sister  must  be  some  years  her  senior. 
There  was  also  a  married  sister  present,  a  Mrs.  Collie,  also 
her  husband ;  Professor  Blackburn  of  Oxford,  Frank 
Tuckett  of  Frenchay,  and  Dr.  Beddoe,  F.R.S.,  etc.  Dinner 
was  ceremonious  but  good,  and  between  Mrs.  Collie  and 
Dr.  Beddoe  I  had  some  pleasant  conversation. 

"  On  Wednesday  morning  I  had  to  re-cast  the  end  of  my 
address  so  as  to  answer  Professor  Rowley's  remarks.  I 
arranged  also  to  have  a  few  experiments.  At  11  a.m.  the 
large  lecture-room  was  considerably  more  than  half  full, 
about  90  to  100  being  present. 

"  Followed  by  Lewis  Fry,  Dr.  Caldicott,  Mr.  Shacht,  etc., 
etc.,  I  solemnly  entered  the  room,  robed  and  hooded,  and 
took  my  place.  j 

"My  lecture,   which  I  timed  for  one  hour,  took  just 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  35 

sixty-three  minutes  to  deliver,  and  the  experiments  were 
very  successful — as  I  meant  them  to  be.  I  had  little 
applauses  several  times,  and  a  good  round  at  the  end. 
Lewis  Fry  and  Mr.  Shacht  came  afterwards  to  thank  me 
personally.  I  hear  that  it  was  thought  quite  a  success  aa 
an  address  ;  and  that  my  answer  to  Rowley  was  at  once 
complete  and  quiet.  In  the  evening  was  a  soiree  at  the 
Museum,  I  exhibited  several  bits  of  apparatus,  and  con- 
trived in  the  intervals  to  get  a  good  deal  of  chat  with  sundry 
people — Dr.  Percival,  Dr.  Beddoe,  Dr.  Shingleton  Smith, 
Dr.  Tilden  [afterwards  Sir  William  Tilden,  F.R.S.].  The 
affair  was  a  great  success,  over  800  tickets  having  been 
sold. 

"  This  morning  was  my  second  lecture,  I  had  twenty-two 
students  present,  the  nucleus  with  which  I  start  work. 

"  We  are  to  have  an  inauguration  of  the  evening  classes 
at  which  I  am  to  speak — but  my  first  evening  lecture  will 
be  on  Tuesday.  I  am  quite  falling  steadily  into  the  work 
of  the  College,  and  am  enjoying  it  thoroughly.  My  col- 
league, Mr.  Bousfield,  I  like  more  and  more.  He  has  a 
capital  knowledge  of  Physics,  and  we  have  many  a  chat 
together.  We  hope  to  do  a  little  research  together  by  and 
bye — if  we  have  time,  that  is. 

"  I  am  astonished  how  much  easier  it  is  to  me  to  lecture 
now  than  it  was  at  York.  No  doubt  the  number  of  lectures 
I  have  heard  during  last  year,  and  the  utter  attention  of  my 
students  has  something  to  do  with  it.  The  apparatus  is 
now  very  nearly  all  here,  and  looks  very  nice — only  I  wish 
we  had  a  little  more  of  it.  I  am  afraid  I  shall  a  little 
exceed  the  allotted  sum,  but  hope  it  will  not  be  so.  Another 
year,  if  the  Lectures  of  the  present  term  are  successful  I  shall 
be  sure  of  another  grant.  The  stingiest  of  the  Council — or 
I  should  say  the  most  cautious — remarked  how  nice  it 
looked.  I  instantly  turned  upon  him  afraid  to  lose  so  good 
a  chance  of  working  the  point : — the  procuring  of  some 
additional  apparatus.  '  That,  Mr.  Thompson,  must  depend  on 
the  results  of  the  present  session,'  was  the  rebuke  I  received. 

"Dear  love  to  mother  and  thyself.  How  quiet  you  will 
be  with  all  the  girls  away  !  Happily  you  have  Fan  at  school 
near,  and  she  will  be  at  home  to-day  (Saturday).  My  love 
to  her  too.  What  is  Tom  thinking  of  doing  when  he  leaves 
Harrogate  ?  Won't  he  try  to  see  something  of  the  merchant 
aspect  of  his  business  in  London  for  a  few  months.  I  am 
persuaded  it  will  be  very  greatly  to  his  advantage." 


36  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

The  two  younger  sons  of  Silvanus  Thompson  had  both 
started  on  what  their  father  hoped  was  to  be  the  training  for 
their  future  careers.  Thomas  had  been  learning  the  tea 
trade,  he  was  never  interested  in  business,  was  devoted 
to  music  and  drawing,  and  so  he  did  not  care  to  take 
his  brother's  suggestion  of  striking  out  boldly.  Finally 
he  entered  the  old  family  business  of  Tatham  &  Sons 
at  Settle,  where  he  lived  for  many  years,  spending  all  his 
spare  time  over  carving,  drawing,  or  music.  The  youngest 
son,  called  after  his  maternal  grandfather  John  Tatham, 
began  to  study  pharmaceutical  chemistry.  He  had  been 
apprenticed  to  a  firm  in  Scarborough,  but  had  a  serious 
attack  of  pneumonia  during  1876,  and  it  was  not  thought 
wise  for  him  to  return  to  the  bleak  East  Coast.  The  father 
had  to  break  off  his  indentures  at  considerable  loss,  and  was 
rather  puzzled  what  to  do  with  the  boy.  With  the  un- 
selfishness characteristic  of  him  throughout  life,  the  elder 
brother  offered  to  have  him  at  Clifton;  the  mild  climate 
was  just  what  was  needed,  and  he  could  help  his  brother 
in  the  laboratory  and  with  lecture  preparing.  The  parents 
were  delighted  with  the  plan,  and  Silvanus  found  much 
pleasure,  if  also  some  anxiety  and  responsibility,  in  the 
company  of  lively  Jack,  the  spoilt  boy  of  the  family. 

"  December  1st,   1876. 

"  MY  DEAR  FATHER, 

"  We  had  been  expecting  to  hear  from  you  to-day, 
and  were  quite  disappointed  when  no  letter  turned  up  this 
morning.  However,  we  suppose  that  mother  is  better,  or 
we  should  have  heard.  I  do  hope  she  will  soon  be  able  to 
get  about  the  house  as  usual. 

"  Jack  is  going  on  very  well  with  me.  He  works  hard, 
and  enjoys  the  work,  though  the  hours  are  long,  and  he 
gets  very  tired.  He  is  really  interested  in  the  work  and 
in  the  lectures,  and  is  a  really  valuable  help  to  me.  He 
finds  time  to  do  a  lot  of  drawing,  too,  of  which  I  am  glad,  as 
it  gives  him  occupation,  while  I  am  studying  at  home.  As 
to  anything  further  for  him  in  the  future,  I  do  not  see  any 
clear  course,  though  I  have  been  keeping  my  eyes  open. 

"  We  must  leave  it  for  the  present,  what  he  will  do, 
if  for  no  other  reason  that  circumstances  do  not  enable  us 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  37 

to  see  far  ahead.  Meantime  I  will  bear  in  mind  thy  sug- 
gestions and  wishes,  and,  as  before,  keep  on  the  watch  for 
opportunities.  On  Tuesday  we  ransacked  the  garrets  of  the 
Museum,  and  found  an  ocean  of  fine  apparatus.  Two 
glorious  air  pumps  (one  must  have  cost  £60)  in  good  condi- 
tion, but  more  than  inch  deep  in  dust,  and  quite  forgotten. 
Also  70  cells  of  Wollaston's  battery.  A  large  plate-glass 
electric  machine.  A  battery  of  12  Leyden  jars,  each  of 
2£  gallon  size  1 — and  an  Attwood's  machine  worth  at  least 
£50  at  the  present  moment,  besides  a  lot  of  lesser  apparatus. 

"  I  shall  have  the  opportunity  of  using  all  of  these  things 
for  my  Christmas  Lectures,  and  they  are  literally  '  a  find  '  ; 
but  there  will  be  some  red  tape  to  go  through  before  they 
can  be  used  for  the  lectures  of  the  College  Course — if  indeed 
they  can  be  got  at  all  for  that.  You  should  have  seen  the 
figures  that  Jack  and  I  cut  amongst  the  dust. 

"As  to  the  Christmas  Lectures,  everything  seems  to 
promise  favourably.  There  are  but  350  seats  in  the 
Lecture  Theatre — which  is  a  capital  room  for  the  purpose. 
More  than  130  tickets  have  been  already  sold,  already 
expenses  are  cleared.  Francis  J.  Fry  is  delighted  with  the 
outlook. 

"  I  now  have  fifty-two  students,  morning  and  evening 
together.  A  most  successful  beginning.  I  am  beginning 
to  think  seriously  whether  I  shall  not  try  for  the  D.Sc. 
examination  next  June.  The  thing  is  worth  doing  un- 
doubtedly, but  it  will  require  every  spare  moment,  from  the 
time  my  lectures  are  over,  until  the  day  of  the  examination. 
Then  there  is  the  question  in  which  branch  shall  I  attempt 
it  ?  Either  Electricity  and  Magnetism,  or  Physical  Optics 
and  Sound,  or  Physical  Optics  and  Heat  ?  " 


The  city  of  Bristol  possessed  a  very  good  Museum  and 
Public  Library,  attached  to  which  was  a  hall,  well  fitted 
both  for  hearing  lectures  and  seeing  experiments,  the  seats 
being  arranged  in  tiers  in  a  semicircle.  Here  by  the  invita- 
tion of  the  managing  council  of  the  Museum,  Thompson 
gave  six  lectures  on  "  The  Forces  of  Nature  "  adapted  to  a 
juvenile  audience. 

They  were  a  great  success  and  much  appreciated  by 
large  audiences,  the  exposition  was  clear,  and  the  experi- 
ments went  well.  They  included  the  subjects  of  Sound, 


38  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Light,  Heat,  and  Electricity,  two  lectures  being  devoted  to 
the  last-named. 

These  lectures  established  his  reputation  as  a  good  popular 
lecturer,  and  he  began  to  be  in  request  to  lecture  in  other 
places.  He  consented  to  undertake  some  work  under  the 
Gilchrist  Trust,  and  during  the  next  few  years  lectured  under 
their  auspices  in  many  towns  in  the  neighbouring  counties, 
at  Taunton,  •  Bridg  water,  Cheltenham,  West  on,  etc.,  and 
he  is  still  remembered  by  many  hearers. 

In  May  of  1877,  Silvanus  and  Bridget  Thompson  visited 
their  sons  at  Clifton,  and  were  much  pleased  and  satisfied 
with  their  work  and  surroundings.  This  was  the  only  time 
their  father  was  able  to  come  south,  as  he  became  increas- 
ingly disabled  and  enfeebled  by  severe  headaches  as  years 
went  on. 

Despite  his  lecture  engagements,  Thompson  still  continued 
his  researches  in  physics,  and  as  the  London  Physical 
Society's  meetings  were  held  at  the  week  end,  he  was  able 
to  attend  many  of  them,  bringing  to  them  the, "  fruits  of  his 
industrious  labours." 

He  was  also  able  to  keep  in  touch  with  the  many  friends 
whom  he  had  made  during  his  student  days,  and  frequently 
stayed  till  Sunday  night  with  Dr.  Gladstone  and  other 
friends. 

On  these  occasions  he  was  generally  to  be  seen  on 
Sunday  morning  at  Westminster  Meeting  House,  where  he 
was  welcomed  by  many.  During  his  student  days  he  had 
formed  a  friendship  with  another  science  student  who  was 
at  University  College,  Walter  Palmer  (afterwards  Sir  Walter 
Palmer,  M.P.),  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends.  He 
and  Thompson  kept  up  a  correspondence  for  many  years. 
In  1877  the  two  went  to  Switzerland  together  during  the 
long  vacation.  So  the  quiet  home  circle  at  York  was  again 
enlivened  by  journal  letters  describing  this  tour.  They 
went  up  the  Rhine  as  Silvanus  had  done  the  previous  year, 
but  did  not  linger  long.  He  mentions  a  visit  to  Strasbourg, 
"  going  minutely  over  the  laboratory  of  Professor  Kundt, 
and  being  well  pleased  with  what  he  saw."  At  Zurich  they 
made  a  short  stay  to  see  its  splendid  University.  He  wrote : 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  39 

"  This  morning  we  paid  a  visit  to  the  Physical  laboratory, 
also  went  over  the  Chemical  laboratory  in  the  Polytechnicum 
attached  to  the  University.  There  is  here  the  most 
complete  and  excellent  Engineering  school  in  Switzerland — 
probably  in  the  world.  This  we  went  over  also,  and  were 
immensely  pleased  with  what  we  saw." 

The  two  young  men  were  on  climbing  bent,  but  the 
weather  was  very  unfortunate  for  either  that  pastime  or  for 
sketching.  After  walking  over  the  two  Scheideck  Passes 
and  the  Grimsel  and  then  up  to  Zermatt,  mostly  in  rain  and 
clouds,  they  crossed  the  Theodule  into  Italy  under  the 
guidance  of  Peter  Taugwalder,  one  of  the  three  survivors  of 
the  Whymper  expedition.  On  the  way  over  the  Pass,  the 
day  being  a  glorious  one,  they  climbed  the  Little  Matter- 
horn.  Silvanus  wrote  : 

"  We  stood  upon  the  top  feasting  our  eyes  upon  the 
magnificent  circle  of  peaks  that  wound  around  on  every 
hand.  Such  sights  come  seldom  in  a  life-time.  When  they 
do,  they  awaken  emotions  and  thoughts  very  difficult  to 
forget — still  harder  to  express." 

Much  invigorated  by  this  holiday  and  change,  Thompson 
returned  to  prepare  his  papers  for  the  Meeting  of  the 
British  Association  at  Plymouth.  He  read  there  four 
communications.  One  was  the  first  part  of  a  long  research 
on  "  Binaural  Audition,"  or  "  Hearing  with  Two  Ears," 
which  was  not  completed  for  several  years,  and  which 
helped  to  gain  for  him  the  recognition  of  the  University  of 
Konigsberg,  which  granted  him  the  honorary  degrees  of 
M.D.  and  C.M. 

To  aid  him  in  demonstrating  electrical  experiments 
before  very  large  audiences,  Thompson  had  devised  a  form 
of  lantern  Galvanometer.  This  he  described  and  showed 
at  Plymouth.  It  was  mentioned  in  Engineering  of 
Nov.  2nd,  1877,  and  was  pronounced  to  be  an  exceedingly 
simple  instrument,  which  met  the  requirements  of  a  good 
lecture-room  galvanometer  in  a  remarkable  degree.  At  the 
Meeting  at  Plymouth  Sir  William  Thomson  spoke  of  the 
arrangement  as  "a  most  valuable  instrument,"  and  said 


40  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

that,  "  whenever  he  had  occasion  in  future  to  explain  electro- 
dynamic  phenomena  to  a  large  audience,  he  should  certainly 
avail  himself  of  Mr.  Thompson's  beautiful  arrangement." 

At  the  opening  of  the  Autumn  Session  at  Bristol  Uni- 
versity, Thompson  gave  the  Inaugural  Lecture  which  was 
later  published  as  a  pamphlet  entitled  The  Methods  of  Physical 
Science.  First  explaining  carefully  the  terms  ' '  phenomena, ' ' 
"experiment,"  "law,"  the  lecturer  went  on  to  show,  by  a 
wealth  of  reference  to  the  early  history  of  Physical  Science, 
that  law  could  only  be  deduced  from  the  observation  of 
phenomena,  after  experiment  which  proved  {he  facts. 

In  the  course  of  -his  historical  account  of  scientific  pro- 
gress he  referred  to  Dr.  Gilbert,  the  Elizabethan  writer  on 
magnetism,  in  whose  work  he  was  then  beginning  to  be  much 
interested.  In  enumerating  the  methods  of  Physical  Science 
he  grouped  them  under  various  heads,  Methods  of  Com- 
parison, Methods  of  Precision,  of  Analogy,  of  Hypothesis, 
Mathematical  and  Graphical  Methods.  He  endeavoured  to 
show  the  value  of  these  methods  in  the  training  of  the  mind. 

"As  a  mental  and  moral  training,  the  pursuit  of  the 
scientific  method  is  absolutely  priceless.  Just  think  of 
what  is  required  of  him  who  would  accurately  perform  a 
single  crucial  scientific  experiment.  It  is  a  moral  and 
intellectual  training  second  to  none.  The  will  must  be 
brought  into  active  and  perfect  obedience.  A  keenness  of 
moral  integrity  is  requisite  equal  to  that  demanded  of  any 
man  in  any  study. 

"  And  the  further  we  penetrate  and  explore,  and  the  more 
we  heap  up  to  ourselves  the  treasures  of  scientific  knowledge, 
the  more  surely  do  we  become  persuaded  of  the  aptness 
of  that  beautiful  simile  of  Newton's,  that  he  who  has  learnt 
most  widely  and  most  deeply  is  yet  but  as  a  child  gathering 
pebbles  under  the  blue  sky,  upon  the  shores  of  a  boundless 


Mr.  William  Crookes,  then  editor  of  the  Quarterly  Journal 
of  Science,  wrote  to  the  author  : 

"  It  has  given  me  so  much  pleasure  that,  had  I  known  of 
this  address  earlier,  I  should  have  been  happy  to  have 
printed  it  as  an  ordinary  article." 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  41 

During  the  Christmas  holidays  (1877-8)  Thompson  gave 
another  course  of  six  lectures  to  juveniles  on  "  Voltaic 
Electricity."  These  required  a  great  amount  of  illustration 
and  experiment,  and  occupied  much  time  in  preparation. 
In  attempting  to  explain  such  subjects  to  children,  he  was 
following  in  the  footsteps  of  Faraday  and  Tyndall,  and 
from  the  latter  he  received  a  short  note :  "I  wish  you 
success.  Your  movement,  depend  upon  it,  is  an  important 
one." 

The  lectures  were  brilliantly  successful,  and  the  experi- 
ments so  ingenious,  that  next  year  he  received  a  letter  from 
Mr.  Preece  (afterwards  Sir  William  H.  Preece),  of  the  Post 
Office,  asking  if  he  could  help  him  by  suggesting  some 
experiments  for  some  similar  lectures  at  the  Society  of  Arts. 
This  led  to  some  correspondence,  and  many  suggestions 
from  Thompson. 

Mr.  Preece  wrote : 

"  I  send  you  herewith  a  copy  of  the  lecture  I  gave  at  the 
Society  of  Arts.    You  will  see  I  used  two  of  your  experiments . 
"  I  think  your  ear  idear  a  splendid  one,  and  hope  you  will 
carry  it  out  sooner  or  later.     I  give  you  a  rough  sketch 
showing  how  we  made  the  hat  speak.     It  is  a  very  simple 
experiment,  and  very  telling.     With  many  thanks. 
Believe  me,  yours  sincerely,, 

W.  H.  PREECE." 

At  this  time  Thompson  was  in  frequent  correspondence 
with  Professor  Guthrie  in  regard  to  the  result  of  researches 
which  he  was  communicating  to  the  Physical  Society.  In 
December  he  wrote : 

"  Many  thanks  for  your  kind  offer  of  help  for  Saturday. 
I  am  very  sorry  that  I  cannot  come  up  for  the  day :  en- 
gagements are  too  pressing.  Prof.  Reinold  has  my  paper, 
and  the  specimens  of  films  are  under  the  care  of  my  friend 
Conrad  Cooke,  who  will  do  ample  justice  to  them.  There 
remains  consequently  nothing  further  to  ask  you  to  do, 
unless  you  think  it  might  be  well  to  have  some  other  wire 
frames,  and  a  Plateau's  soap  solution  in  order  that  the 
Society  may  see  in  what  respects  the  fixed  films  resemble 


42  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

or  differ  from  the  true  cohesion  films  of  Plateau.  You 
will  find  my  fixed  films  disappointing  in  not  yielding  chro- 
matic phenomena.  They  burst  before  setting  hard,  when 
made  as  thin  as  one  twenty-thousandth  of  an  inch. 

"  You  are  in  error  in  addressing  me  as  '  Professor.'  The 
Council  of  our  College  are  discussing  the  question  of  turning 
the  temporary  Lectureships  into  chairs — but  have  not  done 
it  yet.  So  I  have  no  claim  to  the  title." 


This  letter  refers  to  a  research  on  soap  films  communicated 
to  the  Physical  Society,  and  afterwards  published  under 
the  title  of  "Permanent  Plateau's  Films." 

The  day  after  Thompson's  paper  had  been  read  he  received 
a  letter  from  his  friend  Mr.  Oliver  J.  Lodge,  saying  :  "  Your 
permanent  films  went  off  all  right  to-day  at  the  Physical. 
It  is  jolly  being  able  to  have  hard  ones  like  that.  Their 
strength  is  remarkable." 

In  January  of  the  following  year  Thompson  began 
working  at  magnetical  problems,  and  several  interesting 
letters  passed  between  him  and  Professor  Guthrie.  On 
January  10th  he  wrote  : 

"  I  made  a  rather  interesting  observation  yesterday, 
which  I  wish  to  inform  you  of,  as  I  think  it  may  be  worth 
while  to  repeat  it  before  the  Physical  Society.  I. have 
neither  the  time  nor  the  means  to  prosecute  the  subject 
further  at  the  present  time.  The  observation  is  as  follows  : 
The  resistance  experienced  by  moving  bodies  in  traversing 
a  magnetic  field  is  experienced  also  by  vortex  rings  as  they 
cross  such  a  field.  My  experiment  was  made  with  vortices 
of  coloured  liquid,  in  water,  passing  either  through  a  coil 
of  wire  carrying  a  powerful  current  or  between  the  poles  of 
a  powerful  electromagnet.  The  resistance  was  not,  however, 
sufficiently  great  to  completely  retard  and  destroy  the 
vortices,  and  I  am  desirous  of  knowing  whether  this  would 
be  the  case  if  a  battery  of  60  or  70  Groves'  cells  were  employed 
to  excite  the  electromagnet.  I  am  sorry  I  have  no  prospect 
of  being  up  at  any  approaching  meeting  of  the  Physical 
Society,  or  I  would  have  asked  your  permission  to  take 
advantage  of  such  an  occasion  to  make  some  further 
experiments  in  your  laboratory." 


LECTURESHIP  AT  BRISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  43 

With  regard  to  the  researches  made  at  this  time  a  rather 
curious  occurrence  took  place  in  connexion  with  a  paper 
on  "Some  Magnetic  Figures  made  by  Means  of  Iron  Filings," 
which  Thompson  had  shown  at  the  Physical  Society,  and 
which  had  been  apparently  accepted  as  a  new  piece  of 
research.  However,  afterwards  Professor  Guthrie  admitted 
in  conversation  that  these  were  not  new  to  him,  and  the 
following  letter  from  Thompson  explains  itself,  and  is  char- 
acteristic of  the  man : 

"  I  have  been  thinking  over  the  question  I  put  to  you  last 
Saturday,  as  to  whether  my  filing-figures  were  new  to  you, 
and  feel  a  little  puzzled  how  to  act  on  your  reply.  I  wish 
I  had  been  able  to  see  you  in  the  morning,  that  I  might 
have  learned  then  that  you  had  preceded  me  in  this  little 
item  of  research,  for  it  was  relying  on  the  opinion  of 
Prof.  G.  C.  Foster  and  Prof.  Adams  that  they  were  new 
results  that  I  was  induced  to  show  them  to  the  Society. 
And  of  your  generosity  in  not  publicly  stating  your  previous 
knowledge  of  them  I  know  not  what  to  think. 

"  But  the  difficulty  of  the  situation  to  me  lies  here  :  that 
I  am  placed  in  the  position,  when  I  contemplate  publishing 
the  paper,  of  being  about  to  claim  for  myself  what  I  know 
to  belong  to  another,  though  I  arrived  at  it  independently. 

"  It  appears  to  me  that  three  courses  are  open  to  me : 

"  (1)  To  publish  my  series  of  figures,  saying  nothing 
about  knowing  now  that  I  am  not  the  first  with  them — a 
course  which  I  simply  refuse  to  take. 

"  (2)  To  publish  the  results  as  far  as  they  go,  adding 
that  I  have  been  informed  that  you  have  already  done 
the  very  thing. 

"  (3)  To  ask  you  if  you  are  willing  to  publish  your  results, 
and  whether  in  that  case  you  will  accept  and  embody  mine, 
in  part  or  entire,  and  stating  that  I  had  independently 
arrived  at  those  which  are  in  my  series. 

"  I  want  to  take  no  action  in  this  matter  that  you  would 
not  cordially  approve,  and  I  hope  you  will — as  I  know  you 
will  do — answer  me  with  the  freedom  with  which  I  lay  the 
matter  before  you." 

To  this  Dr.  Guthrie  replied  that  three  or  fou    years  ago 
Professor  Barrett 1  had  shown  him  some  similar  figures,  but 
r    *  Of  Dublin ;  now  Sir  William  Barrett,  F.B.S. 


44  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

that  lie  did  not  claim  them  as  new,  and  advising  him  to  ask 
Professor  Barrett  what  literature  there  was  on  the  matter. 


"  I  have  no  claim  in  the  matter.  But  in  any  case  I  think 
it  would  be  well  to  state  something  to  the  effect  that  you 
are  informed  that  some  of  these  effects,  though  unpublished, 
have  been  exhibited  before." 


Before  receiving  this  advice  Thompson  found  that  his 
electromagnetic  figures  had  already  been  shown  by  Faraday, 
from  whose  researches  Professor  Barrett  also  had  got  them. 
He  wrote : 

"  I  am  surprised,  not  that  I  did  not  know  of  their  existence 
in  Faraday's  book,  but  that  no  one  of  the  members  of  the 
Physical  Society  knew.  I  shall  have  to  make  the  amende 
honorable  to  Prof.  Adams  as  President.  The  other  results 
of  which  I  spoke  are  not  described  in  Faraday." 

During  this  year  also  Silvanus  Thompson  designed  some 
very  curious  optical  illusions  which  he  called  "  Strobic 
Circles."  They  excited  considerable  interest  among 
scientific  men  both  in  England  and  France.  He  had 
them  printed  on  cards  in  sets  of  six,  they  were  entered  at 
Stationers'  Hall,  and  many  thousands  were  sold.  They 
attracted  the  attention,  among  others,  of  Dr.  J.  Crichton 
Browne  (afterwards  Sir  James  Crichton  Browne),  who  asked 
that  a  description  of  them  might  appear  in  the  periodical 
Brain,  as  he  thought  they  were  of  special  interest  to  those 
who  were  engaged  in  the  study  of  brain  and  nervous  diseases. 
This  was  done,  and  they  thus  reached  a  wide  public. 
Professor  Stirling,  of  the  Physiological  Department  of 
Owen's  College,  Manchester,  wrote  some  years  later  to 
Silvanus  Thompson  that  these  Strobic  Circles  had  "  amused 
many  a  passing  moment.  If  any  knowledge  I  have  from 
the  anatomic-physiological  point  of  view  is  of  any  use  to 
you,  it  is  at  your  service  con  amore.  Your  arrangement  of 
whirling  cylinder  is  excellent." 

The  Strobic  Circles  reached  a  still  wider  public  when  they 


LECTUKESHIP  AT  BEISTOL,  EARLY  RESEARCHES  45 

were  used,  with  permission  of  course,  by  a  famous  soap 
maker  as  an  advertisement  of  his  wares. 

During  this  second  year  of  Thompson's  Lectureship, 
when  his  reputation  both  as  a  researcher  and  as  a  teacher 
was  growing  with  great  rapidity,  the  Council  of  the  College 
managed  to  collect  sufficient  funds  to  endow,  very  modestly 
it  must  be  confessed,  a  Chair  of  Physics.  To  this  he  was 
elected  in  the  autumn  of  1878,  the  same  year  in  which  he 
had  also  taken  his  degree  of  D.Sc.  at  London  University, 
in  the  branches  of  Optics,  Heat,  and  Sound. 

But  the  progress  and  growth  of  the  University  College 
was  very  slow ;  funds  did  not  come  in  as  freely  as  had  been 
hoped,  and  the  scientific  departments  were  cramped  for  space 
and  hampered  by  want  of  both  proper  equipment  and  of 
assistance.  Professor  Thompson  no  longer  had  his  young 
brother  as  a  voluntary  assistant  in  his  laboratory,  and  he 
had  to  spend  much  valuable  time,  not  only  in  looking  after 
his  apparatus,  but  in  actually  making  many  pieces  himself, 
which  might  have  been  provided  for  his  use.  It  was 
not  until  several  years  later  that  he  was  allowed  an  assistant. 

The  College  Council  consisted  of  men  who  had  little  or  no 
apprehension  of  the  enormous  and  rapid  development  which 
was  taking  place  in  the  knowledge  and  teaching  of  electricity. 
The  Principal  also,  Professor  Alfred  Marshall  the  economist, 
was  not  particularly  interested  in  science,  so  it  was  very 
uphill  work  for  any  man  who  was  seeking  to  keep  abreast 
of  the  demands  of  the  age. 

That  year  he  still  went  on  diligently  working  at  small 
pieces  of  research  which  cropped  up  in  connexion  with  his 
teaching.  He  also  collaborated  with  Mr.  Oliver  J.  Lodge, 
then  an  assistant  to  Professor  Carey  Foster  of  University 
College,  London,  in  a  research  on  the  peculiar  properties  of 
the  tourmaline,  a  semi-precious  gem.  This  consisted  of  a 
study  of  the  Unilateral  Conductivity  of  Electricity  in  the 
crystals.  The  important  result  obtained  was  the  proof  of 
"  convection  of  heat  by  Electricity  analogous  to  an  effect 
predicted  by  Sir  William  Thomson  in  unequally  heated 
metals  (Bakerian  Lecture,  1856)."  The  results  of  the 
research  were  communicated  to  Section  A  of  the  British 


46  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Association  at  Dublin  by  Thompson.  He  also  read,  among 
other  communications,  Part  II  of  his  research  on  "  Binaural 
Audition." 

The  President  of  that  year  was  Dr.  William  Spottiswoode, 
an  authority  on  optical  phenomena.  Among  the  Associates 
of  the  Meeting  were  Jane  Henderson  and  her  sister,  who 
were  staying  with  some  Quaker  cousins  near  Dublin. 
Jane  Henderson  was  at  that  time  on  the  literary  staff  of 
The  Glasgow  Daily  Mail,  to  which  her  father  had  also  been 
a  contributor  for  many  years,  and  she  was  engaged  by  the 
Editor  of  the  journal  as  special  correspondent  to  write  a 
lively  general  account  of  the  meeting.  The  sections  where 
their  old  acquaintance  Silvanus  Thompson  was  showing 
any  of  his  fascinating  experiments  were  of  course  diligently 
attended. 

The  phenomenon  of  the  rainbow  and  its  optical  causes 
had  for  long  attracted  the  attention  of  Thompson,  who 
with  his  love  for  painting,  and  his  strong  sense  of  the  beauty 
of  colour,  had  tried  to  reproduce  its  marvels.  This 
autumn  he  gave  a  lecture  to  the  Bristol  Naturalists  Society 
"  On  some  Obscure  Points  about  Kainbows."  It  was 
enriched  with  quotations  from  poets  and  writers  from 
Aristotle  onwards,  and  illustrated  by  a  great  number  of 
experiments.  It  created  quite  a  furore  among  the  artistic 
and  literary  circles  in  Clifton,  and  was  talked  about  for 
a  long  time  afterwards. 


CHAPTER    IV 

PIONEER    WORK    IN    TECHNICAL    EDUCATION 

SILVANUS  THOMPSON  found  himself  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
seven  occupying  a  post  such  as  he  had  never  dreamt  of 
attaining  to  when  he  started  on  his  scientific  career. 
Now  he  felt  the  full  responsibility  of  the  opportunities 
which  lay  before  him,  and  set  to  work  with  a  will  to  take 
advantage  of  them.  Along  with  most  of  the  earnest  young 
Quakers  of  his  generation,  he  had  not  been  indifferent  to  the 
subject  of  the  social  amelioration  of  the  working  classes. 

He  was  a  diligent  reader  and  great  admirer  of  the  writings 
of  John  Ruskin,  and  believed  with  him  that  better  conditions 
would  arise  were  the  people  better  educated.  Ruskin's 
idea  was  to  bring  this  about  through  teaching  the  use  of 
museums  and  the  study  of  art. 

At  the  time  when  Thompson  began  to  interest  himself  in 
a  better  system  of  primary  and  technical  education,  he  had 
some  correspondence  with  Ruskin,  but  it  did  not  result  in 
any  very  practical  help  towards  a  solution  of  the  difficulties. 

With  Dr.  John  HaU  Gladstone,  F.R.S.,  who  was  for 
fifteen  years  a  member  of  the  London  School  Board,  he  had 
been  in  constant  correspondence  for  several  years.  Dr. 
Gladstone  regarded  the  education  problem  from  the  point 
of  view  of  a  scientific  man ;  Silvanus  Thompson  did  the  same. 
The  former  was  a  pioneer  worker  in  trying  to  obtain  a  less 
clerkly  education  for  the  children  of  London,  and  succeeded, 
while  he  was  Chairman  of  the  London  School  Board,  in  intro- 
ducing some  more  systematic  teaching  of  handwork  and 
simple  nature  study  into  the  curriculum  of  the  schools. 
But  for  the  older  children  there  was  still  far  too  little  of  this 
teaching,  and  the  small  amount  which  they  learned  at 
school  left  them  only  fitted  for  blind-alley  occupations. 

47 


48  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Those  who  entered  the  industries  wasted  much  of  their 
time  in  simply  trying  to  be  imitators,  without  having  any 
scientific  knowledge  of  the  materials  employed,  or  of  the 
proper  use  of  tools. 

Thompson  had  already  found  how  difficult  it  was  to  get 
pieces  of  apparatus  made  in  workshops  from  his  own  design, 
exactly  to  drawings  or  to  scale.  Especially  for  optical 
research  he  had  found  himself  obliged  to  employ  foreign 
workmen  to  make  apparatus  for  him.  He  was  also  far- 
seeing  enough  to  recognise  that  industries,  electrical, 
chemical,  and  optical,  were  going  to  develop  more  and 
more  in  the  future ;  unless  England  woke  up  to  the  need 
of  technical  education,  she  would  be  left  far  behind  in 
the  race. 

With  his  usual  thoroughness,  he  determined  to  see  for 
himself  what  was  already  being  done  in  technical  education 
abroad,  in  order  to  acquire  a  comprehensive  grasp  of  the 
subject. 

He  therefore  devoted  much  time  during  several  vacations 
to  making  studies  of  how  the  people  of  France,  Germany, 
and  Switzerland  were  dealing  with  the  question,  as  well  as 
giving  attention  to  what  was  being  attempted  in  this 
country. 

His  first  public  contribution  to  the  discussion  of  this 
problem,  which  was  beginning  to  take  hold  of  many  thinkers 
of  that  period,  was  a  paper  read  at  the  Social  Science 
Congress  at  Cheltenham  in  1878,  entitled  "Technical 
Education,  Where  it  should  be  given." 

After  reviewing  the  condition  of  scientific  teaching  in  our 
schools  and  colleges,  which  at  that  time  showed  only  the 
rudiments  of  what  was  really  required,  he  pointed  out  how 
the  old  system  of  apprenticeship  had  died  out,  and  some- 
thing new  must  be  created  to  take  its  place.  He  then  gave 
an  account  of  the  Ecoles  d'Apprentis  of  Paris  and  Besan^on, 
and  of  Gewerbeschule  and  Polytechnicum  of  Germany  and 
Switzerland.  This  paper  was  subsequently  printed  as  a 
pamphlet,  and  when  it  fell  into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Ruskin, 
the  author  received  the  following  characteristic  letter  from 
him : 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    49 

"  BBENTWOOD,  CONISTON,  LANCASHIBE. 

"MY  DEAR  SIR, 

"  I  have  read  your  paper  with  great  interest,  and 
entirely  concur  in  most  of  its  statements  and  recommenda- 
tions. But  it  fatally  ignores — what  none  of  our  modern 
thinkers  that  I  know  of  ever  have  recognised — the  power 
of  race  and  climate. 

"  The  sentence — '  There  is  no  reason  why  an  English 
workman  should  not  take,'  etc.,  etc.,  p.  10 — is  too  fatally 
false.1  No  good  decorative  work  ever  has  been  done  in 
England — or  ever  will  be.  It  belongs  to  Etruscan  and 
Pelagic  races  exclusively — and  in  America — no  art  whatever 
will  be  possible  these  hundred  years. 

"  If  you  care  to  look  up  my  published  lectures,  you  will 
see  these  statements  made  at  length — and  they  are  irre- 
fragable. You  can  no  more  teach  an  Englishman  to  paint 
a  wall  than  a  kingfisher  to  build  a  honeycomb. 

"  Ever  truly  yours, 

"J.    RUSKIN." 

Thompson's  reply  to  this  has  not  been  preserved.  Not 
long  after  he  received  another  letter  from  Ruskin,  which 
shows  his  disappointment  over  his  efforts  in  stirring  up 
public  interest  in  education : 

"  BBENTWOOD, 
"  January  25th,  1879. 

"DEAR  PROFESSOR  THOMPSON, 

"  I  have  kept  your  kind  letter  by  me,  till  in  a  day  of 
desperate  effort  to  fulfil  the  duties  of  the  past  month — I 
must  try  to  thank  you  for  it.  I  am  so  very  glad  to  hear  of 
anyone  '  missing '  Fors.  I  hope,  however,  her  work  is 
done — as  far  as  in  this  present  time  is  needful  or  possible. 
I  had  no  conception  of  the  injury  it  was  doing  me  to  live  in 
the  perpetual  heated  air  of  indignation,  an  effort  or  two 
lately  made  to  resume  the  index-work  have  instantly  been 
checked  as  if  I  had  stooped  in  the  Grotto  del  Cane. 

"  Those  who  see  the  truth  and  the  horror  of  existing  facts 

1  The  paragraph  referred  to  on  p.  10  of  Thompson's  pamphlet  ran  as 
follows  : 

"  There  is  no  reason  why  an  English  workman  should  not  take  just  as 
high  a  place  in  the  skilled  industries  as  a  German  or  an  American  workman. 
When  he  has  the  chance  of  acquiring  the  training  he  is  in  no  respect 
inferior,  possessing  more  independence  than  the  one,  and  more  self-control 
than  the  other." 
4 


50  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

must  now  deal  with  them — I  can  do  no  more— except  by 
little  by  little — my  index  and  the  essential  (absolutely) 
work  of  the  Mastership  till  /  can  find  a  Master. 

Ever   gratefully   yours, 

J.    RUSKIN." 

"  The  horror  of  existing  facts  "  only  stimulated  Silvanus 
Thompson  to  more  strenuous  endeavours  to  pursue  his 
advocacy  of  Technical  Education.  The  City  Guilds  of 
London  and  other  City  Councils  were  beginning  to  take  up 
the  idea  of  providing  trade  schools  and  institutes  for  the 
better  training  of  youths  about  to  enter  the  industries.  It 
was  therefore  most  important  that  these  should  be  started 
on  right  lines  and  adapted  to  local  needs.  The  Easter 
vacation  of  1879  was  spent  by  him  in  studying  in  France 
the  systems  growing  up  there.  During  the  summer  he 
published  a  slender  volume  entitled  Apprenticeship  Schools 
in  France.  In  it  he  pointed  out  how  in  France  "  The  School 
in  the  Workshop  "  had  existed  for  thirty  years,  giving 
examples  of  what  he  had  seen,  such  as  a  famous  factory  for 
making  opera-glasses,  the  printing  of  railway  timetables, 
watchmaking  at  Besan^on,  etc.  The  whole  volume  is 
full  of  carefully  collected  facts  about  the  various  types  of 
education  for  apprentices  in  that  country. 

Some  months  later  he  received  a  communication  from 
the  Secretary  of  the  American  Institute  of  Instruction  at 
Boston  expressing  great  pleasure  in  the  pamphlet,  and 
asking  if  the  author  could  suggest  any  particular  lines  of 
inquiry,  which  would  enable  their  Institute  to  try  to 
incorporate  such  ideas  as  a  regular  feature  in  public  educa- 
tion. The  writer  concludes  by  saying  : 

"  Pray  pardon  the  boldness  of  this  enquiry.  The  earnest, 
disinterested  spirit  which  pervades  your  writings  on  this 
subject  prompts  it.  I  take  the  liberty  of  sending  you  a 
copy  of  some  remarks  of  my  own  at  Philadelphia  last  year, 
and  I  hope  to  get  the  subject  in  its  distinctly  commercial 
aspect  before  our  National  Board  of  Trade  before  many 
months." 

In  a  visit  to  the  United  States  in  1884,  Thompson  found 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    51 

how  rapidly  the  idea  of  Technical  Instruction  had  spread  in 
that  country,  and  was  able  to  gain  much  valuable  informa- 
tion and  guidance  for  future  use  in  spreading  the  desire  for 
it  here. 

During  the  long  vacation  of  1879  he  made  a  pilgrimage 
round  the  Trades  Schools  in  Yorkshire  and  the  North  of 
England,  and  also  visited  Glasgow,  where  a  Technical  College 
already  existed.  In  this  city  he  was  the  guest  of  James 
Henderson,  then  Superintending  Inspector  of  Factories  for 
Scotland  and  the  northern  counties  of  England,  with  whom 
he  had  formed  a  friendship  during  his  student  days  in 
London. 

James  Henderson  had  had  long  and  varied  experience  of 
social  conditions  among  the  workers  in  different  parts  of 
England  and  Scotland,  and  was  well  known  as  a  writer 
on  economic  questions. 

He  was  therefore  well  able  to  enter  fully  into  sympathy 
with  Thompson's  aims,  and  to  help  him  in  various  directions. 

On  leaving  Glasgow  Thompson  went  to  Germany,  and 
visited  the  great  Technical  Institute  at  Charlottenburg, 
also  those  at  Hanover  and  Chemnitz.  On  reaching  Leipzig, 
however,  his  investigations  were  cut  short  by  a  very  severe 
attack  of  laryngitis.  His  youngest  brother  was  obliged  to 
go  to  him  there,  and  nurse  him  until  well  enough  to  travel 
home.  He  was  unable  to  fulfil  several  autumn  lecture 
engagements  which  had  been  arranged  for,  but  in  December 
he  read  a  paper  to  the  Society  of  Arts  by  request. 

He  chose  as  his  title  "  Apprenticeship  :  Scientific  and 
Unscientific."  Professor  Huxley  was  in  the  chair,  and  there 
was  a  large  attendance.  Thompson  began  by  giving 
instances  of  the,  in  most  cases,  hopelessly  inefficient  train- 
ing then  being  given  in  the  workshops  of  this  country. 
He  then  proceeded  to  lay  down  several  general  principles 
of  technical  instruction  which  ought  to  be  followed  in  training 
future  workers : 

"  Firstly,  in  learning  to  perform  any  handicraft  operation, 
or  to  use  skilfully  any  tool  or  appliance,  it  is  evident  that 
the  ability  to  do  that  one  thing  rapidly  and  well  can  only 
be  acquired  by  practice  ;  and  that  the  beginner  must  learn 


52  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

by  doing  the  things  many  times  over,  slowly  and  carefully 
at  first,  rapidly  and  well  afterwards. 

"  Secondly,  whereas  in  the  case  of  most  skilled  (and  in 
many  so-called  unskilled)  industries,  the  craftsman  must 
know  how  to  do  a  great  many  things,  or  to  use  many  different 
tools,  it  is  evident  that  the  process  of  acquiring  the  complete 
knowledge  of  the  craft  will  be  much  facilitated  if  the 
learner  be  not  kept  doing  over  again  that  which  he  already 
knows  how  to  do  rapidly  and  well.  Having  gained  skill 
in  one  operation  by  doing  it  often  enough  to  acquire  speed 
and  precision,  he  ought  at  once  to  set  about  mastering  the 
difficulties  of  some  other  operation.  If  he  is  kept  for 
months  or  years  doing  over  and  over  again  that  which  he 
already  knows  to  do  rapidly  and  well,  employed  as  a  cheap 
machine  simply  to  put  money  into  his  master's  pocket,  he 
is  losing  just  so  much  time  of  his  apprenticeship. 

"  Thirdly,  all  practical  operations  which  have  thus  to  be 
learned  by  repetition  ought  to  be  presented  to  the  learner 
in  a  graduated  order,  best  suited  to  his  growing  powers  ; 
the  easy  first,  the  harder  as  he  gains  power  and  knowledge. 
The  round  of  manual  requirements  ought  to  be  rationally 
and  systematically  arranged. 

"  Fourthly,  'no  apprentice  should  be  allowed  to  do  any- 
thing without  being  shown  or  told  how  to  do  it.  It  is  a 
point  of  the  utmost  importance  that  the  young  workman 
should  never  be  allowed  to  work  unintelligently  ;  the  habit 
of  unintelligent  working  once  acquired  is  hardly  ever  thrown 
off.  The  rational  plan  is  to  ascertain  first  how  a  thing 
should  be  done,  and  then  to  do  it.  This  constitutes,  indeed, 
the  main  difference  in  many  trades  between  the  practical 
training  of  English  and  Continental  workmen. 

"  Fifthly,  instruction  in  the  general  principles  of  science, 
which  underlie  almost  all  handicraft  trades,  ought  to  be 
taught  systematically  to  the  learner  by  teachers  who 
understand  what  they  are  teaching,  and  who  are  also 
acquainted  with  the  practical  details  of  the  trade." 

The  lecturer  then  went  on  to  review  the  whole  field  of 
what  was  being  done  in  this  country,  pointing  out  that  in 
the  Weaving  Schools  of  Leeds,  Bradford,  Huddersfield,  and 
elsewhere,  there  was  the  beginning  of  that  technical  educa- 
tion which  was  required  in  every  trade  and  handicraft  all 
over  the  land.  He  recounted  what  he  had  learned  at  first 
hand  of  Technical  Schools  abroad.  He  pointed  out  many 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    53 

reforms  needed  in  this  country,  and  advocated  the  appoint- 
ment of  a  Minister  of  Education.  Professor  Huxley,  in 
inviting  discussion,  said  that  he  had  listened  with  the 
greatest  gratification  to  Professor  Thompson's  paper,  not 
merely  on  account  of  the  obvious  practical  familiarity 
with  the  subject  which  it  evinced,  and  the  valuable  good 
sense  which  it  embodied,  but  for  a  more  selfish  reason — 
because  it  entirely  accorded  with  the  views  he  had  himself 
expressed,  coming  to  the  matter  from  a  very  different  side. 
Two  years  before  he  had  given  advice  as  regards  this 
question  which  would  be  found  to  be  in  precise  accordance 
with  the  principles  Professor  Thompson  had  laid  down. 
During  the  discussion,  Mr.  George  Ho  well,  Mr.  Hodgson 
Pratt,  and  Dr.  J.  Hall  Gladstone  expressed  approval,  with 
some  criticisms,  of  the  ideas  "  advocated  so  eloquently  " 
by  the  lecturer.  Professor  Perry  and  Professor  Ayrton  both 
thought  that  England  was  too  conservative  to  make  use  of 
trade  schools,  and  that  methods  adopted  by  Continental 
nations  would  not  suit  our  people.  Professor  Huxley, 
in  winding  up  the  discussion,  referred  to  the  City  Guilds  of 
London  which  were  established  to  aid  their  respective  trades, 
and  declared  that,  if  the  people  of  this  country  did  not  insist 
on  their  wealth  being  applied  to  its  proper  purpose,  "  they 
deserved  to  be  taxed  down  to  their  shoes." 

In  later  years  when,  as  Principal,  Thompson  came  to  carry 
out  practically  some  of  the  principles  which  he  had  laid 
down  so  clearly  in  1879,  one  of  his  students  wrote  : 

"  Technical  education  was  new  and  on  its  trial,  much 
less  developed  in  England  than  in  Germany  and  the  United 
States,  and  was  in  England  at  any  rate  looked  at  askance 
by  the  '  practical  man.'  He  [Thompson]  was  therefore 
most  anxious  to  demonstrate  to  each  side  the  benefits  of  co- 
operation between  science  and  industry,  and  he  constantly 
impressed  on  his  students  that  when  we  got  to  the  Works 
we  must  keep  good  time,  conform  to  all  the  rules,  and  be 
willing  to  do  any  job  assigned  to  us,  however  dirty  and 
disagreeable  it  might  be.  But  while  inculcating  the  neces- 
sity of  bearing  the  yoke  cheerfully  in  the  workshop,  he  was 
also  careful  to  awaken  what  he  called  '  the  professional 
instinct '  in  his  students,  and  as  one  means  to  that  end 


54  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

encouraged  all  to  become  student-members  of  the  Institution 
of  Electrical  Engineers  and  attend  its  meetings  and  those 
of  other  scientific  societies.  Such  meetings  were  great 
times,  when  we  saw  and  heard  all  the  big  men  of  the  elec- 
trical world." 

Another  friend  wrote  : 

"  Thompson  was  always  inspiring  when  he  took  up  the 
cause  of  scientific  industry.  His  wide  experience  brought 
him  endless  examples  of  how  to  do  it,  and  how  not  to  do 
it,  whether  in  electric  work,  glass  work,  or  the  dye-stuff 
industry. 

"  '  Belittle  the  teachings  of  science  ;  ignore  the  expert 
trained  in  science,'  he  would  say  ;  '  carry  on  your  works 
without  him  ;  if  you  must  pay  him,  pay  him  less  wages 
than  you  pay  a  fitter  ;  put  him  under  non-technical 
directors  and  managers  who  know  no  science.  Then,  when 
after  years  of  neglect,  your  chickens  come  home  to  roost, 
and  you  find  the  progress  which  ought  to  have  been  made 
here  is  made  in  foreign  countries  instead,  blame  the  patent 
laws,  blame  the  lack  of  protective  tariffs,  blame  the  Trades 
Unions.  Blame  everything  and  anything,  except  the 
chief est  cause — the  blindness  of  manufacturers  and  men 
to  the  truth  that :  that  industry  is  doomed  the  leaders  of 
which  despise  and  neglect  science  !  " 

His  "  gospel  of  industry  "  and  improved  condition  for  the 
workers  depended  most  of  all  on  the  teaching  of  science, 
first  in  the  training  of  eye  and  hand  in  the  elementary  school, 
then  simple  scientific  teaching  about  common  objects  and 
natural  phenomena,  in  secondary  schools,  finally  science  as 
applied  to  tools  and  processes  in  the  technical  colleges. 

Thompson's  researches  during  this  year  had  been  directed 
to  magnetical  problems,  the  "  Action  of  Magnets  on  Mobile 
Conductors  of  Current  "  and  cognate  questions.  But  his 
research  work  was  carried  out  under  great  difficulties,  and 
he  was  feeling  discouraged  about  it. 

His  friend  Professor  W.  F.  Barrett  of  Dublin,  writing  to 
the  College  secretary  thanking  him  for  the  College  Calendar 
in  1880,  sent  a  message:  "Pray  tell  my  friend  Dr.  S. 
Thompson  it  appears  from  your  calendar  he  is  killing  him- 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    55 

self  with  work.  His  life  is  too  valuable  to  be  sacrificed 
quite  so  early." 

Besides  the  elementary  and  advanced  courses  in  physics 
and  the  evening  lectures,  he  gave  four  periods  a  week  to 
teaching  Geometrical  Drawing,  and  four  to  Surveying, 
including  during  the  summer  one  afternoon  a  week  which 
was  devoted  to  field  practice.  One  of  his  old  students  recalls 
how  they  used  to  go  out  tramping  to  some  vantage-point, 
and  how,  when  the  work  was  done,  the  youths  were  only  too 
delighted  to  profit  by  the  kindly  good  humour  of  their 
teacher  which  prompted  him  to  supply  the  party  with 
chocolate. 

The  two  following  letters  to  Professor  Guthrie  tell  their 
own  story.  They  are  dated  from  Carlton  Place,  Clifton, 
where  Professor  Thompson  and  his  brother  were  then  living  : 

"DEAR  DR.  GUTHRIE, 

"  Pray  don't  be  surprised  at  the  occasion  of  my 
writing  to  you. 

"It  is  to  ask  the  favour  of  your  support  in  my  probable 
candidature  for  the  Chair  of  Physics  in  the  Josiah  Mason 
College  at  Birmingham. 

"  My  reasons  for  contemplating  this  step  are  easily 
stated.  Here  my  opportunities  for  work  in  Physics  are 
terribly  circumscribed.  My  lecture-room  is  used  for  all 
sorts  of  other  lectures.  My  only  laboratory  is  a  damp 
cellar  11  feet  by  9  feet.  The  College  cannot  afford  me  any 
assistant,  nor  can  it  afford  proper  apparatus  for  any  exact 
quantitative  work — they  won't  even  buy  a  barometer  that 
will  read  to  the  tenth  of  an  inch.  Moreover,  I  am  saddled 
with  work  that  I  do  not  care  to  continue — the  teaching  of 
geometrical  drawing  for  example.  The  change  will  involve 
pecuniary  loss — at  least  at  first.  Nevertheless  I  must  regard 
opportunities  for  thought  and  work  as  higher  than  that. 
You  know  me,  I  trust,  sufficiently  well  to  speak  of  my 
capabilities  and  work  ;  and  I  shall  esteem  it  a  favour  if  you 
are  able  to  furnish  me  with  some  definite  evidence  to  help 
me  in  seeking  to  obtain  the  post." 

Professor  Thompson  did  not  succeed  in  the  candidature 
for  this  post,  but  soon  after  writing  this  letter  he  went 


56.  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

off  to  Glasgow  on  a  visit  to  his  former  host  there,  James 
Henderson. 

During  his  visit  there  in  the  autumn  he  had  renewed 
his  friendship  with  the  young  people,  whom  he  had  first 
known  during  his  student  days.  The  family  life  was  of  the 
same  quiet  simple  Quaker  type  in  which  he  had  himself 
been  brought  up.  But  the  three  grown-up  daughters  were 
all  keenly  interested  in  music,  art,  and  literature,  and  he 
found  much  in  common  with  them.  So  the  announcement 
of  his  engagement  to  the  eldest  was  not  a  great  surprise 
to  his  family,  as  he  had  already  hinted  to  his  mother  of  the 
object  of  his  journey  North. 

On  his  way  back  from  Glasgow  he  went  to  York  to  tell 
his  parents  about  the  new  daughter  that  was  to  be.  After 
this  time  letters  flew  northwards  frequently,  chronicling  the 
life  and  thoughts  of  a  lover  gifted  with  no  mean  powers  of 
expression. 

At  the  beginning  of  this  term  there  was  a  change  in  the 
staff  of  the  College,  Professor  Letts  having  returned  to 
Belfast  to  the  Chair  of  Chemistry  there.  He  was  succeeded 
by  Dr.  William  Ramsay  of  Glasgow,  with  whom  Thompson 
formed  a  lifelong  friendship.  They  had  many  tastes  in 
common,  though  politically  they  were  diametrically 
opposed.  Silvanus,  however,  took  very  little  part  in  politics, 
and  detested  party  tactics.  He  was,  however,  a  good  deal 
interested  in  the  elections  of  1880,  as  Lewis  Fry  was  standing 
as  Liberal  candidate  for  Bristol. 

To  his  fiancee  he  wrote  in  April : 

"  I  am  delighted  at  the  progress  of  the  elections,  and  the 
unmistakeable  decision  against  the  worst  and  most  un- 
principled of  modern  governments  and  the  flashy  froth  of 
the  Jew. 

"  Our  election  is  to-morrow,  I  hope  we  shall  be  all  right ; 
but  it  will  be  a  near  run." 

To  the  same  next  day  : 

"  We  had  a  very  exciting  time.  The  day  was  fine 
between  the  showers,  and  the  city  was  enormously  crowded, 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    57 

and  very  gay  with  party  colours.  I  never  saw  party  feeling 
run  so  high  before,  anywhere.  I  dined  that  night  with  the 
Wills,  the  cousins  of  the  new  M.P.  for  Coventry — there 
were  about  twenty  present — all  men — all  Liberals— just 
the  lively  younger  men  of  the  party.  After  dinner  we 
adjourned  to  the  city — just  too  late  to  hear  the  news  of 
Fry's  election,  and  the  speeches,  but  in  time  to  see  the 
enthusiastic  crowds  surrounding  the  newspaper  offices, 
where  telegrams  were  posted.  It  was  rumoured  in  the 
afternoon  that  if  either  Guest  or  Robinson  got  in,  there 
would  be  a  riot.  Mounted  police  were  stationed  at  im- 
portant points  ;  long  cordons  of  unmounted  police  lined 
the  thoroughfares  about  the  Guild  Hall ;  and  the  militia  in 
the  Horfield  Barracks  two  miles  out  were  ordered  to  be  in 
readiness.  Happily  nothing  occurred  of  a  riotous  nature. 
The  Conservatives  are  dreadfully  mad  and  wild  at  their 
defeat." 

Early  in  this  year  he  gave  a  popular  lecture  on  "  Heat 
within  the  Safety  Lamp"  at  the  Bristol  Athenaeum.  This 
attracted  a  great  deal  of  local  interest,  it  was  largely 
reported  in  the  Press,  and  led  to  a  considerable  amount  both 
of  private  and  public  correspondence.  He  was  now  being 
inundated  with  requests  to  lecture  in  all  parts  of  the  West 
Country,  and  his  duties  at  Bristol  prevented  the  acceptance 
of  many  of  these  invitations,  unless  the  lectures  could  be 
given  at  week-ends.  One  course  which  he  gave  that  year 
was  at  Cheltenham  Ladies'  College.  Miss  Beale,  the  success- 
ful pioneer  of  higher  education  for  women,  asked  him  to 
give  a  course  on  Chemistry  and  Physics  to  her  most  advanced 
students.  Owing  to  the  interest  he  took  in  the  raising  of 
the  position  of  women,  he  undertook  to  fit  this  in  among 
all  his  numerous  engagements.  He  enjoyed  meeting  Miss 
Beale,  and  they  were  always  afterwards  on  friendly  terms. 
Professor  Thompson  was  also  to  the  end  of  his  life  a  steady 
supporter  of  women's  claims  to  the  franchise. 

He  was  pressed  to  give  the  Inaugural  Lecture  at  the 
Mechanics'  Institution,  Nottingham,  where  he  again  brought 
forward  his  plea  for  Technical  Education.  Afterwards 
published  as  a  pamphlet  it  bears  the  title  The  Apprenticeship 
of  the  Past  and  of  the  Future,  or  Trade  Education  for  the 


58  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Working  Men  of  Nottingham.  He  appealed  to  the  working 
men  to  make  use  of  the  splendid  science  school  then  growing 
up  in  their  new  University  College,  showing  how  the  new 
inventions  for  generating  electrical  power  were  likely  to 
revolutionise  industry,  though  the  signs  of  that  were  "  as 
yet  but  a  little  speck  on  the  horizon."  He  closed  with  the 
words  : 

"It  is  only  the  man  of  weak  and  sluggish  mind  who 
would  wilfully  miss  the  golden  opportunity  in  store.  For 
it  still  remains  to  be  true  that  to  the  lower  and  narrow  mind 
whatever  he  attempts  is  a  mere  trade;  but  to  the  mind  of 
higher  mould  the  merest  trade  becomes  a  great  and  glorious 
art ;  for  in  doing  one  thing  rightly  he  sees  the  image  of  all 
that  is  done  rightly." 

Most  of  the  vacations  of  that  year  were  spent  in  Scotland, 
but  the  happy  occasion  of  the  marriage  of  his  eldest  sister, 
Marie,  to  Elewood  Brockbank  of  Settle  took  him  to  York 
in  July.  While  attending  the  British  Association  Meeting 
at  Swansea  in  August,  he  wrote  to  his  fiancee  about  another 
publication  on  Technical  Education : 

"  I  have  a  little  bit  of  good  news  quite  unexpectedly 
to-day.  More  than  a  year  ago  I  sent  to  the  Editor  of  the 
Contemporary  Review  an  account  of  some  of  the  French 
Schools.  I  heard  nothing  more,  and  supposed  it  had  long 
ago  gone  to  the  wastepaper  basket. 

"  This  morning,  to  my  astonishment,  I  found  the  proofs 
of  this  very  article  awaiting  my  final  corrections  to  appear 
next  month,  under  the  title  of  '  Apprenticeship  of  the 
Future ' !  I  wish  I  had  had  longer  notice,  as  some  of  it  really 
required  rewriting.  However  I  have  had  to  let  it  pass, 
and  am  very  glad  that  it  will  go  in.  I'll  do  something  better 
some  day. 

"  My  paper  on  Electric  Convection  Currents  gave  rise  to 
some  little  discussion,  but  Section  A  was  thinly  attended. 
Altogether  the  meeting  is  rather  less  interesting  than 
usual." 

He  read  several  other  papers  to  the  Association  that  year, 
the  most  important  being  an  account  of  the  continuation 
of  his  researches  on  the  Tourmaline. 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    59 

In  the  Education  Section,  Dr.  Gladstone  gave  an  im- 
portant paper  on  "  The  Teaching  of  Science  in  Elementary 
Schools."  The  discussion  resulted  in  the  formation  of  a 
Committee,  of  which  he  was  chairman,  and  of  which 
Silvanus  Thompson  was  appointed  a  member,  to  inquire 
into  the  question  and  suggest  improvements.  This  com- 
mittee was  continued  for  many  years,  and  sent  in  reports 
to  the  Association  annually.  Later  in  the  autumn,  Silvanus 
read  a  paper  on  the  same  subject  at  the  Social  Science  Con- 
gress at  Nottingham,  and  again  brought  forward  his  in- 
vestigations into  the  apprenticeship  school  system. 

Feeling  a  continued  dissatisfaction  with  the  prospects  of 
work  in  the  College  at  Bristol,  it  was  not  surprising  that  he 
made  other  attempts  to  obtain  a  more  congenial  post ;  these, 
however,  proved  unsuccessful,  and  he  made  up  his  mind  to 
settle  down  in  Clifton,  and  took  a  house  near  the  Downs, 
12  Beaconsfield  Road,  which  was  his  home  until  he  removed 
to  London.  Here  he  began  the  hard  work  of  writing  his 
book  on  Electricity  and  Magnetism.  But  there  were  many 
interruptions,  and  he  wrote  once,  "  My  poor  book,  when  will 
it  get  finished  ?  " 

During  all  that  severe  winter  of  1880-1  there  was  great 
anxiety  about  his  father,  whose  health  was  rapidly  failing. 
The  family  had  removed  from  York,  and  had  gone  to  live 
at  Castle  Hill  House,  Settle,  which  had  been  built  by  the 
grandfather  Tatham.  Silvanus  went  to  them  at  Christmas, 
and  found  the  beloved  invalid  very  feeble,  and  a  few  weeks 
later  he  passed  away.  Between  father  and  son  there  had 
been  great  confidence  and  sympathy,  and  the  loss  was 
deeply  felt. 

On  March  30th,  1881,  Silvanus  Phillips  Thompson  was 
married  to  Jane  Smeal  Henderson  in  the  old  Friends' 
Meeting  House  at  Glasgow.  There  was  a  large  gathering 
of  relations  and  friends,  as  it  was  a  double  wedding  of  the 
two  eldest  daughters.  Thompson's  mother  was  not  able  to 
be  present,  so  after  a  week  in  Perthshire  the  young 
couple  visited  her  at  Settle  on  their  way  southwards  to 
Devonshire. 
The  first  term  after  his  marriage  was  much  occupied  by 


60  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

social  engagements,  for  he  was  now  very  popular  in  Clifton, 
and  his  bride  was  welcomed  by  his  many  friends.  During 
the  summer  parties  in  the  many  beautiful  old  gardens  at 
Clifton  and  the  neighbourhood  were  greatly  enjoyed. 
This  year  Thompson  acted  for  the  first  time  as  external 
examiner,  an  office  which  he  frequently  undertook  through- 
out his  life,  for  many  different  Universities.  He  was 
appointed  as  degree  examiner  in  physics  at  the  Newcastle 
College  of  Science,  Durham  University,  and  his  co- examiner 
was  Professor  A.  S.  Herschel,  with  whom  he  for  a  long 
time  kept  up  a  correspondence  on  scientific  questions.  In 
April  1882  Professor  Herschel  wrote  to  him  : 

"  We  may  not  ask  anyone  to  appraise  us  for  more  than 
two  successive  years ;  it  is  just  on  that  account  that  I  am 
charged  to  write  to  you  first,  because  of  the  thoroughly 
approved  and  appreciated  way  in  which  your  last  year's 
examination  was  conducted.  I  am  at  any  rate  very  glad 
to  have  this  task  to  offer  you,  as  nothing  will  give  me 
greater  pleasure  than  if  you  can  by  any  means  accept 
of  it?" 

After  spending  part  of  the  vacation  in  Scotland,  Professor 
and  Mrs.  Thompson  went  to  York  to  attend  the  Meeting  of 
the  British  Association,  where  they  were  the  guests  for  the 
week  of  the  Lord  Mayor  at  the  Mansion  House.     The  man 
chosen,  on  account  of  his  ability  as  a  speaker,  for  the  office 
of  Lord  Mayor  that  year  was  John  Stephenson  Rowntree, 
a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends.     It  was  the  jubilee 
year  of  the  Association,  and  was  attended  by  a  most  extra- 
ordinary number  of  men  of  the  highest  eminence  in  Science  ; 
some  of  the  dinner  and  breakfast  parties  at  the  Mansion 
House   brought   together   more   illustrious   scientific    men 
than   have   perhaps   ever   assembled   together   during   an 
Association  meeting  since.     In  the  Section  Meetings,  with 
Sir  William  Thomson,  Huxley,  Darwin  and  their  compeers 
present  and  taking  part  in  the  proceedings,  there  were 
many  brilliant  and  memorable  discussions. 

Silvamis  Thompson  read  a  number  of  papers  in  Section  A. 
The  third  part  of  his  research  on  Binaural  Audition,  on 


PIONEER  WORK  IN  TECHNICAL  EDUCATION    61 

Volta  Electric  Inversion,  on  the  Opacity  of  Tourmaline, 
and  on  A  New  Polarising  Prism.  In  the  last  of  these 
papers  Sir  William  Thomson  took  a  great  interest,  and  said 
some  complimentary  things  to  the  author  in  his  usual  kindly, 
encouraging  way. 

At  this  meeting  the  Red  Lion  Club  dinner,  which  is  the 
opportunity  for  the  scientists  to  unbend  and  make  fun  of 
their  own  proceedings,  was  a  very  lively  occasion,  and 
Thompson  did  a  large  amount  of  the  roaring  suitable  to  the 
younger  members.  The  soiree  that  year  at  the  Art  gallery 
was  a  gay  function,  and  the  electric  incandescent  lamps 
made  a  novel  and  brilliant  illumination. 

The  autumn  session  at  Bristol  saw  the  University  College 
under  new  guidance.  Owing  to  delicate  health  Professor 
Marshall  had  been  obliged  to  resign  his  position  as  Principal 
and  go  abroad  for  the  winter.  He  was  succeeded  by 
Professor  William  Ramsay.  For  some  time  previously  to 
this  Thompson  had  been  acting  as  secretary  to  the  Educa- 
tional Board  of  the  College,  and  this  he  continued  to  do. 
He  also  now  had  to  devote  much  time  and  attention  to  the 
fitting  up  of  the  new  physical  laboratories  in  the  Science 
wings  of  the  College,  which  were  the  first  portions  to  be 
built  of  the  large  University  which  now  stands  in  TyndalPs 
Park. 


CHAPTER   V 

CONTRIBUTIONS    TO    ELECTRICAL    SCIENCE 

THE  work  to  be  dealt  with  in  this  chapter  was  for  the  most 
part  accomplished  in  the  last  two  decades,  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  though  a  not  inconsiderable  portion  of  it  belongs 
to  later  years.  It  was  all  carried  on  whilst  fulfilling  success- 
fully his  position  as  Professor,  first  at  Bristol,  and  then  at 
Finsbury,  as  described  in  Chapters  III  and  VII. 

The  scope  and  value  of  his  work  can  perhaps  best  be 
grasped  by  considering  it  under  three  headings  :  (1)  Public 
Lectures  and  Conferences.  (2)  Published  Works.  (3)  Dis- 
coveries and  Inventions. 

The  headings  are  taken  in  this  order  because  it  was 
as  an  exponent  of  science  that  Thompson  achieved  world- 
wide fame,  and  several  of  his  books  were  based  upon  his 
courses  of  lectures.  Through  these  works  his  name  reached 
an  immense  circle  of  people,  to  whom  he  early  became  known 
as  a  scientist  of  high  rank.  His  researches,  though  numerous 
in  earlier  years,  and  of  value  in  the  gradual  progress  of 
knowledge,  were  none  of  them  of  such  striking  originality 
or  so  far  reaching  in  result  as  to  bring  him  world- wide 
repute  as  a  discoverer,  such  as  Ramsay,  Rontgen,  or  Madame 
Curie  enjoyed.  The  biographical  note  published  by  the 
Royal  Society  mentions  the  communications  recorded  in 
the  Society's  catalogue  of  scientific  papers  as  being  very 
numerous,  and  of  them  it  estimates  166  as  important.  His 
technical  researches  were  numerous,  and  his  patents  not  a 
few,  but  none  of  them  were  ever  worked  so  as  to  be  remunera- 
tive to  their  author.  Chapter  VI  describes  the  misfortunes 
of  one  of  the  patents  which  most  nearly  fulfilled  the  desired 
end  of  patents,  fortune  making.  The  best  of  such  research 

62 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    63 

work  was  embodied  in  his  technical  books,  and  communi- 
cated to  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  and  to  his 
students. 


I.    PUBLIC  LECTURES  AND  CONFERENCES 

Thompson's  public  lectures  began  in  Bristol,  and  extended 
to  Somersetshire  and  neighbouring  counties.  When  lectur- 
ing for  the  Gilchrist  Trust  his  subjects  were  by  no  means 
limited  to  the  then  most  popular  one  of  Electricity.  At 
Bridgwater  in  1877  only  the  last  of  a  course  of  ten  lec- 
tures on  "  Recent  Discoveries  in  Natural  Philosophy  "  was 
devoted,  to  electrical  phenomena. 

The  following  list  of  nineteen  titles  has  been  found  among 
his  papers  of  this  period,  and  a  choice  of  two  or  three  of 
these  subjects  was  frequently  offered  in  response  to  invita- 
tions to  give  a  single  lecture  of  a  popular  type : 

Lectures  :  The  Telephone  and  Microphone.  The  Electric 
Light.  The  Earth  as  a  Magnet.  The  Rainbow  in 
Science  and  Art.  The  Physical  Effects  of  Heat. 
The  Safety  Lamp.  Boiling  and  Bubbling.  Waves 
of  Sound.  Frost,  Ice,  and  Snow.  Comets  and 
Meteors.  Artificial  Freezing.  Atoms  and  Molecules. 
William  Gilbert,  the  Founder  of  Electrical  Science. 
Colour.  Optical  Illusions.  The  Photophone.  The 
Eye  as  an  Optical  Instrument.  The  Ear  as  an 
Acoustical  Instrument.  Ancient  and  Modern  Science. 

For  the  illustration  of  his  lectures  in  Bristol  he  had  easy 
access  to  apparatus  which  was  not  available  farther  afield 
at  a  cost  acceptable  to  the  organisers,  and  without  experi- 
ments even  his  lectures  would  have  been  by  no  means  as 
acceptable  to  his  audiences. 

In  November  1878  he  gave  an  important  lecture  on 
Electric  Light  in  Colston  Hall,  Bristol,  which  was  so  popular 
that  it  had  to  be  repeated  a  week  later.  That  same  season, 
at  the  end  of  his  Christmas  Course  on  Voltaic  Electricity 
at  Bristol  Museum  and  Library,  he  received  a  letter  from  the 
secretary  of  the  Council  sending  him  his  fee  and  expenses, 


64  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

"  and  £20  presented  as  some  acknowledgment  of  their 
appreciation  of  your  efforts  on  their  behalf." 

It  was  in  1880  that  he  began  to  lecture  farther  afield,  and 
gave  the  opening  discourse  of  the  season  to  the  Leeds 
Philosophical  and  Literary  Society,  his  subject  being  "  Waves 
of  Sound  and  the  Photophone,"  which  same  lecture  he 
delivered  again  to  a  similar  society  in  Liverpool  at  the 
Christmas  season,  persuaded  thither  by  his  cousin  Isaac 
Cooke  Thompson,  who  was  keenly  interested  in  achieving 
a  success  on  this  occasion. 

In  the  spring  of  this  year,  and  again  in  December,  he 
lectured  at  the  Royal  Artillery  Institution  at  Woolwich,  one 
of  the  lectures  being  on  the  Electric  Light,  which  was  just 
beginning  to  be  considered  a  possibility  for  the  immediate 
future.  Invitations  came  also  in  that  autumn  from  lecture 
committees  in  Burton- on-Trent  and  Cumberland.  This 
was  the  winter  preceding  his  wedding.  Next  year  he  gave 
a  long  course  on  Astronomy  at  Bridgwater,  and  also  his 
little  book  came  out  in  the  late  autumn  of  1881,  so,  though 
he  had  two  invitations  from  Taunton,  and  others  from 
York  Literary  Society  and  Bootham,  he  did  not  undertake 
occasional  lectures  away  from  home,  except  at  the  Society  of 
Arts,  when  before  an  unusually  large  assembly  he  lectured 
upon  "  The  Storage  of  Electricity." 

Thompson's  opinion  of  the  importance  of  his  subject  may 
be  gathered  from  the  two  opening  paragraphs  : 

"  Science  has  of  late  made  two  advances  the  ultimate 
importance  of  which  it  would  be  difficult  to  over-estimate. 
Not  many  months  before  he  was  seized  with  the  mortal 
illness  which  robbed  us  too  soon  of  his  rare  and  unique 
genius,  Professor  Clerk  Maxwell  was  asked  by  a  distinguished 
living  man  of  science  what  was  the  greatest  scientific  dis- 
covery of  the  last  twenty-five  years.  His  reply  was : 
4  That  the  Gramme  machine  l  is  reversible.'  His  far-reaching 

1  An  early  form  of  dynamo,  with  a  ring  armature,  which  when  rotated 
between  the  poles  of  a  magnet  produced  a  current  of  electricity  in  the 
wires  wound  upon  it.  The  reverse  action  referred  to  was  the  sending  of 
an  electric  current  through  these  wires,  whereupon  the  ring  rotated,  and  the 
machine  became  a  motor. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    65 

and  philosophic  mind  had  perceived  that  in  this  phenomenon, 
which  to  so  many  had  seemed  little  more  than  a  curious 
scientific  experiment,  lay  the  principle  which,  if  rightly 
developed,  would  render  possible  the  electric  transmission 
of  power,  and,  in  the  solution  of  this  practical  problem, 
bring  about  social  and  economic  changes  the  importance  of 
which  but  few  of  us  have  even  yet  begun  to  realise. 

"  If  we  could  to-night  summon  up  the  noble  spirit  of  the 
philosopher,  and  ask  him  to  tell  us  what  recent  scientific 
discovery  came  next  in  importance  to  this,  I  think  we  should 
receive  the  reply  '  that  a  voltaic  battery  is  reversible.'  The 
reversibility  in  the  action  of  the  voltaic  cell  is  the  counter- 
part and  complement  of  the  reversibility  of  the  Gramme 
machine  ;  for  while  the  one  has  solved  for  us  the  problem 
of  the  electric  transmission  of  poiver,  the  other  has  solved  for 
us  the  problem  of  the  electric  storage  of  energy." 

Describing  storage  batteries,  he  attributed  to  Gaston 
Plante  of  Paris  the  advance  in  their  ^practical  construction, 
and  described  a  variety  _of  effects  obtained  by  their  use, 
some  of  which  he  himself  first  saw  when  visiting  the  inventor. 
He  showed  how  these  cells  and  improved  accumulators  of 
Faure  could  be  used  for  producing  electric  light  for  domestic 
purposes,  though  not  economically,  exhibiting  a  selection  of 
incandescent  lamps  lent  to  him  for  the  occasion  by  the 
Edison,  Lane-Fox,  Maxim,  and  Swan  firms. 

The  last  part  of  his  discourse  particularly  aroused  the 
interest  of  Bristolians,  for  Thompson  discussed  the  problem 
of  utilising  and  transmitting  the  energy  derived  from  wind 
and  water  power.  Power  was  not  to  be  obtained  just  where 
and  when  it  was  wanted.  The  reversibility  of  the  dynamo- 
electric  machine  solved  the  problem  of  the  where,  by  giving 
us  a  means  of  electric  transmission.  He  thought  the 
reversibility  of  the  voltaic  cell  would  solve  the  problem  of 
the  when,  by  enabling  us  to  store  the  energy  whenever  it 
was  available.  He  expressed  hesitation  in  accepting  the 
statements  of  Sir  William  Thomson  in  his  recent  Presidential 
Address  to  the  Mathematical  and  Physical  Section  of  the 
British  Association,  as  to  the  use  of  tidal  power  not  being 
economically  advantageous.  He  had  obtained  data  from 
the  dock  engineer  as  to  the  rise  and  fall  of  tides,  and  the 
5 


66  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

tidal  flow  at  Rownham  Ferry,  and  calculated  that  a  tenth 
part  of  the  tidal  energy  in  the  gorge  of  the  Avon  would 
suffice  to  light  the  city  of  Bristol.  He  did  not  consider  it 
impossible  of  achievement,  but  looked  forward  to  the 
development  of  some  different  form  of  accumulator,  the 
types  of  that  day  being  inadequate  for  such  purpose. 

Attempts  were  afterwards  made  to  use  the  tidal  waters  of 
the  Avon,  but  it  was  found  that  so  much  mud  was  deposited 
in  the  machinery  as  to  render  it  inefficient. 

Work  in  preparation  for  these  lectures  brought  Thompson 
into  touch  with  several  people  actively  engaged  in  the  same 
problems.  He  exchanged  frequent  letters  with  Gaston 
Plante  of  Paris,  whom  he  met  at  the  Congres  des  tlectriciens 
in  1881,  but  who  already  wrote  to  him  in  1880,  thanking 
him  "  de  votre  bonne  lettre  re9ue  hier  matin.  Je  vois,  avec 
plaisir,  que  nous  avons  les  memes  opinions  scientifiques." 

Thompson  wrote  once  to  his  wife  expressing  delight  at  the 
courtesy  of  many  people  from  whom  he  obtained  the  loan 
of  apparatus.  From  Joseph  W.  Swan,  with  whom  he  at  this 
time  began  a  lifelong  friendship,  he  received  a  message : 
"  I  will  send  you  the  lamps  with  very  great  pleasure.  I 
am  glad  that  you  are  experimenting  on  secondary  cells,  the 
subject  is  of  first-rate  importance.  ...  I  spent  a  very 
pleasant  evening  with  M.  Plante,  thanks  in  a  great  measure 
to  you." 

During  the  autumn  of  1881  the  Crystal  Palace  Company 
were  busy  organising  an  International  Exhibition  of  Elec- 
tricity, the  preparations  for  which  were  for  many  weeks, 
even  before  nearing  completion,  one  of  the  principal  attrac- 
tions to  the  public.  The  chief  interest  was  in  the  numerous 
systems  of  lighting  by  electricity  ;  there  was  a  great  display 
of  lights,  fed  by  many  dynamos  driven  by  gas  or  steam 
engines.  Before  this  time  the  attempt  to  light  the  Savoy 
Theatre  by  electric  light  was  the  only  one  generally  known 
to  the  public  in  England. 

When  the  exhibits  were  nearly  complete  there  was  a 
formal  inauguration  by  the  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Edinburgh, 
who  were  received  and  shown  round  by  the  Chairman  of 
the  Board,  and  several  others,  including  Silvanus  Thompson, 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    67 

who  was  one  of  the  jurors.     Early  in  1882  he  had  received  a 
letter  from  the  manager,  saying  : 

"I  have  just  had  some  conversation  with  Mr.  Preece 
with  reference  to  some  lectures  which  I  wish  to  organise  in 
connection  with  the  exhibition,  and  he  has  shown  me  your 
note  to  him  of  a  few  days  ago. 

"  I  wish  to  have  a  series  of  four  or  six  elementary  lectures 
on  Electricity  with  special  reference  to  Electric  Light.  These 
lectures  would  be  delivered  to  the  general  public,  and  for 
the  most  to  grown-up  people,  but  who  have  no  electrical 
knowledge  whatever.  They  should  be  strictly  elementary. 

"  I  shall  be  glad  to  hear  from  you  as  soon  as  possible, 
as  I  shall  not  communicate  with  anybody  else  on  the  subject 
at  present." 

College  Term  had  already  begun,  but  this  was  an  opening 
too  tempting  to  be  refused,  and  Thompson  replied  promptly 
accepting  the  invitation,  if  the  arrangements  he  proposed 
met  with  approval.  He  offered  to  give  four  evenings. 

The  lectures  were  given  in  the  large  concert-room  to  a 
numerous  audience.  They  were  well  reported  in  many 
papers  all  over  the  country,  and  thus,  with  the  rapid  sale 
of  his  Elementary  Lessons,  his  reputation  as  an  electrician 
became  fully  established  throughout  England. 

The  Saturday  Review,  as  is  not  unusual,  passed  some 
caustic  comments  : 

"  Professor  Thompson  showed  that  he  had  all  the  quali- 
ties requisite  for  a  high-class  popular  lecturer — a  dramatic 
style,  a  clear  and  audible  delivery,  and  rapidity  and  dexterity 
as  an  experimenter.  The  lecture  was  planned  on  very 
sound  scientific  lines,  the  only  fault  being  that  the  necessity 
of  covering  much  ground,  and  introducing  pictures  and 
startling  experiments,  obliged  the  lecturer  to  make  very 
wide  gaps  in  his  chain  of  reasoning,  which  only  fairly  good 
electricians  and  physicists  could  fill  up.  However,  a  very 
large  audience  seemed  thoroughly  pleased  with  the  lecture. 
The  defects  which  we  have  hinted  at  were  unavoidable 
from  the  circumstances,  and  we  must  really  feel  glad  that 
so  much  sound  scientific  feeling  was  shown  in  so  very 
popular  a  lecture.  .  .  . 

"  The  more  astonishing  piece  of  indiscretion  to  which  we 


68  LIFE   OP   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

refer  was  Professor  S.  P.  Thompson's  own  private  theory  of 
electricity.  He  began  well ;  he  said  the  "  two-fluid  "  theory 
would  not  do  ;  he  said  that  Professor  Clerk  Maxwell  might 
have  given  us  a  true  theory  of  electricity  had  he  lived  :  he 
referred  to  Maxwell's  theories  of  strain  of  luminiferous 
ether  in  the  magnetic  field,  but  he  went  on  to  say  that  he — 
Professor  Silvanus  Thompson — went  further  than  Clerk 
Maxwell,  and  looked  upon  a  positive  charge  as  a  condensa- 
tion of  ether,  and  on  a  negative  charge  as  a  refraction  of 
ether,  and  on  an  electric  current  as  a  flow  of  ether.  We  dare 
not  say  that  Professor  Thompson  is  wrong,  because  we  do 
not  profess  to  know  what  a  charge  is,  or  what  a  current  is, 
and  therefore  cannot  say  with  certainty  what  it  is  not ; 
but  we  fear  that  this  expression  will  send  a  shudder  through 
the  frames  of  most  physicists  who  may  hear  of  it.  Such  a 
speculation  in  an  ordinary  popular  lecture  we  could  afford 
to  pass  over.  But  when  made  in  a  lecture  of  such  great 
merit  as  that  lately  delivered  by  Professor  Thompson,  it 
becomes  of  serious  importance,  and  we  cannot  pass  it  over 
without  entering  our  protest  against  it." 

A  week  later  the  report  was  much  more  favourable  : 

"  It  was  a  model  of  what  a  popular  lecture  ought  to  be. 
Professor  Thompson  had  obviously  found  out  and  reflected 
upon  the  blemishes  of  his  first  otherwise  excellent  discourse, 
and  managed  to  keep  a  perfectly  logical  and  easily  intelligible 
train  of  thought  throughout  his  lecture,  and  led  his  hearers 
on  step  by  step  from  the  first  experiments  and  discoveries 
of  Faraday  on  magneto-electric  induction  up  to  the  most 
modern  and  improved  forms  of  dynamo-electric  machines." 

In  commenting  on  the  arc  light  lecture,  the  writer  still 
seemed  to  think  the  young  Professor  required  some  of  his 
former  prescription : 

"  At  one  moment  we  were  able  to  feel  quel  grand 
homme  /  il  pense  comme  nous,  for  Professor  Silvanus  P. 
Thompson  said  that  what  remained  to  be  done  in  arc 
lighting  was  to  improve  the  carbons  ;  the  mechanical 
control  of  the  arc  was  now  in  many  systems  as  perfect 
as  could  be  hoped  for 

"  On  the  question  of  pure  incandescent  lamps,  we  were 
glad  to  find  that  the  lecturer,  in  spite  of  his  obvious  bias  in 
favour  of  Mr.  Edison,  really  gave  Mr.  Swan  fair  credit  for 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    69 

his  work  on  the  subject.  Perhaps  Professor  Silvanus  P. 
Thompson  would  do  more  good  to  Mr.  Edison's  reputation 
if  he  refrained  from  such  highly  coloured  laudation." 

These  comments  on  and  criticisms  of  Thompson's  lectures 
have  been  given  very  fully.  He  was  only  just  entering 
into  the  full  publicity  of  his  career,  and  young,  successful, 
and  confident  as  he  was,  his  essential  humility  was  very 
possibly  not  apparent,  and  the  comments  deserved.  Be 
that  as  it  may,  he  preserved  the  Press-cuttings,  and  in 
future  reserved  his  own  theories  for  fuller  confirmation. 

The  Press  comments  upon  these  lectures  lay  emphasis 
on  two  points  apart  from  the  actual  scientific  facts  and 
theories.  Thompson  had  taken  the  opportunity  to  advocate 
better  education  : 

"  If  England  desires  to  reap  the  benefit  of  this  impending 
reorganisation  of  the  methods  of  mechanical  production, 
if  she  desires  that  her  workmen  should  rise  to  the  immense 
future  before  them,  she  must  not  lose  an  hour  in  providing 
them  with  an  education  in  matters  electrical,  seeing  that  a 
knowledge  of  electric  currents  and  their  properties  will  be  of 
far  more  practical  importance  than  a  knowledge  of  any 
other  branch  of  science.  If  technical  education  does  not 
come  in  any  other  way,  it  will  be  forced  upon  us  by  the 
practical  fact  that  electricity  is  to  be  our  servant  in  place 
of  steam  and  of  coal." 

Amongst  the  numerous  departments  in  the  exhibition 
was  one  devoted  to  electro-medical  appliances,  and  according 
to  the  advertisements  of  some  of  the  exhibitors,  their 
appliances  were  likely  to  effect  cures  where  everything  else 
had  failed.  In  the  first  of  his  lectures  the  magnetic,  thermal, 
and  physiological  effects  of  the  electric  current  were  illus- 
trated experimentally,  with  the  very  emphatic  remark 
that  "  the  mistake  of  confounding  physiological  with 
medical  or  remedial  effects  led  to  the  gross  impositions 
of  the  quacks  and  rogues  who  deal  in  so-called  magnetic 
appliances,  and  disgrace  alike  the  sciences  of  electricity 
and  medicine,  while  knowing  nothing  of  either." 

This  was  incautious  action  on  the  part  of  the  lecturer 
had  he  desired  a  life  of  peace,  for  he  at  once  received 


70  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

numerous  communications  from  "  medical  electricians " 
and  firms  manufacturing  "  magnetic  appliances,"  and  also 
from  private  people  wanting  advice. 

Thompson  took  an  active  interest  in  preventing  these 
medical  swindles,  while  managing  to  avoid  prosecution 
for  libel.  In  the  celebrated  case  of  the  Harness  Swindle 
so  thoroughly  exposed  by  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette  in  1893-4, 
he  was  one  of  the  expert  witnesses  against  the  "  quacks 
and  rogues."  Science  Sittings,  a  little  paper  which,  with 
The  Electrical  Review,  brought  about  the  exposure,  and  was 
one  of  the  journals  sued  by  Harness,  devoted  a  page  to  the 
trial  of  Dr.  Tibbits  fof  his  testimonial  with  regard  to  the 
virtues  of  the  Harness  Belts,  and  commented  thus  upon 
Thompson's  part  in  it : 

' '  Of  the  value  of  these  belts  in  generating  electricity, 
which  is  the  point  to  which  counsel  for  the  plaintiff  pinned 
their  flag,  it  will  suffice  to  quote  from  the  evidence  of 
Professor  Silvanus  Thompson.  The  learned  scientist  said 
that  the  current  he  measured  from  one  of  the  belts  was  less 
than  could  be  secured  by  connecting  up  an  ordinary  pin  and 
needle  and  dipping  them  in  a  spot  of  ink.  And,  forsooth, 
five  guineas  seems  to  have  been  the  charge  imposed  upon 
rich  and  poor,  for  a  belt  possessing  no  more  electrical  pro- 
perties than  Professor  Thompson  alleges  can  be  generated 
in  the  connection  of  what  we  shall  term  the  proverbial  pin 
and  needle.  Pointed  criticism  this,  on  the  part  of  a  skilled 
witness  in  more  than  one  sense,  and  we  are  sure  Professor 
Thompson  possesses  a  quainter  vein  of  humour  than  the 
scientific  cult  of  these  days  is  usually  credited  with," 

It  is  fair  to  recall  these  efforts  against  quackery,  because 
later,  when  Thompson  was  helping  to  organise  the  Spectacle 
Makers  Company's  Examinations  for  Opticians,  and 
encouraging  the  granting  of  certificates,  he  met  with  some 
heated  opposition  from  sections  of  the  medical  profession, 
especially  from  ophthalmic  surgeons,  who  suspected  his 
policy  as  encouraging  unskilful  and  fraudulent  practice. 

In  1882  Thompson  had  already,  in  the  January  vacation, 
lectured  in  Oldham,  Birmingham,  and  Altrincham,  but 
after  the  Crystal  Palace  Lectures,  invitations  poured  in 
from  all  sides,  from  Falmouth  in  the  South- West,  to  Don- 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     71 

caster  and  Newcastle  in  the  North,  from  Lecture  Com- 
mittees and  Societies,  Institutes,  Y.M.C.A.s,  Mutual 
Improvement  Societies,  and  from  several  groups  of  Quakers. 
By  September  he  wrote  to  one  institute,  saying  his  spare 
time  was  "full  up  to  Easter  1883,"  and  in  response  to  a 
local  invitation,  that  he  had  "  already  refused  twenty 
invitations  this  season,  all  energies  wanted  for  our  own 
laboratories." 

Perhaps  something  should  be  said  about  his  welcome  in 
the  North.  At  the  end  of  the  year  he  lectured  again  in 
Liverpool  at  the  United  Soiree  of  the  Literary  Scientific 
and  Art  Societies,  his  subject  being  "  The  Economic  Pro- 
duction of  Electricity."  0.  J.  Lodge  was  now  settled  in 
his  home  there,  and  invited  Silvanus  and  his  wife  to  stay 
with  them,  if  they  could  be  spared  from  over  the  road,  at 
the  cousins'.  After  Christmas  he  made  a  tour,  lecturing  on 
"  The  Electric  Light  "  in  Settle  ;  it  was  a  great  event  in  that 
quiet  little  place.  He  went  on  to  Glasgow,  speaking  there 
on  "  The  Earth  a  Great  Magnet,"  a  lecture  already  delivered 
in  the  Midlands.  The  Glasgow  people  were  enthusiastic 
about  his  lecture.  To  his  wife,  who  was  not  able  to  accom- 
pany him,  he  wrote  home  : 

"  GLENVAL,  POLLOKSHIELDS, 

January  12th,  1883. 

"  All  went  off  well  last  night.  Sir  William  Thomson  was 
present,  and  moved  the  vote  of  thanks  at  the  end.  The 
people  here  say  I  gave  them  the  best  science  lecture  they 
(The  Glasgow  Science  Lecture  Association)  have  had  this 
season.  .  .  .  Papa  and  I  are  going  to  lunch  with  Sir 
William." 

This  lecture  had  also  been  very  well  received  and  reported 
in  Altrincham,  where  great  local  enthusiasm  was  displayed 
by  the  Bowdon  Literary  and  Scientific  Club,  by  whose 
efforts  he  was  able  to  make  use  of  "  a  lantern  of  peculiar 
construction,1  which  allowed  of  experiments  being  readily 
performed  in  it,  and  thus  exhibited  on  the  screen.  Experi- 

1  This  is  probably  the  lantern  described  in  The  Photographic  News  of 
December  8th,  1882,  as  used  by  him  at  his  Society  of  Arts  Lectures  on 
Dynamo-Electric  Machines, 


72  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

ments  were,  in  consequence,  possible  which  would  otherwise 
have  required  heavy  and  costly  apparatus  to  render  them 
visible  to  a  large  audience.  .  .  .  For  nearly  two  hours  he  was 
listened  to  by  his  audience  with  an  attention  that  never 
nagged." 

His  second  lecture  in  Altrincham,  less  than  twelve  months 
after  his  first,  was  an  even  greater  success,  when,  owing 
to  the  enthusiasm  of  a  local  man,  electric  plant  was  obtained 
for  the  occasion,  enabling  the  inhabitants  to  enjoy  for  the 
first  time  the  dazzling  light  of  four  arc  lamps,  while  the 
lecturer  discoursed  of  their  mysteries,  and  the  history  of 
their  invention.  His  concluding  remarks  turned  on  the 
advantages  and  disadvantages  and  the  economic  production 
and  distribution  of  electricity,  comparing  its  cost  with  that 
of  gas.  He  told  how  in  France  it  had  been  proved  possible 
to  plough,  to  reap,  to  sow  by  means  of  electric  engines. 
He  believed  he  had  proved  in  vaiious  ways  that  there  would 
be  distinct  economy  in  generating  currents  of  electricity  at 
a  central  station  on  a  large  scale,  and  in  distributing  them 
to  electric  engines,  which  would  supply  power  on  a  small 
scale  far  more  cheaply  than  steam  engines. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  in  these  early  days,  before 
electricity  had  begun  to  be  adopted  by  the  community  for 
practical  purposes,  Thompson  always  seems  to  have  pictured 
large  central  stations.  Frequently  in  later  life  he  deplored 
the  immense  number  of  small  stations  and  companies  ;  and 
the  idea  of  organising  about  a  score  of  central  stations  for 
the  whole  of  Great  Britain,  recently  so  prominently  before 
the  public,  had  his  support  over  twenty  years  before  it  was 
a  popular  question.  The  subject  of  central  stations 
evoked  general  interest  at  the  Bradford  Meeting  of  the 
British  Association  in  1900.  It  arose  in  the  Section  of 
Economics  and  Statistics  in  a  discussion  on  Municipal 
Trading,  during  which  Thompson  remarked  that  the 
supply  of  electricity  for  lighting  and  power  on  a  large  scale 
was  not  a  parochial  or  even  a  municipal  question,  but  a 
large  question  affecting  whole  counties  and  districts  ;  and 
he  commended  the  Lancashire  Powers  Bill,  and  urged  wide 
co-operation  in  the  matter  of  electrical  supply. 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    73 

Advocates  of  municipal  administration  were  not  pleased 
by  this.  A  leading  article  in  The  Yorkshire  Post  next 
morning  rejoiced  that,  "  in  spite  of  Professor  Silvanus 
Thompson,"  bills  for  electrical  supply  were  actually  being 
promoted  by  local  bodies,  such  as  the  London  County 
Council,  and  the  Corporations  of  Glasgow,  Manchester,  and 
other  cities.  Thompson  favoured  the  schemes  of  "  various 
profit-earning  companies  "  that  by  the  Electric  Power  Bill 
sought  to  disturb  the  rights  of  the  local  corporations  in 
order  to  establish  their  stations  and  installations.  He  had 
given  expert  evidence  before  Parliament  in  1900  in  con- 
nection with  the  Lancashire  Power  Bill ;  it,  with  several 
others, was  defeated.  The  following  year,  after  visiting  the 
district  proposed  to  be  served  by  the  Caledonian  Electric 
Power  Scheme,  he  reported  favourably  thereon  to  the 
promoters  ;  and  also  gave  evidence  to  the  Parliamentary 
Select  Committee  in  favour  of  both  the  Yorkshire  and  the 
Derby  and  Notts  Electric  Power  Bills.  In  his  evidence 
he  declared  himself  to  have  been  for  fifteen  years  an  advocate 
of  extensive  schemes  of  this  sort,  and  he  described  results 
obtained  from  such  all  over  the  world. 

He  was  full  of  this  subject,  and  when  invited  to  deliver 
the  Popular  Saturday  Evening  Lecture  at  the  British 
Association  at  Bradford,  he  chose  as  his  title  "  Electricity 
and  Industry."  The  main  interest  centred  round  the 
question  of  the  supply  of  electricity  "  in  bulk,"  and  he 
described  the  great  power  stations  of  Niagara,  of  Rhein- 
felden,  and  of  Vizzola  in  Lombardy,  which  were  creating 
whole  new  industries,  and  new  industrial  communities  living 
under  conditions  materially  and  socially  greatly  in  advance 
of  those  with  which  they  competed.  England,  not  posses- 
sing waterfalls,1  should  place  electric  generating  centres 
right  at  the  mouth  of  the  coal-pits.  He  urged  upon  his 
audience  the  thought  that  this  was  not  only  an  industrial 
question  ;  it  affected  the  well-being  of  the  community  at 
large  ;  it  was  a  great  national  question. 

This  lecture   was   delivered  in  the   St.    George's   Hall, 

1  Later  Thompson  took  a  great  interest  in  the  use  of  water-power  at 
Aberystwith, 


74  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

which  was  said  to  seat  3,500  persons,  and  was  described  as 
being  packed  from  floor  to  ceiling  with  an  audience  com- 
posed in  an  overwhelming  proportion  of  men  of  the  working 
classes.  According  to  the  report  in  The  Times  : 

"  They  listened  with  the  closest  attention  and  keenest 
interest  to  the  lecture,  which  lasted  for  an  hour  and  three- 
quarters,  and  showed  their  appreciation  of  the  many 
effective  experiments  and  demonstrations  in  the  most  cordial 
•way.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  lecture,  and  again  when 
the  vote  of  thanks  was  put  by  the  President,  the  manifesta- 
tion of  feeling  was  such  as  is  generally  associated  with  a 
great  political  meeting,  rather  than  with  a  scientific  lecture.'* 

Thompson  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

11  The  meeting  has  been  very  successful.  They  pressed 
me  to  repeat  my  lecture  for  the  Bradford  children  for  next 
Saturday  evening.  I  declined  :  but  have  agreed  to  give 
them  a  Children's  Lecture  on  December  31st.  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Priestley  [the  Mayor  and  Mayoress,  with  whom  Thomp- 
son stayed  in  Bradford  during  the  Association]  hope  that 
you  will  come  down  to  Bradford  then  ;  and,  in  fact,  I 
have  also  had  invitations  to  stay  on  that  occasion  from 
two  other  quarters — [Quakers].  Nothing  could  have 
exceeded  the  kindness  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  P.  ;  and  all  the 
Bradford  folk  have  been  most  cordial.  I  find  on  coming 
back  a  most  enormous  pile  of  letters  and  of  College  work. 
How  to  get  through  the  next  two  days  I  know  not :  it  will 
be  a  great  push. 

"  We  had  a  lively  dinner  of  the  Red  Lions  on  Tuesday 
night.  My  host  was  amongst  the  privileged  few  who 
were  admitted  (of  local  men) ,  and  greatly  appreciated  the 
burlesque  science.  I  drew  them  some  caricatures  on  the 
blackboard  as  a  small  contribution." 

The  experiment  of  a  lecture  to  3,000  children  at  once, 
even  though  only  picked  members  of  the  upper  standards 
formed  the  audience,  was  disappointing.  The  children  wore 
clogs,  and  were  so  excited  by  the  novelty  of  the  occasion, 
that  even  the  appeals  of  the  Mayor  failed  to  keep  them  in 
their  seats,  and  the  lecturer  found  it  almost  impossible  to 
make  his  voice  heard  above  the  clatter.  However,  there 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     75 

were  many  who  were  quite  satisfied  that  the  imagination 
of  the  youngsters  was  aroused  by  the  brilliant  experiments 
on  "  Electricity  at  Work." 

In  tracing  Thompson's  interest  in  the  subject  of  central 
supplies  of  electricity,  we  have  been  carried  on  far  into 
"  The  Electrical  Age,"  and  must  return  to  Bristol,  1882. 

At  the  opening  of  the  University  Session  in  the  autumn, 
Thompson  gave  the  introductory  lecture  on  a  Saturday 
evening  in  the  Museum  and  Library,  where  many  of  his 
colleagues,  and  a  large  assembly  besides  the  students, 
attended  to  hear  his  discourse  upon  "The  Age  of  Electricity." 
He  gave  an  epitome  of  the  advances  of  the  science  which 
had  been  so  marked  in  the  six  years  that  he  had  been  at 
Bristol,  and  he  appealed  to  the  citizens  not  to  be  indifferent 
to  the  advancement  of  electrical  science  and  its  applications 
to  the  machinery  of  life,  concluding  with  a  well-prepared 
peroration  as  was  his  wont : 

"  I  have  insisted  on  the  reality  of  the  age  of  electricity 
on  which  we  are  entering,  as  marking  a  distinct  epoch 
in  the  material  civilisation  and  development  of  the  human 
race.  Far  be  it  from  me  to  depreciate  the  other  factors  in 
the  development  of  man,  and  of  these  intellectual  faculties, 
whose  roots  are  struck,  not  in  the  material  conquest  of  the 
forces  of  nature  only,  but  in  those  moral  and  spiritual  forces 
which,  though  less  tangible,  are  none  the  less  real.  Where 
scientific  knowledge  ends,  there  begin  the  emotional  and 
poetic  faculties,  the  play  of  purely  intellectual  activities  of 
which  science  can  render  no  account.  Those  faculties  can 
exist  without  science — nay,  may  be  said  to  have  pre-existed. 
Science  did  not  make  them,  and  cannot  destroy  them. 
Yet  no  man  possessing  these  faculties  can  be  heedless  of 
scientific  progress,  for,  after  all,  the  sober  facts  of  science 
are  amongst  the  things  that  most  excite  the  wonder,  the 
amazement,  the  delight,  the  poetic  fervour  of  man." 

This  chapter  was  to  be  mainly  devoted  to  Thompson's 
work  on  "  the  sober  facts  of  science,"  but  it  was  so  charac- 
teristic of  his  mind  to  link  these  with  the  imaginative 
elements  of  human  nature,  that  it  seems  unnatural  to  pass 
by  without  this  slight  reference.  The  fuller  working  out 


76  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

of  this  thought  was  expressed  publicly  in  an  address  which 
he  gave  in  1885  as  President  of  the  Wellington  Literary 
and  Scientific  Institute. 

In  1882  Electric  Light  was  the  question  of  the  day  ;  it 
was  passing  out  of  the  region  of  theoretical  experiment 
into  that  of  practical  utilisation.  The  gas  companies  began 
to  take  alarm,  and  there  were  many  heartburnings  in  the 
various  municipalities  as  schemes  for  the  new  lighting  were 
proposed  and  opposed.  Citizens  of  Bath,  who  were  eager 
for  reformation,  engaged  Thompson  to  give  a  lecture  in  the 
Theatre  Royal,  and  provided  him  with  funds  for  the  hire 
of  the  necessary  machinery  for  exhibiting  both  arc  and 
incandescent  lamps  in  action. 

Thompson  took  every  opportunity  of  furthering  the 
popularity  of  the  new  light,  and  contributed  to  a  variety 
of  journals,  articles  intended  to  reassure  the  public  as  to 
its  cheapness  as  well  as  its  other  advantages. 

1882  was  the  year  of  the  Electric  Lighting  Act.  In 
this  measure  Thompson  had  some  part,  having  prepared 
a  Report  and  General  Advice  on  Draft  Provisional  Orders. 
This  Act  was  described  in  1884  as  "  a  panic  Act,"  carried 
through  by  representations  that  the  public  would  be  left 
at  the  mercy  of  an  enormous  monopoly.  It  not  only 
fixed  the  maximum  rates  of  charge  to  consumers,  but 
contained  an  objectionable  Purchase  Option  Clause, 
authorising  local  authorities,  if  they  so  chose,  to  acquire, 
after  twenty-one  years,  the  entire  property,  plant,  etc., 
of  the  company  or  person  who  had  undertaken  to  supply 
electric  light,  at  their  then  value,  without  any  addition 
in  respect  of  compulsory  purchase,  or  of  prospective  profits. 
It  was  felt,  and  publicly  expressed  by  Sir  Frederick 
Bramwell  at  the  British  Association  in  1884,  that  the 
conditions  imposed  by  the  Board  of  Trade  framing  of  the 
Provisional  Orders  had  been  unjust,  and  had  discouraged 
the  investment  of  capital  in  such  enterprises  ;  and  herein 
lay  the  reply  to  the  frequently  heard  question :  "  Why  does 
not  electric  lighting  go  ahead  ?  " 

Thompson  was  amongst  the  forty-five  members,  but  not 
one  of  the  eleven  on  the  Executive,  of  the  General  Com- 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    77 

mittee,  formed  on  the  suggestion  of  the  President  of  the 
Board  of  Trade,  to  frame  clauses  in  amendment  of  the 
Electric  Lighting  Act,  and  to  confer  with  the  Board  of  Trade 
as  to  the  terms  of  the  Provisional  Orders  and  Licences.  It 
was  summoned  in  November  1884,  and  the  deliberations 
continued  intermittently  for  some  months. 

1882  was  also  the  year  of  the  Lightning-rod  Conference, 
which  drew  up  rules  for  the  guidance  of  those  who  desired 
to  protect  their  property  from  being  struck.  The  findings 
of  this  Conference  have  since  been  much  criticised,  par- 
ticularly by  0.  J.  Lodge,  but  also  by  the  Lightning  Research 
Committee  (1905).  Thompson's  contribution  to  this  subject 
was  in  the  form  of  a  paper  to  the  Physical  Society,  published 
in  the  Philosophical  Magazine,  March  1888,  "  On  the  Price 
of  the  Factor  of  Safety  in  the  Materials  for  Lightning- 
rods."  In  proportion  to  their  effectiveness  iron  was,  he 
calculated,  very  much  cheaper  than  copper. 

Another  question  of  public  interest  in  which  Thompson 
took  an  active  part  from  early  years  was  that  of  safety  in 
the  coal-mines.  In  1884  the  Ellis  Lever  Prize  was  offered 
for  a  perfect  safety  lamp.  The  Miners'  National  Union  laid 
down  the  conditions,  and  Thompson  served  for  them  as 
one  of  the  adjudicators,  receiving  very  cordial  thanks  for 
readily  undertaking  the  arduous  duty  of  testing  the  safety 
lamps,  and  also  for  the  admirable  and  painstaking  manner 
in  which  he  had  carried  out  the  duties  at  the  cost  of  much 
of  his  valuable  time  involved  in  travelling,  as  well  as  in 
experiment  and  consultation  with  others.  Three  years 
later,  when  a  lamentable  disaster  in  the  Udston  colliery 
was  reported  as  caused  probably  by  the  opening  of  a  lamp 
by  a  miner,  he  wrote  to  The  Times,  pointing  out  how  no 
perfect  lamp  had  been  found  amongst  those  submitted 
for  the  prize  in  1884,  but  that  since  then  the  electric  safety 
lamps  had  been  much  improved.  He  suggested  that  a 
Royal  Commission  to  supplement  the  work  of  the  Accidents 
in  Mines  Commission  should  institute  a  special  inquiry  into 
electric  safety  lamps. 

Thompson  once  spoke  to  an  audience  composed  chiefly 
of  miners,  when  in  1891  he  gave  the  British  Association's 


78  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

operatives'  lecture  at  Cardiff,  on  the  subject  of  "Electricity 
in  Mining."  A  crowd  of  men  attended,  special  trains 
having  been  run  to  bring  them  to  it ;  this  in  spite  of  the 
fears  of  the  local  committee,  who  were  for  giving  up  the 
whole  idea  within  a  week  or  two  of  the  lecture,  when  most 
of  his  preparations  for  it  were  well  on  their  way  ;  and  such 
preparations  were  no  light  task  to  anyone  who,  in  the 
words  of  Sir  Frederick  Bramwell,  "  was  willing  to  devote 
himself  on  behalf  of  the  Association."  Machinery  he  then 
described  as  in  use  in  some  parts  of  the  world,  has  not  yet 
been  made  use  of  in  English  mines,  as  he  had  hoped  it 
might  be. 

After  he  left  Bristol  and  became  more  closely  occupied 
with  the  innumerable  calls  upon  his  time  in  London, 
Thompson  gave  up  the  practice  of  delivering  isolated 
popular  lectures,  except  on  rare  occasions.  He  lectured 
several  times  in  the  London  Institution,  and  in  1889,  when 
invited  to  lecture  there,  he  drew  up  the  following  list  of 
subjects  :  The  Magic  of  Amber  and  Lodestone.  Distribu- 
tion of  Electricity.  Electric  City  Lighting.  The  Galvanic 
Arts.  Arcs  and  Sparks.  Action  and  Reaction.  Sins  of 
Art  against  Science.  Myths  of  the  Magnet. 

Amongst  his  correspondents  at  this  period  was  Mr. 
James  Wimshurst,  F.R.S.,  Chief  Shipwright  Surveyor  of  the 
Board  of  Trade,  who  devoted  most  of  his  leisure  time  to 
experimental  work,  and  fitted  up  for  himself  at  his  house 
large  workshops,  equipped  with  engineering  appliances, 
driven  by  power.  Thompson  experienced  the  pleasures 
of  his  generosity  and  hospitality,  to  which  he  paid  tribute 
in  an  obituary  notice  for  the  Royal  Society  in  1903.  In 
1881  Wimshurst  had  become  interested  in  electrical  influ- 
ence machines,  of  which  he  constructed  more  than  ninety, 
making  continual  alterations  and  improvements.  Many 
of  them  he  presented  to  his  scientific  friends  ;  Thompson 
received  two  at  least  at  different  times,  once  with  the 
note  : 

"  and  please  remember  that  at  all  times  I  shall  be  glad  to 
contribute  any  other  thing  I  may  be  able  to  aid  you  in  your 
advancing  steps  of  research— moreover,  I  am  (except  for 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL   SCIENCE    79 

business  calls)  usually  at  home  in  the  evenings,  and  shall 
always  be  pleased  to  see  you  for  the  little  chat,  or  a  few 
experiments." 

1888  saw  the  100th  anniversary  of  influence  machines, 
William  Nicholson  having  written  a  letter,  read  to  the 
Royal  Society  by  its  President,  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  in  1788, 
announcing  his  invention  of  a  "  revolving  doubler,  an 
instrument  which,  by  the  turning  of  a  winch,  produces  the 
two  states  of  electricity  without  friction  or  communication 
with  the  earth."  Thompson  wrote  a  short  history  of 
the  after-development  of  Nicholson's  doubler,  which  was 
published  in  the  Journal  of  the  Proceedings  of  the  Society  of 
Telegraph  Engineers  and  Electricians  ;  and  at  his  instance 
Wimshurst  was  persuaded  to  lecture  at  the  Royal  Institution 
on  "  Influence  Machines."  Three  years  later  Wimshurst 
wrote  to  Thompson  regretting  the  little  attention  being 
given  to  that  line  of  research  : 

"  neglected  for  the  reason  (at  least  so  I  suppose)  that  there 
is  no  money  in  it,  and  the  branches  of  electricity  which  for 
the  present  have  commercial  value  are  flooded  with  seekers. 
Now,  I  know  that  you  do  take  an  interest  in  the  glass  and 
tinfoil  line  as  much  as  in  the  copper  wire,  and  the  modern 
bricks  of  iron  business,  and  therefore,  if  you  should  have 
another  evening  to  spare  in  the  course  of  this  recess,  I  assure 
you  that  I  think  we  might  profit  by  it  together." 

Their  interest  was  not  confined  to  the  elder  man's 
"  fadism,"  as  he  dubbed  it,  for  in  1894  he  wrote  to 
Thompson  : 

"  Your  beautiful  experiment  of  the  Electrical  Vortex  l 
has  been  in  mind  since.  I  did  not  try  the  twisting  force 
of  the  egg,  but  it  seems  to  me  that  it  would  be  sufficient  to 

1  At  a  Royal  Society  soiree  Thompson  exhibited  nine  Illustrations  of 
Polyphase  Electric  Currents,  one  of  which  is  described  thus  in  the  pro- 
gramme :  "  Revolution  of  a  copper  egg  in  a  rotatory  magnetic  field." 
The  eggs  lay  upon  a  tray,  and  when  the  electromagnets  in  the  neighbour- 
hood were  excited  they  began  slowly  to  rotate  upon  their  sides,  but  as  their 
speed  increased  they  rose  and  span  upon  their  ends.  The  experiments 
aroused  great  curiosity  and  delight.  They  were  also  exhibited  at  "  Mor- 
land  "  on  the  occasion  of  one  of  the  evening  "  At  Homes  "  of  the  family. 


80  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

drive  an  aerial  machine.  Could  you  not  make  a  light  egg 
or  sphere,  and  on  it  place  light  vanes  ;  or  have  the  light 
vanes  with  just  sufficient  metal  on  them  to  suit  your 
purpose,  if  so  it  would  poise  itself  in  the  vortex,  and  add 
another  to  your  instructive  and  beautiful  devices." 

In  the  year  of  Queen  Victoria's  Diamond  Jubilee, 
Thompson  lectured  at  the  Crystal  Palace  on  "  Electrical 
Discoveries  and  Inventions  during  the  Queen's  Reign," 
including  in  his  demonstrations  signalling  across  space,  not 
through  conductors,  the  beginnings  of  so-called  "  wireless 
telegraphy."  Of  this  subject  he  became  an  accredited 
exponent,  though  claiming  little  contribution  to  its  progress  ; 
he  followed  closely  the  developments  from  the  outset,  which 
he  dated  from  about  the  year  1876,  when  he  was  himself 
experimenting  on  oscillating  sparks  and  their  inductive 
properties  (see  p.  22). 

In  1898  he  received  from  the  Society  of  Arts  one  of  their 
silver  medals  for  his  lecture  before  them  on  "  Telegraphy 
across  Space."  l  In  his  lecture  he  described  the  achieve- 
ments of  Preece  in  the  Bristol  Channel  and  elsewhere,  using 
the  conductive  method  of  signalling  through  water  between 
long  base-lines  on  land.  Effects  obtained  by  earth  conduc- 
tion had  been  investigated  to  some  extent,  and  induction 
methods  also  were  under  experiment  by  Preece,  who  had 
used  the  telegraph  wires  forty  miles  apart  on  the  Scottish 
border,  and  had  communicated  sounds  from  the  Newcastle- 
Jedburg  line  to  the  Gretna  line.  Thompson  told  of  a  vain 
offer  he  had  made  to  a  financial  friend  in  the  city  seriously 
to  undertake  to  establish  telegraphic  communication  with 
the  Cape,  provided  £10,000  were  forthcoming  to  establish 
the  necessary  basal  circuits  in  the  two  countries,  and  the 
instruments  for  creating  the  currents.  Two  effects  coupled 
in  his  mind  led  him  to  believe  in  the  possibility  of  his  plans  : 
Firstly,  when  one  of  the  dynamos  of  the  Ferranti  station 
at  Deptford  became  once  accidentally  earthed,  all  the 
railway  signal  telegraphs  of  South  London  were  affected, 
and  the  earth  currents  were  detected  as  far  away  as  Leicester 
and  Paris.  Secondly,  a  single  circuit  operating  an  instru- 

1  Published  in  the  Smithsonian  Report  for  1898,  Washington,  U.S.A. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    81 

ment  such  as  the  phonopore  by  means  of  alternating  currents 
of  ,high  frequency  could  be  heard  in  telegraph  lines  a 
hundred  miles  away. 

In  his  lecture  Thompson  spoke  of  the  great  importance  of 
Lodge's  idea  of  "  syntony,"  the  tuning  of  the  transmitting 
and  receiving  circuits,  so  as  to  enable  the  receiver  by  reson- 
ance to  select  out  one  particular  signal  from  amongst  many 
issued  simultaneously  from  different  sources.  The  greatest 
practical  successes  till  then  achieved  were  those  of  Marconi, 
who  for  two  years  had  had  the  advantage  of  facilities  for 
experiments  on  a  large  scale  granted  to  him  by  the  British 
telegraph  department,  and  had  signalled  intelligibly  over 
a  distance  of  eleven  miles  ;  and  of  Professor  Slaby,  of  Char- 
lottenburg,  who  had  penetrated  thirteen  and  a  half  miles 
over  land ;  many  experimenters  were  then  at  work,  and 
making  rapid  progress  in  other  countries  and  continents, 
and  no  account  Thompson  could  give  of  the  work  could  be 
complete. 

Writing  to  Lodge  about  The  Times  report  of  this  lecture, 
Thompson  added  a  postscript : 

"  After  my  lecture  a  man  came  up  to  me.  Said  he  had 
heard  a  lecture  on  Marconi  last  week  by  a  lecturer  who  had 
Marconi's  own  apparatus  to  show,  who  told  them  that 
M.  did  not  use  electromagnetic  or  Hertz  waves  :  for  EM. 
waves  spread  like  sound  in  all  directions  (diagram  on  screen), 
while  the  Marconi  waves  went  straight  to  the  place  to  which 
they  were  directed — even  through  mountains — (diagram 
shown)  !  !  !  !  I  replied  it  was  most  amazing." 

Many  ill-informed  people  seemed  to  be  under  the  delusion 
that  "  Marconi  waves,"  as  distinct  from  Hertz  waves,  had  a 
real  existence  and  had  special  properties.  This,  of  course, 
is  nonsense. 

Thompson  lectured  some  years  later  to  the  Hampstead 
Scientific  Society,  using  Lodge's  apparatus. 

The  development  of  wireless  telegraphy  in  England  is  not 
a  happy  story.  The  name  of  Marconi  calls  up  a  whole 
series  of  newspaper  controversies,  patent  cases  in  the  law 
courts,  as  well  as  libel  suits  involving  the  names  of  members 
of  the  Government. 
6 


82  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

It  was  as  a  historian  of  science  that  Thompson  became 
involved  in  these  distasteful  affairs.  In  April  1902,  after 
Marconi  had  achieved  the  magnificent  success  of  sending 
an  intelligible  signal  over  1,500  miles  across  the  Atlantic, 
Thompson  contributed  to  The  Saturday  Review,  for  which 
journal  he  from  time  to  time  wrote  on  scientific  subjects 
(though  nothing  could  have  been  more  alien  to  his  sym- 
pathies than  the  political  views  of  the  paper),  a  signed  article 
entitled  "The  Inventor  of  Wireless  Telegraphy."  This 
article  was  a  fierce  attack  upon  what  Thompson  considered 
the  excessive  claims  of  Marconi  to  the  inventions  of  the 
day  ;  and  it  set  out  the  case  of  the  experimenter  whom 
Thompson  believed  to  be  the  original  inventor  of  wireless 
telegraphy,  Oliver  Lodge,  whose  experiments  had  been 
exhibited  and  explained  to  many  scientific  societies  in 
England  two  years  before  any  patents  were  taken  out  by 
anyone. 

Thompson  held  a  very  poor  opinion  of  English  Patent 
Law,  and  gave  his  reasons  for  it  in  his  second  Presidential 
Address  to  the  Physical  Society  in  1902.  Such  was  English 
Law,  that  Lodge,  having  expounded  his  inventions  to 
scientific  societies,  might  not  patent  them  in  England, 
though  he  might,  and  did  do  so  in  the  United  States,  at  the 
Patent  Office  where  rigorous  proof  is  required  as  to  actual 
first  invention  by  the  would-be  patentee. 

The  article  in  The  Saturday  Review  provoked  a  hostile  reply 
from  Marconi,  and  a  rejoinder  from  Thompson,  very  explicit, 
as  he  took  the  trouble  to  "  make  good,  point  by  point,  by 
reference  to  the  pages  of  original  documents,"  the  state- 
ments to  which  he  put  his  signature  ;  statements  to  which 
no  detailed  reply  was  forthcoming,  only  the  suggestion  that 
he  was  retailing  malicious  gossip,  and  had  fallen  into 
"  absolute  and  gratuitous  untruth."  In  vain  he  asked  for 
contradiction  of  his  facts.  Correspondence  was  afterwards 
opened  in  The  Times  and  the  Westminster  Gazette  by  a  letter 
from  Lieutenant  Solari  of  the  Italian  Navy,  who  claimed 
a  friendly  interest  in  Marconi's  experiments  ;  and  finally 
the  controversy  was  turned  to  a  complete  comedy  by  the 
intrusion  of  Mr.  J.  Henniker  Heaton,  M.P. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    83 

As  was  said  by  a  writer  in  Electrical  Investments  at  the 
time,  whether  Professor  Thompson  were  right  or  wrong  in 
his  history,  the  general  public  will  always  associate  the 
name  of  Marconi  with  wireless  telegraphy  ;  "  commercial 
success  is,  in  fact,  the  proper  criterion  in  this  as  in  most 
matters  of  applied  science."  In  fairness  to  Thompson, 
however,  it  must  be  added  that  a  month  or  two  later  the 
same  newspaper  contained  the  following  paragraphs  : 

"  The  electrical  Press  is  calling  on  Mr.  Marconi  for  an 
explanation.  The  cause  of  the  clamour  is  the  following 
'  application  for  amendment '  in  a  recent  issue  of  the 
Official  Journal  of  the  Patent  Office  : 

"  '  18,105.  Guglielmo  Marconi  seeks  leave  to  amend 
the  Application  for  Letters  Patent,  numbered  as  above, 
for  ' '  Improvements  in  coherers  or  detectors  for  electric 
waves,"  by  converting  it  into  an  application  for  a  Patent 
for  an  invention  communicated  to  him  from  abroad  by 
the  Marquis  Luigi  Solari,  of  Italy.' 

"  Those  who  have  followed  Professor  Silvanus  Thompson's 
vigorous  onslaughts  against  Mr.  Marconi's  priority  in  certain 
patents  will  appreciate  the  desire  for  an  explanation." 

Controversy  on  the  subject  never  died  down  for  long,  but 
Thompson  took  little  further  part,  though  following  every 
achievement  in  the  scientific  field,  and,  as  far  as  the  public 
were  permitted  to  do  so,  the  schemes  and  rivalries  of  the 
company  promoters.  In  1906,  at  the  time  of  the  second 
International  Wireless  Congress  at  Berlin,  there  was  a  great 
stir  in  the  Press,  when  it  seemed  that  the  contracts  of  Great 
Britain  and  Italy  with  the  Marconi  companies  prevented 
these  Powers  from  agreeing  to  the  internationalisation  of 
wireless  telegraphy.  Garbled  history  in  defence  of  certain 
actions  of  the  Marconi  company  was  put  forth  in  The  Times 
correspondence  columns,  and  provoked  Thompson  once  more 
to  endeavour  to  correct  the  impressions  of  the  public  in 
this  matter. 

He  presented  a  concise  history  of  the  subject  in  a  pamphlet 
privately  printed  in  1911  in  connection  with  the  successful 
petition  of  the  Lodge-Muirhead  Wireless  and  General  Tele- 
graphy Syndicate,  Limited,  for  the  renewal  of  Lodge's  patent 
of  1897  for  Improvements  in  Syntonised  Telegraphy  with- 


84  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

out  Line  Wires.  In  pronouncing  his  decision,  the  judge 
remarked  that  the  patent  was  a  great  advance  upon  the 
Marconi  patent  of  1896,  and  that  the  patentee  had  been 
inadequately  remunerated,  partly  because  the  owners  had 
been  seriously  hampered  by  the  Post  Office  monopoly,  which 
prevented  them  from  obtaining  the  licence  necessary  for 
working  the  system  in  this  country. 

Lodge  wrote  to  Thompson  : 

"  March  llth,   1911. 

"MY   DEAR  S.    P.    T., 

"  I  have  just  read  the  proof  that  you  sent  me  on 
Points  in  Early  History.  It  is  an  extraordinarily  able  pro- 
duction, bringing  out  the  essential  features  with  great  skill 
and  knowledge.  I  could  not  have  done  it  nearly  so  well. 
You  certainly  have  a  genius  for  matters  of  scientific  history, 
and  I  am  grateful  to  you  for  your  help." 

When  the  pamphlet  was  complete  he  wrote  : 

"  The  case  you  make  out  is  impressive,  and  the  amount 
of  trouble  you  have  taken  over  it  is  extraordinary,  not  to 
speak  of  the  great  ability  it  displays.  I  should  think  that 
some  day  it  ought  to  be  published.  My  own  statement  too 
might  be  published,  but  yours  is  the  more  valuable  as  being 
independent  of  what  people  will  suppose 'to  be  bias  caused 
by  personal  interest." 

There  remain  to  be  mentioned  one  or  two  other  public 
lectures  of  some  importance.  At  the  Meeting  of  the  British 
Association  at  Ipswich  in  1895,  Thompson  delivered  one  of 
the  two  evening  lectures  to  the  members.  The  subject 
was  "  Magnetism  in  Rotation,"  a  study  of  the  elaborate 
development  of  polyphase  machinery,  from  Arago's  casual 
observation  in  1822  of  the  deadening  effect  of  a  copper  plate 
placed  near  a  vibrating  magnet,  and  Faraday's  work  on 
eddying  currents  induced  by  a  revolving  magnet.  In 
the  light  of  modern  knowledge  he  discussed  the  origin  of 
terrestrial  magnetism  and  auroral  phenomena.  The  magic 
of  magnetism  had  great  fascination  for  him.  It  formed  the 
subject  of  many  of  his  lectures,  the  Boyle  Lecture  at  Oxford, 
the  three  Tyndall  Lectures  at  the  Royal  Institution  in  1907, 
and  one  in  the  same  year  at  Bristol  when  he  went  back  to 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL   SCIENCE    85 

his  old  haunts  to  inaugurate  a  course  of  popular  lectures  at 
University  College.  Two  of  his  Friday  Evening  Discourses 
at  the  Royal  Institution  were  devoted  to  this  subject, 
the  first,  on  "  Magnetism  in  Transitu,"  was  illustrated  by 
a  cinematograph  film  taken  from  a  long  series  of  careful 
diagrams  drawn  by  hand  to  show  the  movements  of  magnetic 
lines  of  force.  His  last  Discourse  before  the  war,  in  May 
1913,  was  on  "  The  Secret  of  the  Permanent  Magnet  "  ;  a 
very  excellent  title,  for  the  secret  was  not  to  be  disclosed  in  his 
day  and  generation,  though  he  worked  hard  to  lay  it  bare. 
Of  his  courses  of  public  lectures  on  electrical  subjects,  by 
far  the  most  important  were  his  Cantor  Lectures  of  1882  on 
"Dynamo-Electric  Machinery,"  and  of  1890  on  "The 
Electromagnet."  Both  of  these  were  published,  and  after- 
wards were  expanded  into  substantial  volumes.  The 
lectures  were  very  much  appreciated  by  the  limited  audiences 
that  were  able  to  attend  them,  but  their  significance  is  small 
compared  with  that  of  the  books  which  are  living  yet. 

II.    PUBLICATIONS 

In  October  1879  Thompson  sent  to  Mr.  Norman  Lockyer, 
for  insertion  in  Nature,  some  notes  on  physical  subjects 
which  met  with  cordial  approval,  and  he  was  invited  to 
undertake  "  a  Physical  Column,  on  somewhat  the  same 
lines  as  our  astronomical  column  and  meteorological  notes," 
to  begin  in  the  new  volume,  when  Nature  entered  upon  the 
second  decade  of  its  existence.  He  had  already  undertaken 
some  reviews  for  the  journal,  and  his  capabilities  as  a  writer 
were  therefore  not  unknown  to  the  editor.  He  was  to  com- 
pile the  column  from  material  supplied  to  him  by  the  office, 
and  from  excerpts  from  Poggendorff's  "  Annalen  "  and  other 
foreign  serials.  This  column  was  not  continued  for  more 
than  about  a  year,  but  Thompson  was  for  several  years  a 
frequent  contributor  of  articles.  Amongst  these  were  some 
on  "  Physics  without  Apparatus,"  which  it  was  at  one  time 
suggested  by  the  publishers  might  suitably  be  collected 
into  a  volume  for  "  The  Nature  Series,"  but  the  suggestion 
was  never  carried  out. 

The  first  book  Thompson  undertook  to  write  was  also 


86  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

never  completed.  He  thought  that  there  was  a  need  in 
England  for  a  book  equivalent  to  Miiller-Pouillet's  French 
"  Textbook  of  Physics,"  and  he  had  a  great  desire  to  publish 
some  such  student's  manual. 

Independently  he  approached  Messrs.  Macmillan  &  Co. 
on  the  subject,  at  the  same  time  offering  to  lay  before  them 
another  proposal  respecting  an  Elementary  Treatise  on 
Electricity  and  Magnetism  for  their  School  Class  Book  Series. 
The  publishers  expressed  themselves  frankly  unwilling  to 
take  the  venture  of  the  bigger  book,  for,  though  they  heard 
favourable  expectations  as  to  his  future  from  all  they  con- 
sulted, they  were  not  yet  able  to  regard  him  as  certain  to 
turn  out  what  would  be  a  standard  textbook  of  the  subject. 
They  were,  however,  willing  to  entertain  the  idea  of  the 
smaller  work  on  electricity  and  magnetism,  and  Thompson 
set  to  work  diligently  upon  his  congenial  task.  At  the 
time  of  his  marriage  in  March  1881  he  had  completed  the 
writing,  and  was  busy  with  the  proof  correcting,  a  task 
with  which  his  wife  was  able  to  assist  him,  having  had 
training  in  it  from  her  father,  whom  she  had  helped  in 
connection  with  his  wiitings  on  economic  subjects. 

By  the  end  of  January  1882,  when  the  book  had  barely 
been  out  two  months,  and  neither  the  educational  nor  the 
scientific  and  technical  journals  had  yet  published  reviews, 
the  publisher  wrote  to  tell  him  that  he  should  be  preparing 
necessary  alterations  in  case  of  a  reprint,  although,  "  of 
course,  we  cannot  expect  the  sale  to  go  on  at  the  same  rate." 
This  anticipation  was  quite  wrong.  The  book  was  reprinted 
twice  in  1882,  and  altogether  sixteen  times  in  the  twelve 
succeeding  years.  It  met  with  an  immediate  appreciation 
from  many  of  his  scientific  friends.  Almost  the  very  day 
that  he  received  his  copy,  Oliver  Lodge  sent  a  postcard  : 

"November  9th,  1881. 

"  The  [anti-]  vivisectionists  will  be  down  upon  you ;  see 
p.  23. l  I  have  written  to  inform.  It  will  be  my  textbook 
henceforth." 

1  P.  23  bore  "  the  delightful  picture  of  the  Italian  gentleman  with  wavy 
hair,  taper  fingers,  and  a  three-legged  and  be-tailed  cat-skin,  presiding 
over  an  electrophorus." 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    87 
In  February  following  he  wrote  at  greater  length  : 

"  DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  I  am  delighted  to  hear  of  the  success  of  your  book, 
Floreat  silva  !  I  wish  I  could  get  through  an  edition  in  a 
few  months.  I  have  been  thinking  I  should  like  to  review 
it  some  time.  I  could  send  a  notice  to  The  Electrician  any 
time,  but  I  daresay  you  would  prefer  Nature. 

"  I  have  not  noticed  much  to  correct.  I  have  not  read  it 
yet,  but  only  glanced  at  it.  Several  points  I  have  noticed 
which  I  liked  much.  Page  200  (bottom)  :  I  don't  think 
you  should  even  suggest  that  this  is  a  paradox.  Potential 
and  surface  density  do  not  pretend  to  be  connected. 

dV 
Density  oc  -r— ,  not  V. 

"  I  don't  think  I  have  noticed  a  thing  else. 

"  I  was  asked  just  lately  to  write  an  elementary  Electricity, 
but  I  told  the  people  it  was  too  late,  and  that  I  couldn't 
hope  to  beat  your  book  (nor  indeed  to  equal  it).  I  would 
write  a  big  book  for  them  if  they  liked,  but  in  elementary 
books  yours  had  the  field  to  itself. 

"  I  am  fearfully  busy  just  now,  as  you  may  judge  from 
enclosed  prospectus  [Liverpool,  University  College].  Please 
send  me  one  of  yours. 

"  With  kind  regards,  yours  sincerely, 

"  0.  J.  LODGE." 

"  I  recognise  your  handwriting  in  Engineering.  .  .  . 
I  am  not  very  satisfied  with  my  latest  test-tube  Daniells.1 
They  work  well  when  first  set  up,  but  the  glass  gets  dry  after. 
You  must  not  depend  on  the  conduction  of  a  film  of  moisture 
on  glass." 

It  was  the  compactness  of  the  volume  that  was  perhaps 
its  greatest  achievement.  Professor  Riicker  wrote  to  him, 
"  You  have  certainly  succeeded  remarkably  in  being  at  once 
concise  and  clear  ";  and  Professor  Frankland,  "  Such  a  class 
book  was  much  wanted  ;  you  seem  to  have  made  it  clear, 
concise,  and  practical,  and  I  predict  for  it  a  large  sale." 
From  the  business  men  also  he  received  tribute.  Joseph 
W.  Swan  wrote  : 

"  I  have  only  had  time  to  glance  through  it,  but  it  is  only 
necessary  to  do  so  in  order  to  see  that  it  fills  a  place  in 

1  See  p.  137? 


88  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

science  literature  till  now  almost  vacant,  and  much  needing 
to  be  filled.  I  have  often  been  asked  if  such  a  thing  existed, 
and  had  to  answer  '  No.'  You  have  the  art  of  clear  exposi- 
tion, and  one  has  only  to  read  the  first  paragraph  of  your 
book  to  realise  what  a  pleasure  it  must  be  to  learn  lessons 
with  you  for  teacher." 

Professor  Carey  Foster  wrote  : 

"  I  like  the  book  very  much  indeed.  You  have  managed 
to  bring  it  up  to  a  much  higher  level  than  anything  of  the 
same  kind  existing  hitherto,  and  I  doubt  not  it  will  be  recog- 
nised as  the  book  on  the  subject." 

It  did  virtually  become  the  book.  How  completely  this 
is  true  may  be  gathered  from  the  reviews  of  the  last  edition 
in  1914.  For  instance,  The  Electrician  wrote  : 

"  This  volume  is  a  new  edition  of  a  book  that  needs  no 
recommendation.  The  book  is  probably  more  widely  used 
than  any  other  on  the  subject,  and  is,  beyond  question,  well 
known  to  most  of  our  readers.  The  first  edition  was  pub- 
lished nearly  thirty-five  years  ago,  and  after  being  re- 
printed eighteen  times,  a  new  edition  appeared  in  1895. 
This  edition  was  reprinted  no  less  than  twenty-one  times. 

"  We  venture  to  think  that  the  book  owes  much  of  its 
popularity  to  the  fact  that  the  author  is  an  experienced 
teacher.  As  such  he  is  able  to  present  the  several  branches 
of  the  subject  in  logical  sequence,  and  to  give  the  exact 
amount  of  information  required  by  a  beginner.  The  latter 
will  not  regard  his  education  as  complete  when  he  has 
finished  reading  '  Thompson,'  but  being  properly  grounded 
he  will  be  able  to  turn  to  more  ambitious  works.  For  this 
reason  Elementary  Lessons  in  Electricity  and  Magnetism 
may  be  regarded  more  as  an  institution  than  as  a  mere  book." 

The  early  reviews  were  unanimous  as  to  the  usefulness, 
attractiveness,  and  reliability  of  the  little  volume.  Thompson 
was  rather  disappointed  that  the  scientific  papers  were  so 
slow  in  noticing  it  at  any  length. 

However,  in  April  the  review  appeared  in  Nature  signed 
0.  J.  L.  Whilst  ending  with  a  strong  recommendation 
to  teachers  to  adopt  it  at  once  as  their  textbook,  the 
comments  passed  were  throughout  in  different  style  from 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    89 

those  of  all  the  other  reviews  ;  some  of  the  most  enlightening 
are  quoted  : 

"  The  historical  statements  indicate  by  little  additional 
details  that  they  have  not  been  simply  copied  from  the 
joint-stock  property  of  textbook  writers,  but  that  some 
original  authorities  have  been  referred  to.  The  author's 
statements  of  the  well-worn  facts  are  moreover  interspersed 
with  notes  and  characteristic  touches  which  redeem  them 
from  dulness. 

"If  it  is  necessary  to  say  anything  by  way  of  general 
criticism,  it  is  that  the  author  sometimes  shows  a  disposi- 
tion to  theorise  a  little  too  baldly,  and  to  state  without 
qualification,  and  with  an  air  of  certainty  and  completeness, 
views  concerning  the  nature  of  electricity,  which  though 
undoubtedly  they  have  some  truth  in  them,  i.e.  which 
certainly  are  steps  towards  the  truth,  yet  have  no  finality 
about  them,  and  which  require  to  be  cautiously  worded 
and  expressed  lest  they  should  mislead.  For  instance,  his 
statements  in  the  preface  that  '  electricity  is  not  two  but 
one '  ;  that,  '  whatever  it  is,  it  is  not  matter  and  not 
energy,'  that  '  it  may  be  heaped  up  in  some  places  and 
will  do  work  in  returning  to  its  former  level  distribution,' 
are  all,  considered  strictly,  unjustifiable  dogmas  of  the  kind 
we  have  mentioned. 

"Neither  are  we  altogether  disposed  to  approve  of  the 
phrase  '  conservation  of  electricity,'  by  which  the  author 
seems  to  set  much  store. 

"  However,  all  these  doctrines  are  immense  improve- 
ments on  the  old  forms  of  the  fluid  theory,  and,  being  steps 
towards  truth,  will  probably  do  far  more  good  than  harm. 
We  are  fully  impressed  with  the  necessity  in  teaching  of 
getting  some  ideas  into  the  heads  of  the  students  to  begin 
with,  and  of  polishing  them  up  as  much  as  possible 
afterwards. 

"  On  the  whole,  then,  while  we  have  not  been  able  to  find 
any  statement  which  is  certainly  and  distinctly  wrong,  we 
find  a  very  great  deal  which  is  not  only  certainly  and 
distinctly  right,  but  which  is  also  exactly  that  concerning 
which  a  real  student  desires,  but  has  hitherto  been  unable 
to  obtain,  information." 

His  friend  Professor  G.  F.  FitzGerald  of  Dublin  wrote  to 
him  concerning  the  method  of  teaching  referred  to  by 


90  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Lodge  in  this  review.  He  had  seen  the  proofs  of  the  book 
at  the  British  Association  at  York  in  the  summer,  and 
found  that  the  complete  volume  quite  came  up  to  the  high 
expectations  he  had  formed  : 

"  I  am  particularly  pleased  with  your  idea  of  giving  three 
elementary  all-round  chapters  to  begin  with,  and  am 
thinking  of  arranging  my  lectures  next  term  on  that 
principle,  at  least  as  an  experiment  to  see  how  it  works,  as  I 
presume  you  cannot  patent  an  idea  of  that  kind." 

The  phrase  "  conservation  of  electricity  "  by  which  the 
author  "  set  much  store  "  was  the  outcome  of  a  considerable 
amount  of  reading  and  thought.  Just  when  his  book  was 
in  the  press,  Thompson  was  made  acquainted  with  some 
work  of  Monsieur  G.  Lippmann  of  Paris,  published  in 
Comptes  Rendus.  In  his  preface  Thompson  had  claimed 
to  be  the  first  to  enunciate  the  doctrine  under  this  title,  but 
after  seeing  this  earlier  paper  he  appended  a  footnote 
referring  to  the  prior  publication  of  Lippmann' s  "  elegant 
analytical  statement "  of  the  same  view,  independently 
reached. 

As  the  practical  applications  of  electricity  began  to  be 
realised,  interest  in  theories  as  to  its  nature  was  revived. 
Thompson  was  roused  to  speculations  initially  by  gaining 
close  familiarity  with  Clerk  Maxwell's  theory,  and  by  the 
hope  of  establishing  the  true  nature  of  electricity  by  experi- 
ment. Accepting  the  idea  of  the  universal  presence  of 
electricity,  electrification  being  a  state  of  possession  of  too 
much  or  too  little  of  the  "  imponderable  fluid  "  electricity, 
he  tabulated  all  the  facts  available  from  published  accounts 
of  experiments  which  threw  any  light  on  the  question  as  to 
whether  the  vitreous  or  the  resinous,  the  so-called  positive 
and  negative  electrifications  of  Franklin,  were  the  true 
excess.  In  particular,  analogies  with  the  theories  of  radia- 
tion led  him  to  state,  with  some  degree  of  conviction,  that 
"  the  state  of  resinous  (negative)  electrification  corresponds 
in  reality  to  that  of  excess,  or  to  a  true  plus  electrification." 
These  speculations  he  expounded  fully  in  a  paper  on  "  The 
Conservation  of  Electricity  and  the  Absolute  Scale  of 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     91 

Potential,"  which  he  submitted  to  the  Royal  Society.  Dr. 
Spottiswoode  conferred  with  Professor  Stokes  on  the  merits 
of  the  paper,  and  reported  that,  notwithstanding  the  interest 
which  attached  to  his  views  of  the  subject,  the  paper  was  of 
a  more  speculative  character  than  such  as  were  usually 
published  in  the  Proceedings,  and  recommended  it  as  more 
suited  to  the  Philosophical  Magazine,  where  in  due  time  it 
appeared. 

When  the  book  was  largely  rewritten  in  1894,  the  preface 
containing  these  theories  disappeared,  and  a  short  paragraph 
on  the  contemporary  position  as  to  theory  was  inserted  in 
the  text,  the  new  preface  being  devoted  to  outlining  the 
chief  developments  in  theory  and  practice  which  the 
thirteen  years  had  witnessed.  When  twenty  years  later  the 
work  was  completely  revised  for  a  second  time,  it  was  again 
the  latter  half  of  the  book,  dealing  with  the  industrial  appli- 
cations of  electricity,  that  required  remodelling,  though 
throughout  the  work  the  modern  conception  of  elec- 
trons as  the  substance  of  electricity  was  borne  in  mind. 
Thompson's  second  daughter,  Helen,  who  as  a  Newnham 
student  had  studied  Physics  at  the  Cavendish  Laboratory, 
rendered  him  some  assistance  with  this  part  of  the  work. 
The  review  in  Nature  refers  to  the  chapter  on  Electrons  as  a 
welcome  addition,  the  author  having  managed  to  "  compress 
into  a  dozen  pages  as  much  information  on  this  subject  as 
is  usually  contained  in  books  of  much  larger  size."  In  this 
he  had  previously  achieved  mastery,  having  contributed 
articles  on  Electricity  to  Harmsworth's  Self-Educator,  and 
having  dealt  in  one  short  weekly  section  with  "  The  Nature 
of  Electricity." 

His  1914  volume  brought  him  a  tribute  from  his  former 
student  and  secretary,  who  had  done  much  to  help  him 
with  the  former  revision,  Miles  Walker,  now  a  Professor 
at  the  University  of  Manchester : 

"  This  book  will  always  be  to  me  the  authority  for  first 
principles.  The  simple  figures  have  formed  in  the  mind, 
images  which  stand  for  the  laws  they  illustrate.  With 
thousands  of  readers  it  must  be  the  same  long  after  they  have 
passed  on  to  other  books.  The  fascination  which  lies  in  the 


92  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

study  of  natural  laws  has  been  caught  by  you,  and  caged  in 
these  pages,  so  that  as  one  turns  them  over  it  peeps  out 
and  lures  fresh  readers  to  give  their  lives  to  things  electrical. 
I  wonder  how  many  engineers  you  have  won  already.  There 
will  be  many,  many  more  in  the  future,  and  the  new  chapters 
will  add  to  the  spell." 

Those  who  fell  under  the  spell  of  the  book  were  not 
Englishmen  only.  From  the  beginning  it  was  largely 
bought  in  America  ;  from  France,  Germany,  Italy,  Sweden, 
Poland,  Spain,  and  Japan,  came  letters  from  those  anxious 
to  obtain  permission  to  translate  the  'book,  so  that  others  in 
those  countries  might  benefit. 

The  Cantor  Lectures  mentioned  above  (p.  85),  and  in 
addition  those  on  Arc  Lamps  of  a  later  day,  were  pub- 
lished in  full  by  the  Society  of  Arts.  After  the  lectures 
on  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery,  Thompson  received  in 
January  1883  the  following,  in  a  letter  from  Mr.  W.  M. 
Mordey  (later  President  of  the  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers) : 

"DEAR  SIR, 

"  Your  Cantor  Lectures  were  a  decided  boon,  and  to 
have  them  in  full  and  well  illustrated  as  they  appear  in  the 
Society's  Journal  is  a  great  treat.  Everywhere  I  hear  them 
spoken  of  as  what  was  wanted  on  the  subject,  and  as  the 
perfection  of  '  plain,  unvarnished  '  explanation.  After  the 
thick  coats  of  *  varnish  '  so  painfully  familiar  to  young 
'  searchers  after  truth '  like  myself,  I  assure  you  we 
appreciate  your  straightforward  work.  .  .  . 

"  I  have  some  further  results  springing  from  your  sugges- 
tions, and  hope  to  send  you  an  account  soon.  I  believe 
I  shall  have  an  opportunity  of  getting  curves  of  Edison 
and  several  other  machines  shortly." 

This  letter  shows  the  sort  of  impression  Thompson 
produced  on  men  in  the  electrical  industry  the  first  time 
he  came  up  to  London  to  lecture  to  them.  Professor  John 
Perry,  writing  about  some  machinery  in  which  he  had  an 
interest,  added  :  "  Let  me  congratulate  you  on  the  immense 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     93 

amount  of  information  you  have  been  able  to  put  into 
your  lectures  "  ;  and  he,  like  others,  took  for  granted  that 
they  would  be  published  in  compact  form. 

The  reprint  very  rapidly  reached  a  distant  public.  Spare 
copies  were  in  request  on  the  Continent ;  an  American 
reprint,  with  slight  additions,  was  produced  unauthorised  ; 
and  from  Paris  came  the  following  letter  in  July  1883  : 

"  MONSIEUR, 

"Attache  a  la  Maison  Siemens  freres  de  Paris, 
j'ecris  dans  quelques  journaux  scientifiques  et  publie  en  ce 
moment  dans  1'un  d'eux  la  Traduction  de  votre  remarquable 
travail  '  On  Dynamo- Electric  Machinery '  (Cantor  Lectures). 
J'aurais  peut-etre  1'intention  de  faire  de  cette  traduction  une 
Brochure  separee,  et  viens  vous  en  demander  1'autorisation. 

"  Je  vous  serais  reconnaissant,  monsieur,  de  vouloir  bien 
m'honeur  d'une  reponse,  et  vous  prie  d'agreer  la  respec- 
tueuse  expression  de  mon  entier  devourment. 

"  EMIL  BOISTEL." 

Thus  introduced  himself  the  Frenchman  who  translated 
all  Thompson's  works  on  Electricity,  and  was  henceforth 
in  constant  correspondence  with  him.  After  their  first 
meeting  he  was  always  hoping  for  an  occasion  which  should 
bring  a  visit  from  his  "  cher  maitre,"  to  whom  he  professed 
profound  attachment,  and  in  whose  affairs  both  public  and 
private  he  took  a  continual  interest. 

The  demand  for  the  book  became  more  and  more  urgent, 
and  during  the  next  two  years  Thompson  was  busy  in  his 
spare  time  collecting  material  to  add  to  his  lectures. 

In  February  1884  he  wrote  to  his  wife  from  London  : 

"  I  have  had  a  busy  day.  First  the  Safety  Lamp  affairs. 
.  .  .  We  meet  again  next  Saturday.  After  this  I  inter- 
viewed Alexander  Siemens  about  progress  in  dynamos. 
Then  I  went  into  the  City  and  called  at  the  Telephone  Co.'s 
office  ;  after  which  I  went  out  by  train  to  Chelmsford  to 
see  Mr.  Crompton's  works  and  his  new  Dynamo- Electric 
machines  and  lamps.  I  came  back  about  6  p.m.,  called  on 
Prof.  Hughes,  and  on  an  instrument  maker  about  some 
apparatus.  Then  I  had  some  dinner,  and  after  that  went 


94  LIFE   OP   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

to  the  Royal  Institution  to  hear  Max  Miiller  lecture.  Here 
I  saw  Hughes  again,  and  Tyndall,  the  latter  only  for  a 
moment.  It  is  very  curious  how  the  principles  I  enunciated 
eighteen  months  ago  are  proving  to  be  solid  in  practice. 
All  the  makers  are  remodelling  their  dynamo-electric 
machines  in  agreement  with  the  principles  I  laid  down." 

The  reviews  were  quick  in  appearing  when  the  book  was 
published,  and  were  full  of  congratulations  and  thanks  for 
the  manner  in  which  the  author  had  supplied  the  wants  of 
students.  The  book  found  no  rival  in  the  field  in  its  earlier 
editions,  but  even  in  the  absence  of  the  stimulus  of  compe- 
tition, "  never,"  declared  one  amongst  the  many  favourable 
reviews,  "  in  the  whole  history  of  applied  science  has  a  more 
satisfactory  first  step  been  made." 

It  was  required  at  once  in  foreign  countries  as  well  as  in 
America,  and  there  was  no  lack  of  offers  to  translate  it  into 
diverse  tongues.  Only  the  French  translation  of  the  first 
edition  was  effected,  for  after  eight  months  the  publishers 
were  already  demanding  "  copy  "  for  the  second  edition. 
Even  in  the  short  time  that  elapsed  before  this  was  prepared 
considerable  advances  in  theory  and  practice  had  to  be 
recorded,  and  the  volume  increased  by  over  100  pages,  and 
by  nearly  as  many  diagrams.  One  item  that  evoked 
particular  interest  was  the  elaboration  of  Dr.  Hopkinson's 
method  of  studying  "characteristic  curves"  obtained  from 
dynamos,  and  another  was  Thompson's  reference  to  the 
early  discovery  of  the  "  ring  armature  "  by  Pacinotti  J  in 
1864,  which  preceded  the  better-known  "  Gramme  machine  " 
by  some  years,  but  was  then  unknown  even  to  his  com- 
patriots, the  Italian  engineers.  The  book  received  praise 
for  the  excellence  of  its  index,  a  feature  to  which  Thompson 
attached  great  importance  in  all  his  books. 

The  work  grew  ;  each  edition  was  pronounced  "  better 
than  its  predecessor,  and  that  is  saying  a  great  deal,"  as 
Professor  Ayrton  wrote  to  him  about  the  third.  The  novel 
feature  in  this  edition  was  a  chapter  containing  historical 

1  Pacinotti,  Professor  at  Pisa  University.  Thompson  first  met  him 
when  visiting  Pisa  during  his  extended  Easter  vacation  in  1892.  See 
p.  223. 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     95 

notes,  which  some  found  extremely  interesting  because  it 
gave  the  most  complete  list  of  workers  in  this  field  that  had 
yet  been  published. 

On  August  29th,  1888,  he  received  the  following  letter  from 
W.  H.  Snell,  editor  of  The  Electrician  : 

"  DEAR  DR.  THOMPSON, 

"  Of  course  I  am  sorry  that  you  were  not  able  to  send 
me  the  papers  on  graphic  constructions,  but  I  should  have 
been  still  more  sorry  if  you  had  sunk  into  a  premature  grave 
whilst  labouring  to  do  so.  It  is  quite  evident  that  you 
have  got  through  an  enormous  amount  of  work  this  year, 
and  I  am  totally  at  a  loss  to  conceive  how  you  find  the  time 
to  elaborate  those  exhaustive  historical  papers  in  the  midst 
of  your  educational  duties — to  say  nothing  of  research 
work. 

"  I  am  glad  you  are  getting  such  a  thoroughly  laissez 
faire  holiday/  and  greatly  envy  your  ability  to  carry  out 
such  a  programme.  I  am  sorry  that  you  will  not  be  at  Bath, 
but  with  the  exception  of  Lodge,  Ayrton,  and  Preece,  no  one 
of  very  great  electrical  magnitude  seems  to  intend  to  be 
there.  Preece  is  going  to  attack  Dr.  Lodge's  mathematical 
theory  of  Lightning,  so  we  may  expect  something  brilliant. 

"  Your  third  edition  of  Dynamo- Electric  Machinery  came 
into  my  hands  just  as  I  was  leaving  town  (for  four  days), 
and  it  was  only  after  a  severe  struggle  that  my  strict  sense 
of  duty  led  me  to  leave  it  behind.  Since  my  return  I  have 
been  dipping  into  it  at  every  spare  moment,  but  I  don't 
think  any  *  Review '  will  appear  quite  immediately.  It  is 
a  grand  piece  of  work." 

The  fourth  edition  in  1892  had  expanded  to  a  volume 
approaching  1,000  pages,  bound  in  scarlet,  and  jokingly 
referred  to  as  "  The  Peerage,"  or  "  the  big  red  book,"  to  dis- 
tinguish it  from  "  the  little  red  book,"  or  "  L.  R.  B."  as  some 
of  his  students  called  the  Electricity  and  Magnetism.  Much 
of  the  former  work  had  been  rewritten  in  hopes  of  making 
it  up-to-date,  or,  as  one  friend  described  it,  "  rather  more 
than  up-to-date  on  some  points."  The  later  editions  were 
published  in  two  volumes,  but  even  then  it  was  found  quite 

1  Thompson  was  at  Glen  Sannox  in  Arran,  N.B.,  with  his  wife  and  four 
small  daughters,  spending  much  time  sketching.  He  did  not  attend  the 
British  Association  at  Bath. 


96  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

impossible  to  include  the  masses  of  information  provided 
by  the  rapid  development  of  the  industry.  The  historical 
portion  was  compressed,  and  when  his  Cantor  Lectures  on 
the  Electromagnet  were  published  in  book  form  as  one  of 
the  Finsbury  Technical  Manuals,  some  portions  of  the 
chapters  on  magnetical  subjects  were  transferred  to  that 
book,  The  Electromagnet  and  Electromagnetic  Mechanisms, 
to  which  his  brother,  Dr.  J.  Tatham  Thompson  of  Cardiff, 
contributed  a  chapter  on  the  Use  of  the  Electromagnet  in 
Surgery.  "  The  book  is  admirably  lucid,  and  many  difficult 
problems  are  successfully  attacked.  In  several  cases  also 
his  conclusions  have  formed  the  starting-point  for  other 
investigators,  and  the  good  seed  he  sowed  has  borne 
abundant  fruit."  l 

In  1895  much  work  with  alternating  currents  was  already 
being  done,  both  in  England  and  America,  and  in  the  spring 
of  that  year  Mr.  Martin,  of  The  Electrical  Engineer  of  New 
York,  wrote  to  Thompson,  "  I  am  most  heartily  glad  you  are 
tackling  the  subject.  It  needed  your  master  hand.  There 
is  an  infinite  lot  in  the  way  a  thing  is  done."  The  portion 
of  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery  referring  to  such  work  was 
expanded  into  his  book  Polyphase  Electric  Currents  and 
Alternate  Current  Motors.  This  was  immediately  translated 
into  both  French  and  German,  as  were  also  the  two  sub- 
sequent editions. 

Later  he  wished  to  expand  his  treatment  of  Design  of 
Dynamos,  but  it  was  agreed  that  this  should  be  done  in  a 
separate  volume  from  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery.  A 
great  deal  of  the  work  for  this  new  book  was  done  during 
a  long  wet  summer  holiday  in  North  Wales.  The  author 
sat  in  the  circle  of  his  family,  drawing  what  appeared  to 
them  to  be  a  never-ending  series  of  diagrams,  of  "  boosters  " 
and  other  unfamiliar  machines,  while  Great  Expectations 
and  other  novels  were  read  aloud  to  him. 

Of  Dynamo- Electric  Machinery  it  was  written:  "If 
Professor  Thompson  had  done  nothing  else,  this  invaluable 
book  would  serve  as  his  enduring  monument."  8 

1  Extract  from  Journal  of  Inst.E.E.  vol.  Iv,  p.  549. 

2  The  Electrical  Engineer,  1892. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    97 

But  in  the  publication  of  such  a  work  there  was  all  the 
ordinary  labour  involved  in  going  to  press,  and  in  addition 
the  difficulties  arising  from  the  active  rivalries  of  the 
persons  and  firms  whose  inventions  and  productions  were 
to  be  described. 

When  one  of  the  editions  appeared,  the  author  was  at 
once  assailed  by  an  engineer  on  behalf  of  his  design  and 
his  firm's  execution  of  a  number  of  engines,  which  Thompson 
mentioned  as  "  now  being  replaced  "  Jby  those  of  another 
firm.  Usually  so  extremely  careful  to  verify  and  test 
every  statement,  Thompson  was  very  reluctant  to  believe 
himself  misinformed,  and  guilty  of  misinforming  others. 
The  charge  entailed  inquiry,  correspondence,  both  private 
and  in  the  technical  Press,  the  stoppage  of  the  issue  of  the 
book,  and  the  cancelling  of  a  sheet  to  replace  it  by  a 
corrected  one. 

In  1902  a  much  more  troublesome  affair  arose  in  the 
preparation  of  the  sixth  edition — namely,  the  case  in  the 
Chancery  Division  known  as  Wilde  v.  Thompson,  which 
aroused  considerable  interest  among  electricians  and  authors 
of  scientific  works.  It  delayed  the  book  for  so  long  that 
Thompson  published  a  lengthy  explanation  in  The  Electrician. 

The  unfortunate  Dr.  Henry  Wilde,  F.R.S.,  believed  that 
he  alone  should  "  enjoy  the  reputation  "  of  being  the  in- 
ventor of  the  dynamo-electric  machine,  whereas,  in  common 
practice  among  engineers  and  others,  the  term  "dynamo- 
electric  machine"  was  used  to  cover  many  machines 
besides  the  type  invented  by  Wilde.  From  1899  onwards, 
Dr.  Wilde  protested  that  his  reputation  was  being  destroyed 
successively  by  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  and 
the  Society  of  Arts,  which  both  had  honoured  him  for  his 
original  work,  but  not  for  "  the  invention  of  the  dynamo  "  ; 
he  could  not  let  the  matter  rest.  All  Thompson's 
endeavours  to  meet  Dr.  Wilde's  demands  without  com- 
mitting himself  to  what  seemed  to  him  false  statements 
failed,  and  the  case  dragged  on,  entailing  endless  worry 
and  expense. 

In  December  1902  Thompson  was  feeling  very  depressed 
about  it,  and  wrote  as  follows  to  Sir  William  Crookes  : 
7 


98  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

"  I  think  I  told  you  that  poor  old  Wilde  had  brought  an 
action  against  me  for  libel,  because  I  will  not  describe  him 
as  '  the  inventor  of  the  dynamo.'  It  is  a  libel — a  malicious 
libel — even  to  say  that  poor  Faraday,  when  near  his  end, 
'  took  an  interest  in  the  description  of  Wilde's  new  magneto- 
electric  machine,'  because  thereby  the  said  Plaintiff  '  is 
deprived  of  the  credit  of  being  the  inventor  of  the  dynamo.' 

"Now,  you  described  the  Wilde  machine  in  Q.  J.  Sci. 
for  October  1867  in  precisely  those  terms  which  are  now 
a  malicious  libel.  Could  you  tell  me  this,  whether  Wilde 
at  that  date  ever  objected  to  this  name  being  given  to  his 
machine,  or  whether  he  wanted  you  to  call  it  a  '  dynamo  '  ? 

"  I  am  ill  and  worried,  or  I  would  come  myself  to  ask 
you.  Pray  forgive  my  troubling  you.  I  am  in  the  middle 
of  preparing  my  defence.  Wilde  has  retained  our  friend 
Fletcher  Moulton  to  fight  his  case." 

Eventually  in  March  1903,  eleven  months  after  the 
start,  it  was  heard  on  a  motion  to  dismiss  the  action  as 
frivolous,  on  the  ground  that  the  Statement  of  Claim  l 
showed  no  reasonable  ground  for  action.  Judgment  was 
given  in  Thompson's  favour,  with  costs,  the  complaint  of 
libel  being  termed  "  pure  nonsense  "  ;  and  the  judge  added, 
"  It  would  be  an  evil  day,  if  it  were  the  law,  that  if  one  man 
make  a  concession  to  another  man  for  the  sake  of  peace, 
the  result  is  that  there  is  a  contract  upon  which  the  one 
can  sue  the  other  for  specific  performances  or  damages." 

Despite  this  result  the  case  was  carried  by  Wilde  to  the 
Appeal  Court,  where  it  was  heard  six  months  later,  when 
it  was  again  practically  laughed  out  of  court.  It  was,  how- 
ever, no  laughing  matter  to  the  defendant,  and  he  had 
many  sympathisers,  among  them  the  editors  of  Murray's 
New  Oxford  Dictionary,  which  publication  contained  an 
article  on  the  Dynamo  that  brought  the  threat  of  a  similar 
action  against  its  perpetrators.  Thompson  had  often  had 
queries  from  the  editor  on  questions  of  scientific  terms, 
both  at  this  time,  and  from  Sir  James  Murray  himself  on 

1  The  Statement  of  Claim  asked  for  (i)  an  injunction  to  restrain  the 
publication  of  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery ;  (ii)  to  restrain  S.  P.  T.  from 
making  any  mention  of  Wilde,  his  discoveries  and  inventions,  in  Dynamo- 
Electric  Machinery  otherwise  than  in  accordance  with  the  agreed  proof ; 
(iii)  damages ;  (iv)  costs. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     99 

other  occasions.     The   following   letter   from   Mr.    Henry 
Bradley  is  one  of  many : 

"'NEW  ENGLISH  DICTIONARY' 

"  OLD  ASHMOLEAN  LIBRARY, 
"  OXFORD. 
"  December  IQth,   1903. 

"DEAR  PROF.  THOMPSON, 

"  I  enclose  two  sets  of  proofs  of  the  Magnet  articles 
in  the  latest  stage  so  far  reached.  One  copy  I  send  in 
order  that  you  may  keep  it  for  reference.  The  other  copy 
please  return  with  any  remarks  or  corrections  you  may  be 
able  to  make.  (You  see,  the  penalty  of  doing  a  kind  action 
freely  is  to  be  asked  to  do  more  !  But  I  am  anxious  not  to 
be  too  exacting.)  The  slips  include  the  words  from  Magnet 
onwards,  which  I  think  have  not  been  sent  to  you  before.  .  .  . 

"  I  had  a  visit  from  the  new  D.C.L.  [Wilde]  yesterday. 
He  was  in  a  quite  amiable  mood,  perhaps  mollified  by  his 
reception  in  Oxford.  I  asked  him  to  name  any  scientific 
man  of  the  first  rank  to  whom  I  could  go  in  order  to  obtain 
an  opinion  free  from  the  bias  which  he  attributed  to  the 
authorities  whom  I  had  consulted.  His  reply  was :  *  Ah, 

well,  you  see,  unfortunately '  you  may  guess  the  rest. 

I  said  that,  being  myself  ignorant  of  science,  I  could  not  pre- 
sume to  constitute  myself  judge  in  a  scientific  controversy, 
nor  could  I  accept  him  as  judge  in  his  own  cause  ;  I  was 
bound  to  consult  the  most  competent  and  impartial  authori- 
ties I  could,  and  to  follow  their  advice.  I  gave  him  a  copy 
of  my  proof,  and  promised  to  consider  any  suggestions, 
and  also  to  omit  any  quotation  which  he  thought  damaging 
to  his  reputation.  This  morning  he  came  in  again  with  the 
proofs  ...  we  parted  in  all  friendliness,  though  I  should 
not  wonder  if  there  is  trouble  when  Dr.  Wilde  comes  to 
consider  things  at  his  leisure." 

In  his  defence  1  published  in  The  Electrician,  Thompson 
wrote  : 

"  No  self-respecting  man  could  have  consented  to  insert 
in.  his  book ,  as  though  they  were  true,  statements  which  he 
found  to  be  false,  even  though  furnished  to  him  by  a  re- 
spected and  aged  inventor,  who  supposed  them  to  be  true. 

1  Never  heard  in  either  law  court,  but  elaborately" prepared  in  case  of 


100  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

I  preferred  the  worry  and  the  waste  of  time  and  money 
inseparable  from  a  Chancery  suit,  knowing  full  well  that, 
when  I  should  have  succeeded  in  my  defence  against  this 
monstrous  attack,  the  English  law  could  award  me  no 
damages  to  compensate  me  for  the  inevitable  loss." 

Before  leaving  the  subject  of  Thompson's  books,  let  the 
verdict  on  his  largest  technical  work  be  given  in  the  words 
of  one  of  his  old  Finsbury  men  : 

"  I  wish  to  thank  you  for  the  new  edition  of  your  Dynamo- 
Electric  Machinery.  Your  book  is  in  great  request  at  our 
works.  Every  now  and  again  some  member  of  the  staff 
creeps  into  the  Engineering  Office,  where  we  have  a  copy, 
and  asks  in  a  subdued  tone  of  voice  if  he  may  borrow  the  new 
edition  of  '  Thompson.'  There  is  a  charm  about  the  book, 
with  its  illustrations  and  clear  explanations,  that  makes 
every  student  of  electricity  long  to  have  a  copy." 

In  the  first  "  Silvanus  P.  Thompson  Memorial  Lecture  "  1 
delivered  to  the  Rontgen  Society  in  April  1918,  Professor 
Sir  Ernest  Rutherford  spoke  thus  : 

"  I  would  like  to  express  the  debt  which  I,  and  I  am  sure 
many  other  scientific  men  in  this  audience,  owe  to  his 
admirable  textbooks.  I  gained  my  first  knowledge  of 
electricity  from  Elementary  Lessons,  that  remarkable  and 
perennial  book  which  has  served  to  interest  and  instruct 
scientific  youth,  and  even  middle  age,  in  all  parts  of  the 
world.  This  work  is  marked  by  that  clearness,  simplicity, 
and  charm  which  is  so  characteristic  of  all  his  writings  and 
lectures.  If  I  was  suckled,  so  to  speak,  on  Elementary 
Lessons,  I  cut  my  first  teeth  on  Dynamo- Electric  Machinery, 
and  I  can  well  recall  the  strong  impression  left  on  me  by 
the  exceedingly  clear,  simple,  and  logical  statement  of  the 
essentials  of  a  complex  subject.  In  this  connection,  I  call 
to  mind  a  conversation  I  had  some  ten  years  ago  in  New 
York  with  an  editor  of  a  well-known  technical  journal, 
apropos  of  the  rapid  growth  of  electrical  engineering  in 
U.S.A.  He  remarked  on  the  eagerness  and  almost  excite- 
ment with  which  the  publication  and  first  arrival  of  S.  P. 
Thompson's  Dynamo- Electric  Machinery  was  awaited  in  his 
country,  and  the  strong  influence  this  book  had  exerted  in 
1  Journal  of  the  Rontgen  Society,  No.  56,  vol.  xiv. 


CONTRIBUTIONS   TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE  10 1 

leading  to  a  correct  understanding  of  ite*i\mdamentai  fact's 
and  theories  on  which  the  science  of  electrical  engineering 
is  based." 


III.    RESEARCHES,  INVENTIONS,  AND  COMMUNICATIONS  TO 

SOCIETIES 

Thompson's  first  communication  to  the  Royal  Society 
was  not  made  until  1884,  when  a  paper  in  connection  with 
his  electrical  work  was  read  there — viz.,  a  "  Note  on  the 
Theory  of  the  Magnetic  Balance  of  Hughes."  The  instru- 
ment had  been  recently  described  by  its  inventor,  Professor 
D.  E.  Hughes,  F.R.S.,  and  was  considered  likely  to  be  of 
great  convenience  and  usefulness  for  work  in  the  laboratory  ; 
it  had,  however,  only  been  graduated  by  empirical  deter- 
minations for  a  small  number  of  values,  the  remainder  to  be 
found  by  interpolation.  Thompson  worked  out  a  formula 
for  its  graduation,  and  submitted  it  to  Hughes,  from  whom 
he  received  the  following  letter : 

"  January  15th,  1884. 

"DEAR  PROP.  THOMPSON, 

"  I  have  received  yours  this  evening,  and  as  I  shall 
be  very  busy  the  next  few  days  I  wish  at  once  to  express  my 
sincere  thanks  for  the  formula  you  have  kindly  sent  for  the 
graduation  of  the  magnetic  balance.  It  seems  perfectly 
correct,  although  I  believe  it  might  be  reduced  to  a  simpler 
expression. 

"  The  real  difficulty  is  this — we  cannot  have  the  distance 
a  constant.  ...  If  you  have  the  time  and  find  the  formula 
for  all  cases  please  publish  a  paper  on  the  subject,  either 
at  the  Royal  Society  or  elsewhere ;  it  would  be  extremely 
useful. 

"  At  present  I  am  too  busily  engaged  with  molecules  to 
do  anything  until  I  have  got  hold  of  one  of  them  and 
demonstrated  its  existence. 

"With  many  thanks,  believe  me,  with  the  highest 
expressions  of  esteem, 

"  In  haste, 

"  Yoursr 
"D.  E.  HUGHES."    , 


102  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Thompson  -continued  to  work  at  the  formula  and  report 
progress,  receiving  constant  encouragement  from  the  older 
man,  who  knew  that  it  was  sufficiently  important  for  others 
also  to  be  engaged  on  the  same  work,  but  who  always  wrote 
of  his  own  eager  pursuit  of  "  a  molecule,  and  a  molecule 
/  must  have."  He  gladly  acted  "  as  sponsor  "  for  the  note 
for  the  Royal  Society,  and  saw  to  its  publication  in  the 
Proceedings. 

Enough  has  been  said  in  other  chapters  of  Thompson's 
earlier  researches  connected  with  improvements  in  appara- 
tus, communicated  to  the  Physical  Society  of  London,  and 
of  his  inventions  of  telephone  details,  and  of  the  magnetic 
figures.  His  interest  in  influence  machines  has  been  men- 
tioned in  connection  with  his  friendship  with  Wimshurst, 
and  his  own  pamphlet  on  the  history  of  the  subject ;  he 
described  "  A  Modified  Water-dropping  Influence  Machine  " 
in  the  Philosophical  Magazine  in  1888. 

The  outstanding  researches  of  the  years  1883-6  were 
published  in  the  Philosophical  Magazine,  one  on  "  The 
Graphic  Representation  of  the  Law  of  Efficiency  of  an 
Electric  Motor,"  and  several  on  the  fundamental  principles 
of  the  Electromagnet  and  Dynamo,  and  the  mathematical 
theories  and  formulae  which  express  the  essential  physical 
basis  of  all  practical  construction  of  these  machines.  They 
bore  witness  to  his  careful  study  of  contemporary  Con- 
tinental work  on  the  subject.  One  of  these  papers  in  the 
Philosophical  Magazine  was  translated  into  German,  and 
appeared  in  Exner's  Repertorium  der  Physik,  1886. 

1888-91  were  the  years  of  most  active  interest  in  electro- 
magnetic problems,  which  were  the  subject  of  his  Cantor 
Lectures  and  of  his  presidential  address  in  1890  to  the 
Junior  Engineering  Society,  now  the  Junior  Institution  of 
Engineers.  It  was  in  connection  with  this  subject  that  he 
became  so  eagerly  interested  in  the  work  of  William  Sturgeon 
the  electrician,  and  set  about  unearthing  all  existing  records 
of  the  discoveries  and  personality  of  that  remarkable  English 
worthy,  who,  escaping  in  early  youth  from  a  position  of 
poverty  and  degradation,  as  apprentice  to  an  unworthy 
shoemaker,  to  the  comparative  leisure  of  a  private  soldier 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE  103 

in  the  Royal  Artillery,  educated  himself  in  natural  philo- 
sophy, and  particularly  in  electrical  science,  to  such  purpose 
and  extent  that,  later  on,  making  his  own  apparatus,  and 
writing  clearly  of  his  researches,  he  was  able  to  communicate 
at  least  one  of  these  to  the  Royal  Society. 

A  few  years  later  Thompson  again  devoted  a  considerable 
amount  of  time  to  problems  of  magnetism,  working  in  con- 
junction with  Mr.  Miles  Walker,  his  pupil,  assistant,  and 
secretary.  Together  they  presented  papers  to  the  Physical 
Society  reporting  their  experiments  and  conclusions.  Their 
most  important  piece  of  work  on  "Electric  Traction  by 
Surface  Contacts,"  which  they  described  to  the  British  Asso- 
ciation, Section  G,  was  reprinted  in  The  Electrician  in  1898. 
At  that  time  everyone  was  disgusted  by  the  weight  and 
the  rapid  deterioration  of  accumulator  cells;  many  local 
authorities  objected  to  overhead  wires,  and  tramway 
companies  wished  to  avoid  the  expense  of  continuous  con- 
duits with  open  slots.  A  great  many  plans  for  surface  con- 
tacts had  been  already  devised,  but  all  had  their  defects. 
Thompson  and  Walker  designed  a  system  which  they  believed 
combined  the  advantages  of  the  earlier  inventions,  but 
overcame  their  lack  of  safety  or  lack  of  power.  The 
engineering  firm  Baker  &  Sons  of  Willesden,  the  heads  of 
which  were  Quaker  friends  of  Thompson,  assisted  him  by 
the  construction  of  an  experimental  tramline  near  their 
works  at  Willesden  Junction,  where  the  various  suggested 
arrangements  were  put  to  practical  tests.  In  the  end  the 
inventors  were  satisfied  that  their  peculiar  system  of  isolated 
metal  studs,  from  which  the  vehicles  picked  up  electric  power 
as  they  went  along,  did  answer  in  the  affirmative  the  three 
fundamental  questions :  (i)  Is  it  possible  to  lay  surface 
contacts  in  a  roadway,  so  that  they  do  not  cause  any 
obstruction  to  traffic  ?  (ii)  Is  the  method  of  picking  up 
current  from  studs  by  means  of  a  skate  on  the  vehicle 
feasible  under  practical  working  conditions — e.g.,  wet,  mud, 
street  refuse  such  as  paper,  etc.  ?  (iii)  Can  the  studs  be 
made  perfectly  safe,  so  that  there  is  no  possibility  of  current 
being  accidentally  drawn  from  them  in  the  absence  of  a 
tram  ? 


104  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

In  the  following  year,  Mr.  Walker  read  to  the  Institution 
of  Electrical  Engineers,  of  which  he  was  then  an  associate, 
a  paper  on  the  work  he  and  Mr.  C.  E.  Holland  had  done 
at  Willesden  under  Thompson's  direction.  The  verdict  of 
that  body  was  favourable,  and  it  is  suggested  by  Dr. 
Alexander  Russell l  that  the  system  might  have  become 
popular  had  the  local  authorities  in  this  country  made  a 
firmer  stand  against  the  erection  of  overhead  wires. 

Patents  were  taken  out,  and  with  his  usual  optimism, 
Thompson  was  full  of  hopes  of  the  adoption  of  their  scheme 
for  some  locality  where  the  simpler  and  less  expensive  over- 
head wires  were  unsuitable.  This  venture,  however,  was  no 
more  successful  than  his  others,  and  the  financial  outlay 
was  a  loss  serious  enough  to  check  all  further  attempts  of 
this  kind. 

Of  later  technical  work  there  remain  two  important  sub- 
jects to  mention.  In  The  Electrician  of  1 894  he  published  his 
"  Notes  on  Rotatory  Field  Motors,"  compiled  for  the  use 
of  Finsbury  students,  and  printed  as  being  probably  of 
service  to  others  in  aiding  their  comprehension  of  the 
operation  of  this  little  understood  class  of  machinery.  A 
few  years  later  he  read  to  the  Electrical  Engineers  a  long 
paper  on  Rotatory  Convertors,  which  was  considered  of 
such  importance  that  a  second  evening  was  devoted  to  its 
discussion.  During  this  several  speakers  agreed  in  the 
view  that  Dr.  Thompson  was  the  first  systematically  to 
elaborate  and  present  the  subject  in  palatable  form.  "  To 
many  no  small  part  of  their  present  knowledge  of  the  subject 
was  first  given  in  this  paper."  s 

1  The  Journal  oflnst.E.E.,  vol.  Iv,  p.  549. 

2  It  was  on  the  occasion  of  this  debate  that  Thompson  gave  utterance 
to  a  very  characteristic  expression  of  views  on  the  subject  of  the  value  of 
words.     Many  speakers  used  "  Rotary."     "  Lastly,  let  me  protest  against 
the  insinuation  that  in  using  the  good  old  adjective  '  rotatory  '  I  have 
altered  the    English  language.      The  old   English  language   has  many 
adjectives  like    *  rotatory,'    '  explanatory,'    '  inflammatory,'   '  sanatory,' 
and  *  undulatory,'  but  I  do  not  think  any  of  those  adjectives  would  be 
improved  by  cutting  out  what  might  seem  an  unnecessary  syllable.     I 
think  such  clipping  would  not  add  either  dignity  or  literary — perhaps 
I    ought  to   say  *  litary  ' — f  orm  to    any  communication  that  might  be 
written  in  such  an  abbreviated  language." 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO   ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE    105 

His  last  work  in  this  field  was  a  prolonged  research  upon 
the  magnetism  of  permanent  magnets.  He  published 
several  papers  between  1909  and  1915  on  his  own  work 
and  that  of  his  student  secretary,  Mr.  Ernest  Moss,  under 
his  direction  ;  and  lectured  to  the  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers'  at  the  great  Glasgow  meeting  of  that  body  in 
1912.  At  the  time  of  his  death  he  was  preparing  a  book 
on  Permanent  Magnets,  part  of  which  was  outlined  as  a 
historical  study  drawn  from  the  resources  of  his  own 
library,  leading  up  to  a  much  needed  exposition  of  the 
most  recent  work  on  the  subject. 

Another  phenomenon  which  always  fascinated  Thompson, 
and  at  which  he  worked  from  time  to  time,  was  the  curious 
dust  figures  of  Lichtenberg,  obtained  by  sifting  mixtures 
of  red  lead  and  sulphur  upon*plates  of  shellac  or  glass  on  to 
which  electricity  has  been  discharged.  They  formed  the 
subject  of  a  Preliminary  Note  to  the  Royal  Society  in  1895, 
but  further  work  on  the  nature  of  electric  discharges  was 
then  postponed  by  his  ardent  pursuit  of  the  newly-dis- 
covered Rontgen  Rays  (see  Chapter  X) ;  and  he  does  not 
seem  to  have  investigated  the  matter  further,  though  it  was 
not  lost  sight  of,  and  was  included  in  the  subjects  of  the 
last  of  his  Royal  Institution  Discourses,  in  March  1916,  on 
"  The  Corona  and  Other  Forms  of  Electric  Discharge," 
when  he  displayed,  with  his  usual  delight,  the  extraordinary 
and  brilliant  stellate  or  dendritic  patterns  to  be  obtained 
by  scattering  various  electroscopic  powders  on  sparked 
surfaces,  and  endeavoured  to  apply  the  knowledge  con- 
cerning the  nature  of  the  electric  discharge  so  obtained  to 
practical  questions  such  as  have  to  be  faced  in  attempts  to 
transmit  electricity  from  central  stations  at  tremendously 
high  voltage. 

In  connection  with  his  work  on  alternating  electric 
currents,  Thompson  developed  a  lively  practical  interest 
in  that  branch  of  mathematics  known  as  Harmonic  Analysis. 
In  1904  he  read  a  paper  to  the  Physical  Society  which 
showed  his  familiarity  with  many  of  the  various  attempts 
of  mathematicians  to  simplify  the  methods  of  this  analysis, 
and  he  described  in  his  paper,  and  later  in  The  Electrician 


106  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

for  the  benefit  of  technical  workers,  "  A  Rapid  Approximate 
Method  of  Harmonic  Analysis."  He  continued  to  work  at 
this  for  some  years,  and  in  1911  presented  to  the  Physical 
Society  a  second  paper  on  what  he  called  a  "  New  Method 
of  Approximate  Harmonic  Analysis."  This  method  was 
also  described  in  a  paper  read  before  a  Swedish  Society  a 
few  months  later,  and  printed  in  the  Arkiv  for  Matematik, 
Astronomi  och  Fysik  of  Upsala  and  Stockholm.  The  method 
is  described  in  eight  short  pages,  quite  as  obscure  as  Chinese 
to  the  lay  mathematical  mind,  but  evidently  appreciated 
by  those  with  sufficient  training  to  follow  its  argument  ; 
and  in  June  1914  he  was  requested  to  allow  his  method, 
with  its  scheduled  forms,  to  be  incorporated  in  the  Hand- 
book of  an  exhibition  of  forms  for  facilitating  Harmonic 
Analysis,  at  the  Napier  Tercentenary  Celebrations  held  at 
Edinburgh  that  summer. 

He  heard  from  his  "  collegue,"  Professor  G.  Lippmann 
of  the  Sorbonne,  that  his  paper  had  been  presented  to 
the  Academie  des  Sciences,  and  accepted  for  incorporation 
in  the  Comptes  Rendus,  but  was  afterwards  found  to  exceed 
the  prescribed  length  for  that  publication. 

Thompson  was  anxious  to  have  his  method  tested  by 
applications  to  practical  data,  and  communicated  with  the 
workers  at  the  National  Physical  Laboratory  at  Richmond 
and  Bushy,  who  dealt  with  tide  observations,  and  magnetic 
and  meteorological  statistics,  to  which  harmonic  analysis 
was  occasionally  applied. 

Dr.  Alexander  Russell  sent  him  several  helpful  criticisms 
of  his  papers,  and  drew  his  attention  to  some  previous 
work  of  Gauss,  concluding  :  "I  think  it  adds  to  the  value  of 
your  method  that  a  man  like  Gauss  thought  something  like 
it  deserving  of  the  most  serious  study."  Of  the  last  paper 
he  wrote :  "I  think  that  you  have  made  it  very  hard  for 
anyone  to  simplify  harmonic  analysis  any  further."/ 

The  same  friend  wTote  thus  of  Thompson's  work  in  this 
field :  * 

"  He  loved  music  and  had  an  accurate  musical  ear.  The 
valuable  paper  which  he  read  to  the  Physical  Society  in 

1  Journal  oflnst.E.E.,  vol.  Iv,   p.  660. 


CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  ELECTRICAL  SCIENCE     107 

1910  on  'Hysteresis  Loops,  and  Lissajous'  Figures'  was 
a  happy  mixture  of  magnetism,  sound,  and  mathematical 
theorems.  In  solving  mathematical  problems  and  inventing 
new  mathematical  theorems  he  took  the  keenest  delight. 
He  did  most  excellent  work,  for  instance,  in  simplifying 
Runge's  method  of  practical  harmonic  analysis.  He  was 
dissatisfied,  however,  with  the  accuracy  obtainable  by  this 
method.  He  then  invented  a  series  method  of  harmonic 
analysis.  The  writer  remembers  how  pleased  he  was  when 
he  first  discovered  it,  and  with  what  mutual  pleasure  we 
discussed  it.  He  greatly  appreciated  the  lectures  which 
Dr.  Kennelly  of  Harvard  gave  at  the  Institution  some 
years  ago .  In  proposing  a  vote  of  thanks  to  him  he  expressed 
himself,  as  usual,  most  happily.  He  said  that  he  felt  con- 
strained to  exclaim,  '  Great  is  the  Hyperbolic  Angle,  and 
Kennelly  is  its  Prophet!'" 

Thompson  took  a  keen  interest  in  hyperbolic  trigonometry, 
and  contemplated  writing  a  little  treatise  on  the  subject, 
which  was  to  have  been  a  companion  volume  to  the 
Calculus  made  Easy.  He  and  his  old  student,  Mr.  Maurice 
Gheury,  had  already  partly  planned  the  work  in  1914,  but 
like  much  else  it  was  cut  short  bv  the  war. 


CHAPTER   VI 

TELEPHONE    RESEARCH   AND   "LIFE  OF  PHILIPP   REIS " 

IT  has  already  been  mentioned  that  among  the  early  re- 
searches of  Thompson,  the  subject  of  Binaural  Audition 
had  taken  a  very  prominent  place. 

Some  work  on  the  same  lines  had  previously  been  done 
by  Lord  Rayleigh  in  1877.  In  a  letter  to  Thompson  of 
February  1879,  Dr.  Sedley  Taylor,  of  Trinity  College, 
Cambridge,  writes,  "  I  am  very  glad  you  are  going  to  take 
up  this  hitherto  much  neglected  subject."  Thompson 
had  before  that  published  papers  in  1877  and  1878,  and 
also  had  read  a  communication  in  French  to  the  Congres  de 
Paris  of  the  Association  Frangaise  pour  1'avancement  des 
Sciences,  under  the  title  of  "  Sur  des  Phenomenes  de  P Audi- 
tion Binauriculaire  "  in  the  latter  year. 

During  these  researches  he  made  use  of  the  telephone 
invented  in  1876  by  Graham  Bell,  and  his  attention  was 
attracted  by  this  wonderful  instrument,  with  its  combina- 
tion of  electrical  and  acoustical  properties.  He  began 
to  try  to  work  out  a  mathematical  theory  for  it.  In  1879 
he  had  some  correspondence  with  Graham  Bell  on  the 
subject,  who  wrote  on  March  7th  : 

"  Your  note  of  February  21st  received  ;  the  experiments 
made  by  me  in  London  on  January  30th,  1878,  with  two 
pair  Telephones  have  not  yet  been  published.  I  have 
continued  those  experiments.  I  am  engaged  just  now  in 
preparing  a  work  upon  the  History  of  Electric  Telephony. 
I  remember  especially  a  communication  having  reference 
to  the  phenomena  of  binaural  audition  observed  by  yourself. 
I  have  made  a  note  of  this,  and  will  forward  the  reference  as 
BOOD  as  I  can  find  it.  .  .  ." 

108 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  109 

In  December  he  wrote  again : 

"  Your  two  notes  dated  the  9th  and  10th  instant  re- 
spectively received.  I  need  not  tell  yon  how  much  pleasure 
it  has  given  me  to  hear  from  you.  I  do  hope  that  plenty  of 
time  and  opportunity  will  now  be  given  you  for  original 
research  in  Bristol.  It  would  be  a  shame  to  force  you  to 
seek,  a  professorship  elsewhere,  in  order  to  have  time  to 
carry  on  the  valuable  researches  that  are  already  bringing 
your  name  into  prominent  notice  on  both  sides  of  the 
Atlantic. 

"I  have  been  much  interested  in  the  Pseudophone,  and 
have  read  your  paper  in  the  Philosophical  Magazine  for 
October.  I  read  a  paper  at  the  last  meeting  of  the  American 
Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  upon  some 
experiments  relating  to  Binaural  Audition  which  you  would 
be  interested  in  reading.  ...  If  you  would  like  to  make 
use  of  it  in  your  monograph  on  Binaural  Hearing  I  shall  be 
glad  to  send  you  advanced  sheets." 

The  Pseudophone  to  which  Mr.  G.  Bell  referred  was  an 
instrument  invented  by  Thompson  for  investigating  the 
laws  of  Binaural  Audition.  He  read  an  account  of  it  before 
Section  A  of  the  British  Association  at  Sheffield.  It 
enabled  him  to  study  the  subjective  perception  of  two 
sounds  led  separately  to  the  ears  and  differing  in  pitch, 
phase,  or  intensity. 

In  January  1880,  in  the  course  of  a  long  letter  on  the 
same  subject,  A.  Graham  Bell  writes : 

"  I  should  like  to  know  more  about  your  instrument  for 
analysing  compound  tones  without  using  resonators ;  when 
you  are  prepared  to  make  known  the  details  of  it,  please 
remember  my  interest  in  the  subject." 

This  new  instrument,  also  devised  by  Thompson,  he 
styled  "  A  New  Phonautograph."  It  was  a  distinct  im- 
provement on  the  original  Phonautograph  invented  in  1859 
by  Leon  Scott  de  Martinville  of  Paris.  It  was  intended 
for  investigating  the  quality  of  the  consonantal  sounds, 
and  enabled  Thompson  to  carry  out  more  exact  records  of 
these  than  had  been  possible  with  the  earlier  instruments. 

About  this  time  Graham  Bell  brought  out  a  very  beautiful 


110  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

little  instrument  called  the  Photophone.  Thompson,  in 
lecturing  to  the  Leeds  Philosophical  Society  on  "  Waves  of 
Sound  and  the  Photophone,"  described  to  a  large  audience 
the  new  invention,  and  also  wrote  on  it  in  Nature.  He 
immediately  began  experimenting  with  it,  and  in  a  letter 
of  October  that  year,  Graham  Bell  sent  him  numerous 
drawings  and  diagrams  of  improvements  in  his  instrument. 
In  November,  Thompson  wrote  to  Miss  Henderson : 

"  I  was  very  lucky  yesterday  in  a  little  theoretical 
investigation  about  the  Photophone.  Two  little  mathe- 
matical calculations  came  out  beautifully,  and  I  can  now 
tell  Graham  Bell,  in  the  most  positive  way,  how  his  instru- 
ment can  be  theoretically  improved.  Also  a  quite  separate 
little  geometrical  problem  suddenly  solved  itself  in  my 
mind  last  night :  not  a  very  important  problem,  but  a 
pretty  one." 

In  November,  Graham  Bell  wrote  : 

"  I  am  much  interested  in  what  is  stated  in  the  Leeds 
newspapers  about  your  improved  Phonograph.  I  should 
very  much  like  to  have  any  particulars  concerning  this 
that  are  published  or  that  you  may  care  to  make  known 
at  the  present  time." 

This  friendly  interchange  of  their  researches  went  on 
between  Thompson  and  Graham  Bell  for  some  years.  He 
was  also  carrying  on  frequent  correspondence  with  Professor 
Barrett,  to  whom  he  wrote  in  February  1880  : 

"  I  am  very  much  pleased  to  hear  that  the  suggestion  I 
made  as  to  the  possibility  of  using  the  Motograph  Telephone 
as  a  transmitter  turns  out  successfully  after  all.  I  never 
dreamed,  however,  that  there  would  be  an  E3I.F.  of  any- 
thing like  J  volt.  Did  you  observe  whether  this  varied 
with  the  rate  of  rotation  to  any  extent  ? 

"  I  was  sorry,  too,  that  I  did  not  succeed  at  Birmingham. 
I  ran  Poynting  closely,  being  second ;  but  was  not  sur- 
prised when  I  found  the  very  high  opinion  the  Trustees  had 
formed  of  him.  He  was  second  wrangler  and  Smith's  prize 
man,  and  his  collegiate  experience  nearly  doubled  mine.  .  ,  . 

"  Have  you,  seen  de  Fonvielle's  shallow  and  blatant 
attack  in  UElectriciti  upon  Crookes'  Radiant  Matter  in 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  111 

particular,  and  the  Kinetic  Theory  of  Gases  in  general  ? 
It  is  very  stupid. 

"  Pray  excuse  this  brief  note.  I  am  working  at  high 
pressure.  This  is  our  heavy  term,  and  we  have  in  addition 
science  lectures  in  partibus." 

In  January  of  1881  Thompson  read  before  the  Physical 
Society  "  Notes  on  the  Construction  of  the  Photophone," 
in  which  he  stated  that  in  certain  experimental  observations 
he  had  been  led  to  query  whether  Professor  Graham  Bell's 
arrangement  was  the  best  possible  one.  He  therefore 
brought  forward  three  theorems  of  construction  which, 
being  carried  out,  caused  considerable  improvement. 

An  article  on  this  new  form  of  the  Photophone,  with 
diagrams,  appeared  in  Engineering  on  February  4th,  1881. 
The  Monograph  of  all  the  researches  on  Binaural  Audition 
appeared  in  the  Philosophical  Magazine  for  June  1882,  and 
was  entitled  "  On  the  Function  of  the  Two  Ears  in  the 
Perception  of  Space."  In  it  Thompson  reviewed  all  that 
had  been  done  on  the  subject  by  Professor  Mach  of  Prague, 
with  whom  he  had  been  in  correspondence,  by  Lord  Rayleigh, 
who  had  also  consented  that  what  he  had  done  should  be 
quoted,  by  Graham  Bell,  and  by  himself,  and  ended  by  pro- 
posing the  theory  which  he  believed  to  cover  all  the  facts 
observed,  up  to  that  time. 

While  making  all  these  small  researches,  Thompson  had 
also  been  engaged  in  numerous  experiments  with  telephones 
themselves.  His  Problem  Books,  in  which  he  kept  a  list  of 
ideas  to  be  worked  out,  are  full  of  suggestions  of  new  forms. 
In  this  country  the  only  well-known  forms  of  the  telephone 
were  those  invented  in  America  by  Dr.  Graham  Bell  and 
Mr.  T.  A.  Edison,  but  during  one  of  his  visits  to  Germany, 
Thompson  had  come  across  an  earlier  form  of  telephone, 
which  was  regarded  there  as  the  original  and  first  telephone 
invented.  He  was  much  interested  in  it,  and  set  about 
tracing  the  history  and  construction  of  this  instrument. 

In  January  1882  he  was  giving  some  lectures  in  Lan- 
cashire and  Cheshire,  and  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  I  had  an  hour  in  Manchester  with  Mr.  Horkheimer,  a 
former  pupil  of  Reis,  who  told  me  lots  of  things  about  the 


112  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

telephone,  and  is  going  to  give  me  two  which  he  himself 
had  set  up  in  his  house  in  1875." 

A  few  months  later  he  published  the  results  of  his  investiga- 
tions in  a  lecture  to  the  Bristol  Naturalists'  Society  entitled 
"  The  First  Telephone."  This  invention,  made  by  an  ob- 
scure German  schoolmaster  named  Philipp  Reis,  had  been 
first  exhibited  at  a  meeting  of  the  Physical  Society  of 
Frankfort  in  1861,  when  the  author  sent  in  a  memoir  "  On 
Telephony  by  the  Galvanic  Current."  Next  year  it  had 
been  shown  by  Philipp  Reis  himself  to  a  crowded  audience 
in  a  large  hall  in  Frankfort.  Thompson  had  procured  some 
of  the  apparatus  made  by  this  man,  and  the  reprint  of  his 
lecture  was  illustrated  by  drawings  of  it  made  by  himself. 
The  most  interesting  form  was  a  receiver  of  wood  made  in 
the  form  of  a  human  ear,  with  a  metal  tympanum  against 
which  rested  a  curved  lever  of  platinum  wire.  Graham 
Bell  had  known  of  this  invention,  and  both  he  and  Edison 
had  referred  to  the  prior  work  of  Reis. 

The-  lecture  on  "  The  First  Telephone  "  brought  many 
inquiries,  and  his  interest  in  the  personality  of  the  inventor 
was  so  great  that  Thompson  decided  to  write  a  biography 
of  him*  The  short  accounts  of  Reis  existing  in  Germany 
were  too  sketchy  to  satisfy  him,  so  early  in  1883  he  began 
his  second  book.  Much  of  it  had  already  gone  to  press 
when  during  the  long  vacation  he  went  to  Germany,  accom- 
panied by  his  wife,  and  spent  several  weeks  in  prosecuting 
inquiries  amongst  the  surviving  contemporaries  of  Philipp 
Reis,  The  son  of  the  inventor,  Carl  Reis,  at  that  time  lived 
in  Frankfort,  so  the  first  part  of  the  time  was  spent  in  that 
city.  From  there  he  went  on  to  the  Taunus  district, 
staying  at  Homburg  and  visiting  Soden,  where  dwelt  one 
of  the  contemporaries  of  Reis,  who  was  able  to  give  much 
useful  information  about  his  work  and  his  experiments. 

Reis  was  one  of  those  men  of  inventive  genius  who  were 
little  appreciated  during  life  ;  he  died  at  the  age  of  forty, 
so  did  not  see  the  fruition  and  recognition  of  his  work. 

His  widow  and  daughter  lived  in  the  little  village  of 
Friedrichsdorf,  some  miles  drive  through  the  forest  from 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  113 

Homburg.  They  were  quite  poor,  but  of  a  refined  and 
well-educated  type,  and  received  most  warmly  this  English 
professor  who  was  such  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of  the 
humble  schoolmaster.  The  Garnier  Institute  where  he 
had  taught  for  several  years,  and  the  schoolroom  where  he 
had  put  up  one  of  his  first  telephones,  connecting  it  to  the 
physical  cabinet  of  the  Institute,  were  visited.  Various 
small  inventions  made  by  him  were  shown,  including  a  very 
primitive  bicycle.  Then  Frau  Reis  led  the  way  to  the 
cemetery,  where  stands  the  monument  to  Philipp  Reis  erected 
in  1878  by  the  members  of  the  Frankfort  Physical  Society. 
An  engraving  of  this  appears  in  Thompson's  biography  of 
him. 

The  holiday  was  not  entirely  devoted  to  this  literary 
work  ;  time  was  found  to  hear  many  of  Wagner's  operas  in 
the  fine  Opera  House  at  Frankfort,  and  a  pilgrimage  was 
made  to  Bayreuth  to  hear  Parsifal,  given  as  Wagner  himself 
had  arranged  and  directed  before  his  death  in  the  previous 
year.  Thompson  was  an  ardent  admirer  of  his  music, 
which  he  had  first  heard  in  the  Albert  Hall  in  1876. 

The  book  was  published  by  Messrs.  Spon  early  in  the 
autumn  of  1883,  but  it  never  had  a  very  large  sale  ;  many 
thought  that  Thompson  had  estimated  too  highly  the  work 
of  Reis  as  a  pioneer  of  Telephony.  It  was,  however,  received 
with  much  appreciation  in  Germany,  as  doing  honour  to  a 
native  of  that  country.  Both  in  England  and  America 
too  it  was  recognised  by  some  scientific  men  as  a  "  most 
important  contribution  to  the  history  of  telephony."  In  the 
latter  country  a  very  appreciative  review  of  it  appeared  in 
the  Popular  Science  Monthly. 

In  1892  Professor  Leopold  Petsik  of  the  Staatsgymnasium, 
Trieste,  wrote  to  the  author  that  he  was  about  to  publish  a 
paper  on  the  History  of  Telephony,  and  that  he  had  "  found 
very  much  information  in  your  excellent  book  on  Philipp 
Reis."  Thompson  never  abandoned  his  belief  that  Reis 
was  the  first  inventor  of  this  useful  instrument.  His 
former  master  and  friend,  Professor  Quincke  of  Heidelberg, 
had  written  to  him,  recounting  how  he  had  been  present  at 
the  meeting  of  the  German  Naturalists'  Association  held  at 
8 


114  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

Giessen  in  1864,  when  Philipp  Reis  showed  and  explained 
the  telephone  he  had  invented  : 

"  I  listened  at  the  receiver  part  of  the  apparatus  and 
heard  distinctly  both  singing  and  talking.  I  distinctly 
remember  having  heard  the  words  of  the  German  poem 
*  Ach,  du  lieber  Augustin,  Alles  ist  hin.'  The  members  of 
the  Association  were  astonished  and  delighted." 

In  1914  an  article  appeared  in  The  Times  on  "  The  Story 
of  the  Telephone  "  which  roused  Thompson  to  send  the 
following  letter  to  the  Editor  : 

"  Your  contributor  who  writes  on  p.  6  the  article  entitled 
'  The  Story  of  the  Telephone '  makes  an  extraordinary 
blunder.  He  says:  '  On  March  10th,  1876,  he  [Bell]  suc- 
ceeded in  sending  spoken  words  along  an  electrified  wire. 
No  one  had  ever  done  this  before.  Edison  had  not.  Reis 
had  not.  Bell  invented  the  telephone  first  and  alone.5 
Either  your  contributor  does  not  know  the  facts,  or  else  he 
deliberately  misstates  them.  Philipp  Reis  invented  his 
4  Telephon '  and  called  it  by  that  name  in  1860.  It  was 
invented  for  the  express  purpose  of  transmitting  speech  by 
electricity.  He  exhibited  it  to  scientific  societies  repeatedly 
in  the  years  from  1862  to  1864.  Eminent  scientific  men 
are  still  living,  some  of  them  pupils  of  Reis,  who  heard 
spoken  words  through  it  at  the  time.  Their  testimony  has 
been  collected  in  my  work  Philipp  Reis  :  Inventor  of  the 
Telephone,  published  thirty  years  ago. 

"  Surely  the  work  accomplished  by  Dr.  Alexander  Graham 
Bell  is  sufficiently  well  recognised  that  there  is  no  excuse  for 
his  admirers  to  advance,  on  his  behalf,  an  untenable  claim." 

Although  of  a  gentle  and  pacific  nature  in  his  personal 
relationships  with  individuals,  Thompson  was  a  trenchant 
controversialist,  most  anxious  that  credit  should  be  given 
to  the  earliest  pioneers  of  science,  and  most  ardent  in  the 
defence  of  truth.  During  his  lifetime  he  had  many  con- 
troversies on  scientific  and  educational  subjects,  both  in  the 
pages  of  the  Scientific  Journals  and  in  the  columns  of  The 
Times  or  Saturday  Review. 

Thompson  took  out  a  patent  for  "  Improvements  in 
Telephone  Instruments  "  in  May  1 882.  He  had  also  lectured 
on  Telephony  in  various  parts  of  the  country,  so  was  re-* 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  115 

garded  as  an  expert  on  the  question.  During  the  long 
vacation  of  that  year  he  was  obliged  to  spend  some  weeks 
in  London  as  adviser  to  a  telephone  company  which  had 
been  started  as  a  rival  to  the  United  Telephone  Company, 
which  was  endeavouring  to  create  a  monopoly  in  this 
country  with  the  patents  of  Bell  and  Edison.  As  that 
company  refused  to  sell  their  instruments,  and  charged  a 
very  high  rent  for  them,  the  idea  of  obtaining  a  cheaper 
form  of  telephone  was  very  much  in  the  minds  of  business 
people,  who  were  anxious  to  obtain  telephones  which  they 
could  use  between  their  private  houses  or  offices  and  their 
factories. 

Electrical  engineers  were  constantly  at  work  experi- 
menting to  devise  some  form  of  telephone  which  would  not 
infringe  the  patents  of  Bell  and  Edison.  Among  them  was 
Thompson  with  his  keen  inventive  brain,  which  suggested 
and  rejected  many  a  new  form,  as  his  problem  books  of  that 
period  show. 

This  was  the  first  time  he  had  been  called  as  an  expert 
witness  in  a  patent  case,  and  he  found  it  weary  work,  while 
he  was  longing  to  be  off  sketching  in  the  Highlands  of 
Scotland,  where  his  wife  and  baby  daughter  were  staying. 
To  her  he  wrote :  "  How  is  my  pretty  wee  rosebud  ? 
I  don't  forget  my  daughter  in  thinking  of  my  ducats."  In 
after-years,  when  patent  cases  took  up  much  of  his  time,  he 
found  the  resulting  "  ducats  "  came  in  very  usefully  for  the 
education  of  the  daughters. 

Alter  the  publication  of  his  Life  of  Philipp  Reis  he  con- 
tinued his  experiments  in  telephone  improvements,  taking 
out  several  patents  which  excited  interest  among  those 
who  at  that  time  were  anxious  to  break  down  the  mono- 
poly of  the  United  Telephone  Company,  both  in  this  country 
and  in  America.  At  last  he  produced  a  new  telephone 
with  a  valve  transmitter  and  Reis  receiver,  which  were 
both  of  his  design,  and  a  syndicate  was  formed  to  buy  them 
from  him.  The  Attorney-General  of  the  day  gave  his 
opinion  that  the  telephones  invented  by  Professor  Silvanus 
Thompson  did  not  infringe  any  of  the  patent  rights  held  by 
the  United  Telephone  Company. 


116  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

The  following  letter,  written  from  London  in  July  1884 
to  his  wife,  gives  an  account  of  the  starting  of  what  was 
tsalled  "  The  New  Telephone  Company  "  : 

"  The  negotiations  which  Mr.  W.  has  been  quietly  carrying 
on  for  me  to  try  and  effect  a  sale  of  my  telephone  patent 
rights  are  coming  to  a  head,  and  I  found  at  Paddington  a 
message  from  him.  He  has  had  part  of  the  instruments 
for  some  time.  The  proposal  is  to  form  at  present  a  syndi- 
cate, to  take  the  thing  up  in  a  preparatory  way  ;  which  will 
put  a  little  capital  into  the  affair — enough  to  provide  means 
for  manufacturing  a  lot  of  instruments,  and  paying  some 
of  the  expenses  incurred  in  patenting.  Then  after  a  few 
months,  when  the  thing  is  developed,  they  will  take  over 
the  patents,  and  begin  to  pay  royalties.  Meantime, 
though  I  get  nothing  more  than  expenses,  probably,  I  shall 
incur  no  risks." 

That  year  the  British  Association  was  being  held  for  the 
first  time  out  of  Great  Britain  at  Montreal,  Canada  ;  Professor 
Thompson  had  intended  to  sail  with  the  party  of  scientists 
who  were  going  there  in  the  Circassian.  He  was,  however, 
detained  in  London  by  details  connected  with  the  Telephone 
Company,  and  had  to  postpone  his  departure  until  the 
eleventh  hour.  He  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  This  telephone  negotiation  drags  most  wearily ;  I  shall 
not  remain  here  beyond  to-morrow,  whether  things  are 
concluded  or  not.  It  is  in  good  hands,  but  there  is  a  great 
deal  to  do.  Each  man  who  thinks  of  taking  part  in  the 
concern  has  his  own  ideas  how  the  thing  should  be  managed, 
and  it  is  very  tedious  talking  the  people  round  point  by 
point." 

The  New  Telephone  Company  got  its  prospectus  out  in 
November  1884,  and  began  to  advertise  its  instruments, 
which  it  sold  outright  to  its  customers  under  licence  from 
the  Postmaster-General. 

In  the  Inventions  Exhibition  of  1885  the  Company  showed 
their  "  New  Patent  Valve  Telephone  invented  by  Professor 
Silvanus  Thompson."  The  inventor  was  paid  for  his 
instruments  by  shares  in  the  company,  and  he  was  made  a 
director. 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  117 

The  Company  was  immediately  inundated  by  inquiries 
from  all  parts  of  the  country,  but  as  soon  as  some  of  the 
instruments  had  been  installed,  and  a  commercial  success 
was  in  view,  the  United  Telephone  Company  brought  an 
injunction  against  them  for  infringement  of  patents.  Then 
followed  a  lawsuit  in  Chancery  in  which  the  New  Telephone 
Company  was  defeated.  It  was  taken  to  the  Appeal  Court, 
where  Lord  Justice  North  again  gave  the  decision  against 
them. 

In  the  transmitter  of  Silvanus  Thompson,  the  valve  was 
used  instead  of  a  diaphragm  for  the  transmission  of  speech. 
Lord  Justice  North  gave  his  judgment  that  "  every  surface 
which  can  vibrate  is  a  diaphragm."  This  decision,  of  course, 
completely  ruined  the  New  Telephone  Company's  prospects, 
and  the  directors  were  obliged  very  soon  to  wind  up  its 
affairs  and  go  into  bankruptcy.  This  was  finally  settled 
up  in  1889. 

Professor  Thompson  received  much  sympathy  from  some 
of  his  friends,  to  whom  the  decision  was  a  complete  surprise. 
Mr.  Walter  Palmer  wrote  : 

"  I  do  not  understand  Justice  North's  definition  '  every 
surface  that  can  vibrate  is  a  diaphragm.'  This  seems  to  me 
most  monstrously  unfair.  I  conclude,  however,  that  I  for 
one  as  a  shareholder  must  acquiesce  in  what  the  board  have 
decided  and  arranged,  although  I  am  extremely  sorry, 
firstly  because  your  company  has  come  to  grief,  and  secondly 
because  the  same  fate  doubtless  awaits  several  other 
companies,  and  it  will  lead  to  the  monopoly  of  the  United 
Company  being  much  increased.  I  hope  we  may  have  the 
opportunity  of  meeting  before  long." 

A  few  months  later  Thompson  wrote  to  another  of  his 
friends  who  had  been  a  loser  : 

"  Although  I  cannot  for  a  moment  admit  that  you  have 
any  legal  claim  against  the  directors  personally,  yet  it 
is  clear  that  yours  is  a  hard  case,  and  I  shall  be  glad  if  you 
will,  as  a  friend,  allow  me  to  give  you  my  personal  assurance 
that  I  will  see,  so  soon  as  things  are  settled  with  the  liquida- 
tors, that  you  are  not  a  loser  by  these  instruments." 


118  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

He  received  the  following  reply  : 

"  No,  I'm  blest  if  you  shall !  I  appreciate  your  great 
kindness,  but  you  have  been  treated  badly  enough  already. 
I  shall  not  forget  your  kindness  ;  but  do  get  it  out  of  your 
head  that  I  care  a  button  for  the  £.  s.  d.  I  I  value  your  friend- 
ship even  more  than  I  did,  and  I  feel  more  sorry  for  your  loss 
than  for  mine  in  this  little  affair." 

After  the  collapse  of  the  New  Telephone  Company,  the 
problems  of  telephony  still  continued  to  interest  Thompson, 
and  in  1893  he  took  out  a  new  patent  for  Ocean  Telephony. 
That  year  he  was  one  of  the  British  delegates  to  the  Electrical 
Congress  at  Chicago,  and  also  held  the  appointment  of 
judge  in  the  department  of  "  Instruments  of  Precision  " 
at  the  Great  Exhibition.  At  this  Congress  he  communi- 
cated to  one  of  its  sittings  his  new  discovery,  in  the  form 
of  a  paper  which  attracted  world-wide  attention  as  the 
earliest  pioneer  work  in  Ocean  Telephony.  His  discovery 
as  described  by  Dr.  Alexander  Russell  1  was  a  method  for 
diminishing  the  distortion  of  the  electromagnetic  waves  in 
submarine  cables  used  for  telephony.  The  method  was 
to  insert  inductive  shunt  circuits  or  leaks  across  the  two 
lines  of  the  cable,  or  between  the  line  and  the  earth.  Dr. 
Russell  wrote  : 

"  It  undoubtedly  equalises  the  '  attenuation  '  at  different 
frequencies,  and  so  improves  the  clearness  of  the  articulation. 
Unfortunately,  however,  it  greatly  diminishes  the  loudnesa 
of  the  sound.  The  method  is  a  perfectly  valid  one,  and 
useful  in  certain  cases." 

The  invention  was  never  adopted  by  any  of  the  cable 
companies,  and  was  later  superseded  by  Pupin's  invention. 
At  the  time,  however,  it  was  hailed  in  America  as  a  remark- 
able contribution  to  telephony. 

Some  years  later  Dr.  J.  A.  Fleming,  Professor  of  Engineer- 
ing at  University  College,  wrote  as  follows  : 

"DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  In  my  book  Propagation  of  Electric  Currents  in 
Telephone  and   Telegraph   Conductors,    I   have   mentioned 

1  In  the  Journal  oflnst.E.E.,  July  1917. 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  119 

your  1893  Patent  (see  p.  106),  but  had  not  space  to  discuss 
the  claims. 

"  I  have  always  regarded  Pupin's  contribution  to  the 
subject  to  be  his  experimental  and  mathematical  proof  of 
the  right  distance  for  spacing  coils,  and  not  in  any  sense 
as  a  first  suggestion  for  '  loading  '  generally  (see  my  book, 
p.  109).  You  certainly  deserve  credit  for  the  modes  of 
constructing  highly  inductive  circuits  to  be  used  as  shunts, 
and  if  you  had  received  more  encouragement  from  the 
practical  monopolists,  G.P.O.  and  Telephone  Camps  would 
no  doubt  have  been  able  to  anticipate  Pupin.  .  .  .  The 
mathematics  is,  however,  very  complicated,  and  I  should 
be  sorry  to  dogmatise.  Owing  to  expensive  nature  of  the 
work,  experiments  are  difficult." 

Thompson  had  paid  his  first  visit  to  America  in  1884, 
when  he  attended  the  British  Association  Meeting  at  Mont- 
real. His  fame  as  the  author  of  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery 
had  spread  widely  both  in  Canada  and  the  United  States, 
and  the  scientific  journals  commented  frequently  on  his 
youthful  appearance,  "  still  on  the  sunny  side  of  forty," 
as  one  of  them  expressed  it. 

The  Meeting  of  the  Association  was  a  brilliant  one,  from 
the  presence  of  a  large  number  of  scientific  stars  of  the 
first  magnitude.  Lord  and  Lady  Rayleigh,  Sir  William  and 
Lady  Thomson,  Oliver  Lodge,  William  Ramsay,  and  many 
others. 

Thompson  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  This  morning  before  breakfast  a  party  of  us,  including 
the  Ramsays,  Sollas,  and  others,  went  to  Lachine  to  shoot 
the  rapids  in  the  steamer — it  is  very  fine. 

"  People  are  most  hospitable  here,  Graham  Bell  and  I  are 
great  friends  !  The  debates  in  Section  A  are  exciting.  Sir 
Frederick  Bramwell  made  a  splendid  Lion  King  at  the  Red 
Lion  dinner.  His  jokes  from  the  chair  were  superb.  Sir 
William  Thomson  was  described  as  being  neither  the  head 
nor  the  tail  of  the  '  Ass,'  and  therefore  '  no  end  of  an  ass.' 
We  had  a  splendid  mock  speech  in  French  by  the  Hon.  Mr. 
Freemantle,  duly  translated  by  Jackal  Roberts.  There 
were  also  speeches  of  very  witty  kinds  from  Preece  and 
Henry  Wood.  I  gave  my  lecture  on  the  '  Electricity  of  the 


120  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Cat '   (illustrated  by  cartoons),  amid  roars  and  howls  of 
applause." 

Silvanus  Thompson,  his  cousin  Isaac  C.  Thompson  the 
zoologist,  and  Oliver  Lodge,  made  up  a  little  party  and  went 
a  tour  in  Canada  on  their  way  to  Niagara.  They  visited 
some  of  the  Thompson  cousins  living  in  Toronto,  and  then 
had  a  quiet  time  inspecting  the  Falls  at  their  leisure.  After- 
wards Thompson  and  Lodge  went  on  to  Philadelphia, 
whence  he  wrote  to  his  wife  a  week  later  : 

"  This  has  been  a  hot — nay  a  scorching — week,  with 
much  to  do,  and  little  possibility  of  rest.  Between  the 
meetings  of  the  American  Association,  the  meetings  of  the 
International  Electrical  Conference,  and  the  visits  to  the 
Electrical  Exhibition,  I  am  feeling  considerably  jaded,  and  I 
hail  with  pleasure  the  chance  of  running  off  to  Boston,  where 
there  are  cool  sea  breezes. 

"  Philadelphia  and  the  Philadelphians  are  simply  charm- 
ing :  but  the  American  Assocf&tion  is  disappointing  in 
many  ways.  The  quality  of  the  papers  read  is  decidedly 
inferior.  I  have  come  across  some  most  delightful  Friends 
here  :  an  old  bachelor  Dr.  Levick  :  also  President  Chase, 
LL.D.,  of  Haverford  College,  and  his  brother,  Professor 
Pliny  Earle  Chase,  of  the  same  College,  who  is  a  great  mathe- 
matical genius.  It  has  been  intensely  interesting  meeting 
all  the  American  electricians  and  scientific  men  here. 
Graham  Bell  and  Elisha  Gray  were  both  here.  I  have 
not  seen  Edison  yet,  but  shall  meet  him  in  New  York.  I 
made  a  long  speech  yesterday  at  the  Electrical  Conference 
on  the  subject  of  Dynamos,  and  found  that  what  I  had 
to  say  was  very  well  received.  Most  people  whom  I  have 
met  have  been  frank  enough  to  express  surprise  that  I  had 
not  a  long  grey  beard  and  a  bald  head.  The  Electrical 
Exhibition  is  a  very  interesting  show,  but  there  are  very  few 
novelties." 

During  this  visit  Thompson  formed  several  lifelong 
friendships  with  men  whom  he  admired  and  liked,  and 
which  were  renewed  on  his  subsequent  visits,  or  when  his 
friends  came  to  Europe. 

On  the  occasion  of  the  great  Chicago  Exhibition  of  1893, 
many  Congresses  were  held,  and  during  the  time,  when 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  121 

he  was  serving  on  the  Jury  there,  he  again  attended  the 
International   Electrical    Congress. 
To  his  wife  : 

"  An  Electrical  Congress  is  always  a  busy  time  ;    but 

in  this  city  of  magnificent  distances  and  with  all  the  local 

circumstances  of  the  occasion,  it  is  doubly  a  cause  of  toil. 

"  Yesterday  morning  was  Jury  work  as  usual ;  but  in  the 

afternoon  the  Congress  met. 

"  I  left  the  Exhibition  about  noon,  and  travelled  down 
by  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad  to  the  '  down-town  '  station 
at  Van  Buren  Street  in  the  heart  of  the  city,  close  to  the 
Institute  where  the  Congress  was  to  meet.  Helmhbltz 
had  already  arrived  in  the  morning,  and  there  were  many 
others  to  greet  whom  I  had  not  seen  for  years — Elihu 
Thomson,  Professor  Eddy,  and  a  score  more.  The  opening 
meeting,  which  was  given  over  to  greetings  and  formal 
business,  was  held  at  three  o'clock.  It  was  a  great  success, 
and  everything  went  without  a  hitch.  Elisha  Gray  pre- 
sided, and  did  his  part  very  well.  Helmholtz  *  was  received 
with  immense  enthusiasm,  and  Ferraris 2  and  Mascart 3 
came  in  for  warm  welcomes.  Preece  *  was  well  received 
and  made  a  very  short  speech.  Ayrton 5  made  a  very 
witty  address  which  delighted  them  all.  .  .  .. 

"The  last  paper  in  the  morning  was  mine  on  *  Ocean 
Telephony.'  It  was  extremely  well  received ;  and  at  the 
end  I  received  an  ovation. 

"  Some  of  the  Americans  say  this  will  be  the  event  of  the 
Congress.  The  discussion  on  it  was  adjourned.  Meantime 
I  am  preparing  weapons  for  reply. 

"  In  the  afternoon  there  were  no  section  meetings  :  but 
we  held  a  sitting  of  the  '  Chamber  of  Delegates  '  from  the 
various  Governments.  Besides  this  work  of  attending 
Congress  and  Chamber  of  Delegates,  I  have  been  on  two 
committees  :  so  that  my  hands  have  been  full. 

"  One  of  the  most  curious  features  of  the  Congress  is  the 
absence  of  certain  persons.  Edison  is  known  to  be  in 
town  ;  but  has  not  once  turned  up.  He  has  not  even  been 

1  President  of  the  Reichs  Anstalt,  Berlin. 

2  Galileo  Ferraris  of  Milan. 

3  Professor  Mjuscart  of  the  Sorbonne,  Paris. 

4  Sir  William  Preece  of  the  London  Post  Office. 

5  Professor  W.  E.  Ayrton,  of  the   City  Guilds  Central  College,  South 
Kensington. 


LIFE   OP   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

suggested  for  any  post  as  Vice-president  or  other  prominent 
part :  but  the  catch-penny  Press  has  been  full  of  his  portraits 
and  biographies,  referring  to  him  as  the  brightest  star  of  the 
Congress  ;  and  talking  of  Von  Helmholtz  as  the  '  Edison  of 
Germany.'  Another  absent  person  is  Graham  Bell.  He 
was  named  by  Government  as  the  temporary  President  of 
Section  C.  But  he  never  turned  up,  and,  curiously  enough, 
nobody  seemed  to  expect  him  to  do  so.  Gray  is  universally 
esteemed  and  loved  :  and  he  is  chairman  of  the  Congress." 

To  the  same  on  August  26th  : 

"  At  last  the  Congress  is  over,  and  I  can  breathe  again. 
It  has  been  a  very  closely  packed  time  ;  and  I  have  not 
been  the  least  busy  of  the  six-and-twenty  delegates  of  the 
Official  Chamber.  I  had  just  time  on  Wednesday  to  write 
you  that  my  paper  on  '  Ocean  Telephony '  had  been  well 
received,  and  that  I  had  won  over  into  belief  in  my  plans 
several  of  the  men  of  whom  I  had  the  most  fear — namely, 
the  cable  engineers.  As  it  turns  out,  my  paper  and  the 
discussion  on  it  have  been  one  of  the  features  of  the 
Congress  ;  and  I  have  received  congratulations  right  and 
left. 

"  The  Sections  met  only  in  the  mornings.  One  could  not 
attend  more  than  one  of  them  each  day  ;  and  it  was,  in  the 
absence  of  proper  preliminary  arrangements,  very  difficult 
to  learn  what  was  going  to  come  off. 

"  On  Wednesday  morning  I  had  to  make  my  reply  to  the 
discussion  ;  and  afterwards  I  took  part  in  the  debate  on 
Long-distance  Transmission  of  Power.  Another  day  I  took 
part  in  the  discussion  on  Ayrton's  paper — which  is  a  most 
valuable  one — on  the  Phenomena  of  the  Voltaic  Arc. 

"  On  most  days  the  official  Chamber  of  Delegates  met  in 
the  afternoons  in  a  room  in  the  Union  Pacific  Hotel.  We 
had  some  very  warm  discussions  ;  and  much  of  the  work 
had  to  be  done  by  sub-committees.  I  was  put  on  that 
upon  the  consideration  of  the  Unit  or  Standard  of  Light  : 
and  of  that  sub-committee  they  madeM.  Violle,of  Paris,  the 
chairman  and  myself  secretary.  As  the  committee  con- 
sisted of  two  Germans,  one  Swiss,  one  American,  and  the 
chairman  and  secretary,  the  proceedings  were  in  several 
languages,  mostly  French  and  German.  The  secretary 
therefore  had  a  lively  time  of  it ;  and  his  rough  notes  were 
highly  polyglot  in  form.  The  two  Germans  worked  very 


TELEPHONE  RESEARCH  123 

hard  to  put  upon  us  as  a  standard  lamp  one  that  has  been 
rejected  in  England  ;  but  we  defeated  the  proposition,  and 
left  the  question  undetermined. 

"  Thursday  evening  witnessed  the  banquet  given  to  the 
official  delegates.  It  went  off  extremely  well ;  the  speeches 
being  witty  from  first  to  last.  Professor  Gray,  who  presided, 
led  off  in  a  most  charming  way.  Mascart  was  very  amusing 
and  so  was  Preece.  This  was  the  only  affair  at  which  Mr. 
Edison  put  in  an  appearance  ;  I  was  quite  shocked  to  see  how 
old  he  had  grown.  He  refused  to  make  any  speech,  though 
called  upon.  The  closing  meeting  of  the  Congress  next  day 
somewhat  resembled  those  at  the  end  of  a  British  Associa- 
tion meeting. 

"  In  the  evening  I  returned  to  the  Exhibition,  first  to 
meet  two  of  my  former  students,  and  secondly  to  hear  Tesla 
lecture.  The  latter  affair  was  not  brilliant ;  but  it  was  of 
great  scientific  interest. 

"  This  afternoon  Preece  and  the  British  delegates  held  a 
reception  at  the  house  of  the  British  Commission.  We 
had  a  large  number  of  the  electrical  folk — the  Congress  at 
large — in  attendance,  and  altogether  it  was  a  pleasant  time. 
Now  I  am  going  out  again  to  see  some  experiments  of  Elihu 
Thomson's.  He  makes  real  lightning  6  feet  long  ;  and 
shows  some  extraordinary  effects." 

During  his  stay  in  the  States,  Thompson  was  the  guest 
both  of  Professor  Elisha  Gray  and  Mr.  Elihu  Thomson  in 
their  homes,  and  he  often  talked  of  the  delightful  hospitality 
which  he  had  received  from  them.  While  at  Lynn  he 
spent  a  whole  day  in  the  electric  works  of  the  latter. 

To  his  wife  from  Boston  : 

"  To-day  I  have  called  on  one  or  two  folk  ;  have  visited 
the  Art  Museum,  have  inspected  an  electric  lamp  factory 
and  hunted  over  a  famous  old  book  store." 

In  New  York  he  visited  Edison  and  saw  his  laboratories, 
in  which  one  of  his  own  old  students  was  assistant. 


CHAPTER    VII 

REMOVAL    TO    LONDON  ;    WORK    AT    FINSBURY    COLLEGE 

THE  position  of  Bristol  University  College  as  compared 
with  other  newer  University  Colleges,  and  their  provision 
for  meeting  the  increasing  demands  of  the  time  for  scientific 
training,  was  very  far  from  being  ideal  during  the  years 
1883-4.  The  great  obstacle  to  progress  in  every  direction 
was  the  lack  of  proper  endowment  and  financial  support. 

During  a  visit  paid  at  Easter  1883  to  Liverpool,  and  to 
the  laboratories  of  his  old  friend  Mr.  Oliver  Lodge,  then 
recently  appointed  Professor  of  Physics  at  the  University 
College,  Thompson  was  filled  with  admiration  and  envy 
at  seeing  the  liberal  provision  of  space  and  equipment 
provided  for  the  scientific  Professors  by  the  generous  gifts  of 
the  wealthy  merchants  of  the  town. 

Notwithstanding  the  renown  of  some  of  the  staff  and  the 
attainments  of  the  Principal  of  the  Bristol  College,  Dr. 
William  Ramsay,  little  progress  had  been  made  since  the 
opening  of  the  first  wing  of  the  new  building  in  1882. 

The  Electrical  department  had  attracted  clever  students 
from  different  parts  of  the  country,  but  the  wretched  equip- 
ment discouraged  research,  and  prevented  the  entrance 
of  others. 

Great  dissatisfaction  was  felt  by  all  the  Staff  of  the 
College,  and  it  culminated  when  a  proposal  of  the  Council 
to  cut  down  all  the  salaries  was  seriously  suggested.  Princi- 
pal Ramsay  had  been  trying  for  some  time  to  obtain  that 
Government  support  which  was  so  tardily  granted  in  the 
end.  The  following  letter  from  Thompson,  written  in  June 
1884  to  the  Principal  of  the  Newcastle  College,  shows  the 
state  of  affairs  at  that  time : 

124 


REMOVAL  TO   LONDON  125 

PROFESSOR  GARNBTT, 
"  I  have  been  asked  by  the  Principal  of  our  College, 
Dr.  Ramsay,  to  communicate  with  you  upon  a  question  that 
is  a  little  agitating  us  just  now.  You  are  aware,  I  suppose, 
that  our  College  is  (and  always  has  been)  on  a  very  precarious 
financial  footing,  and  that  our  expenditure  exceeds  our 
income  by  several  hundred  pounds  every  year. 

"  This,  obviously,  must  come  to  an  end  sometime,  and  the 
matter  is  so  far  critical  that  there  is  a  serious  proposal  on 
the  tapis  for  reducing  our  not-too-large  salaries  all  round. 
We  have  no  endowment  of  any  kind.  The  Oxford  grant 
is  reduced  to  £200  a  year,  contributed  from  private  sources 
with  no  promise  of  perpetuity,  and  the  Clothworkers'  grant 
of  £300  a  year  is  not  too  certain  to  continue.  Under  these 
circumstances  the  question  of  applying  to  Government,  as 
the  Welsh  Colleges  have  done,  for  Imperial  assistance  has 
cropped  up. 

"  The  opinion  of  our  Council  is,  however,  that  Bristol 
asking  alone  would  have  no  chance  of  success  in  Parliament : 
but  that,  if  such  a  demand  came  at  once  from  all  the  English 
colleges  of  kindred  type,  or  at  any  rate  from  those  of  them 
that  are  not  substantially  endowed,  such  a  united  demand 
could  not  be  neglected. 

"  Our  Council  has  therefore  determined  to  feel  its  way  by 
taking  the  preliminary  step  of  communicating  in  an  unofficial 
way  with  the  authorities  of  the  kindred  colleges.  This 
is  how  I  come  to  address  you  in  the  present  instance.  Do 
you  think  that  the  Newcastle  College  would  join  with  us  in 
an  appeal  to  Government  for  a  Royal  Commission  to 
inquire  into  the  facilities  for  higher  education  afforded  by 
the  University  Colleges  of  English  cities  ?  " 

Dr.  Garnett  replied  at  once  that  he  would  not  only  bring 
the  subject  before  the  next  meeting  of  the  Council  of  his 
College,  but  also  before  the  Nottingham  Committee. 

Meantime  another  proposal  before  the  Bristol  Council, 
to  drop  the  Arts  side  of  the  University  College,  also  excited 
great  wrath  among  the  staff,  and  led  to  the  following  letter 
from  Thompson,  written  in  June  to  a  member  of  the  Council : 

"DEAR  CANON  PERCIVAL, 

"  The  Principal  has  shown  me  the  outlines  of  a 
scheme  for  recasting  the  financial  arrangements  of  Univer- 
sity College.  As  I  have  given  myself  time  to  consider  the 


126  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

question,  I  think  I  cannot  too  early  take  the  opportunity 
of  saying  that  it  does  not  commend  itself  to  my  judgment. 

"  If  carried  out  it  will  effectually  cripple  the  literary  side 
of  the  College,  and  for  that  reason,  if  for  no  other,  I  should 
regard  it  as  disastrous  to  the  prospects  of  the  College. 
We  owe  it  to  the  influence  of  Oxford,  and  I  believe  very 
largely  to  yourself  and  the  Master  of  Balliol,  that  our 
College  has  not  been  confined  in  its  aims  to  being  merely  a 
Science  College.  To  draw  back  now  would  be  little  less  than 
fatal.  Further  than  this,  the  scheme  runs  counter  to  the 
entire  policy  pursued  by  the  College  of  late  years  towards 
members  of  our  staff,  to  whom  it  has  been  our  policy  to  give 
as  good  a  guarantee  as  possible,  leaving  the  fluctuating 
chances  of  shares  of  fees  as  a  minor  item. 

"  Were  the  change  adopted  in  my  own  case,  I  think  it 
would  probably  not  make  a  difference  of  £50  per  annum 
either  way.  But  I  am  quite  certain  that  it  could  not  have 
the  effect  of  inducing  me  to  throw  myself  any  more  heartily 
into  the  College  work.  Some  of  my  colleagues  it  would 
effectually  drive  away  to  seek  their  bread  elsewhere,  and 
some  whom  I  should  be  most  unwilling,  for  the  sake  of  the 
College,  to  lose.  I  do  not  think,  though  I  am  speaking 
only  from  my  own  opinion,  that  the  scheme  would  be 
acceptable  to  any  one  of  my  colleagues,  and  I  sincerely  hope 
it  will  not  be  pressed  either  now  or  at  any  future  time. 
I  do  not  say  that  the  scheme  might  not  work,  had  it  been 
propounded  at  the  beginning  of  the  work  of  the  College. 
But  it  will  not,  I  am  sure,  bring  anything  but  disaster  to 
adopt  such  a  course  at  this  stage." 


Although  Thompson  received  little  encouragement  in  his 
efforts  to  awaken  public  opinion  to  the  needs  of  the  College, 
a  long  letter  from  him  to  the  Western  Daily  Press  in  October 
1883  pointed  out  the  necessity  of  Government  assistance 
to  English  Colleges,  such  as  was  granted  to  those  of  Scotland, 
Ireland,  and  Wales.  It  was  entitled,  "  Why  not  for  English- 
men ?  "  and  created  considerable  interest  and  correspon- 
dence. But  he  was  told,  "  Mr.  Mundella  is  dead  against  the 
idea  of  endowing  English  Colleges,  and  so  will  the  Treasury 
be,  you  may  be  sure." 

The  staff  of  the  College  held  a  united  meeting  of  protest, 
but  the  obnoxious  scheme  for  readjustment  of  salaries  was 


REMOVAL  TO   LONDON  127 

persisted  in.  The  following  letter  to  his  mother,  written 
by  Thompson  at  the  end  of  the  Session  of  1884,  shows  his 
feeling  on  the  matter  : 

"  The  time  seems  drawing  very  near  when  work  will  be 
over  and  my  American  trip  begin.  I  have  to  go  to  Liver- 
pool next  week  to  preside  at  a  meeting  of  the  National 
Association  of  Science  and  Art  Teachers  on  Saturday  after- 
noon and  evening.  But  I  shall  not  have  a  spare  hour,  other- 
wise I  would  try  to  sleep  one  night  at  Settle.  I  shall, 
however,  come  for  a  peep  before  I  go  to  Canada  ;  probably 
about  July  12th  or  18th. 

"  The  babies  are  well  and  lively.  The  Conference 
(annual)  of  Head  Mistresses  is  going  on  this  week  in  Clifton. 
Janie's  old  schoolmistress,  Miss  Jones  of  Netting  Hill,  is 
staying  with  us.  We  were  at  the  Conversazione  at  the 
Clifton  High  School  last  night. 

"  College  affairs  are  drifting  from  bad  to  worse.  I  fear 
the  Council  are  simply  letting  the  whole  thing  slide  ;  for 
they  are  doing  absolutely  nothing  to  put  the  College  on  a 
better  financial  basis.  Money  is  being  given  to  other 
colleges  all  round  ;  we  cannot  get  any.  No  legacies  and  no 
endowments  have  yet  been  given  us  since  we  began.  The 
Professors  held  a  meeting  this  week  to  protest  against  the 
inaction  of  the  Council.  Whether  this  will  produce  any 
good  result  remains  to  be  seen.  This  kind  of  thing  going 
on  is  very  unpleasant.  It  makes  one  all  the  more  sorry 
that  none  of  the  London  posts  have  fallen  to  my  lot." 

The  London  posts  referred  to  in  this  letter  were  appoint- 
ments under  the  City  Guilds  Institute  in  connexion  with 
the  founding  of  their  two  Technical  Colleges  in  London. 
Thompson  had  applied  for  the  post  of  Directing  Secretary, 
and  later  for  that  of  Professor  of  Physics  at  the  Central 
Institution. 

The  Technical  College,  Finsbury,  the  first  to  be  started  by 
the  City  Guilds  Institute,  began  with  evening  classes  in  1879. 
The  day  training  classes  for  engineers  and  chemists  began 
in  1883,  when  the  present  building  was  opened.  Its  founda- 
tion stone  had  been  laid  by  the  late  Duke  of  Albany  in  1881. 
The  three  chairs  of  Physics,  Mechanical  Engineering  and 
Chemistry  were  held  respectively  by  Professor  W.  E. 
Ayrton,Professor  John  Perry,  and  Professor  H.  E.  Armstrong, 


128  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Mr.  Philip  Magnus  (afterwards  Sir  Philip)  being  the 
Directing  Secretary. 

Thompson's  name  was  well  known  to  many  members  of 
the  City  Guilds  Institute,  and  so  was  his  work  on  Technical 
Education  ;  he  had  been  asked  to  draw  up,  for  the  use  of 
the  Committee,  a  scheme  for  a  Central  Technical  College, 
which  was  practically  embodied  in  the  final  scheme  adopted 
by  them  for  their  new  Central  Technical  College,  which 
was  opened  by  Albert  Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  in  1884. 

The  following  communication  was  therefore  sent  to  him 
in  January  1885  by  Mr.  Magnus  as  soon  as  Professor  Ayrton 
of  the  Finsbury  College  was  elected  to  the  chair  of  Physics 
at  the  Central : 

"  The  Members  of  Sub-committee  C  are  about  to  con- 
sider the  recommendation  to  the  Executive  Committee  of 
the  names  of  two  or  more  gentlemen  as  candidates  for  the 
post  of  Principal  of  the  Finsbury  Technical  College.  The 
Principal  will  be  expected  to  take  the  general  management 
and  superintendence  of  the  College,  and  to  act  as  Professor 
of  one  of  the  Science  Departments.  He  will  be  required  to 
give  his  whole  time  to  the  work.  The  Committee  are 
prepared,  under  certain  circumstances,  to  offer  a  salary 
of  as  much  as  £800  a  year." 

Professor  Thompson  did  not  hesitate  long  in  deciding  to 
send  in  an  application  for  the  new  post.  Among  those  who 
gave  him  testimonials  were  Canon  Percival,  then  President 
of  Trinity  CoUege,  Oxford,  Dr.  B.  Jowett  of  Balliol,  Pro- 
fessor Alfred  Marshall,  Professor  of  Political  Economy  at 
Cambridge,  Mr.  Albert  Fry,  the  Chairman  of  University 
College,  Bristol,  and  his  kind  friend  Dr.  John  Hall  Glad- 
stone, F.R.S.  Canon  Percival  wrote  to  him  personally  : 

"  Though  I  shall  be  very  sorry  to  see  the  Bristol  College 
lose  your  services,  I  should  feel  it  my  duty  to  give  you  a 
very  hearty  support  in  any  way  which  you  might  suggest 
as  likely  to  be  most  effective,  should  you  stand  for  this." 

In  his  testimonial  he  wrote  : 

"  Mr.  Thompson  is  so  well  known  that  I  suppose  he  can 
hardly  need  my  testimony,  but  having  had  constant  oppor- 


REMOVAL  TO   LONDON  129 

tunities  of  observing  his  career  ever  since  he  became  Pro- 
fessor at  Bristol,  I  can  only  say  of  my  own  experience  that 
he  is  not  only  a  remarkably  brilliant  lecturer,  and  a  writer 
of  excellent  textbooks,  but  that  he  has  given  much  study 
and  attention  to  the  best  methods  of  Technical  Education, 
both  at  home  and  abroad,  and  has  written  some  of  the  most 
interesting  things  that  I  have  ever  seen  on  this  subject. 
Mr.  Thompson  is,  moreover,  a  man  of  great  energy  and 
activity,  and  would  be  ambitious  of  making  any  institu- 
tion under  his  direction  thoroughly  efficient  in  all  its 
departments." 

From  Jowett  he  received  the  following  : 

"  You  are  welcome  to  refer  to  me  in  your  candidature 
for  the  Finsbury  College.  If  it  were  not  likely  to  be  so  great 
a  loss  to  us  at  Clifton,  I  should  heartily  wish  success,  either 
to  you  or  Professor  Ramsay. 

"  Yours  sincerely,  B.  JOWETT." 

The  post  was  applied  for  by  seventeen  candidates,  many 
of  whom  were  known  to  Thompson,  among  them  Dr. 
William  Ramsay  and  Professor  Barrett  of  Dublin.  The 
latter,  when  he  heard  that  Thompson  was  a  candidate,  very 
generously  wrote  to  withdraw  in  his  favour,  and  used  all  his 
influence  on  his  behalf. 

To  him  Thompson  wrote  on  February  17th  : 

"  Your  most  generous  action  in  withdrawing  your  candi- 
dature in  my  favour  will,  I  believe,  practically  make  my 
election  secure.  I  will  let  you  know  how  things  stand 
after  Friday  next ;  but  meantime  I  know  not  how  to 
thank  you  in  words. 

"It  is  entirely  untrue  that  I  have  been  canvassing  in  the 
City  ;  and  it  is  a  great  shame  of  X  to  be  circulating  the 
reckless  and  untrue  statements  that  have  been  so  freely  set 
going  of  late  in  this  matter.  This  instance  is  only  one  of  a 
large  number  that  have  come  to  my  knowledge.  It  is  a 
great  pity.  With  the  most  grateful  feelings.  ..." 

The  list  was  shortened  down  to  six  candidates,  and  when 
the  election  took  place,  Thompson  had  a  large  majority, 
nineteen  out  of  twenty-six  voting  in  his  favour. 
9 


130  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

He  received  many  letters  of  congratulation.  Sir 
Frederick  Abel,  with  whom  he  had  been  associated  in  the 
judgment  of  the  Safety  Lamps,  one  of  the  Committee,  wrote  : 

"  I  congratulate  you  sincerely  upon  your  success,  which 
was  gratifying  to  me  personally.  I  hope  and  believe  that 
the  appointment  is  one  in  every  way  congenial  to  you." 

Dr.  Gladstone  wrote  : 

"  I  am  very  glad  indeed  to  hear  that  you  have  been 
elected.  The  right  man  in  the  right  place.  I  have  no 
doubt  there  is  good  work  before  you  in  London,  and  that 
you  will  do  it  with  all  your  heart." 

Silvanus  Thompson  was  in  his  thirty-fourth  year  when 
he  became  Principal  of  the  Technical  College,  Finsbury,  and 
this  was  the  scene  of  his  labours  for  over  thirty-one  years , 
as  he  still  held  the  appointment  at  the  end  of  his  life. 

The  college  building  is  situated  in  Leonard  Street,  a 
dismal  back  street  off  the  City  Road  and  behind  Finsbury 
Square,  from  whence  it  derived  its  name.  The  neighbour- 
hood is  dull  and  depressing,  but  it  has  its  advantages  in 
being  very  central  for  trams  and  railways  from  the  outlying 
suburbs  of  London.  The  college  was  a  dingy-looking  stone 
building  in  harmony  with  its  surroundings,  and  during 
Thompson's  time  there,  was  considerably  enlarged  by  the 
addition  of  a  huge  wing  for  the  engineering  department. 

As  Professor  H.  E.  Armstrong  also  left  Finsbury  at  the 
same  time  as  Professor  Ayrton,  in  order  to  take  up  the  chair 
of  Chemistry  at  the  Central  Institution,  Thompson  had  the 
pleasure  after  Easter  of  welcoming  as  his  colleague  his  old 
friend  Raphael  Meldola,  who  had  already  attained  to  fame 
as  the  discoverer  of  the  beautiful  aniline  dyes  known  as 
Meldola  greens.  With  him  he  always  had  the  most 
harmonious  relationship,  and  their  friendship,  founded  on 
many  common  interests,  lasted  to  the  end.  His  other 
colleague,  John  Perry,  F.R.S.,  the  Professor  of  Mechanical 
Engineering,  had  held  his  post  in  the  early  days  of  the 
foundation  of  the  college,  and  had  been  intimately  associ- 
ated with  Professor  Ayrton  in  the  pioneer  work  of  forming 
an  Electrical  Engineering  Laboratory.  Electrical  science 


REMOVAL  TO   LONDON  131 

at  that  time  had  hardly  yet  been  recognised  as  a  branch  of 
engineering,  and  a  few  brilliant  young  men  were  anxious  to 
get  it  established  on  a  thoroughly  practical  basis.  Thompson, 
by  his  Cantor  Lectures  and  published  works,  had  already 
very  largely  contributed  to  the  attainment  of  this  aim. 
With  him  Professor  Perry  co-operated  most  loyally,  and  the 
relations  between  the  two  departments  were  all  such  as  to 
promote  the  welfare  of  the  college.  Two  years  after  they 
had  begun  to  be  colleagues,  Professor  Perry  wrote  to 
Thompson  in  March  1887  : 

"Your  letter  of  the  llth  inst.  is  another  evidence — 
if  evidence  were  wanted — that  in  working  for  the  good  of 
Finsbury,  the  details  of  your  method  of  working  are  as  free 
from  meanness  as  the  object  itself  is.  I  agree  to  your 
proposal  (as  you  see  by  my  programme  for  next  year) 
after  a  large  amount  of  mental  debate." 

Thompson's  appointment  took  place  early  in  March, 
and  he  removed  to  London  that  month  in  order  to  prepare 
to  take  up  his  duties  after  the  Easter  vacation.  He  was 
fortunate  in  being  able  to  retain  the  services  of  his  former 
assistant,  Mr.  E.  A.  O'Keefe,  who  also  left  Bristol,  and  was 
appointed  assistant  at  Finsbury.  Having  acceded  to  the 
request  of  the  Council  of  the  Bristol  College,  to  continue 
his  work  there  until  the  end  of  the  Summer  Session, 
Thompson  had  a  very  strenuous  three  months  at  the 
beginning  of  his  career  in  London. 

The  work  of  Principal  and  Professor  at  Finsbury  was 
always  strenuous,  indeed  too  strenuous,  because  the  college 
had  departments  for  day  and  evening  students,  and  even 
the  Principal  was  expected  to  give  one  or  two  evening 
lectures  every  week  from  October  to  May,  with  a  very  short 
vacation  at  Christmas.  During  many  sessions  Thompson 
was  giving  ten  lectures  per  week  during  the  winter  months. 
For  the  day  students,  who  numbered  over  two  hundred, 
there  were  courses  in  Physics,  Electricity,  Chemistry,  and 
Engineering.  The  object  of  the  training  as  set  forth  in  the 
prospectus  was  the  education  of — 

I.  Persons  of  either  sex  who  wish  to  receive  a  scientific 


132  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

and  practical  preparatory  training  for  intermediate  posts 
(as,  for  instance,  foremen  or  managers)  in  industrial  works. 

II.  Apprentices,    journeymen,    and    foremen    who    are 
engaged  in  the  daytime,  and  who  desire  to  receive  supple- 
mentary instruction  in  the  art  and  practice,   and  in  the 
theory  and  principles  of  science  connected  with  the  industry 
in  which  they  are  engaged. 

III.  Pupils  from  middle-class  and  other  schools  who  are 
preparing  for  the  higher  scientific  and  technical  courses  of 
instruction  to  be  pursued  at  the  Central  Institution. 

The  college  therefore  fulfils  the  functions  of  a  finishing 
technical  school  for  those  entering  industrial  life  at  a  com- 
paratively early  age  ;  of  a  supplemental  school  for  those 
already  engaged  in  factory  and  workshop ;  and  of  a 
preparatory  school  for  the  Central  Institution. 

The  department  for  the  evening  classes  comprised  each 
of  the  subjects  of  the  day  classes  adapted  to  the  requirements 
of  the  different  types  of  student,  with  the  addition  of  a  large 
Art  Department,  and  various  Building  trade  classes, 
Cabinet-making  and  other  Art  industries. 

When  Thompson  came  to  Finsbury  there  were  only  two 
women  day  students  taking  the  courses,  Miss  Hertha 
Marks  (afterwards  Mrs.  W.  E.  Ayrton),  a  distinguished 
student  in  Physics,  and  one  other,  a  chemical  student. 
There  were  never  any  more  women  day  students  during  his 
time,  as  the  accommodation  for  them  was  so  inadequate. 
Even  the  men  students  had  no  common-room  or  lunch- 
room, and  were  obliged  to  go  to  restaurants  during  the 
lunch  hour. 

Finsbury  College  was  adapted  most  rigorously  for  work, 
and  work  only,  and  the  numerous  evening  students  of  both 
sexes  simply  came  for  their  classes,  but  had  no  corporate 
feeling  or  attraction  to  the  place,  such  as  was  felt  at  the 
more  popular  Polytechnics  which  came  into  being  in  later 
years,  and  proved  such  a  boon  to  those  whose  education  was 
lacking  in  many  respects. 

The  students  desiring  to  enter  the  day  courses  of  Physics, 
Engineering  or  Chemistry  had  to  pass  an  entrance  examina- 
tion in  mathematics  and  English  subjects,  particular  stress 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,  FINSBURY  133 

being  laid  on  composition  and  precis  writing.  There  was 
no  limit  of  age  above  fourteen,  but  it  was  rare  for  anyone 
below  sixteen  to  be  able  to  pass  the  entrance  examination, 
and  as  there  were  for  many  years  more  students  applying 
than  there  was  room  for,  it  became  in  a  way  competitive, 
for  those  who  did  best  were  admitted  by  preference. 

Thus  it  happened  that  occasionally  the  students  included 
a  few  who  were  older,  who  had  previously  gone  through 
some  engineering  or  workshop  training.  Thompson  fre- 
quently found  ithat  such  students  did  extremely  well. 
The  college  did  not  prepare  its  students  for  any  outside 
degree  or  examination,  but  at  the  end  of  the  courses  of 
either  Electrical  Engineering,  Mechanical  Engineering,  or 
Chemistry,  certificates  of  proficiency  were  granted  to  those 
who  had  passed  the  final  examinations  up  to  a  certain 
standard.  Within  a  few  years  of  the  establishment  of  this 
system,  those  students  who  had  gained  certificates  were  able 
to  obtain  good  posts  without  serving  any  apprenticeship, 
paying  any  premium,  or  taking  any  University  degree. 
Thompson's  insistence  that  the  training  for  the  industries 
must  be  essentially  practical  became  so  well  known  that 
to  have  been  under  him  at  Finsbury  was  an  asset  to  many 
of  them. 

In  October  1887,  at  a  time  when  there  was  again  great 
public  discussion  on  Technical  Education,  and  at  the  end 
of  his  first  complete  year's  work,  Thompson  printed  an 
account  of  The  Present  Operations  of  the  Finsbury  Technical 
College.  After  a  historical  summary  of  the  starting  of  the 
College,  he  gave  a  survey  of  the  scope  of  the  work  which  had 
been  and  might  be  achieved  in  it.  During  1886  the  college 
had  been  attended  by  156  day  students  and  912  evening 
students.  But  after  a  few  years  the  numbers  increased 
considerably.  With  regard  to  the  educational  methods 
pursued  he  wrote  : 

"  The  education  given  in  the  college  presents  several 
points  in  marked  contrast  to  an  ordinary  college  education. 
The  laboratory,  the  workshop,  and  the  drawing  office  take 
up  the  main  portion  of  the  student's  time.  For  every  hour 
in  which  the  student  is  being  talked  to  in  the  lecture-room, 


134  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

there  are  two  hours  in  which  he  is  instructing  himself  by 
actual  work. 

"  Textbooks  are  almost  unknown  ;  the  students  acquire 
their  facts  and  draw  their  inferences  not  from  books,  nor 
from  the  ipse  dixit  of  the  teacher,  but  from  the  things  them- 
selves. The  results  of  this  scheme  of  instruction  are 
briefly  this  :  that  the  students  who  have  followed  out  their 
course  enter  industrial  life  under  much  more  favourable 
conditions  than  otherwise  they  could  have  done.  They 
pick  up  in  the  shops  in  two  or  three  years  more  than  they 
could  have  done  in  five  or  six  years  under  the  old  apprentice- 
ship system. 

"  In  many  cases  they  enter  at  once  as  improvers  ;  their 
college  training  stands  them  in  better  stead  than  an  expen- 
sive premium,  because  it  fits  them  to  enter,  not  as  premium 
pupils,  but  rather  as  workmen,  and  they  gain  the  con- 
fidence of  older  workmen  as  premium  pupils  very  rarely 
can  do." 

The  Evening  Classes  admitted  many  of  the  students  at 
half  fees  as  apprentices  ;  some  were  not  much  over  fourteen 
years  of  aga,  others  considerably  older.  There  were  no 
entrance  examinations  to  restrict  admission,  and  the 
attainments  of  the  students  were  very  varied.  The 
subjects  of  Electricity  and  Magnetism  and  others  connected 
with  Electrical  Engineering,  such  as  Dynamo  Design, 
Electric  Bells,  Electro-plating,  when  inaugurated  by 
Thompson,  brought  crowds  of  eager  young  men  to  the 
college,  and  later  on  courses  on  Technical  Optics  attracted 
men  from  great  distances,  some  even  from  Nottingham 
and  Leicester  who  had  to  travel  back  by  night  in  order  to  be 
at  their  work  next  day,  so  keen  were  they  to  profit  by  his 
remarkably  lucid  and  clear  explanations  of  complicated 
optical  phenomena. 

No  actual  trades  were  taught  in  the  college,  the  nearest 
approach  to  trade-teaching  being  the  practical  instruction 
given  in  the  Plumbing  and  Metal  Plate  classes.  This 
instruction,  though  more  than  mere  handicraft,  was  regarded 
as  supplementary  to  apprenticeship,  not  as  a  substitute  for 
it.  In  these  classes  the  aim  was  to  give  instruction  in  the 
application  of  the  principles  that  underlie  the  various 


TECHNICAL   COLLEGE,  PINSBURY          135 

processes.  In  every  case  the  classes  were  placed  under 
instructors  who  were  conversant  with  trade  usages  and 
terms,  having  themselves  worked  in  that  trade.  This  was 
in  Thompson's  opinion  an  absolutely  essential  qualification 
for  the  teachers  of  the  "  Trade  Classes."  In  the  Applied 
Art  Department  he  took  a  very  great  interest.  There  were 
life  classes  both  for  painting  and  modelling,  and  some 
distinguished  men  received  their  first  instruction  in  the 
Finsbury  Evening  Classes. 

One  subject  which  greatly  attracted  Thompson  was  the 
electro-plating,  which  was  taught  for  thirty-five  years  by 
Mr.  Rousseau,  an  extremely  able  instructor.  The  electro- 
deposition  of  metals  was  thoroughly  investigated  by 
Thompson ;  he  tried  many  experiments,  and  succeeded  in 
inventing  a  mode  of  electro-plating  with  cobalt  which 
produced  a  beautiful  untarnishable  silver-grey  surface  of 
great  use  for  decorative  purposes.  He  sent  a  paper  de- 
scribing this  discovery  to  the  Royal  Society  in  1887,  which 
was  communicated  by  Dr.  G.  Carey  Foster,  F.R.S.,  and 
also  took  out  a  patent  for  the  process. 

In  his  home  at  Hampstead  he  had  for  more  than  twenty 
years  an  overmantel  executed  in  brass  and  plated  with 
cobalt  which  never  tarnished,  and  was  often  greatly  admired. 
He  also  had  a  portrait  model  made  of  William  Gilbert, 
author  of  De  Magnete  ;  this  too  was  executed  at  the  college 
and  plated  by  the  cobalt  process.  At  one  time  the  Metal- 
work  classes  attracted  two  gold  medallists  from  South 
Kensington  to  attend  at  Finsbury  for  the  purpose  of  studying 
that  art.  Some  of  the  early  work  of  Mr.  Gilbert  Bayes,  R. A. , 
was  executed  in  this  department,  while  he  was  still  a  student 
in  his  teens,  and  before  he  had  begun  his  career  at  the 
Royal  Academy.  Among  these  early  works  was  a  portrait 
group  of  Thompson's  four  little  daughters,  to  whose  nursery 
at  Hampstead  the  young  artist  was  a  welcome  visitor  on 
Saturday  afternoons. 

After  a  visit  paid  to  Italy  in  1892,  Thompson  introduced 
another  artistic  handicraft  into  the  curriculum  of  the  Art 
Department,  that  of  enamelling  on  metal  as  carried  out  in 
Venice  and  other  Italian  towns.  He  was  able  to  find  just 


136  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

the  right  man  as  instructor,  and  under  Mr.  Alexander 
Fisher  a  most  successful  and  enthusiastic  class  was  carried 
on  for  several  years.  Some  of  the  students — as,  for  example, 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nelson  Dawson — achieved  remarkable  results 
and  set  up  schools  of  metal- work  themselves.  Thompson, 
of  course,  tried  his  hand  at  the  new  form  of  Art,  and  suc- 
ceeded in  producing  some  little  souvenirs  of  his  own  design. 
During  that  same  Session  1892-3  he  gave  a  Special  Course 
of  three  lectures  on  the  electrical  principles  underlying  the 
process  of  Electro-deposition  of  metals. 

In  spite  of  the  many  administrative  duties  which  fell  upon 
the  Principal  of  a  progressive  and  active  Technical  College, 
such  as  Finsbury  became  under  Thompson,  he  was  always 
at  work  devising  better  experimental  means  of  bringing 
within  the  mental  grasp  of  his  students  the  very  difficult 
problems  presented  by  the  study  of  Electrical  Engineering. 
As  an  original  investigator  himself  he  stimulated  his  senior 
students  to  work  out  original  problems  and  designs  for 
themselves.  As  years  went  on  there  grew  up  round  him 
in  the  college  groups  of  young  men  who  were  eager  to  act  as 
his  assistants,  and  who  many  of  them  passed  on  to  take 
prominent  positions  themselves.  To  mention  a  few  associ- 
ated with  him  in  the  earlier  years,  Dr.  Walmesley,  Mr. 
O'Keefe,  Professor  Miles  Walker,  Dr.  Dennis  Coales ;  all 
have  become  in  later  years  heads  of  Colleges  or  of  Technical 
Departments  in  different  parts  of  the  country. 

During  the  vacation  preceding  his  first  Session  at  Finsbury, 
Thompson  was  fully  occupied  in  preparations,  and  there  was 
no  possibility  of  taking  a  holiday,  hence  the  following  letter 
to  Oliver  Lodge,  then  at  the  British  Association  Meeting, 
dated  September  7th,  1885  : 

"DEAR  LODGE, 

"  I  am  taking  the  liberty  of  addressing  to  you  a  small 
parcel  which  contains  some  polarising  prisms  which  I  wish 
to  have  shown  to  Section  A.  Much  to  my  regret  I  can't 
come  in  person  :  but  will  post  to  you  by  later  post  the  paper 
describing  them,  and  also  some  sheet  diagrams  explaining 
how  these  prisms  are  cut.  I  hope  you  will  have  a  good 
time,  and  will  keep  the  ball  rolling  of  making  Section 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   FINSBURY  137 

meetings  productive  of  better  results  in  the  way  of  fuller  and 
more  exhaustive  discussions.  We  must  get  frictional  pro- 
duction of  currents  next  in  hand  :  it  must  be  explicable. 
Fleming  is  going  to  be  with  you  :  I  think  he's  on  the  war- 
path on  Electrolysis.  So  is  Armstrong  more  suo. 

"  Has  Sir  W.  Thomson  given  in  yet  ?   If  not,  shake  your 
fist  at  him  again  :   he  must  cave  in." 

During  the  Christmas  holidays  he  wrote  to  the  same  : 

"  Apropos  of  your  last  circular  (You've  hit  the  way  to 
make  us  work  !)  and  your  own  experiments^  may  I  make  a 
suggestion — namely,  that  you  fill  your  (HC1)  tube 
previously  with  a  jelly  to  which  a  little  HC1  has  been 
added  ?  This  will  get  rid  of  many  difficulties  arising  from 
currents.  But  probably  you  have  thought  of  this  before. 
I  think  we  ought  to  make  a  set  of  special  jelly  experiments — 
e.gr.,a  jelly  Daniell  cell — and  see  how  the  presence  of  the 
jelly  affects  action.  If  you  think  well  of  it,  I  will  have 
some  experiments  made  on  this  matter." 

To  this  Professor  Lodge  replied  : 

"  No,  I  had  not  thought  of  jelly  in  this  connection,  but  it's 
an  Al  idea. 

"  Please  try  your  jelly  Daniell ;  I  think  it  must  lead  to 
something.  It's  very  Guthriesque. 

"I  shall  try  a  jelly  tube  very  shortly ._.  Best  wishes  for 
New  Year." 

Thompson  wrote  again  to  the  same,  early  in  1886,  com- 
menting on  an  article  in  the  Philosophical  Magazine  : 

"  I  am  delighted  to  see  that  when  '  polemick  '  is  the 
right  thing,  you  are  not  afraid  to  polemicise.  What  reply 
there  can  be  I  can  hardly  conceive.  I'm  the  more  delighted 
because  I  find  you  have  rejected  the  specific  heat  of  electricity 
so  completely.  Now  that  you  have  Brought  down  a  sledge- 
hammer of  common  sense  upon  the  thing  I  shall  be  sur- 
prised if  the  misleading  analogy  does  not  die  out.  I  shall 
be  very  curious  to  learn  what  Sir  W.  Thomson  says. 

"  I  wish  I  could  report  any  progress  on  the  few  things 
I  am  hoping  to  do.  All  my  days  and  nights  are  going  on 
administrative  work  just  now,  and  on  devising  much-needed 
lecture  illustrations.  I  got  some  jelly  ready  to  make  a 


138  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

'  jelly  Daniell.'  It  developed  swarms  of  bacteria  and 
other  organisms  before  I  could  even  begin  to  use  it.  But  I 
shall  try  again." 

Many  of  the  new  students  who  came  to  Finsbury  had 
received  little  or  no  training  in  the  art  of  making  notes  for 
themselves  of  lectures  or  of  laboratory  work.  Thompson 
considered  this  part  of  their  training  to  be  of  such  great 
importance  that  he  frequently  held  a  "  note-taking  "  class 
at  the  beginning  of  a  new  Session,  and  would  give  up  part 
of  his  Saturday  morning  to  drilling  them  in  the  art  of 
making  notes  which  would  be  useful  to  themselves  in  after 
life.  He  often  told  the  new  students  : 

"  I  want  you  to  work  hard  at  your  notebooks  in  the 
different  subjects.  You  must  make  them  so  thoroughly 
your  own  that  they  will  be  more  useful  to  you  during  the 
next  twenty  years  than  any  textbook  you  can  buy.  Keep 
a  separate  notebook  for  every  subject,  and  so  build  up  a 
library  of  your  own  records  of  your  own  experiments.  Of 
course  you  must  have — and  read — other  books  for  reference, 
but  your  own  will  prove  so  valuable  that  you  will  go  to 
them  in  future  years  if  you  want  to  look  things  up.  I  do 
not  know  where  I  got  the  notion,  which  I  never  thought  of 
for  myself,  but  to  this  day  I  have  notebooks  of  forty  years 
ago,  and  find  them  useful." 

Thompson  was  very  strict  with  first-year  students ;  if 
they  wasted  their  time,  were  indolent  and  unpunctual, 
showed  no  purpose  in  their  work,  and  failed  in  the  first 
year's  examinations,  he  would  frequently  advise  their 
parents  or  guardians  to  take  them  from  the  college,  and 
put  them  to  other  work.  In  a  very  few  cases  they  were 
allowed  to  repeat  the  first-year  course. 

In  order  to  help  his  students  to  get  a  grasp  of  the 
Integral  Calculus,  a  branch  of  mathematics  absolutely 
essential  for  the  training  of  a  mechanical  or  electrical 
engineer,  he  invented  a  new  way  of  presenting  the  subject 
which  was  used  for  many  years  in  the  college.  At  last,  in 
1910,  he  published  this  in  the  form  of  a  small  volume  entitled 
Calculus  made  Easy,  by  "F.R.S."  It  was  brought  out  by 
Macmillan's,  and  the  secret  of  its  authorship  was  faithfully 


Q 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   FINSBURY  139 

kept  until  after  the  death  of  the  author.  It  was  written 
in  a  very  amusing  colloquial  style,  which  raised  the  ire  of 
some  of  the  serious  teachers  of  mathematics  who  objected 
to  the  subject  being  treated  as  a  joke,  but  its  tremendous 
success  showed  that  it  met  the  need  of  students.  In  the 
Prologue  he  says  : 

"  Being  myself  a  remarkably  stupid  fellow,  I  have  had 
to  unteach  myself  the  difficulties,  and  now  beg  to  present 
to  my  fellow  fools  the  parts  that  are  not  hard.  Master 
these  thoroughly,  and  the  rest  will  follow.  What  one 
fool  can  do,  another  can." 

In  the  Epilogue  he  says  : 

"  There  are  amongst  young  engineers  a  number  on  whose 
ears  the  adage  that,  what  one  fool  can  do  another  can,  may 
fall  with  a  familiar  sound.  They  are  earnestly  requested 
not  to  give  the  author  away,  nor  to  tell  the  mathematiciana 
what  a  fool  he  really  is." 

The  students  who  knew  the  secret  kept  it  carefully.  The 
reviewer  in  the  Athenaeum  said ; 

"It  is  not  often  that  it  falls  to  the  lot  of  a  reviewer  of 
mathematical  literature  to  read  such  a  gay  and  boisterous 
book  as  this  *  very  simplest  introduction  to  those  beautiful 
methods  of  reckoning  which  are  generally  called  by  the 
terrifying  names  of  the  differential  calculus  and  the  integral 
calculus.'  As  a  matter  of  fact,  professional  mathematicians 
will  give  a  warm  welcome  to  a  book  which  is  so  orthodox 
in  its  teaching  and  so  vigorous  in  its  exposition." 

Another  critic  wrote  : 

"  Not  only  is  this  book  an  admirable  introduction  to  the 
calculus,  but  it  is  more  than  that.  It  is  a  broad  philosophy 
of  life,  and  as  such  will  endear  itself  to  all  men  who  have 
been  through  Part  I  Mechanics.  It  is  worth  buying  for 
the  jokes  alone  ;  and  as  for  its  mathematics,  the  principles 
of  differentiation  and  integration  as  presented  by  the 
anonymous  author  would  be  intelligible  even  to  a  Botany 
man.  All  textbooks  should  be  written  in  this  style." 

Many  appreciatory  letters  were  sent  to  "F.R.S."  through 


140  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

the  publishers,  and  his  colleague,  Professor  E.  G.  Coker, 
F.R.S.,  wrote  : 

"  I  am  very  pleased  to  hear  that  your  little  book  on  the 
Calculus  is  likely  to  be  available  for  general  use.  As  you 
know,  I  have  been  teaching  the  elements  of  this  subject  to 
the  junior  classes  here  for  some  years,  and  I  do  not  know  of 
any  other  book  so  well  adapted  to  give  fundamental  ideas. 
One  of  the  great  merits  of  the  book  is  that  it  dispels  the 
mysteries  with  which  professional  mathematicians  envelope 
the  subject.  I  feel  sure  that  your  little  book,  with  its 
common  sense  way  of  dealing  with  elementary  ideas  of  the 
calculus,  will  be  a  great  success." 

The  book  had  to  be  reprinted  three  times  during  the  year 
after  it  was  published.  In  1914  a  new  edition,  with  errata 
corrected  and  a  considerable  number  of  new  examples 
added,  appeared.  This  was  reviewed  in  The  Mathematical 
Gazette  by  Professor  Alfred  Lodge,  a  distinguished  mathe- 
matician, brother  of  Sir  Oliver  Lodge.  His  criticisms  were 
somewhat  severe,  but  he  wrote  : 

"  The  work  is  very  sound  as  a  whole — and  it  is  not  sur- 
prising to  see  that  the  book  has  met  with  a  good  deal  of 
success,  as  it  carries  the  practical  student  to  a  very  useful 
point." 

In  1916  Professor  Alfred  Lodge  somehow  discovered  the 
authorship,  and  wrote  to  Thompson  for  confirmation  of  the 
fact, promising  to  preserve  the  anonymity  and  saying  :  "It 
was  a  courageous  book  to  write,  and  I  congratulate  you  on 
its  great  success." 

Sir  Oliver  Lodge  wrote  : 

"  MY   DEAR   SlLVANUS, 

"  You  know  that  book  Easy  Lessons  in  the  Calculus, 
I  have  concluded  that  the  book  is  by  John  Perry,  but  recently 
I  have  heard  it  attributed  to  yourself.  I  do  not  in  the  least 
think  that  that  is  true,  but  perhaps  you  would  not  mind 
sending  me  a  postcard  either  of  denial  or  acceptance,  for 
evidently  the  anonymity  is  not  carefully  preserved. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  OLIVER  LODGE." 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   PINSBURY  141 

After  the  death  of  the  author  the  book  was  published  in 
his  name,  and  is  still  being  largely  used,  both  in  this  country 
and  in  America. 

In  1893  the  Director  and  Secretary  of  the  Municipal 
Technical  School,  Manchester,  Mr.  J.  H.  Reynolds,  writing  to 
Thompson  about  a  Conference  on  Technical  Education 
which  was  being  held  there,  says  : 

"  I  am  very  sorry  indeed  to  learn  from  your  letter  that 
you  are  not  able  to  be  present  at  the  Meeting.  I  think  you 
would  have  helped  to  put  the  objects  of  the  Meeting  on  a 
sound  basis.  I  am  with  you  entirely  in  your  desire  that 
the  organisation  should  be  educational  rather  than 
professional. 

"  Finsbury  is  to  me  the  prototype  of  what  Technical 
Schools  should  aim  to  be.  In  saying  this  I  refer  to  the 
organisation,  method,  and  aims  of  that  school,  and  I  have 
striven  as  far  as  circumstances  permit  to  realise  these  condi- 
tions in  the  Manchester  School,  but  very  few  indeed  of 
those  who  will  meet  to-morrow  control  schools  of  like  aim." 

Like  every  other  college,  Finsbury  had,  of  course,  its  Old 
Students'  Association.  In  early  years  they  used  to  give  a 
soiree  for  the  students  and  their  friends,  which  used  to 
overflow  into  some  of  the  rooms  of  the  Cowper  Street  School 
behind,  kindly  lent  for  the  occasion,  a  covered  way  being 
erected  across  the  playground  of  the  school  to  connect  the 
two  buildings.  When  the  old  students  began  to  be  num- 
bered by  thousands,  this  was  given  up,  and  an  annual 
dinner  was  instituted  at  which  the  Principal  almost  invari- 
ably presided.  There  was  also  an  Old  Students'  Magazine, 
with  a  portrait  (somewhat  of  a  caricature)  of  Thompson 
on  the  outside  cover.  There  were  smaller  societies  of 
Chemical  Students  and  Electrical  Students  which  maintained 
the  esprit  de  corps  of  their  own  departments. 

The  following  extracts  from  a  letter  from  Professor 
William  Ernest  Dalby,  F.R.S.,  who  succeeded  Professor 
Perry  in  the  chair  of  Engineering,  gives  an  idea  of  the 
position  which  Thompson  had  reached  with  staff  and 
student^  after  nine  years'  administrative  work  : 


142  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

"  I  was  appointed  to  the  Professorship  of  Mechanical 
Engineering  and  Applied  Mathematics  at  Finsbury  in  1896. 
The  Principal  was  to  everyone  in  the  college  '  The  Doctor.' 
His  influence  over  the  students  was  wide  and  deep.  Prob- 
ably every  student  who  entered  the  college  knew  him 
through  his  writings.  It  is  certain  that  every  student 
when  he  left  the  college  was  affectionately  devoted  to  him, 
and  knew  him  as  a  friend.  It  was  only  a  few  weeks  ago 
that  I  ran  across  an  old  student  of  his  who  considered  that 
the  greatest  good  he  carried  away  from  him  was  not  what 
he  learnt  in  the  lecture-room  and  laboratory,  but  guidance 
in  his  theological  difficulties,  which  helped  him  to  a  rule 
of  life  which  he  has  practised  consistently. 

"  No  doubt  this  same  experience  could  be  multiplied  by 
many  others.  The  devotion  of  the  students  to  the  Doctor 
was  shown  enthusiastically  when  he  appeared  on  the 
platform  during  the  one  soiree  of  the  year.  All  must 
remember  the  wild  and  enthusiastic  greeting  he  always 
received.  , 

"  He  was  helpful  to  students  and  staff  in  every  way 
one  man  can  be  helpful  to  another,  and  I  am  sure  letters  of 
acknowledgment  from  old  students,  of  help  and  guidance 
received,  would  be  enough  to  fill  a  book." 

Professor  Dalby  left  Finsbury  in  1904,  being  appointed 
to  the  Professorship  of  Civil  and  Mechanical  Engineering 
at  the  then  Central  Technical  College,  now  a  part  of  the 
Imperial  College  of  Science  and  Technology.  It  was 
during  his  time,  and  owing  greatly  to  the  success  of  his 
department,  that  an  anonymous  donor  offered  £10,000 
towards  an  extension  of  the  college  if  the  Institute  of  the 
City  Guilds  would  give  £20,000  ;  this  offer  was  accepted. 
The  new  Engineering  wing  was  opened  in  October  1907 
by  the  Lord  Mayor,  and  the  extension  of  the  building  pro- 
vided incidentally  much  better  accommodation  both  for  the 
Principal  and  for  the  Art  Department. 

Professor  Ernest  G.  Coker,  who  succeeded  to  the  chair  of 
Mechanical  Engineering,  was  also  a  very  friendly  colleague  ; 
he  was  engaged  for  some  years  in  a  series  of  researches  on 
stresses  in  materials  such  as  are  used  in  engineering.  He 
devised  a  means  of  showing  how  they  occurred  by  executing 
models  in  transparent  celluloid,  examining  them  by  polarised 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   FINSBURY  143 

light.  These  researches,  which  gained  for  him  the  Fellow- 
ship of  the  Royal  Society,  were  deeply  interesting  to 
Thompson.  Professor  Coker  wrote  of  him  : 

"  To  his  artistic  instinct  experimental  work  on  light 
appealed  with  especial  force,  and  it  always  remained  a 
dominant  attraction.  His  knowledge  of  this  branch  of 
science,  in  fact,  was  quite  as  encyclopaedic  as  in  the  electrical 
field,  and  one  could  go  to  him,  as  I  often  did,  with  some 
perplexing  question,  perhaps  on  polarisation  phenomena, 
or  an  allied  topic,  and  find  in  him  a  mine  of  information. 
Form  and  colour  especially  appealed  to  him,  and  he  revelled 
in  the  gorgeous  displays  which  this  kind  of  work  afforded, 
and  to  which  he  contributed  many  new  and  original  experi- 
ments and  ideas." 


It  was  the  habit  of  the  Principal  to  give  every  year  an 
address  to  the  new  students.  On  one  occasion  some  of  his 
assistants  desired  to  preserve  one  of  these  addresses,  and 
had  it  taken  down  in  shorthand.  It  has  since  been  pub- 
lished in  a  Memorial  Number  of  The  Old  Students'  Magazine, 
with  notes  by  Mr.  Robert  P.  Howgrave  Graham,  who  was 
associated  with  him  as  student  and  assistant  for  seventeen 
years.  The  addresses  were  of  course  varied,  and  altered 
somewhat  in  character  with  the  development  of  the  college ; 
in  1885  the  note  was  "Finsbury  going  to  be  a  success." 

"  References  to  the  Old  Students  Association,  to  tho 
Literary  and  Debating  Societies,  and  to  all  the  athletic 
clubs,  rowing,  swimming,  running,  cricket,  and  football, 
brought  these  under  the  notice  of  the  new  students,  and 
showed  his  enthusiasm  for  everything  which  tended  to 
provide  students  with  common  aims,  or  to  enlarge  the 
scope  of  their  interests.  In  1895,  when  he  had  completed  a 
decade  of  hard  and  successful  work,  and  felt  some  pride  in 
its  fruits,  he  faced  a  room  full  of  new  students,  to  whom  he 
spoke  of  the  Inventors,  Consulting  Engineers,  Discoverers, 
and  Big  Factory  Managers  who  had  sat  there  before  them. 

"  He  used  to  tell  them,  '  What  one  fool  can  do  another 
can,'  '  Genius  is  the  genius  to  work  hard,'  '  We  can  hope 
to  be  at  least  happy  in  that  we  found  our  work  in  the  world 
and  did  it.' 


144  LIFE   OE   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

"  The  spirit  and  ideals  which  governed  his  intercourse 
with  students  and  others  who  worked  under  him  at  the 
college  are  typified  by  a  small  shield  which  hung  in  his 
room  there,  emblazoned  with  a  line  from  Chaucer's  descrip- 
tion of  the  poor  parson  :  '  If  golde  ruste  what  shall  iren  do  ?  ' 
Finsbury  records  certainly  show  that  some  at  least  of  its 
students  carry  away  enough  of  its  atmosphere  to  save  them 
from  rust,  and  they  will  surely  remember  with  ever  fresh 
gratitude  the  untarnished  gold  in  the  character  and  teaching 
of  their  old  Principal.  His  wonderful  memory  is  well  known 
to  those  who  have  left  the  College  as  youngsters,  and  on  their 
return  after  long  years — responsible,  much  changed,  and 
perhaps  bearded  men — have  received  his  greeting  by  name 
and  initials — perhaps  even  by  date  and  department.  His 
special  memory  for  faces  and  persons  was  partly  the  out- 
come of  his  keen  interest  in  the  welfare  of  his  students,  and 
was  valuable  in  the  preparation  of  the  annual  lists  which 
show  their  subsequent  occupations.  He  was  delighted  when 
anyone  enabled  him  to  correct  or  amplify  the  printed  proof 
which  always  lay  on  his  table,  and  though  its  revision  was 
a  labour  of  love,  it  was  by  no  means  a  light  task,  since  old 
students  have  not  always  kept  the  College  informed  of  their 
movements.  In  the  last  year  or  two  of  his  life,  he  com- 
plained that  an  occasional  name  in  the  long  list  carried  with 
it  no  memory  of  its  owner,  and  felt  this  to  be  a  sign  of 
advancing  years  ;  nevertheless  he  retained  sufficient  mental 
vigour  to  excite  the  envy  of  many  an  ordinary  man  in  his 
prime.  .  .  . 

"  And  now  that  he  has  gone,  our  thoughts  turn  from 
the  past  to  the  future  influence  of  his  life  and  work.  Has 
his  '  Quest  for  Truth  '  been  consummated  or  merely  ended 
where  he  left  it,  or  is  he  still  exploring  new  and  strange  paths, 
nearer  to  the  light,  with  clearer  vision  and  fewer  limita- 
tions ?  Whatever  may  be  the  answer  of  the  individual,  we 
know  that  the  Doctor's  philosophy  and  teaching  had  a  pro- 
found effect  which  will  long  survive  him,  helping  students, 
scientific  workers,  and  engineers  for  many  generations. 
The  more  personal  and  human  side  of  his  character  will 
exert  its  influence  at  least  while  any  Finsbury  men  who 
knew  him  remain  alive.  Numerous  letters  from  them  have 
been  preserved  among  his  correspondence,  and  show  a 
depth  of  affection  which  many  more  have  felt  without 
giving  it  definite  expression. 

"  Past  students  come  and  go  across  the  world,  returning 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   FINSBURY  145 

from  time  to  time  to  see  how  things  are  at  the  old  place  in 
Leonard  Street,  and  long  experience  has  shown  that  their 
first  desire  has  almost  invariably  been  to  see  the  Doctor 
or  to  hear  news  of  him." 

The  address  to  new  students  which  is  printed  in  The 
Memorial  Magazine  is  too  long  to  quote  in  these  pages,  but 
the  last  paragraphs  sum  up  a  good  deal  of  its  teaching  : 

"Finsbury  students  have  a  reputation  for  hard  work, 
for  not  being  afraid  to  take  off  their  coats  or  to  get  dirty, 
and  for  avoiding  running  after  degrees  merely  for  their  own 
sake.  We  have  had  to  make  our  own  reputation,  and 
though  twenty-five  years  ago  Finsbury  had  not  begun  to 
be  known,  it  is  different  now.  A  little  while  ago  I  was  at 
the  Exhibition  at  Turin,  and  met  two  old  students  who 
promptly  invited  me  to  dinner.  In  Switzerland  more 
recently  I  saw  at  least  one  old  student,  and  at  Breslau, 
though  I  did  not  see  an  old  student,  I  saw  a  man  who 
employed  two.  From  China  to  Peru  there  are  old  Finsbury 
men,  and  one  is  the  chief  engineer  at  Shanghai  dockyard 
at  the  present  time.  Many  of  these  past  students  come 
back  here  now,  for  they  have  old  friends  to  see  and  old 
recollections  to  revive  by  visiting  the  College,  and  they 
know  that  we  are  always  glad  to  see  them.  I  can  never 
be  satisfied  unless  the  students  who  go  out  into  the  world 
keep  up  the  reputation  which  has  been  won  for  the  College 
by  the  quality  of  the  students  who  have  already  gone  out. 
It  is  a  reputation  not  founded  on  air,  but  on  something 
much  firmer.  It  is  a  most  precious  possession  for  us,  and 
a  thing  of  which  I  think  all  of  you  should  also  be  proud. 

"  Make  it  your  business  to  live  up  to  it,  to  add  to  it,  and 
if  possible  to  excel  in  all  things  which  you  undertake. 

"For  the  rest  let  each  of  you  try  to  maintain  the  high 
standard  of  conduct  which  has  been  upheld  here  in  the 
past,  avoiding  all  that  is  contrary  to  manliness  and  delicacy 
of  thought  and  feeling,  and  acting  together  for  the  promo- 
tion of  all  that  is  really  worth  having  and  doing. 

"  In  this  way  you.  can  build  for  yourselves  on  a  sure 
foundation,  not  only  as  engineers,  but  as  men." 

Finsbury  College  attracted  to  its  laboratories  men  of 
many  nations  besides  the  young  Englishmen  who   were 
10 


146  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

afterwards  to  be  found  in  every  country  of  the  globe  :  there 
were  Belgians,  Germans,  Swiss,  Hindoos,  Chinese  and 
Japanese  among  the  students.  The  letters  which  came  to 
"  The  Doctor  "  from  many  varied  scenes  of  labour  often 
began,  "  I  know  that  you  like  to  hear  from  your  old 
students,"  and  the  writers  went  on  to  tell  their  experiences 
in  the  various  electrical  works,  some  in  the  States,  or  in 
India,  or  Johannesberg,  or  Buda  Pesth,  or  Russia. 

Many  would  probably  tell  of  much  success,  others  of 
having  got  into  the  wrong  branch  of  work,  and  begging  for 
a  fresh  recommendation.  Thompson  through  his  Technical 
writings  was  in  touch  with  electrical  firms,  and  would 
receive  letters  from  them  about  his  old  students,  often 
ending  up  with  remarks  such  as,  "  If  you  have  any  more 
fellows  like  X  leaving  college  soon,  please  send  them  along 
to  us  ;  we  could  do  with  many  such  "  ;  or,  "  We  want  a  man  in 
our  Dynamo  design  office,  or  our  Drawing  office  ;  can  you 
supply  the  need  ?  "  At  the  end  of  many  sessions,  every 
qualified  student  who  was  leaving  had  already  secured  a 
post  through  the  college.  This  was  a  great  boon  to  students 
who  had  no  one  to  push  them,  and  Thompson  gained  the 
reputation  of  being  very  specially  kind  to  widows'  sons. 
Many  students,  of  course,  did  not  desire  posts  immediately, 
and  went  on  for  further  study  in  some  University  in  England 
or  abroad. 

But  these  last,  too,  kept  up  a  correspondence  with  their 
former  Principal.  A  Chinese  student  who  went  to  study  at 
Charlottenburg  wrote  several  times  in  his  quaint  English, 
which  became  quainter  still  during  his  stay  in  Germany. 

In  his  first  letter  he  says  : 

"  Next  week  I  shall  begin  to  study  German  language 
properly  in  the  coming  days.  I  sincerely  hope  that  your 
example,  as  well  as  your  kind  instructions,  have  possessed 
sufficient  influence  over  my  conduct.  Moreover,  I  was  very 
happy  in  enjoying  the  lectures  and  experiments  when  I  was 
in  your  college.  It  is  my  opportunity  to  thank  you  for 
your  kind  instructions  and  advice.  I  am  living  as  you 
would  wish  and  have  taught  to  live." 

Some  months  later  he  writes  : 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,   FINSBURY  147 

"  How  are  you,  Sir  ?  I  hope  you  are  quite  well  in  your 
land.  Your  instructions  profited  me  very  much,  even  now 
I  am  in  Germany  I  always  remembered  your  sayings  in 
Finsbury  College.  Since  I  came  to  Germany  having 
nothing  improved  but  learning  German  language  day  after 
day.  In  this  spring  I  have  entered  the  Technical  High 
School  in  Charlottenburg,  Berlin,  in  which  I  am  taking  a 
course  of  metallurgy,  specially  for  the  metallurgy  of  Iron. 
Can  you  recommend  me  several  kinds  of  chemistry  and 
other  universal  technical  Science  magazines  ? 

"  I  am  much  obliged  you. 

"  Yours  very  respectfully," 

A  Spanish  student  wrote  from  Huesca,  where  he  had  been 
appointed  to  take  charge  of  a  Hydro-Electric  station : 

"  We  have  a  waterfall  40  kilometres  distant  capable  of 
furnishing  1,000  horse-power.  At  the  same  time  I  am  the 
agent  to  the  Westinghouse  Company  for  a  certain  district 
in  this  North. 

"Dear  Doctor  Thompson,  one  of  the  greatest  possible 
pleasures  for  me  would  be  to  know  that  you  were  disposed 
to  a  trip  in  Spain,  and  to  put  myself  at  your  orders.  I 
know  that  in  more  than  one  occasion  I  have  been  rough, 
ungrateful,  and  the  like.  This  was  only  apparently.  The 
truth  is  that  I  keep  a  most  grateful  remembrance  of  my 
stay  in  England.  People  call  me  here  :  the  Englishman. 
I  cannot  forget  how  indebted  I  am  to  yourself." 

A  Belgian  who  went  from  Finsbury  to  Electrical  works  at 
Chelmsford  wrote  : 

"  There  are  many  from  Finsbury  here,  Wright,  Church, 
Lewis,  Ashton,  Sheppard ;  the  two  former  specially  were 
very  kind  to  me,  and  made  my  beginning  easy.  It  is  always 
a  very  awkward  time.  I  soon  found  out  that,  if  to  come 
from  Finsbury  is  a  recommendation,  it  is  also  a  cause  for 
hearty  welcome,  and  that  in  the  coiwtry  as  in  the  city, 
Finsbury  men  stick  together  and  are  proud  of  the  tie." 

The  same  student  afterwards  took  up  the  teaching  of 
mathematics,  and  was  associated  with  Thompson  in  the 
revision  of  some  of  his  mathematical  work.  Years  later, 


148  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

when  he    was  a    married  man  and  father  of  two  sons, 
Thompson  sent  him  a  copy  of  his  Life  of  Kelvin,  and  he  wrote : 

"  Your  magnificent  gift  has  arrived  yesterday,  and  you 
may  guess  that  all  other  business  had  to  be  put  aside  for 
the  rest  of  the  day,  while  I  perused  the  two  volumes — the 
finest  ones  in  my  library." 

One  or  two  of  his  students  named  their  sons  after  their 
revered  "  Doctor  "  and  would  send  him  photographs  of  the 
youngsters,  and  perhaps  proudly  boast  of  precocious  traits 
showing  aptness  for  an  engineering  training. 

Thompson's  increasing  public  engagements  obliged  him 
after  some  years  of  London  life  to  engage  the  services  of  a 
private  secretary.  No  fewer  than  seven  old  Finsbury 
students  served  him  in  this  capacity,  Professor  Miles 
Walker  being  the  first  and  also  the  longest  with  him.  He 
proved  a  great  help,  and  assisted  in  many  important  re- 
searches. After  his  departure  to  study  at  Cambridge,  he 
was  succeeded  by  Dr.  Dennis  Coales,  who  also  eventually 
took  up  the  teaching  profession ;  those  who  followed  all 
went  into  engineering  posts  with  different  Electric  firms 
after  two  or  three  years  of  the  training  which  work  under 
Thompson  entailed.  They  all  became  his  firm  and  devoted 
friends  and  parted  from  him  with  regret. 

Some  of  his  other  students  remained  on  at  Finsbury 
as  assistants  in  the  Electrical  department  of  the  college. 
Mr.  Stratten  Holmes,  who  had  been  with  him  for  many 
years,  wrote  : 

"  I  shall  always  remember  my  long  association  with  the 
late  Dr.  Thompson,  first  as  a  student,  and  then  as  one  of  his 
assistants  at  Finsbury  ;  his  interesting  lectures  and  his 
kindly  help  and  advice  in  times  of  difficulty  and  worry. 
He  will  be  greatly  missed  by  those  who  had  the  privilege  of 
knowing  him  and  working  with  him." 

Mr.  Charles  Gorick  wrote  : 

"  It  was  my  pleasure  to  work  for  him  for  fourteen  years 
at  Finsbury1  from  the  time  he  was  appointed  chief,  and  I 


THE  "DOCTOR"  AMONG  HIS  APPARATUS. 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  J.  Russell  &  Sons  about  1910. 


148] 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,    FINSBURY  149 

have  nothing  but  pleasant  memories  in  connection  with  his 
good  and  glorious  work,  more  especially  of  my  duties  as  his 
lecture  assistant.  Like  many,  many  more,  I  feel  the  loss 
of  so  true  a  friend  and  kind  master,  and  will  remember 
him  always  for  his  most  noble  manner,  for  which  he  was  so 
greatly  admired  by  all  those  who  came  in  contact  with  him." 

Another  wrote  that,  during  all  his  years  as  assistant,  he 
had  never  heard  Thompson  utter  an  unkind  word  to  anyone. 
His  extraordinary  patience  was  always  a  marvel  to  those 
who  worked  under  him,  and  seemed  to  spur  them  all  on  to 
do  their  best.  His  perfect  calmness  as  a  lecturer  and 
experimenter  was  an  immense  help  to  his  assistants.  On 
one  occasion,  when  he  was  giving  a  public  lecture  to  an 
audience  of  many  hundreds,  a  small  piece  of  apparatus, 
which  was  being  used  in  an  experiment  in  a  projection 
lantern,  gave  way  suddenly,  owing  to  the  heat  of  the  lantern. 
He  calmly  left  the  subject,  and  passed  on  to  other  experi- 
ments in  front  of  him,  while  Mr.  Walker  and  Mr.  Thomas 
deftly  soldered  the  apparatus  there  on  the  platform,  and 
in  about  a  quarter  of  an  hour  he  turned  and  resumed  the 
experiment,  explaining  what  had  occurred,  and  saying  that 
he  counted  himself  fortunate  to  have  assistants  who  could 
perform  such  an  operation  on  a  public  platform  without 
disturbing  the  progress  of  the  lecture.  The  public  appreci- 
ated the  deed,  and  gave  them  a  round  of  applause. 

The  student  who  worked  longest  with  Thompson,  and  at 
the  end  of  nineteen  years  was  still  serving  him,  Mr.  Robert 
Howgrave  Graham,  wrote  that  : 

"  Having  found  that  contact  with  him  brought  always 
increasing  love  and  reverence  towards  him,  may  I  speak 
personally  and  intimately  on  behalf  of  a  multitude  of 
students — old  and  present  at  Finsbury.  I  once  heard  a 
speech  given  by  a  rough-spoken  past  student  at  a  dinner — 
almost  passionately  warm  and  calling  forth  storms  of 
enthusiasm.  He  said  that  :  c  The  Doctor  '  was  the  only 
name  in  Finsbury  students'  hearts,- and  that  all  the  world 
over  it  had  only  one  possible  meaning  when  they  met. 
Finsbury  was  '  The  Doctor  '  inseparably,  and  the  magic 
name  always  warmed  a  Finsbury  man's  heart  as  the  name 


150  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

of  a  certain  and  never-forgetting  friend  as  well  as  teacher. 
This  was  no  exaggeration." 

Another  old  student  wrote  : 

"  I  can  bear  testimony  to  the  reality  of  the  remarkable 
friendship  that  existed  between  Professor  Silvanus  Thompson 
and  his  pupils,  a  friendship  of  which  the  seeds  were  sown 
in  his  '  Opening  Address  '  to  the  new  students,  and  which 
grew  to  be  strong  and  lasting  during  the  happy  days  at 
College,  where,  in  his  gifted  hands,  to  learn  was  a  recreation. 
Professor  Thompson  was  popular,  but  not  in  the  ordinary 
sense  of  the  word.  Our  regard  for  him  was  of  a  different 
and  deeper  nature.  He  had  no  generally  accepted  nickname. 
We  knew  our  Doctor  for  the  great  man  that  he  was — we 
knew  his  talents  would  have  brought  him  far  greater  fame 
had  he  sought  worldly  advancement — in  a  vague  way  we 
knew  him  to  be  the  holder  of  earnest  convictions,  which  led 
him  to  neglect  self,  and  give  to  us  of  his  best — we  each 
knew  him  as  a  personal  friend  and  counsellor.  His  cheerful 
word  of  advice  or  encouragement,  his  real  goodness  of  heart, 
and  above  all  his  downright  sincerity,  drew  from  us  our 
friendship,  regard,  and  respect. 

"  As  a  teacher  the  Doctor  was  extraordinarily  interesting. 
I  have  listened  to  many  lectures  on  scientific  subjects,  but  I 
have  yet  to  hear  the  lecturer  who  can  be  compared  with 
him.  In  Physics  and  Electricity  he  had  subjects  which 
appeared  to  give  special  scope  for  the  application  of  his 
talents,  but  we  found  that  any  subject  that  he  touched  upon 
was  made  to  be  of  absorbing  interest. 

"  Of  the  Doctor's  many  qualities  I  was  perhaps  most 
impressed  by  his  honesty — the  average  '  honest  '  man  was 
not  in  the  same  street  !  Humbug  and  hypocrisy,  even  in 
their  very  mildest  forms,  were  entirely  foreign  to  his  nature 
— yet  he  was  a  model  of  tact. 

"  Shortly  before  leaving  Finsbury  I  asked  his  advice 
regarding  my  attitude  towards  my  prospective  employer, 
then  unknown.  In  reply  to  my  question,  '  Should  one 
address  a  Works  Manager  as  "Sir"?'  he  said,  'There 
are  some  who  wish  to  be  addressed  in  this  manner — I  can 
safely  leave  you  to  judge  your  man  !  '  I  do  not  know  that 
I  could  have  had  better  advice  or  that  it  could  have  been 
more  cleverly  put.  I  certainly  made  it  my  business  to 
judge  my  man  !  " 


TECHNICAL  COLLEGE,  FINSBURY  151 

This  chapter  seems  to  close  fitly  with  the  following  lines 
from  a  poem  by  an  old  student,  written  in  memoriam  : 

"  Great  Teacher,  thou  art  gone  !    We  look  in  vain 
For  such  a  lamp  as  thine  to  grace  again 
The  path  of  learning  and  its  lagging  hours, 
Showing  amid  the  rocks  the  hiding  flowers. 
Thy  flame  was  twofold  ;    all  the  world  well  knew 
How  thy  clear  intellect  in  lustre  grew 
With  passing  years,  and  flinging  far  its  rays 
In  speech  of  flawless  crystal,  lit  the  ways 
Where  pilgrims  journeyed  in  the  quest  for  Truth. 
We  sought  it  with  the  eager  eyes  of  youth 
To  learn  how  man  his  wealth  from  Nature  draws 
And  found  the  ordered  structure  of  her  laws 
Like  storied  architecture,  height  on  height, 
Soaring  beyond  our  vision  into  light 
Of  Truth  yet  unrevealed.     To  thee  of  old 
WTe  came  for  silver,  and  thy  gift  was  gold  ; 
Like  thee  we  found  the  faith  that  Knowledge  brings 
Through  '  the  deep  mystery  of  common  things.'  " 

R.  P.  H.  G, 


CHAPTER    VIII 

LIFE  IN  LONDON,   THE  EOYAL  INSTITUTION.      BIOGRAPHY  OF 
FAEADAY.       UNIVERSITY   REFORM 

IT  was  not  without  considerable  regret  that  the  Thompsons 
left  their  pretty  little  home  in  Clifton  in  1885.  They  had 
been  living  among  an  intellectual  and  congenial  circle  of 
friends  whom  they  knew  that  they  should  miss  greatly. 

They  had  made  many  friends  among  the  large  Quaker 
community  in  Bristol,  and  visits  to  the  beautiful  homes  of 
Lewis  Fry,  M.P.,  of  Francis  J.  Fry,  who  was  an  amateur 
scientist,  of  Albert  Fry,  who  was  Chairman  of  the  College, 
of  Thomas  Pease  at  Westbury-on-Trym,  of  the  Wedmores  of 
Druid  Stoke,  of  many  members  of  the  Sturge  family,  were 
all  times  to  be  remembered. 

Then  there  were  the  friends  and  supporters  of  the  college, 
Mr.  Joseph  Weston,  Mr.  Samuel  and  Mr.  William  Budgett, 
Mr.  Frederick  and  Mr.  H.  0.  Wills,  Mr.  Mark  Whitwill,  Dr. 
Beddoe,  F.R.S.,  Mr.  F.  Gilmore  Barnett,  brother  of  Canon 
Barnett,  and  many  other  worthy  citizens,  who  in  honouring 
the  college  extended  their  hospitality  also  to  its  Professors. 

Among  Thompson's  colleagues,  Professor  and  Mrs. 
Rowley,  who  lived  in  a  charming  house  in  the  Leigh  Woods, 
Professor  Main,  and  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Ramsay,  were  their  most 
intimate  friends.  There  were  also  many  among  the  staff 
at  Clifton  College  with  whom  there  was  much  in  common. 
After  Dr.  Percival  went  to  Oxford  he  was  succeeded  by  the 
Rev.  J.  M.  Wilson  (afterwards  Canon  Wilson),  and  Thompson 
was  deeply  impressed  by  his  fine  religious  teaching.  Dr. 
WiUiam  Tilden  (afterwards  Sir  William  Tilden,  F.R.S.)  Mr. 
A.  M.  Worthington  (afterwards  Professor  A.  M.  Worthington, 
F.R.S.),  and  the  Rev.  Philip  Sleemanwere  scientific  friends, 

152 


LIFE   IN  LONDON  153 

whom  he  had  the  opportunity  of  meeting  again  in  London 
at  scientific  gatherings,  when  old  friendships  were  renewed. 

The  beautiful  surroundings  of  Clifton  held  great  charm 
for  Thompson,  and  he  and  his  wife  used  to  take  long  rambles 
in  the  Leigh  Woods,  to  Coombe  Dingle  and  through  Shire- 
hampton  Park  to  Pen  Pole  Point.  In  two  minutes  from 
their  home  they  could  be  on  the  Downs,  and  they  knew 
every  cranny  where  the  bee  orchis  grew  or  the  rocks  were 
covered  with  the  little  yellow  rock  rose,  and  they  often  took 
evening  walks  across  to  the  cliffs  above  the  Avon.  But  the 
joy  of  being  in  the  midst  of  the  eager  progressive  group  of 
scientific  men  at  work  in  London  outweighed  the  loss  of 
the  joys  of  nature  so  near  at  hand  in  Clifton. 

The  first  home  in  London  was  in  Bayswater,  in  a  dingy 
row  of  high  houses  called  Arundel  Gardens,  the  attraction 
to  the  house  being  the  large  square  behind  where  the  children 
could  play.  He,  and  his  wife  also,  had  a  good  many  old 
friends  in  the  neighbourhood.  Dr.  Gladstone  was  in  Pern- 
bridge  Square  not  far  off,  Sir  William  Crookes  lived  on  the 
hill  above,  and  used  to  be  at  home  to  his  scientific  friends 
in  his  library  on  Sunday  evenings,  when  many  a  discussion 
took  place.  Professor  Ayrton  lived  on  Campden  Hill, 
Professor  Adams  in  Notting  Hill  Square.  Afterwards,  when 
Dr.  Ramsay  came  to  London,  he  too  chose  Arundel  Gardens, 
and  later  Professor  Perry  also  came  to  live  in  the  same 
neighbourhood. 

Arundel  Gardens,  however,  proved  to  be  a  rather  foggy 
situation,  so  after  five  years  the  Thompsons  moved  away  to 
a  house  of  their  own  with  a  private  garden  at  West  Hamp- 
stead,  then  on  the  outskirts  of  London,  and  surrounded  by 
fields,  long  since  covered  with  houses  and  flats.  Thompson 
called  it  "  Morland  "  after  his  ancestral  home  in  Westmor- 
land, and  it  was  for  twenty-six  years  a  meeting-place  for  a 
large  and  varied  circle  of  friends,  and  its  visitors'  book  is 
adorned  by  the  names  of  many  scientific  men  who  came  to 
stay  in  the  quiet  home. 

Not  long  after  coming  to  London,  Thompson  was  ap- 
pointed one  of  the  examiners  in  Physics  for  the  University, 
and  frequently  one  of  his  fellow-examiners  would  come  to 


154  LIFE   OF  SILVAN  US  THOMPSON 

stay  with  him,  while  they  were  engaged  in  correction  of  the 
papers.  Of  these,  Professor  Geprge  Francis  Fitzgerald, 
F.R.S.,  of  Dublin,  quite  frequently  made  "  Morland  "  his 
home  while  in  town.  His  was  a  fascinating  personality,  full 
of  fun  and  Irish  humour.  He  was  some  years  younger  than 
Thompson,  but  his  snow-white  hair  and  beard  made  him 
look  years  older.  The  colleagues  used  to  enliven  their 
tedious  labours  by  jokes  over  the  howlers  perpetrated  by 
the  unfortunate  examinees.  Another  who  used  to  come  to 
London  for  the  same  purpose  was  Professor  Poynting  of 
Birmingham.  He  too  was  a  welcome  guest  and  great  friend. 
Thompson  had  stayed  with  him  in  Birmingham  on  one  or 
two  occasions.  Professor  0.  J.  Lodge  too  paid  at  least  one 
visit  to  "Morland." 

Thompson  soon  found  that  during  the  winter  months, 
when  the  evening  lectures  were  in  progress  at  Finsbury, 
and  the  meetings  of  the  various  Scientific  Societies  to  which 
he  belonged  were  being  held,  it  was  necessary  to  limit  the 
acceptance  of  dinner  engagements  very  severely,  if  he  was 
ever  to  have  any  time  at  home  to  devote  to  his  writings. 

As  an  official  of  one  of  the  colleges  of  the  City  Guilds, 
it  was  almost  obligatory  upon  him  to  accept  a  certain  number 
of  invitations  to  dine  with  the  great  City  Companies,  and  on 
these  occasions  it  was  often  his  duty  to  make  an  after-dinner 
speech.  He  was  glad  of  this  opportunity  to  bring  the 
college  under  the  notice  of  the  wealthy  City  magnates.  He 
soon  gained  for  himself  the  reputation  of  being  a  very  good 
after-dinner  speaker,  and  at  the  annual  dinners  of  Scientific 
Societies  he  was  often  called  upon  to  exercise  this  gift.  He 
was  never  dull,  and  although  he  sometimes  made  use  of  such 
occasions  to  bring  forward  some  aspect  of  science  which  he 
thought  was  being  neglected,  the  apt  quotation,  the  flash 
of  wit,  always  enlivened  what  he  had  to  say,  and  carried 
his  hearers  along  in  sympathy  with  him. 

He  was  still  as  hard  a  worker  as  ever.  Professor  Barrett 
wrote  to  him  : 

"Mr  DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  How  wonderful  your  power  of  work  is  !   That  was 
almost  the  last  thing  G.  F.  Fitzgerald  said  to  me — he  was 


LIFE  IN  LONDON  155 

lamenting  to  me  how  little  he  had  done,  and  how  many 
things  he  had  neglected.  '  Now,  if  Silvanus  Thompson  had 
been  in  my  place,'  he  said,  '  you  would  have  seen  the  garden 
in  order,  the  library  books  all  catalogued,  all  the  references 
I  am  looking  for  tabulated  and  pasted  in  a  book,  and  every- 
thing else  properly  done  ;  he  has  a  wonderful  power  of 
work  and  order.' 

"  Really  I  am  more  than  grateful  to  you,  and  am  amazed 
at  the  ease  and  speed  with  which  you  have  read  those  proofs. 
I  was  sure  Clerk  Maxwell  never  said  '  cells,'  but  without 
actual  proof  did  not  like  to  cross  it  out.  Your  letter  is  just 
what  I  wanted,  to  quote  from." 

In  the  midst  of  his  many  duties,  however,  he  did  not  forget 
his  old  friends  of  Bristol  University  College,  and  we  find  in 
The  Times  in  December  1888  a  letter  on  the  subject  of  the 
English  University  Colleges  which  were  still  struggling  along 
without  support  from  the  Government.  He  wrote  : 

"  SIR, 

"  It  is  greatly  to  be  regretted  that  the  Parliamentary 
Session  should  have  been  allowed  to  close  without  some 
protest  at  the  way  in  which,  after  the  intimation  given 
early  in  the  year  by  the  Right  Hon.  the  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer,  the  interests  of  the  provincial  University 
Colleges  are  still  neglected.  To  a  financier  who  can  deal 
with  £50,000,000  at  a  time,  a  matter  involving  only  £50,000 
may  seem  paltry  ;  yet  to  one  or  two  of  the  English  University 
Colleges,  the  neglect  to  provide  them  this  year  with  the 
promised  pecuniary  support  may  mean  a  condition  peri- 
lously near  ruin.  ...  It  is  little  short  of  a  scandal  that  not 
one  penny  of  Imperial  funds  is  given  for  the  support  of  the 
higher  teaching.  I  speak  with  some  knowledge,  not  having 
yet  forgotten  my  nine  years'  experience  as  a  teacher  in  an 
English  University  College." 

In  March  1889  this  long  due  reform  was  carried  out  by  a 
provision  in  the  Estimates  of  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer 
for  grants  to  English  University  Colleges.  The  battle  was 
won,  though  the  grants  were  at  first  very  small. 

Soon  after  Thompson  came  to  London  he  was  proposed 
and  elected  a  Member  of  the  Royal  Institution,  which  he  had 
so  eagerly  visited,  and  where  he  had  so  diligently  attended 


156  LIFE    OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

the  lectures  of  Tyndall  and  Gladstone  in  his  student  days, 
just  ten  years  previously. 

The  Eoyal  Institution  in  Albermarle  Street  is  not  only 
famous  as  a  centre  of  scientific  research  and  glories  in 
having  had  men  like  Humphrey  Davy,  Faraday,  and 
Tyndall  at  its  head,  but  it  is  also  a  most  delightful  place 
of  reunion  for  men  of  science,  and  those  who  desire  to  learn 
from  them.  It  possesses  famous  laboratories,  two  endowed 
Professorships,  several  endowed  Lectures,  an  excellent 
lecture  hall  which  accommodates  about  1,200  people,  ante- 
rooms and  libraries  where  members  can  meet  and  read 
and  study.  Courses  of  lectures  are  given  on  three  days  of 
the  week,  all  of  which  members  can  attend,  and  which  are 
open  to  the  public  on  payment  of  a  fee  for  the  course.  On 
Friday  evenings  the  libraries  are  thrown  open  for  a  meeting 
of  members  and  their  friends  only,  and  on  that  occasion  a 
special  discourse  is  given  by  invitation  of  the  managers, 
by  some  famous  scientific  investigator  or  traveller  on  the 
very  latest  invention  or  discovery  of  the  day. 

This  discourse  is  given  in  the  lecture  hall,  the  chair  being 
taken  by  the  President  of  the  Royal  Institution  or  some 
scientific  man  of  eminence  among  the  members ;  it  begins 
at  nine  o'clock,  and  is  supposed  to  occupy  not  more  than 
one  hour. 

The  first  time  Thompson  attended  one  of  these  gatherings 
as  a  member  was  on  Friday,  January  22nd,  1886,  and  his 
wife,  who  accompanied  him,  jotted  down  some  notes  about 
that  memorable  evening  : 

"  The  first  object  which  attracts  attention  in  the  Royal 
Institution  is  an  imposing  marble  statue  of  Michael  Faraday, 
which  stands  in  the  entrance  hall  at  the  foot  of  the  staircase. 
He  is  represented  holding  in  his  hand  a  coil  of  wire  and  a 
bar  magnet,  by  means  of  which  he  made  the  wonderful 
electromagnetic  observations  which  formed  the  foundation 
of  the  discovery  of  the  dynamo -electric  machines.  On  the 
staircase  which  ascends  to  right  and  left  hang  portraits  of 
Count  Rumford,  the  founder,  and  Sir  Humphrey  Davy. 
In  the  library  upstairs  were  arranged  various  scientific 
exhibits  which  could  be  inspected  both  before  and  after 
the  discourse. 


THE   ROYAL  INSTITUTION  157 

"I  was  looking  forward  with  pleasure  to  this  lecture, 
which  was  to  b3  given  by  Professor  Tyndall,  who  was  so 
famous  as  a  scientific  expositor.  The  subject  was  '  Wave 
Forms.'  But  such  a  disappointment !  Poor  old  man,  he 
maundered  on  for  an  hour  and  twenty  minutes,  repeating 
himself  over  and  over.  He  gave  us  a  life  of  Thomas  Young 
with  very  little  mention  of  '  Wave  Forms  '  at  all.  He  is 
a  weird-looking,  thin,  stooping  old  man  with  long  grey 
hair  hanging  from  a  high,  narrow  head.  He  has  a  decided 
Irish  brogue  now  and  then,  and  uses  curious  gestures. 

"  After  the  lecture  was  over  the  audience  strolled  out  to 
the  library.  Going  through  the  anteroom,  which  is  adorned 
with  historical  pictures  and  busts  of  famous  men  and  Mrs. 
Somerville,  we  encountered  Professor  David  Hughes 
(inventor  of  the  Microphone)  and  his  wife, who  is  an  American. 

"He  is  a  hearty  old  fellow  with  a  shock  head  of  iron- 
grey  hair ;  he  smote  Silvanus  on  the  shoulder  with  his  hand 
and  called  him  '  My  boy  ' !  In  the  library  we  had  a  talk 
with  Mr.  Crookes  (inventor  of  the  Radiometer)  and  his 
wife.  They  live  not  far  away  from  us. 

"  With  our  old  friend  Mr.  Preece  we  had  a  chat  about  the 
lecture  we  had  just  listened  to.  He  remarked :  '  When  you 
and  I,  Thompson,  come  to  that  stage,  I  hope  some  friend 
will  be  kind  enough  to  prevent  our  making  an  exhibition  of 
ourselves.'  'Faraday  was  wise,'  said  Silvanus,  '  to  give 
up  at  once  when  he  felt  himself  failing. '  '  Ah  !  but  Faraday 
failed  top  the  last  time  he  spoke  here.'  'I  never  heard 
him,'  said  Silvanus,  '  I  have  assisted  him  at  lectures.  I 
used  to  come  here  as  far  back  as  1845,'  said  Mr.  Preece. 
That  was  six  years  before  Silvanus  was  born." 

During  the  next  thirty  years  the  Thompsons  were  habitues 
of  the  Royal  Institution,  and  were  generally  to  be  seen  on 
Friday  nights,  seated  on  the  right  of  the  lecturer  above 
the  places  reserved  for  the  professors  and  officers  of  the 
Institution.  In  later  years  Mrs.  Thompson  was  also  elected 
a  member,  and  they  were  often  accompanied  by  one  or  two 
of  their  daughters.  The  opening  lecture  referred  to  above 
was  the  last  ever  given  at  the  Institution  by  Professor 
Tyndall,  once  its  brilliant  resident  professor.  He  was 
succeeded  by  Professor  James  Dewar,  F.R.S.  (afterwards 
Sir  James  Dewar),  who  with  his  wife  resided  in  the  rooms 
above  the  Institution,  which  they  adorned  with  most  lovely 


158  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

tapestries,  carvings,  and  other  works  of  art.  Here  an  inner 
circle  of  scientific  friends  used  to  meet  after  the  Friday 
discourse  to  enjoy  their  kind  hospitality  and  continue 
discussions  of  the  lectures  and  new  discoveries  which  had 
just  been  described. 

The  Friday  night  lectures  often  made  landmarks  in  the 
public  knowledge  of  scientific  phenomena.  After  a  few 
years  Thompson  was  asked  to  give  accounts  of  the  latest 
discoveries  on  some  line  of  research  in  which  he  was 
interested.  The  first  in  1889  was  entitled  by  him  "  Optical 
Torque." 

Thompson  always  considered  that  a  Royal  Institution 
audience  on  Members'  nights  was  the  most  difficult  one  to 
address  of  any  that  he  came  across.  It  was  not  possible  to 
start  off  one's  subject  on  a  purely  scientific  basis,  and  not 
recognise  that  there  were  always  many  present  who  knew 
little  or  nothing  of  science,  so  these  had  to  be  introduced, 
as  it  were,  to  the  previously  known  facts  which  led  up  to  it. 
Then  there  were  nearly  always  sure  to  be  some  present  who 
knew  as  much  or  perhaps  more  of  the  subject  than  the 
lecturer  himself  ;  for  these  must  be  prepared  new  and 
ingenious  experiments,  so  that  they  too  might  find  something 
of  interest.  In  his  lectures  to  this  audience  Thompson 
was  successful  to  a  high  degree,  and  he  generally  had  a 
very  full  house. 

After  his  first,  he  received  from  his  old  Clifton  friend  the 
Rev.  Philip  Sleeman,  who  had  been  present,  the  following 
letter  : 

"DEAR  DR.  THOMPSON, 

"I  send  a  few  lines  to  offer  my  congratulations 
upon  your  discourse  at  the  Royal  Institution.  Judging  by 
the  remarks  which  I  overheard,  I  think  your  audience  was 
very  much  pleased.  I  enjoyed  it  greatly,  as  you  may 
suppose,  and  should  have  liked  to  have  stopped  the  clock, 
so  that  we  might  have  had  rather  more  of  it.  I  hope  you 
will  be  able  to  spare  me  a  copy  of  the  usual  '  Abstract ' 
when  you  receive  it.  I  half  expected  to  see  the  lecture  in 
Nature  last  week.  Your  use  of  the  string  to  show  the 
polarisation  of  vibrations  was  most  excellent,  and  also 
the  radial  sector,  etc.,  to  show  the  effect  of  rotation  of  the 


THE   ROYAL  INSTITUTION  159 

plane  of  polarisation.  These  were  both  of  them,  doubtless, 
quite  new.  .  .  .  The  Royal  Institution  people  have  now 
had  an  opportunity  of  seeing  that  Spottiswoode's  brilliant 
experiments  can  still  be  presented  to  them  with  additions, 
and  I  hope  they  will  profit  by  the  experience." 

The  next  Discourse  given  there  by  Thompson  was  entirely 
upon  the  great  researches  of  another  man,  Dr.  Koenig  of 
Paris,  of  whose  work  on  Sound  very  little  was  known  in 
England.  It  was  given  in  1890,  and  was  entitled,  "  The 
Physical  Foundation  of  Music." 

Dr.  Koenig  sent  for  exhibition  all  the  instruments  and 
apparatus  used  for  his  researches.  He  lived  in  seclusion, 
surrounded  by  splendid  apparatus,  which  had  been  seen 
and  appreciated  by  Thompson  during  some  of  his  brief 
visits  to  Paris.  The  Musical  World,  commenting  on  the 
lecture,  wrote  : 

"  One  of  the  most  important  lectures  given  in  England 
for  some  years  on  the  Theory  of  Sound  was  delivered  by  Dr. 
Silvanus  P.  Thompson,  on  Dr.  Koenig's  theories  and  recent 
discoveries  concerning  musical  sounds.  Dr.  Thompson 
spoke  extemporaneously  for  over  an  hour,  and  said  that 
Dr.  Koenig's  deductions  had  been  drawn  from  physical 
experiments  extending  over  twenty  years." 

This  lecture  led  to  considerable  correspondence  and 
criticism,  and  to  one  inquirer,  Mr.  R.  H.  Bosanquet,  F.R.S., 

Thompson  wrote  : 

I 

"  I  will  put  your  query  to  Dr.  Koenig,  and  send  you  his 
reply.  Please  bear  in  mind  that  on  Friday  I  spoke  purely 
as  the  exponent  of  Koenig's  views,  not  necessarily  of  my 
own  :  otherwise  I  should  have  said  something  in  criticism 
of  the  whole  method  of  wave-sirens,  and  should  have 
suppressed  sundry  other  things  that  Koenig  wished  to  be 
said.  I  wish  you  had  been  in  front  of  the  wave-sirens,  as 
they  can  not  be  heard  from  behind  with  any  success." 

In  1891  Thompson  gave  his  first  course  of  four  afternoon 
lectures  on  "  The  Dynamo."  This  year  also,  at  the  age  of 
forty,  there  came  to  h.im  the  honour  of  receiving  the  blue 


160  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

ribbon  of  Science  through  his  election  to  the  Fellowship 
of  the  Eoyal  Society. 

For  two  or  three  years  previously  to  this,  people  had 
been  questioning  why  his  work  had  not  been  already 
recognised  by  that  body.  When  they  spoke  to  him  about 
it,  he  always  said,  "  I  am  in  no  hurry.  I  bide  my  time." 
When  the  recognition  did  come,  he  was  pleased  and  gratified, 
and  so  were  many  of  his  friends. 

Professor  Perry  wrote  : 

"  DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"Congratulations  are  usual  in  these  cases,  and 
therefore  I  send  you  them.  But  it  is  the  R.  S.  that  ought 
to  be  congratulated." 

Sir  William  Crookes  wrote  : 

"MY  DEAR  SILVANUS,  F.E.S., 

"  Ten  thousand  congratulations  ! 

"  From  very  sincerely  yours, 

"  WILLIAM  CROOKES." 

From  Mr.  J.  Fletcher  Moulton  (afterwards  Lord  Moulton)  : 

"  Let  me  congratulate  you  very  heartily  on  your  F.R.S. 
I  cannot  understand  why  it  has  been  delayed  so  long. 
"  Yours  ever  sincerely, 

"  J.  FLETCHER  MOULTON." 

From  the  Council  of  the  Junior  Engineering  Society  : 

"  Hearing  with  the  greatest  gratification  of  the  distinction 
which  has  recently  been  conferred  by  the  Royal  Society  on 
Dr.  S.  P.  Thompson,  the  Council  beg  to  offer  to  him,  their 
President,  the  expression  of  their  cordial  congratulations  on 
his  election  to  its  Fellowship,  which  they  fully  recognise  as 
constituting  the  due  acknowledgment  of  the  important 
services  which  he  has  by  continued  research  rendered  to  the 
progress  of  science," 

Of  Thompson's  work  for  the  Royal  Society  more  will  be 
told  later  on.  The  Hon.  Secretary,  Mr.  Arthur  Schuster, 
wrote  in  1916  expressing  admiration  of  his  scientific  re- 


LIFE  IN   LONDON  161 

searches,  and  added  the  opinion,  "  His  successful  work  has 
never  been  sufficiently  recognised  by  the  Royal  Society." 
This  year  (1891)  was  perhaps  the  busiest  in  Thompson's 
busy  life.  After  college  courses  were  finished  for  the 
session,  he  had  two  important  lectures  to  prepare  before 
he  could  get  away  for  his  holiday,  the  Lecture  to  Working 
Men  at  Cardiff  during  the  meeting  of  the  British  Association 
there,  and  an  address  to  be  given  at  Frankfort,  where  he 
had  been  appointed  Vice-President  of  the  Electrical 
Exhibition,  and  where  an  International  Electrical  Congress 
was  to  be  held.  The  following  extracts  from  letters  to  his 
wife  written  in  July,  when  she  had  taken  the  children  to 
visit  her  sister  in  Aberdeenshire,  show  some  of  his  interests 
at  that  time : 

"  July  Uth. 

"  The  lonely  grass-widower  finds  his  house  strangely 
quiet  and  empty.  I  am  living  a  desperately  quiet  life  here  : 
and  yesterday  it  seemed  quieter  and  duller  than  ever. 

"  Herkomer  writes  me  that  he  is  much  overworked, 
and  is  going  from  Bushey  this  week.  He  will  paint  the 
portrait  in  the  autumn,  at  Bushey.  The  Italian  Edition  of 
my  little  Electricity  is  out.  I  got  a  copy  to-day. 

"  To-morrow  evening  I  am  going  to  Mr.  Wimshurst  to 
arrange  with  him  about  republishing — with  cuts  that  he 
will  give  me  respecting  his  machines — my  paper  on  Influence 
Machines,  for  which  there  is  a  demand. 

"  Tell  the  little  girls  that  papa  watered  their  gardens  for 
them  this  evening  ;  and  that  he  has  taken  down  the  swing. 
I  am  getting  a  lot  of  writing  done." 

"JulylBth. 

"  Never  a  line  yet  from  you  to  say  how  you  fare  :  and 
how  the  little  birdies  stood  the  journey  !  All  is  going  on 
steadily  and  quietly,  and  I  am  very  busy. 

"More  proofs;  manuscript  of  my  Cardiff  lecture  pro- 
gressing, and  a  paper  ready  for  the  Frankfort  Congress 
growing  into  shape. 

"  I  had  a  pleasant  coiiple  of  hours  last  evening  with 
Mr.  Wimshurst  amongst  the  machines.  I  want  him  to  work 
out  a  very  simple  sort  of  machine  that  every  schoolboy 
might  be  able  to  make  and  use.  It  is  lovely  weather — too 
hot  indeed." 
11 


162  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

"  July  23rd. 

"  Time,  wears  on,  and  I  shall  soon  have  to  pack  up  my 
traps,  whether  my  work  is  done  or  not.  I  have  got  through 
the  bulk  of  all  the  work  that  necessitated  actual  residence 
among  my  books  :  but  there  is  a  good  deal  of  actual  writing 
yet  to  do,  not  to  mention  scissors-and-paste  work.  Some 
of  this  I  must  bring  with  me,  I  fear.  I  shall  not  be  able  to 
leave  before  the  29th. 

"  Yesterday  was  a  busy  day.  I  worked  hard  at  home 
till  nearly  12.  Then  went  to  College,  kept  three  appoint- 
ments, then  went  to  New  Cross.  After  that  I  returned 
west  by  train  to  Earl's  Court  to  see  the  dynamos  at  the 
German  Exhibition — a  poor  show  it  is — and  then,  snatching 
a  hasty  dinner  at  the  Exhibition,  I  went  to  a  Committee 
Meeting  at  London  University — and  so  home  to  bed. 
Nell's  letter  came  with  yours  while  I  was  out.  Many  thanks 
to  her  and  you. 

"  The  auratum  lilies  are  out ;  I  have  one  in  the  study, 
perfuming  it  amazingly." 

"  July  25th. 

"  The  law  court  case  comes  up  on  Tuesday,  and  will  be 
disposed  of  that  day.  I  shall  therefore,  if  all  is  well,  go  to 
Settle  next  day,  and  am  writing  Marie  accordingly. 

"  I  shall  not  have  finished  all  my  literary  work  :  but 
have  got  on  tremendously  the  last  week.  The  garden  is 
splendid,  roses  magnificent.  I  had  a  feast  of  three  ripe 
strawberries  last  evening  !  [from  Dorothea's  little  garden]. 
Love  and  kisses  to  my  pets,  one  and  all." 

The  garden  at  Hampstead  and  the  little  greenhouse 
were  always  a  joy  to  Thompson,  and  he  managed  to  spend 
many  odd  minutes  and  hours  among  his  beloved  flowers  and 
plants.  He  was  very  fond  of  fuchsias  and  possessed  many 
varieties,  crossing  them  himself,  and  producing  new  seed- 
lings. One  summer  he  had  fifty-two  different  varieties  in 
flower.  He  used  to  send  cuttings  to  his  friends.  Twenty 
years  later,  when  Hampstead  had  become  more  urban,  the 
results  in  the  garden  were  rather  discouraging  to  the  enthusi- 
astic gardener. 

About  two  years  previously  to  the  date  of  these  letters, 
Thompson  had  become  acquainted  with  Hubert  Her- 
komer,  R.A.  (afterwards  Sir  Hubert  von  Herkomer),  and 


LIFE  IN  LONDON  163 

found  him  an  attractive  personality.  Of  Bavarian  ancestry 
— his  father  was  a  wood-carver  who  had  emigrated  to  the 
United  States — Herkomer  had  a  good  many  of  the  ways  of 
an  American.  He  was  then  living  in  two  small  cottages 
down  at  Bushey,  where  there  was  a  large  Art  School,  to  which 
he  freely  gave  his  services  as  teacher  for  many  years.  He 
seems  to  have  been  attracted  by  Thompson  also,  and  often 
pressed  him  to  go  down  to  Bushey.  His  enthusiasm  as 
a  teacher,  and  his  anxiety  to  enlarge  the  horizon  of  his 
students,  enlisted  Thompson's  sympathy,  and  he  helped 
him  by  lecturing  to  them  on  "  Colour  and  Pigments  "  from 
the  scientific  point  of  view.  He  was  also  interested  in  the 
new  house,  a  veritable  palace  of  Art,  which  Herkomer  was 
building  for  himself  at  Bushey.  He  advised  Herkomer 
over  its  lighting  by  electricity,  and  recommended  to  him 
young  men  who  would  be  willing  and  able  to  carry  out  his 
ideas.  Herkomer  in  return  painted  a  very  fine  portrait  of 
Thompson,  which  he  presented  to  him.  It  was  in  process 
of  being  painted  for  several  years,  both  men  being  so  busy 
that  it  was  difficult  to  fit  in  the  necessary  sittings.  Many 
visits  to  Bushey  were  paid  by  Thompson  and  his  wife,  on 
Saturday  or  even  on  Sunday  afternoons.  For  the  sake  of 
making  a  pilgrimage  down  to  that  simple  yet  artistic  home, 
he  would  occasionally  break  through  his  almost  invariable 
rule  of  keeping  Sunday  as  a  "  home  "  day. 

Previously  another  of  his  artist  friends,  Mr.  J.Walter  West, 
who  had  a  studio  in  Hampstead,  had  also  painted  a  large 
portrait  of  him  in  his  robes  as  Doctor  of  Science  of  London 
University.  Unfortunately,  from  1889  to  1892  Thompson 
wore  a  beard,  in  which  he  is  represented  in  this  picture,  but 
which  he  had  given  up  wearing  before  Herkomer 's  portrait 
was  begun. 

In  the  spring  of  1894  Thompson  again  gave  a  brilliant 
Friday  Evening  Discourse  at  the  Royal  Institution  on 
"  Transformations  of  Electric  Currents,"  remarkable  for  its 
ingenious  experiments.  That  year  the  British  Association 
was  held  at  Oxford,  and  his  friend  Professor  Oliver  Lodge 
gave  his  paper  which  foreshadowed  wireless  telegraphy, 
and  succeeded  in  sending  messages  from  one  building  to 


164  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

• 

another.  Mrs.  Thompson  also  attended  the  meeting,  and 
they  stayed  in  some  students'  small  rooms  in  Ship  Street. 
The  week  spent  among  the  architectural  grandeurs  of  old 
Oxford  was  a  great  joy  to  them  both.  Thompson  was  tired 
that  summer,  and  read  no  papers  at  the  meeting.  After  it 
was  over  they  went  off  to  Switzerland,  accompanied  by  his 
sister  Rachel  and  the  two  eldest  children.  They  spent  a 
long  time  at  Riffel  Alp,  which  he  found  an  excellent  centre 
for  sketching.  They  drove  homewards  over  the  Furka 
Pass  through  a  deep  fall  of  early  snow. 

In  1895  Thompson's  brother-in-law,  Ellwood  Brockbank, 
came  with  his  family  to  reside  near  London  at  Winchmore 
Hill ;  the  only  unmarried  sister,  Rachel,  also  left  Settle  at 
the  same  time,  and  came  to  live  with  them.  It  was  an 
added  joy  for  him  to  be  able  now  to  see  his  sisters  more 
frequently,  and  Saturday  afternoons  were  sometimes  spent 
together.  In  July  of  that  year  Mrs.  Thompson  went  to 
Buxton  with  her  mother,  and  the  following  extracts  are 
from  letters  to  her  : 

"July,Uth. 

"  There  were  many  inquiries  for  you  on  Friday  night  at 
the  Swans — where  all  the  world  (the  scientific  world)  and  his 
wife  (especially  his  wife)  were  present.  I  felt  curiously 
lame  and  out  of  place  to  be  there  alone.  They  had  some 
music  and  singing  and  Hilda  recited.  Rachel  did  not 
go,  she  was  suffering  from  facial  neuralgia. 

"  On  Saturday,  after  my  Committee  meetings  were 
over,  I  went  to  Winchmore  Hill,  arriving  there  before  four 
o'clock.  I  like  the  house  ;  it  seems,  but  for  the  distance 
from  the  station,  a  very  desirable  spot. 

"  Marie  was  looking  very  well.  Irene  was  blooming,  and 
said  she  did  not  want  to  come  home.  Marie  seems  very  glad 
to  have  her.  We  had  tea  in  the  garden,  and  the  children 
had  a  high  old  time  making  a  Bedouin  tent,  and  defending 
it  against  the  armed  robbers  ! 

"  On  Monday  I  shall  have  a  very  busy  day  with  meetings 
of  the  College  Committee,  and  at  the  University  ;  and  in 
the  evening  dinner  at  Miss  Jones'.  The  statistics  of  the 
Annual  Report  that  I  have  sent  in  show  that,  of  421  day 
students  who  have  gained  the  certificate  since  I  became 
Principal,  no  few#r  than  393  have  stuck  to  the  professions 


LIFE   IN  LONDON  165 

for  which  the  College  prepared  them.     This,  is  a  very  sur- 
prising result. " 

"July  18th. 

"  I  have  just  come  in  from  the  conversazione  at  Toynbee 
Hall — an  interesting  gathering.  .  .  .  No  further  news,  except 
that  Mr.  Chas.  Brown  of  Baden  i«;  coming  to  see  me  to-morrow 
at  Finsbury.  In  the  evening  is  the  concert  at  the  School.' ' 

"July2l8t. 

"  Saturday  was  Dorothea's  birthday  :  and  what  with 
her  watch  and  chain,  her  new  dolly,  her  letter  from  her 
mamma,  her  innumerable  small  presents  from  sisters  and 
cousins  and  aunts,  she  had  enough  to  think  about.  Yester- 
day Mr.  Brown  of  Baden  came  to  lunch  and  stayed  with 
me  the  whole  afternoon,  much  to  my  delight.  I  got  no 
end  of  useful  tips  in  completing  the  revision  of  Dynamo. 
He  carried  off  with  him  a  copy  of  the  Polyphase  book, 
which  is  now  out." 

"  July  22nd. 

"  I  am  now  getting  rapidly  toward  the  end  of  the  revision 
of  Dynamo,  but  it  takes  a  vast  lot  of  work.  Walker  is  an 
admirable  helper  in  all  this.  I  have  had  another  busy  day 
of  College  and  University  business,  but  this  evening  have 
been  drawing  for  the  Dynamo  book.  But  there  was  no  one 
by  to  read  to  me  !  " 

"  July  24th. 

"  Walker  and  I  are  working  like  Trojans  to  get  the  rest 
of  the  MS.  of  Dynamo  licked  into  shape  within  the  next  ten 
days.  It  is  no  easy  business  :  and  there  is  a  terrible  lot  of 
it.  However,  three-quarters  of  the  book  is  revised,  and 
more  than  half  is  in  the  printers'  hands.  So  the  last 
quarter  won't  take  so  long. 

"  I  went  to  Wilfred  BaU's  bachelor  '  At  Home  '  last 
night.  There  was  some  good  music,  many  artists  ;  and  a 
lot  of  pretty  things  in  his  studio." 

Thompson's  great  admiration  for  the  work  of  Faraday 
led  him,  during  the  years  when  he  was  lecturing  at  the 
Royal  Institution  himself,  to  make  constant  use  of  the 
records  and  notes  of  his  work,  which  are  among  the  treasures 
of  the  Institution.  He  studied  the  apparatus  made 
by  him,  and  would  often  show  pieces  of  it  when  lecturing. 
His  frequent  references  in  public  to  the  work  of  this  great 


166  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

genius  showed  his  enthusiasm  for  the  man.  Faraday's 
friendship  for  his  great-uncles  the  Phillips,  and  hearing  of 
him  from  his  cousin,  Lady  Wilson,  daughter  of  Richard 
Phillips,  added  a  personal  link  to  the  already  attractive 
character.  The  following  letter  to  Sir  William  Crookes, 
then  Hon.  Secretary  of  the  Royal  Institution,  is  of  interest  : 

"DEAR  SIR  WILLIAM, 

"  During  some  recent  lectures  to  my  classes,  I  have 
been  going  over  Faraday's  fundamental  work  as  narrated 
in  the  first  and  second  series  of  his  Experimental  Researches 
in  the  discovery  of  magneto-electric  actions.  In  the  course 
of  this  a  suggestion  occurred  to  me  that  I  think  worthy  of 
putting  before  you.  It  is  this,  that  it  might  be  of  interest 
if  one  were  to  try  in  a  short  series — say  three — of  afternoon 
lectures  at  the  R.  I.  to  reconstruct,  as  it  were,  that  cele- 
brated research,  and  show  the  experiments  as  nearly  as 
possible  as  Faraday  showed  them  ;  making  all  the  experi- 
ments as  he  made  them  ;  and  wherever  possible  with  his  own 
apparatus.  One  has  seen — and  shown — the  experiments 
so  often  with  modern  appliances  that  to  many  it  is  difficult 
to  realise  the  conditions  under  which  Faraday  was  working. 
How  does  this  suggestion  strike  you  ?  There  is  another  thing 
I  have  been  thinking  over.  These  researches  of  1831  are  so 
absolutely  vital  in  the  history  of  Science  that  every  detail 
in  their  making  is  of  intense  interest.  Now,  though  the 
account  in  the  Experimental  Researches  is  partly  narrative 
and  fairly  detailed,  it  is  not  in  the  same  order  as  the  experi- 
ments as  recorded  in  Faraday's  own  laboratory  notes.  I 
think  that  Faraday's  own  notes  as  they  stand  would  be 
valuable  to  the  world.  Do  you  think  that  the  R.  I.  would 
allow  me  to  transcribe  and  print  them  as  a  small  book  ?  " 

The  first  of  these  suggestions  was  welcomed  by  the 
Managers  of  the  Royal  Institution,  and  the  lectures  were 
given,  but  the  second  was  never  carried  out. 

In  1894  Sir  Henry  Roscoe  was  editing  a  series  of  short 
biographies  of  scientific  men  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
and  he  immediately  thought  of  Thompson,  and  wrote  to  him 
as  follows  : 

"  The  series  is  to  be  written  in  a  scientific  spirit,  but 
made  readable.  Thorpe  is  doing  Davy,  Percy  Frankland, 


BIOGRAPHY  OP  FARADAY  167 

Pasteur,  etc.  I  write  to  ask  whether  you  will  write  Faraday 
and  his  Work  ?  It  is  a  tempting  subject,  and  I  feel  sure  that 
you  would  do  it  justice.  Each  volume  is  to  be  about 
200  pages  of  small  pica  type,  and  will  therefore  not  be 
lengthy.  Indeed,  the  difficulty  will  be  that  of  compression. 
"  Cassell's  pay  the  authors  each  £80.  I  can  send  you  a 
dummy  volume  if  you  wish  to  see  the  size  of  the  proposed 
series." 

Thompson  did  feel  much  tempted  to  write  about  a  man 
whose  character  he  so  greatly  admired,  and  whose  work  had 
been  such  an  inspiration  to  him,  so  in  spite  of  his  many 
engagements,  he  undertook  to  add  one  more  task  to  those 
he  had  before  him.  Three  admirable  biographies  were 
already  in  existence,  but  were  all  expensive  books,  and 
were  all  out  of  print ;  so,  as  Thompson  wrote  in  his  preface 
to  his  volume  : 

"  There  seems  room  for  another  account  of  the  life  and 
labours  of  the  man  whose  influence  upon  the  century  in 
which  he  lived  was  so  great.  For  forty  years  he  was  a  living 
and  inspiring  voice  in  the  Royal  Institution,  beyond  all 
question  the  greatest  scientific  expositor  of  his  time. 
Throughout  almost  the  whole  of  that  time  his  original 
researches  in  physics,  and  chiefly  in  electricity,  were 
extending  the  boundaries  of  knowledge  and  laying  the 
foundations,  not  only  for  the  great  developments  of  electrical 
engineering  of  the  last  twenty  years,  but  for  those  still 
greater  developments  in  the  theories  of  electricity,  magnet- 
ism, and  light,  which  are  every  year  being  extended  and 
made  fruitful." 

.  Thompson  was  allowed  to  print  extracts  from  some  of 
Faraday's  original  notes,  and  also  obtained  access  to  some 
of  his  private  letters  and  papers,  which  were  in  the  possession 
of  the  Barnard  family,  nephew  and  nieces  of  Faraday.  He 
was  a  very  long  time  in  getting  the  book  completed,  for  as 
usual  he  took  infinite  pains  with  the  details  of  the  biography, 
and  that  entailed  research  and  correspondence  with  the 
few  old  friends  of  Faraday  who  still  survived.  Sir  William 
Crookes  lent  him  some  excellent  portraits,  and  also  gave  him 
others.  Thompson  was  not  quite  satisfied  with  any  portrait 
or  photograph  of  his  hero,  for  to  him  Faraday  was  a  hero ; 


168  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

so  after  long  comparison  and  study  of  all  available  likenesses, 
he  drew  one  for  himself,  etched  it  on  copper,  and  it  was 
used  as  the  frontispiece  of  the  book  which  appeared  in  the 
autumn  of  1898,  after  many  reproaches  from  editor  and 
publisher  for  its  long  delay.  On  October  17th,  1898,  he 
received  the  following  letter  from  Sir  Henry  Roscoe  : 


"MY   DEAR  SlLVANTJS, 

"  I  forgive  you  all  your  iniquities  !   for  I  have  just 
read  every  word  of  your  Faraday,  which  is  excellent. 

"  It  will  form  a  good  finish  to  the  series,  and  I  am  much 
obliged  to  you.     I  hope  that  the'  portrait  has  come  out  well." 


From  his  friend  Mr.  Conrad  Cooke : 

"Accept  my  warmest  thanks  for  your  most  delightful 
gift,  which  I  value  greatly  for  several  special  reasons.  First 
as  a  very  welcome  present,  another  proof  of  your  kindly 
feeling  towards  me,  next  as  one  more  example  of  your 
wonderful  industry  and  research,  coupled  with  both  literary 
and  artistic  talent,  for  the  portrait  by  you  (evidently 
painted  in  oils)  is  an  artistic  rendering  and  a  most  excellent 
portrait  of  the  dear  great  man  as  I  so  well  remember  him  ; 
and  lastly,  and  I  cannot  say  the  least,  your  book  is  a  treat- 
ment of  the  life  of  my  very  dear  old  friend,  whom  I  loved 
with  all  the  freshness  and  reverence  of  a  boy's  heart,  such  as 
has  not  been  done  before.  Tyndall's  book  should  have  had 
the  title  Faraday's  life  of  Tyndall,  and  neither  Bence  Jones 
nor  Dr.  Gladstone  have  come  more  than  on  the  border  of 
the  field  you  cover.  Oh,  how  you  would  have  appreciated 
the  beauty  of  mind,  the  loveliness  of  that  dear,  good  man, 
and  his  exquisite  manners  !  " 

Professor  David  Hughes  wrote  : 

"I  have  never  seen .  so  complete  and  interesting  an 
account  of  our  great  Master  that  all  electricians  worship. 
It  is  the  matter  of  the  greatest  surprise  to  me  that  you  are 
enabled  to  find  time  to  write  such  a  work,  knowing  as  I 
do  that  every  moment  of  your  tune  is  so  fully  occupied. 
I  am  full  of  admiration  of  your  talent  and  energy." 

Thompson  had  prefixed  to  his  volume  some  verses  on 
"  A  Portrait  of  Faraday,"  by  Mr.  Cosmo  Monkhouse,  whom 


BIOGRAPHY  OF  FARADAY  169 

he  knew,  and  whose  poems  he  much  admired.     Mr.  Monk- 
house  wrote  to  him  : 

"  I  was  pleased  at  the  honour  you  did  my  verses.  It  is 
no  little  pleasure  for  a  poet  to  find  that  what  he  has  done 
more  than  five  and  twenty  years  ago  still  '  lives  '  in  the 
estimation  of  men  like  you." 

Sir  Joseph  Swan,  who  had  known  Faraday,  wrote  : 

"  Faraday  is  to  me  the  ideal  of  a  great  and  good  man ; 
truly  he  was  in  his  simplicity  sublime.  It  will  always  be  one 
of  my  most  precious  memories  to  have  conversed  with  him 
in  his  home.  You  have  done  a  good  work  most  admirably 
in  giving  to  the  world  this  further  account  of  the  life  of 
Faraday." 

Lady  Wilson,  a  cousin  of  Thompson,  wrote  : 

"  I  shall  read  the  book  with  great  interest,  though  I  fear 
not  much  understanding  of  the  scientific  parts.  I  so  well 
recollect  Dr.  Faraday  and  being  nursed  by  him;  he  was 
always  so  devoted  to  children." 

Afterwards  Lady  Wilson  gave  to  Thompson  all  the  letters 
which  had  been  written  to  her  father,  Richard  Phillips,  by 
Faraday.  They  were  greatly  treasured  by  Thompson  among 
the  collection  of  autographs  which  had  come  to  him  from 
his  father  and  grandfather.  Thompson  received  also  many 
appreciatory  letters  from  his  foreign  friends,  M.  Mascart  of 
Paris  writing  :  "  Vous  avez  fait  un  acte  de  veritable  piete 
scientifique  en  publiant  ce  beau  livre  du  Faraday."  Dr. 
Koenig  also  sent  a  long  letter  of  appreciation. 

The  author  was  at  once  approached  by  a  German  pub- 
lisher for  permission  to  publish  a  translation.  Thompson 
gave  his  consent ;  the  author  of  the  translation,  Herr  Dr.  H. 
Danneel,  made  an  admirable  translation  by  the  help  of  his 
wife,  an  Englishwoman.  On  its  completion  they  wrote  to 
Thompson  saying  how  much  they  had  enjoyed  translating 
the  Life  of  this  most  noble  and  good  man,  and  that  through- 
out their  work  they  had  felt  that  the  writer  of  the  book 
they  were  translating  was  himself  a  man  of  a  noble  spirit. 


170  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

From  Mr.  Elihu  Thompson,  of  Massachusetts,  he  had  also 
appreciatory  criticism : 

"  Since  I  first  read  Faraday's  researches  I  have  been  a 
warm  admirer  of  his  genius.  You  have  succeeded  in  bring- 
ing the  man  himself  before  us,  and  have  given  us  a  better 
insight  into  his  character  and  life  than  we  have  hitherto 
been  able  to  obtain.  I  am  glad  that  you  have  testified  in 
such  a  way  to  Faraday's  worth,  for  we  all  know  that  you  are 
a  master  in  book-making.  Our  young  men  must  certainly 
receive  inspiration  from  the  work." 

Sir  William  Crookes  sent  to  Thompson  a  fine  old  engraved 
portrait  of  Faraday,  with  the  accompanying  note  : 

"  MY  DEAR  SILVANUS, 

"  Because  I  have  so  high  an  admiration  for  Faraday, 
I  gladly  give  the  enclosed  picture  to  you,  who  have  given 
to  the  world  the  best  literary  portrait  of  him  as  a  man  and 
a  philosopher." 

Some  years  later  Sir  William  again  presented  a  portrait 
of  Faraday,  a  very  fine  daguerreotype,  to  Thompson,  who 
thus  expressed  his  thanks  : 

"  DEAR  SIR  WILLIAM, 

"  Daylight  only  adds  to  the  beauty  of  the  Brande- 
Faraday  daguerreotype  which  you  so  kindly  and  un- 
expectedly presented  to  me  last  night.  I  fear  my  thanks 
seemed  feeble  :  but  you  fairly  took  my  breath  away. 
I  presume  the  date  was  somewhere  about  1848,  or  in  any 
case  anterior  to  1850. 

"  Yours  most  gratefully, 

"  SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON." 

In  1891  Thompson  was  invited  to  lecture  at  Berlin  in  the 
Urania  Theatre,  an  institution  similar  in  some  respects  to 
our  Royal  Institution.  His  subject  was,  "  Faraday  and 
the  English  School  of  Electricians,"  and  the  lecture  was 
given  in  German  before  a  large  and  enthusiastic  audience. 
He  had  to  go  to  Berlin  early  in  January,  and,  as  the 
lecture  was  illustrated  with  experiments,  had  to  spend  a 
few  days  there  in  preparation  for  it.  The  cold  was  intense. 
He  wrote  to  his  wife  : 


BIOGRAPHY  OF  FARADAY  171 

"  It  is  a  new  experience  to  find  one's  breath  forming  icicles 
that  hang  down  from  one's  moustache.  But  one  feels  the 
cold  far  less  than  one  feels  the  chilly  damp  cold  in  England. 
I  have  been  busy  all  day,  in  a  horribly  overheated  labora- 
tory, getting  my  experiments  ready.  There  is  very  little 
more  to  do,  so  I  am  well  up  to  time." 

On  January  9bh,  the  day  of  the  lecture,  he  wrote  : 

"  It  is  now  five  o'clock,  and  I  have  just  returned  from  an 
hour's  quick  walk  in  the  Thiergarten. 

' '  All  my  preparations  were  complete  and  every  experi- 
ment rehearsed  before  half -past  one.  My  lecture  is  at  eight 
o'clock.  All  the  experiments  go  well,  particularly  the 
kinematograph  diagrams  that  I  took  so  much  pains  to 
draw.  After  the  lecture  I  am  to  go  to  supper  with  Professor 
Neesen." 

"January  Wth. 

"  All  went  off  well  last  night.  The  papers  will  probably 
say  that  I  lectured  for  two  hours,  as  it  was  10  o'clock  when  I 
finished.  But  they  begin  at  ten  minutes  past  eight,  and 
they  give  a  pause  of  ten  minutes  in  the  middle,  so  that  the 
audience  can  go  out  into  the  foyer  to  drink  a  glass  of  beer  ! 
How  thoroughly  German  ! 

"  Happily  all  the  experiments  behaved  themselves  well : 
and  the  kinematographic  demonstrations  were  a  perfect 
success.  There  were  a  number  of  familiar  faces — the  Kapp 
family,  Von  Hefner,  Alteneck,  etc.,  etc.  My  voice  held 
out  well,  I  found  it  quite  easy  to  read,  and  not  hard  to  speak 
the  descriptive  part  about  the  experiments. 

"  Professor  Neesen  had  a  whole  party  to  meet  me.  The 
ladies  made  a  regular  schwdrmerei  around  me.  It  was 
quite  comic.  Of  men  there  were  Lummer,  Rubens,  Prings- 
heim,  Thiesen,  Biedermann,  Spiez,  and  Du  Bois — Ach 
der  schone  !  Professor  Neesen  proposed  a  toast  in  my 
honour  about  midnight.  I  replied  bilingually  and  briefly." 

"  January  \\th. 

" 1  had  a  very  pleasant  time  yesterday — visiting  the 
Reichsanstalt,  and  spending  the  time  mainly  with  Lummer 
and  Pringsheim.  I  walked  back  to  Berlin,  had  a  nap  and 
some  tea,  and  then  went  back  by  train  to  Charlottenburg 
to  dinner  with  the  Kohlrausch  family.  Professor  Kohl- 
rausch  desired  to  be  remembered  to  you  and  Sylvia.  We 


172  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

had  a  party  of  about  ten,  all  c  physikers  '  except  one,  his 
son.  I  think  about  half  the  time  they  were  discussing 
with  me  points  raised  by  n^  lecture.  I  have  seen  three 
reports  in  German  papers.  One  says  that  Professor 
Thompson,  who  is  only  of  medium  height,  does  not  look  at 
all  like  an  Englishman.  But  it  does  not  say  at  all  what  he 
is  like  !  I  gather  that' the  term  of  highest  praise  about  any 
descriptive  lecture  is  that  it  is  plastisch.  That  adjective  is 
at  least  once  awarded  me.  This  evening  I  dine  with  the 
Kapps. 

"  I  came  across  an  old  Finsbury  student  here.  He  is 
making  contracts  for  train-lighting  with  the  German  railway 
folk.  He  speaks  with  admiration  (mingled  with  some  envy) 
of  the  intelligent  business  capacity  of  the  people  here,  all 
alive  and  enterprising." 

To  leave  the  subject  of  Thompson's  life  in  London 
without  reference  to  his  connection  with  the  University  of 
London  would  be  to  misrepresent  his  civic  spirit,  for  in  his 
opinion  no  city  was  complete  without  its  university. 

It  is  impossible  to  give  an  adequate  idea  of  the  amount 
of  work  he  did,  during  some  twenty  years,  without  devoting 
a  whole  chapter  to  the  history  of  the  movements  and  the 
traditions,  personal  and  impersonal,  which,  working  at  cross 
purposes,  so  protracted  the  reform  of  the  University. 

When  Thompson  moved  to  London  early  in  1885  he 
found  the  leading  graduates  amongst  the  members  of 
Convocation  (the  "  lower  "  House  for  the  government  of  the 
University),  intent  upon  the  adoption  of  some  scheme 
comparable  to  one  which  had  just  been  projected  by  an 
association  for  the  Promotion  of  a  Teaching  University  for 
London.  He  at  once  associated  himself  with  the  movement, 
then  reaching  a  critical  stage,  and  before  he  had  been  six 
months  in  London  he  ventured  to  criticise  the  proposed 
scheme  of  reform  in  a  letter  to  The  Times  the  day  before  the 
decisive  vote  was  to  be  taken  in  Convocation.  He  was 
most  anxious  that  the  University  should  cease  to  be  chiefly 
and  almost  solely  an  examining  body,  content  to  accept 
candidates  with  no  college  record,  and  that  it  should  become 
an  association  of  teaching  bodies  ;  but  he  thought  the  scheme 
suggested  would  fail  in  that  purpose,  and  that  it  was  more- 


UNIVERSITY  REFORM  173 

over  retrogressive  in  augmenting  the  powers  of  the  Crown- 
nominated  Senate  at  the  expense  of  the  graduate  body, 
Convocation.  At  the  meeting  of  Convocation  Thompson 
spoke  against  the  policy,  which  was  eventually  rejected.  A 
day  or  two  later  he  received  the  following  in  a  letter  from 
one  of  the  members  of  the  disappointed  group  of  leaders  : 

"  The  issue  of  Tuesday's  discussion  did  not  altogether 
surprise  me,  but  what  did  surprise  and  puzzle  and  perhaps 
to  some  extent  annoy  several  of  us,  was  that  no  definite 
views  were  expressed  as  to  what  ought  to  be  done,  but  the 
position  and  tone  was  (speaking  generally)  mere  opposition 
to  doing  anything.  In  your  speech ,  however,  I  thought  we 
were  probably  meeting  a  friend  in  the  guise  of  an  antagonist, 
and  that,  although  you  objected  strongly  to  some  points  in 
the  scheme,  you  were  disposed  to  accept  some  of  its  main 
provisions.  My  object  in  writing  is  to  ask  whether  this 
opinion  of  mine  is  a  right  one,  or  whether  your  opposition 
to  the  movement  is  radical  and  unalterable.  In  the  former 
case  I  cannot  but  think  that  we  might  profitably  exchange 
ideas  on  the  subject,  and  you  would  perhaps  find  that  we  had 
more  in  common  in  our  views  than  you  expect." 

Another  group  of  reformers,  including  this  writer  and 
Thompson,  set  to  work  to  draft  a  different  scheme,  which, 
though  accepted  by  Convocation,  was  rejected  by  the  Senate, 
which  in  turn  projected  a  scheme  unacceptable  to  the  lower 
House.  These  differences  of  opinion  and  protracted  debates 
extended  over  some  years.  Meanwhile  the  University 
Colleges  and  the  Colleges  of  Surgeons  and  Physicians  were 
petitioning  the  Queen  for  power  to  grant  their  own  degrees 
as  separate  institutions,  leaving  the  examining  body  un- 
disturbed in  its  old  course.  Thompson  was  foremost  in 
opposition  to  such  schemes,  and  wrote  letters  to  The  Times, 
pointing  out  how  disastrous  they  would  be  to  the  prestige 
of  the  University.  Parliament  refused  to  grant  the  peti- 
tions, and,  to  escape  the  deadlock,  a  Royal  Commission  was 
appointed.  When  the  reports  of  this  body  were  presented 
in  1889  to  the  Senate,  Thompson  was  one  of  the  nine  mem- 
bers of  Convocation  elected  to  be  present  at  the  delibera- 
tions of  the  upper  House,  and  was  frequently  in  attendance. 
The  minority  report  of  the  Commission  favoured  the  estab- 


174  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

lishment  of  a  second,  a  teaching  University  of  London,  and 
for  many  years  a  strong  party  supported  that  course,  and 
long  and  hot  was  the  battle  that  ensued,  Thompson  leading 
in  the  arguments  in  favour  of  reform  of  the  existing  body. 
Looking  back  some  years  later,  he  drafted  the  following 
historical  statement  about  the  efforts  of  that  period  : 

"  It  will  be  remembered  that  after  the  failure  in  1892  of 
the  Senate  and  Convocation  to  agree  upon  a  scheme  of  recon- 
stitution  by  way  of  a  new  Charter,  application  was  made 
to  the  Privy  Council  by  persons  representing  chiefly 
University  College  and  King's  College,  for  a  separate 
Charter  for  a  Teaching  University  in  London,  the  distinctive 
feature  of  which  was  that  it  was  to  be  exclusively  metro- 
politan and  collegiate,  as  it  entirely  excluded  non-collegiate 
students.  To  this  proposed  University  so  restricted,  the 
name  first  assigned  was  that  of  the  '  Albert '  University  ; 
but,  while  the  petition  for  its  creation  was  still  under  the 
consideration  of  the  Privy  Council,  the  name  of  '  Gresham 
University  '  was  substituted,  with  the  concurrence  of  the 
Trustees  of  Gresham  College,  who  had  in  the  meantime 
agreed  to  assist  the  proposed  teaching  University. 

"  Owing  to  the  great  opposition  which  arose  not  only  on 
the  part  of  both  Senate  and  Convocation,  but  also  on  the 
part  of  many  influential  persons  interested  in  education  all 
over  the  country,  Parliament  refused  its  sanction  to  the 
granting  of  the  charter  to  the  proposed  Gresham  University, 
and  the  scheme  for  establishing  a  second  university  in 
London  fell  through. 

"  Had  a  separate  Teaching  University  been  thus  estab- 
lished, it  would  have  been  a  crushing  disaster  to  the  Uni- 
versity of  London,  since  it  would  soon  have  absorbed  all 
the  intellectual  life  and  the  material  resources  of  higher 
education  in  London.  Its  establishment  would  leave  the 
present  University  doomed  to  be  for  ever  a  mere  Govern- 
ment Board  of  Examinations,  like  the  Civil  Service  Com- 
mission, under  whose  control  it  would  probably  have 
drifted." 

At  one  time,  when  the  party  feeling  was  very  acute,  and 
personalities  were  not  kept  in  check  by  the  hotheads, 
Thompson  drafted  "  A  letter  to  a  Graduate  "  with  the 
following  personal  introduction : 


UNIVERSITY  REFORM  175 

"  You  tell  me  you  have  heard  it  said  that  my  efforts  to 
help  forward  this  great  educational  movement  are  dictated 
by  the  circumstances  that  the  Finsbury  Technical  College — 
of  which  I  have  the  honour  to  be  Principal — is  to  be  one 
of  the  constituent  colleges ;  and  that  I  want  to  get  easy 
degrees  for  my  students.  Pray  tell  any  of  your  friends, 
who  have  been  told  this,  what  the  facts  are.  No  one  has 
ever  proposed  that  the  Technical  College  should  become  a 
constituent  college.  If  any  one  were  to  propose  it,  I,  as  its 
educational  head,  should  oppose  the  suggestion  to  the 
uttermost.  The  Technical  College  is  a  technical,  not  an 
academic,  institution.  Its  students  do  not  work  for  any 
degrees  or  outside  examinations  ;  the  training  it  gives  is 
professional  rather  than  scholastic.  To  make  it  a  University 
College  would  be  entirely  to  change  the  character  of  its 
training,  and  divert  it  from  its  present  useful  though  less 
ambitious  work.  I  have  thrown  my  energies  into  the 
present  struggle,  because  I  want  to  see  my  own  University 
grow  great,  and  exercise  all  the  functions  and  powers  of  a 
great  University  ;  and  I  strive  the  more  earnestly,  because 
of  the  extraordinary  courses  which  have  been  taken  to 
cloud  the  issue,  and  to  raise  prejudices  and  miscbnceptions 
concerning  the  great  scheme  of  reconstruction  which  is 
now  so  near  being  realised." 

When  it  was  found  that  agreement  could  not  be  reached 
within  the  University  a  second  Royal  Commission  was 
appointed,  and  reported  after  many  months.  The  report 
was  at  once  seized  upon  by  the  various  parties,  but  the 
details  of  the  struggle  cannot  be  entered  upon  here.  It 
continued  for  two  years  before  both  those  who  supported 
and  those  who  opposed  the  scheme  of  the  Royal  Com- 
mission and  the  proposed  Bill  to  put  it  in  force  appointed 
separate  deputations  to  wait  upon  the  Prime  Minister, 
Lord  Rosebery.  Huxley  led  the  supporters,  and  of  those 
who  spoke  Thompson  held  out  most  hope  of  reconciliation. 
Rosebery's  Government  fell  before  he  accomplished  anything 
in  the  matter,  and  the  battle  had  to  be  fought  out  again 
with  the  Duke  of  Devonshire  when  Lord  Salisbury's  party 
took  office.  The  London  newspapers  at  that  time  paid  no 
little  attention  to  the  university  question,  The  Times  pub- 
lished several  long  articles,  and  leaders  devoted  to  the 


176  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

progress  of  affairs,  in  which  Thompson's  position  among 
the  reformers  is  clearly  recognised. 

Early  in  January  1896  Thompson  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  I  am  very  busy  writing  a  paper  for  the  Society  of  Arts 
on  the  London  University  question.  It  was  to  have  come 
off  in  February  :  but,  with  the  questions  coming  on  in 
Convocation,  I  got  Wood  to  put  it  earlier,  and  had  to  take 
Jan.  15  —  -  at  rather  short  notice.  Lord  Reay  will  take 
the  chair." 

Two  days  later : 

"  London  University  affairs  still  keep  me  very  busy  ;  the 
other  side  have  put  out  a  manifesto  in  The  Times  of  to-day. 
I  probably  shall  not  go  to  meeting  to-morrow  [Sunday] ; 
but  take  a  walk  with  Sylvia." 

Three  days  later : 

"  I  am  very  well  and  hearty.  Fagged  ?  Not  a  bit.  I 
am  in  splendid  fettle.  My  Society  of  Arts  paper  was 
finished  yesterday,  and  I  am  quite  at  ease.  The  University 
question  continues  quite  at  fever  heat,  with  letters  in  The 
Times  every  day.  There  has  been  a  run  on  the  Society  of 
Arts  for  tickets  for  my  paper  to-morrow  night.  I  think 
the  facts  will  open  the  eyes  of  a  few  people." 

The  facts  consisted  of  sheets  of  statistics  about  Universi- 
ties all  over  the  world,  with  pertinent  comments  upon  com- 
parative expenditure  and  revenues,  professoriates  and 
students,  libraries,  laboratories,  etc.  The  following  extract 
may  perhaps  be  considered  the  definition  of  his  title,  "The 
Making  of  a  Great  University." 

"  It  is,  therefore,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  scholar, 
whether  he  be  nominally  student  or  nominally  teacher,  that 
the  claims  of  a  university  to  be  considered  great  must  be 
decided.  Does  it  bring  him  into  an  atmosphere  of  mental 
activity  and  progress  ?  Does  it  afford  contact  with  living 
thought  ?  Does  it  give  the  stimulus  of  intellectual  struggle 
so  essential  for  improvement  of  knowledge  ?  Does  it 
furnish  the  means  and  appliances  of  learning  ?  Does  it 
provide  the  scholar  with  libraries,  and  give  him  access  to 


UNIVERSITY  REFORM  177 

the  mental  furniture  of  the  past  and  of  the  present  ?  Does 
it  offer  to  the  investigator  the  means  of  pursuing  research  ? 
If  it  does,  then  it  is  fulfilling  its  functions  as  a  university. 
The  test  of  greatness  is  to  be  found  in  the  degree  to  which 
it  thus  ministers  to  the  intellectual  progress  of  the  age." 

Two  years  later  it  appeared  that  the  battle  was  won. 
On  August  1st,  1898,  Sir  Thistleton  Dyer  wrote  : 

"  MY   DEAR   SlLVANUS   THOMPSON, 

"  Though  somewhat  late  in  the  day,  I  must  write 
a  few  words  of  congratulation  on  the  London  University 
Bill  passing  the  House  of  Commons. 

"  What  I  feel  is  that,  though  many  of  us  have  worked 
pretty  hard  at  times  in  this  business,  it  is  to  your  indefatig- 
able energy  and  enthusiasm  that  we  owe  having  educated 
opinion  in  Convocation. 

"  When  the  Bill  has  received  the  Royal  Assent,  don't 
you  think  we  might  celebrate  the  event  by  a  modest  little 
dinner  ?  " 

When  about  ten  years  later,  in  1907,  and  when  no  longer 
a  member  of  the  Senate  of  the  University,  Thompson  wrote 
to  Oliver  Lodge  his  recollections  of  the  struggles  of  those 
earlier  days : 

"  You  ask  about  the  Graduates'  Union.  It  is  a  body  which 
was  started  ten  years  ago,  or  so,  amongst  the  active  members 
of  Convocation,  to  promote  the  reconstruction,  at  the  time 
when  our  then  M.P.,  Lord  Avebury,  was  hesitating  whether 
to  support  or  oppose  reform,  and  before  the  Bill  had  been 
introduced.  It  was  followed  by  the  creation  of  an  opposi- 
tion body,  the  Graduates'  Association,  under  Collins,  Napier, 
etc.,  to  oppose  the  reconstruction.  This  latter  body  has 
always  shown  a  sort  of  vindictive  hatred  of  "  teachers,"  and 
has  opposed  the  election  of  any  teacher  on  the  Senate.  It 
got  the  ear  of  the  provincial  graduates,  and  of  the  proteges  of 
the  "  Correspondence  College."  And  it  was  this  body  which 

at  a  Senatorial  Election  put  in  a  nobody  named (M.D) 

in  opposition  to  Lord  Lister.  It  has  absolute  control  over 
the  graduates  in  the  Arts  Faculty,  owing  to  the  immense 
preponderence  of  illiterate  B.A.'s  who  have  come  in  through 
the  cram-shop  ;  and  it  further  has  much  weight  in  the 
Laws  Faculty,  which  is  very  small.  Its  shining  lights  are 
12 


178  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

[Lord]  Moulton  and  [Sir  Wm.]  Collins.  It  tries  to  run  all 
university  matters  by  caucus  ;  selects  the  names  of  the 
graduates  to  be  run  to  represent  Convocation  in  senatorial 
elections  ;  and  sends  a  very  third-rate  class  of  men  (except 
Moulton).  Not  only  does  it  thus  govern  (save  in  Science 
Faculty)  the  election  of  the  convocation  members  of  the 
Senate,  but  it  even  directs  these  members  how  to  vote  in 
the  Senate.  This  degradation  of  university  politics  and 
their  persistent  attitude  of  opposition  to  the  internal  side 
of  the  University,  by  the  graduates  of  the  '  Association,' 
has  become  unendurable.  The  graduates'  '  Union,'  on  the 
other  hand,  when  the  reconstruction  took  place,  kept  quiet. 
It  wished  things  to  have  a  fair  trial.  It  never  attempted 
to  run  candidates  to  represent  the  internal  side  ;  it  wished 
both  sides  to  have  a  fair  chance.  .  .  . 

"  I  detest  all  party  lines,  whether  in  public  politics  or 
university  matters.  I  refused  to  be  nominated  for  the 
Senate  eighteen  months  ago  by  either  party  as  a  party. 
I  should  do  so  again  if  I  were  asked  to  stand  on  such  a  basis. 
But  apparently  those  who  feel  the  pinch  of  the  obstruction 
more  than  I  do  agree  that  the  battle  must  be  organised 
more  on  party  lines.  .  That  is  the  meaning  of  the  present 
circular." 

In  October  1900  Thompson  was  elected  by  Convocation 
to  the  Senate  of  the  University.  He  had  been  invited  by 
the  secretary  of  the  science  committee  of  the  "  Union  "  to  be 
one  of  their  six  nominees,  the  others  being  Sir  Michael  Foster, 
Prof.  Carey  Foster,  Prof.  Vines,  Sir  Henry  Roscoe,  and  Mrs. 
Bryant.  He  was  told,  "We  can't  guarantee  election,  as 
Moulton's  crowd  also  has  a  list,  but  a  less  eligible  list  than 
our  5,  and  it  was  impossible  to  compromise  with  them." 

Outside  the  University  also  he  was  much  occupied. 
Earlier  that  same  year  he  became  a  member  of  the  Council 
of  the  London  Society  for  the  Extension  of  University 
Teaching,  of  which  Lord  Avebury  was  President.  The 
secretary,  Dr.  Kimmins,  wrote  to  him,  "  Your  presence 
on  the  Council  just  now  will  be  of  immense  value,  as  we  are 
coming  into  close  connection  with  the  new  Teaching 
University." 

The  following  year  Professor  Ramsay  wrote  asking  him 
to  join  in  a  movement  to  investigate  the  work  of  the  London 


UNIVERSITY  REFORM  179 

Polytechnics  and  stimulate  the  real  work,  which  might  be 
regarded  as  bearing  on  industries,  and  to  discourage  com- 
petition with  University  Colleges. 

The  Senate  was  busy  with  details  of  the  reorganisation 
of  the  University.  The  registrar  had  gone,  the  Principal 
Officer  had  not  yet  been  appointed  in  May  1901  when 
Thompson  wrote  the  following  letter  : 

"  DEAR  VICE-CHANCELLOR  : 

"  In  view  of  the  few  words  which  you  dropped  at 
our  chance  meeting  to-day,  I  think  I  ought  frankly  to  let 
you  know  that  if  it  were  to  be  understood  that  the  University 
is  in  fact  contemplating  the  step  of  appointing  a  Principal 
Officer,  and  if  that  post  is  to  be  distinctly  an  academic  one, 
I  should  inform  my  friends  that,  in  the  event  of  the  post  being 
offered  to  me,  I  should  take  it.  I  know  it  cannot  be  a  heavily 
salaried  post.  If  I  were  chosen  for  it,  I  should  resign,  not 
only  my  Professorship  here,  and  the  Principalship  of  the 
College,  but  also  sundry  examinerships,  and  the  whole  of 
my  professorial  consulting  work.  But  whoever  undertakes 
the  duty  must  have  no  other  outside  interests  or  calls  upon 
his  professional  time.  I  am  not  yet  fifty.  I  have  my 
limitations  and  my  failings — the  consciousness  of  them  is 
only  too  well  known  to  me.  But  you  know  them  too,  and 
have  at  any  rate  the  advantage  of  knowing  whether  those 
limitations  and  defects  put  me  out  of  the  running. 

I  shall  be  to-morrow  at  Committee  Room  15  (Derby  and 
Notts.  Electric  Power  Bill)  at  the  House  of  Commons.  If 
you  are  going  to  Committee  Room  8  I  should  like  to  meet 
you." 

The  appointment  was  a  government  one  ;  and  Thompson 
was  not  a  persona  grata  at  that  time,  possibly  on  account 
of  his  opinions  on  the  Boer  War. 

One  Monday  in  November  1900,  several  London  news- 
papers contained  a  paragraph  somewhat  similar  to  the 
follow  ing  extract  from  The  Times,  presumably  communi- 
cated by  a  visitor  at  the  ordinary  morning  meeting  in  the 
Meeting  House  in  St.  Martin's  Lane. 

"  Speaking  at  the  Westminster  Friends'  meeting  yester- 
day morning,  Professor  Silvanus  Thompson  said  this 
country  had  reached  a  period  in  its  national  life  when, 
reluctant  as  many  people  were  to  pass  judgment  on  others, 


180  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

yet,  if  they  would  live  up  to  the  Christianity  they  professed, 
it  was  incumbent  upon  them  to  do  so.  He  and  others  had 
waited  patiently  and  prayerfully  for  fifteen  months  for  the 
tide  of  passion  excited  by  the  war  in  South  Africa  to  recede. 
But,  after  a  lapse  of  fifteen  months,  the  country  was  face 
to  face  with  horrors  of  the  most  appalling  kind.  Take  one 
simple  fact.  A  country  which  was  flourishing  fifteen  months 
ago  was  now  in  a  state  of  devastation,  its  farms  in  ruins, 
its  women  and  children  turned  out  on  the  veldt,  enclosed  in 
camps,  and  surrounded  by  soldiers  with  the  bayonet  in 
their  hands.  Yet  from  the  official  Christianity  of  this 
country — he  would  say  nothing  of  the  unofficial  Christianity 
— no  voice  was  raised  in  protest.  He  did  not  know  of  any 
Bishop,  or.  of  any  archdeacon,  or  of  any  dean  in  the  Church 
of  England  who  had  said  one  word  against  the  inhumanities 
which  were  being  perpetrated.  It  was  no  answer  to  say 
that  the  Boers  declared  war.  Admit  that  in  form  they  did, 
yet  he  remembered  well  the  days  and  weeks  preceding  the 
outbreak  of  war  when  things  were  said  and  acts  performed 
showing  too  surely  that  this  country  was  drifting  into  war. 
And  for  the  first  time  he  felt  it  a  degradation  to  be  an  English- 
man ;  the  responsibility  for  it  all  must  go  to  somebody's 
account.  In  keeping  silence  he  and  others  might  be  regarded 
as  accomplices.  That  was  why,  loth  as  he  was  to  pass  a 
judgment  on  others,  he  felt  compelled  to  raise  his  voice 
against  this  example  of  '  man's  inhumanity  to  man.'  " 

A  good  many  of  Thompson's  friends  fully  expected  his 
appointment  to  the  position,  but,  though  his  name  was 
among  four  finally  considered,  the  choice  fell  upon  another, 
Professor  Arthur  Riicker,  M.P. 

Thompson  took  an  active  interest  in  the  Library  of  the 
University,  and  served  upon  its  committee.  He  was  out  of 
sympathy  with  the  growing  imperialism  of  the  day,  which 
reflected  itself  in  the  deliberations  of  the  Senate,  with  whose 
schemes  he  found  himself  frequently  in  disagreement,  and 
in  a  small  minority.  He  was  not  re-elected  when  his  term 
of  office  came  to  an  end.  The  same  spirit  prevailed  and 
reflected  itself  in  the  proposal  a  few  years  later  to  found  at 
South  Kensington,  side  by  side  with  the  University,  a 
Technical  College  of  Applied  Science  for  the  whole  Empire,  a 
"  New  Charlottenburg."  To  quote  The  Times  of  July  1905 ; 


UNIVERSITY  REFORM  181 

"  It  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  Imperial  aspect  of  the 
scheme  and  the  provision  in  the  metropolis  of  an  Imperial 
College  of  Applied  Science  in  which  will  be  found  unrivalled 
resources  for  study,  instruction,  and  research  must  be  of 
the  greatest  assistance  in  the  industrial  competition  with 
other  countries,  which  continuously  increases  in  severity 
and  demands  the  utilisation  of  all  possible  aids  to  success 
if  we  are  to  maintain  our  position." 

This  scheme  was  the  uppermost  interest  in  1907  when 
Thompson  was  again  nominated  to  represent  the  science 
graduates  in  Convocation  on  the  Senate  of  the  University. 
Sir  W.  T.  Thistleton  Dyer  wrote  : 

"  I  must  congratulate  you  on  your  election  into  the 
Athenaeum. 

"  I  duly  signed  and  dispatched  your  nomination  paper 
[London  University].  Judging  from  what  you  say  in  your 
address,  the  people  who  are  now  manipulating  the  University 
must  be  insane. 

"  I  entirely  agree  with  you,  and  hope  sincerely  that  you 
will  be  successful  and  able  to  put  on  the  drag. 

"  I  always  had  grave  doubts  about  the  new  constitution. 
Now  that  Universities  are  scattered  all  over  the  country  I 
very  much  doubt  whether  an  external  side  is  really  desirable 
at  all.  Anyhow,  it  should  not  be  allowed  '  to  call  the  tune.'  " 

Thompson  was  not  elected.  He  was  in  Paris  with  the 
party  representative  of  London  University  which  went 
over  on  a  visit  to  the  University  of  Paris  in  May  1907,  and 
wrote  to  his  friend  T.  Bailey  Saunders  a  letter  showing  how 
disappointed  he  was  in  his  University  on  that  occasion  ;  he 
felt,  on  perceiving  the  excellence  of  the  French  manner  of 
receiving  them,  how  sadly  London  lacked  academic  dis- 
tinction : 

"It  is  a  gorgeous  farce,  the  Vice-Recteur  is  devoting 
himself  to  us  nobly.  .  .  .  He  sent  a  note  to  Riicker  that 
they  wanted  the  distinguished  members  of  the  academic 
side  of  the  Faculties  of  the  University — to  meet  their  col- 
leagues in  Paris.  One  of  the  Frenchmen  asked  me  to-day 
how  it  was  that  the  University  had  sent  so  many  dis- 
tinguished men  of  science,  and  so  few  men  of  distinction  on 
the  literary  side  !  What  could  I  reply  ?  .  .  . 


182  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

"  You  can  easily  imagine  how  much  amusement  I  derive 
from  the  events  of  the  visit.  It  is  quite  impossible  to  make 
my  friends  understand  how  it  is  that  my  chair  is  not  a  chair 
in  the  University,  or  that  my  only  reason  for  being  of  the 
party  is  that  I  was  once  '  on  the  Senate  '  of  the  University. 

"  By  the  way,  you  saw  the  result  of  the  senatorial 
elections.  The  caucus  carried  every  seat  except  Sir  Thomas 
Barlow's.  Mrs.  Bryant  was  chucked  out ;  I  was  a  long 

way  below  her,  and  Dr.  A ,  F.R.S.,  bottom  of  the 

list.  .  .  .  There  was  an  absolute  campaign  of  lies.  It  is 
beyond  measure  pitiable  to  see  things  drifting." 

His  amusement  was  distinctly  bitter. 

Another  time  he  wrote  of  the  way  things  were  going  : 

"  Our  good  friend  Riicker  scouts  the  danger.  He  is 
developing  a  full-blown  bureaucracy,  with  an  army  of  clerks 
at  his  back.  There  are  troubles  ahead." 

When  the  university  policy  drifted  into  "  recognising  " 
teachers  in  Institutions  outside  its  borders,  Thompson  was 
in  1913  given  the  title  of  Professor  of  Applied  Physics  in  the 
University  of  London.  In  this  capacity  he  delivered  a 
course  of  three  "  University  Lectures  in  Physics  "  at  Uni- 
versity College  in  the  winter  of  1914,  on  "  Studies  in  Historic 
Magnetism." 

After  his  rejection  in  1907  he  had  very  little  indeed  to  do 
with  the  University,  having  lost  heart  with  its  state  of 
perpetual  "  internal  dissension,"  and  "  wheels  within 
wheels,"  as  described  to  him  by  Professor  Meldola,  an 
onlooker.  For  some  years  the  Kelvin  Biography  absorbed 
all  the  time  and  energy  to  spare  from  his  college  and  pro- 
fessional engagements  ;  but  his  interest  remained  alive.  A 
letter  came  to  him  in  April  1916  from  Dr.  William  Garnett, 
as  chairman  of  an  Education  Reform  Council  of  the  Teachers' 
Guild,  for  the  improvement  of  Education  after  the  war, 
inviting  him  to  undertake  the  chairmanship  of  the  sub- 
committee dealing  with  University  and  Higher  Technical 
work  in  relation  to  Industry  and  Commerce. 

To  those  who  knew  him  in  this  field  it  seems  that  to  the 
end  Thompson  counted  as  an  educational  reformer. 


CHAPTER   IX 

RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT   AND   RADIATION 

THE  presidential  address  of  Sir  William  Crookes  to  the 
Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  in  1891  entitled,  "Elec- 
tricity in  Transitu  from  Plenium  to  Vacuum,"  gave  great 
impetus  to  all  those  physicists  who  were  engaged  at  that 
time  in  research  work  on  the  problems  of  the  relationship  of 
Electricity  and  Light  both  in  this  country  and  abroad. 

For  more  than  twenty  years  this  great  chemist  had  been 
engaged  in  researches  on  radiant  matter.  He  had,  among 
various  other  inventions,  devised  a  glass  tube  of  special 
form,  that,  by  means  of  an  improved  air-pump,  it  could  be 
exhausted  to  such  a  high  degree  that,  when  an  electric 
current  was  passed  through  it,  it  glowed  with  a  pale  apple- 
green  light  which  possessed  several  properties  up  till  that 
time  unknown.  In  his  address  of  1891,  which  was  illus- 
trated by  most  novel  experiments,  Crookes  gave  freely  to 
the  world  the  results  of  many  years'  research.  He  showed 
how  this  mysterious  light,  emanating  from  the  Kathode  or 
negative  pole  in  his  tubes,  travelled  in  straight  lines,  could 
cast  shadows  on  the  tube  wall,  and  could  excite  brilliant 
fluorescence  and  phosphorescence  in  crystals  and  minerals 
on  which  it  fell. 

A  ray  was  capable  of  heating  an  object  when  directed 
upon  it.  When  placed  under  the  influence  of  a  magnet 
the  ray  could  be  deflected  from  its  path.  Crookes  described 
how  his  tubes  were  made,  and  how  they  could  be  exhausted, 
and  thus  provided  means  by  which  these  extraordinary 
phenomena  might  be  studied  by  other  younger  men.  By 
Crookes  and  the  English  physicists  the  phenomenon  was 
regarded  as  an  electrical  one,  by  the  German  physicists 

183 


184  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Wiedemann,  Hertz,  and  others  it  was  regarded  as  more 
akin  to  light. 

For  some  years  previously  to  this  Thompson  had  been 
at  work  upon  the  relation  between  electricity  and  light,  he 
had  in  1890  made  an  arrangement  to  write  a  book  on  the 
subject.  It  was  planned  out,  and  some  parts  of  chapters 
written,  but  was  never  finished. 

Ever  since  1876,  when  he  visited  Dr.  Geissler  at  Bonn 
(p.  48)  and  acquired  some  of  his  remarkable  vacuum-tubes, 
he  had  been  experimenting  upon,  and  studying  the  pheno- 
mena exhibited  by  them,  and  a  chapter  of  his  projected 
book  was  on  "  The  Phenomena  of  Vacuum-tubes."  The 
Crookes'  tubes  were  a  great  advance  on  any  former  vacuum- 
tube,  and  Thompson  now  began  to  turn  his  attention  to  the 
subject  of  phosphorescence,  and  fluorescence,  which  may  be 
grouped  under  the  name  of  luminescence,  that  is,  the  pro- 
perty of  shining  with  visible  light  without  being  heated. 

Other  workers  in  the  same  field  in  Germany  were  Wiede- 
mann, Hertz,  Lenard,  Rontgen  ;  in  France,  M.  Perrin, 
Henri  Becquerel ;  in  Italy,  Professors  Roiti,  Cardani,  and 
Villari. 

On  November  8th,  1895,  Professor  Rontgen  of  Wurzburg, 
while  experimenting  with  a  Crookes'  tube,  on  directing  the 
Kathode-ray  on  to  a  piece  of  cardboard  painted  with  a 
fluorescent  material,  discovered  that  a  ray  could  pass  through 
blackened  cardboard,  and  could  cast  a  shadow  on  the 
luminescent  cardboard.  At  once  he  recognised  that  this 
was  something  new,  and  he  called  the  light  the  X-ray.  He 
soon  found  that  the  rays  could  penetrate  wood,  cloth,  even 
flesh,  but  that  metals  or  bone  were  practically  opaque.  By 
placing  his  hand  in  front  of  the  tube  the  shadow  of  the 
bones  was  clearly  seen  on  the  phosphorescent  screen.  This 
last  was  the  most  important  discovery. 

Next,  Rontgen  found  that  they  could  produce  photo- 
graphic action. 

In  January  1896  this  discovery  was  reported  in  the 
Lancet.  The  account  of  it  appeared  a  few  days  later  in  the 
daily  press,  and  caused  a  tremendous  sensation. 

Thompson,  who  had  been  working  on  the  very  lines  on 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND   RADIATION    185 

which  Rontgen  had  made  his  discovery,  at  once  grasped 
the  facts  of  the  experiments,  and  on  the  same  evening  of  the 
day  on  which  the  account  of  the  discovery  was  given  to  the 
world,  he  succeeded  in  showing  at  his  laboratory  in  Finsbury 
the  action  of  the  X-rays  in  penetrating  substances  and 
casting  shadows  of  bones,  and  also  took  photographs. 
Writing  to  his  friend  Dr.  Kennelly  of  Harvard,  Thompson 
confesses  how  much  he  was  impressed  by  the  possibilities 
opened  out  for  research  by  this  new  discovery  : 

"  There  has  been  such  a  dearth  of  novelties  in  the  electrical 
way  as  I  never  remember  to  have  occurred  before.  All  the 
(inventive)  world  seems  to  have  gone  off  on  two  crazes — 
bicycles  and  the  X-rays.  With  the  latter  I  have  myself 
been  badly  bitten  ;  and  have  been  very  hard  at  work  upon 
these  most  perplexing  and  contradictory  phenomena." 

During  the  month  of  February  Thompson  and  his 
assistant,  Mr.  Miles  Walker,  were  busily  engaged  in  various 
experiments,  using  fluorescent  substances  in  contact  with 
the  photographic  film  to  hasten  chemical  action  when 
stimulated  by  the  X-rays.  The  materials  tried  were  finely 
powdered  fluor-spar,  sulphide  of  zinc,  fluoride  of  uranium, 
and  sundry  platino-cyanides.  While  at  work  Thompson 
came  upon  an  unexpected  effect.  He  found,  on  developing 
a  photographic  plate,  that  where  uranium  nitrate  or  uranium 
ammonium  fluoride  had  been  used,  a  distinct  action  had 
taken  place  through  a  sheet  of  aluminium  which  is  im- 
pervious to  X-rays.  He  immediately  wrote  to  Sir  George 
Stokes,  then  President  of  the  Royal  Society,  on  February 
26th  telling  him  of  this  discovery,  and  received  the 
following  reply : 

"  CAMBRIDGE, 

"  February  29th,  1896. 

"DEAR  PROFESSOR  THOMPSON, 

"  Your  discovery  is  extremely  interesting  ;  you  will, 
I  presume,  publish  it  without  delay,  especially  as  so  many 
are  now  working  at  the  X-rays.  For  my  own  part  I  am 
not  at  all  disposed  to  believe  that  the  Rontgen  Rays  are  due 
to  normal  vibrations,  the  hypothesis  to  which  Rontgen 
himself  leans.  I  think  it  far  more  probable  that  they  are 
transversal  vibrations  of  excessive  frequency.  That  being 


186  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

the  case,  I  think  what  you  have  discovered  belongs  to  the 
same  class  of  phenomena  as  Tyndall's  calorescence.  .  .  . 
I  am  in  correspondence  with  Lord  Kelvin  about  the  Ront- 
gen  Rays,  and  I  should  like  to  refer  to  your  discovery,  but 
do  not  mean  to  do  so  till  you  have  published  your  result. 
I  should  be  glad,  therefore,  of  a  notice  of  the  publication. 
Perhaps  you  may  be  writing  to  him  yourself.  Of  course 
if  you  have  done  so  I  am  free  to  say  anything  to  him.  He 
is  very  enthusiastic,  and  might  let  something  slip  out 
without  thinking  about  it.  Yours  very  truly, 

"G.  G.  STOKES." 

On  March  2nd  Thompson  received  another  letter  from 
Sir  George  Stokes  : 

4 '  I  fear  you  have  already  been  anticipated.  See  Becquerel, 
Comptes  Eendus  for  February  24th,  p.  420,  and  some  papers 
in  two  or  three  meetings  preceding  that." 

This  showed  that,  almost  simultaneously,  Thompson 
working  in  London,  and  M.  Henri  Becquerel  in  France,  both 
discovered  a  new  kind  of  ray.  They  continued  their 
experiments,  and  in  May  Thompson  sent  in  an  account  of 
his  results,  and  of  his  new  discovery,  which  he  named 
"  Hyperphosphorescence."  His  paper  was  not  read  until 
June  6th,  and  in  the  meantime  M.  Becquerel  published  an 
account  of  his  discovery  without  giving  the  new  rays  any 
name  ;  his  account  appeared  before  Thompson's,  and  the 
new  rays  were  named  the  "  Becquerel  Rays." 

Not  discouraged  by  this,  Thompson  went  on  working  at 
researches  on  luminescence  and  on  means  of  producing 
better  X-rays  effects  from  the  Crookes'  tubes.  By  using  a 
concave  piece  of  metal  inside  the  tube  as  a  radiating  surface 
for  the  Kathode  rays,  he  was  able  to  focus  them  better.  He 
got  a  firm  in  Paris  to  make  some  similar  tubes,  and  this 
firm  wrote  requesting  that  they  might  obtain  the  right  to 
sell  them,  saying,  "  Ces  tubes  donnent  une  puissance  bien 
plus  grande  que  ceux  actuels  de  Rontgen.  Nous  les 
appelerons  tubes  focus  du  Professor  S.  Thompson." 

Later  in  April  he  received  the  following  letter  from  M. 
Pellat,  then  secretary  of  the  Societe  Fran9aise  de  Physique, 
concerning  these  focus  tubes  : 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND   RADIATION    187 

"Us  ont  eu  beaucoup  de  succes  a  la  Societe  de  Physique, 
et  ont  ete  beaucoup  admires  de  toutes  les  personnes  a  qui 
je  les  ai  montres.  J'ai  pu  faire  devant  la  Societe  une 
epreuve  tres  bien  venue  avec  un  tube  focus  construit  sur  vos 
indications  par  M.  Chaband." 

As  was  his  frequent  habit  during  the  Easter  vacation, 
Thompson  went  in  1891  to  Paris  to  attend  the  Annual 
Meeting  of  the  Societe  Fran9aise  de  Physique,  on  the 
Council  of  which  he  was  an  elected  member.  On  this 
occasion  he  had  agreed  to  show  experiments  and  apparatus 
and  give  an  account  of  his  recent  researches. 

He  wrote  to  his  wife  from  Paris  on  April  3rd  : 

"  The  passage  across  the  Channel  was  most  delightful, 
as  we  had  bright  sunshine  nearly  all  the  way.  Yet  the 
land  journey  was  dull  on  both  sides.  I  had  no  end  of  bother 
with  the  douane-at  Boulogne  about  my  box  of  apparatus, 
as  it  was  not  registered  through  to  Paris  ;  indeed,  not  being 
a  trunk,  but  a  wooden  box  with  lid  screwed  down,  the 
railway  folk  would  not  register  it  at  all." 

"  April  4th. 

"  I  have  had  a  busy  day.  First  I  went  to  the  Societe  de 
Phj^sique  to  see  what  were  the  arrangements ;  then  to  the 
Gare  du  Nord  to  fetch  my  box.  Then  back  to  the  Societe 
de  Physique.  After  lunch  a  call  on  M.  Cornu,  who  was  out, 
then  on  M.  Potier,  who  was  President  of  the  Societe  at  the 
time  of  the  Exhibition  (1889)  and  who  enquired  after  you. 
For  the  past  three  years  he  has  been  paralysed  on  his  left 
side.  He  evidently  appreciated  a  visit,  and  is  immensely 
interested  in  the  Rontgen  Rays.  Then  I  called  on  M. 
Michelet,  the  publisher  ;  and,  after  watching  a  fire  in  the 
Rue  de  Rivoli,  came  home  to  dine.  To-morrow  I  am  going 
to  spend  an  hour  or  so  with  Dr.  Koenig,  and  perhaps  shall 
get  as  far  as  the  Bois  in  the  afternoon." 

''April  5th. 

"After  morning  breakfast  I  betook  myself  to  M.  Koenig, 
with  whom  I  spent  about  an  hour  and  a  half.  He  looks  aged 
and  far  from  well. 

"  Then  I  walked,  via  Notre-Dame  and  the  statue  of  Henri 
Quatre,  and  the  Quai  Voltaire  almost  as  far  as  the  Eiffel 
Tower,  to  call  on  M.  Mascart,  whom  I  found  at  home.  I 
did  not  stop  long  ;  but  my  principal  object  was  accom- 


188  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

plished  in  leaving  with  him  a  manuscript  which  I  wrote  last 
night  to  be  read  at  the  Academie  des  Sciences  on  Tuesday. 
,  "  I  discovered  on  Saturday  that  the  French  folk  are 
desperately  behind-hand  in  the  matter  of  the  Rontgen  Rays  ; 
so  I  set  to  work  to  write  a  little  information.  Unfortunately, 
I  have  not  brought  with  me  any  of  my  results,  nor  any  of 
the  apparatus  :  and,  owing  to  the  holidays,  it  is  impossible 
to  get  any  over,  as  the  College  is  locked  up,  and  the  Sergeant 
away  on  his  holiday.  The  day  has  been  fine,  with  an 
Italian  sky,  and  a  fresh  breeze  from  the  north,  so  I  deter- 
mined to  spend  the  afternoon  in  a  walk  about  the  Buttes  de 
Montmartre.  The  new  enormous  Basilica  of  the  Sacred 
Heart,  now  nearly  completed,  stands  on  the  highest  point. 
From  its  terrace  there  is  a  magnificent  panorama  of  the 
city — quite  unequalled,  I  should  suppose. 

"  I  heard  service  for  about  ten  minutes  in  an  immense 
and  perspiring  crowd,  and  then  made  tracks  for  my  hotel." 

"  April  6th. 

"  This  morning  I  spent  unpacking  my  apparatus  at  the 
Societe  de  Physique;  after  lunch  returned  here  to  write. 
At  four  o'clock  in  came  M.  Tommasi  to  talk  electrical 
things  with  me,  and  he  stayed  till  nearly  six,  and  dinner  is 
just  over. 

"  A  party  of  noisy  Americans  has  turned  up  here,  who 
make  the  reading-room  unendurable.  They  express  their 
astonishment  that  the  Parisians  don't  know  anything  about 
Trilby.  Apparently  they  have  derived  their  knowledge  of 
Paris  exclusively  from  that  source  ;  for  them  Trilby  is  Paris, 
and  Paris,  Trilby  \  " 

"  April  1th. 

11  Of  to-day  there  is  little  to  chronicle,  because  there  has 
been  so  much  to  do  !  My  paper  on  the  X-rays  was  read  by 
M.  Mascart  at  the  Academie  this  afternoon.  Ramsay  turned 
up  there.  He  is  on  his  way  back  from  the  Pyrenees,  where 
he  has  been  collecting  samples  of  gases  from  well-waters  in 
the  search  for  helium.  He  came  also  to  the  Societe  de 
Physique  to-night.  My  show  of  things  went  off  well.  I 
met  Mascart,  Joubert,  Desroziers,  Koenig,  Palas,  and 
Leduc."  . 

"  April  9th. 

"  Yesterday  was  entirely  occupied  with  affairs  of  the 
Physical  Society.  First  a  lecture  by  M.  Perrin  on  X-rays- 
nothing  new  at  all,  but  interesting.  Then  in  the  -  afternoon 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND   RADIATION     189 

the  exhibition  of  the  apparatus  till  five  o'clock.  At  seven 
o'clock  a  dinner — a  little  dinner  at  a  restaurant  by  Ramsay 
to  eight  of  his  French  chemical  colleagues,  from  which,  at 
nine  o'clock,,  I  hurried  away  to  repeat  my  experiments  at 
the  Societe  de  Physique.  Then  back  to  this  snug  hotel, 
very  tired. 

"  This  morning  I  was  off  early  to  pack  up  :  after  which  I 
made  two  or  three  calls,  and  then  caught  the  12.50  train  to 
Noiseul  with  a  party  of  about  1 30  members  of  the  Societe  de 
Physique,  where  we  visited  the  chocolate  works  of  Menier, 
and  his  model  farm,  in  both  of  which  electricity  is  used  for 
motive  power.  They  have  a  vast  establishment,  most 
beautifully  kept.  The  comfort  of  the  work-people  is  some- 
thing quite  extraordinary.  By  five-thirty  we  were  back  in 
Paris,  and  at  six-thirty  came  the  Council  dinner  of  the 
Societe  de  Physique,  to  which  I  was  invited,  and  found 
myself  placed  on  the  right  hand  of  the  President.  Happily 
there  were  no  speeches.  I  met  a  lot  of  men  whose  names 
and  work  were  well  known  to  me,  but  whom  I  had  not 
known  personally  before. 

"  To-morrow  I  am  going  again  to  Koenig  ;  then  to  some 
other  ateliers  about  apparatus  ;  and  in  the  afternoon  I 
shall  have  M.  Boistel  with  me.  On  Saturday  I  have  to 
visit  the  Sorbonne  and  afterwards  the  national  laboratory 
of  research  at  Sevres,  after  which  I  dine  with  M.  Mascart." 

In  May  Thompson  gave  a  Friday  evening  discourse  at 
the  Royal  Institution  on  "  Electric  Shadows  and  Lumine- 
scence." It  began  with  an  account  of  Rontgen's  discovery, 
and  its  implications  : 

"  The  discovery  was  singular,"  he  said,  "  it  revealed  the 
existence  of  a  remarkable  and  hitherto  unexpected  species 
of  radiation.  It  added  another  to  the  many  puzzling 
phenomena  attendant  upon  the  discharge  of  electricity  in 
vacuo.  It  proved  that  something,  which  in  the  ordinary 
sense  in  which  those  terms  are  used,  is  neither  light  nor 
electiicity,  was  generated  in  the  Crookes'  tube,  and  passed 
from  it  through  substances  opaque  alike  to  both. 

"  But  that  which  took  the  imagination  of  the  multitude  by 
storm,  and  aroused  an  interest  the  intensity  of  which  has 
not  been  known  to  be  aroused  by  any  other  scientific  dis- 
covery in  our  times,  was  not  these  facts,  but  the  entirely 
subsidiary  and  comparatively  unimportant  point  that  to 


190  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

these  mysterious  radiations  flesh  is  more  transparent  than 
bone." 

He  showed  the  experiment  of  photographing  the  hand 
of  his  little  daughter  by  exposure  to  the  Rontgen  Rays, 
remarking  that,  "  there  is  nothing  new  about  this  part  of 
the  subject :  it  is  the  old  photography  ;  there  is  no  '  new 
photography.'  "  (Referring  to  the  popular  description  of 
photographs  taken  by  Rontgen  Rays  as  "  the  new  photo- 
graphy.") 

He  also  photographed  some  metal  substances  shut  up  in 
a  box,  and  various  precious  stones,  some  real,  and  some 
artificial.  At  the  end  of  the  lecture  the  photographs  were 
thrown  on  the  screen,  revealing  his  own  discovery  that  real 
gems  were  more  transparent  than  paste  or  glass. 

He  concluded  by  saying  : 

' '  Whatever  these  remarkable  rays  are,  whether  they  are 
vortices  in  the  ether,  or  longitudinal  vibrations,  or  radiant 
matter  which  has  penetrated  the  tube,  or,  lastly,  whether 
they  consist  simply  of  ultra-violet  light,  their  discovery 
affords  us  one  more  illustration  of  the  fact  that  there  is  no 
finality  in  science.  The  universe  around  us  is  not  only 
not  empty,  is  not  only  not  dark,  but  is,  on  the  contrary, 
absolutely  full  and  palpitating  with  light  :  though  there 
be  light  which  our  eyes  may  never  see,  and  sounds  which 
our  ears  may  never  hear. 

"  But  science  has  not  yet  pronounced  its  last  word  on 
the  hearing  of  that  which  is  inaudible  and  the  seeing  that 
which  is  invisible." 

On  May  26th  Thompson  gave,  by  request,  a  lecture  to 
the  Oxford  University  Junior  Scientific  Club,  and  chose  as 
his  title  "  Luminescence."  He  again  gave  a  survey  of  the 
different  phenomena  of  luminescence,  dividing  them  into 
nine  different  groups,  of  which  he  gave  descriptions,  and 
illustrated  them  by  the  many  wonderfully  brilliant  displays 
of  colour  to  which  the  subject  lends  itself.  He  dwelt  on 
the  luminescence  of  various  gems  of  which  he  had  made 
special  study  from  the  early  days  when  he  paid  so  much 
attention  to  the  curious  properties  of  the  tourmaline.  He 
gave  an  account  of  the  Rontgen  Rays,  and  also  of  the  new 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND   RADIATION     191 

rays  discovered  by  himself  and  M.  Henri  Becquerel.     He 

closed  his  lecture  by  saying  : 

"  But  the  one  thing  that  gives  to  this  whole  subject  of 
luminescence  a  singular  interest,  from  the  practical  point  of 
view,  is  that  by  its  means  we  appear  to  be  within  measurable 
distance  of  the  invention  of  a  new  kind  of  artificial  lighting. 
Even  in  the  incandescent  gas  lighting — which  is  partially  a 
luminescent  phenomenon — the  heat  waste  is  very  great. 
But  the  true  luminescent  light  is  a  cold  light  ;  the  actual 
rays  that  will  give  visible  illumination  being  manufactured 
without  any  simultaneous  manufacture  of  heat.  So  that 
the  luminescent  lamp  of  the  future,  whatever  its  shape  or 
tint,  will  be  one  giving  a  pure  and  a  cold  light,  that  will 
neither  poison  the  air  with  the  fumes  of  combustion  nor 
over-heat  it  with  wasted  calorific  vibrations." 

A  few  days  later  Thompson  received  another  letter  from 
Sir  George  Stokes  dated  May  28th.  He  too  was  experi- 
menting on  luminescence,  and  wrote,  "  It  may  be  worth 
while  to  mention  to  you  a  little  experiment,  though  con- 
taining nothing  new  in  principle."  He  then  went  on  to 
describe  this  new  experiment,  and  also  an  old  one  which 
he  had  made  forty-three  years  before,  on  the  same  line  of 
research.  In  a  postscript  to  the  letter  he  wrote  : 

"  I  may  as  well  mention,  in  case  you  should  not  have 
seen  it,  that  in  the  last  number  of  the  Comptes  Rendus  is  a 
paper  by  Becquerel  in  which  he  mentioned  that  metallic 
uranium  shows  the  remarkable  phenomenon,  which  you  and 
he  discovered  independently,  about  four  times  as  strongly 
as  the  salts  of  uranium  he  had  previously  used." 

Thompson  received  also  in  May  the  following  letter  from 
Sir  William  Crookes  : 

"  MY   DEAR   SlLVANUS, 

"  Would  you  be  willing  to  deliver  the  course  of  six 
Christmas  Lectures  next  winter  at  the  Royal  Institution  ? 
We  want  a  course  on  some  branch  of  Physics,  and  you,  as 
an  old  Christmas  Lecturer  [referring  to  his  Bristol  days],  will 
understand  the  kind  of  thing  required  by  the  audience,  and, 
having  this  good  notice,  will  be  able  to  devise  a  sufficient 


192  LIFE    OP   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

number  of  experiments  to  illustrate  the  course  in  a  manner 
worthy  of  the  best  traditions  of  the  Institution  and  of 
the  distinguished  lecturer.  We  will  leave  the  selection  of 
the  special  subject  to  yourself." 

Thompson  accepted  the  invitation  and  chose  the  subject 
of  optics,  giving,  as  his  title,  "  Light  Visible  and  Invisible." 

The  British  Association  was  held  that  year  at  Liverpool, 
and  Thompson  and  his  wife  were  the  guests  of  his  cousin, 
Mr.  Isaac  Cooke  Thompson,  who  was  one  of  the  local  secre- 
taries for  the  Association.  The  gathering  was  a  brilliant 
success.  Professor  J.  J.  Thomson  was  President  of  the 
Mathematical  and  Physical  Section,  and  founded  his  address 
on  the  discovery  of  Rontgen. 

Thompson  read  two  papers,1  which  were  both  fairly  long, 
giving  accounts  of  all  the  results  of  his  experiments  of  that 
year,  on  Kathode  Rays  and  Hyper-phosphorescent  bodies. 
Sir  George  Stokes,  Dr.  Dawson  Turner,  and  Professor 
Bjerknes  of  Stockholm  took  part  in  the  important  dis- 
cussions after  the  papers. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  year  Thompson  had  before  him 
a  difficult  task  in  endeavouring  to  make  the  problems  of 
optics  interesting  to  a  juvenile  audience. 

The  Christmas  lectures  at  the  Royal  Institution  were  very 
well  attended,  not  only  by  juveniles,  including  the  lecturer's 
four  little  girls,  but  by  their  parents,  and  even  such  dis- 
tinguished grandparents  as  Sir  Alfred  Garrod  and  Sir 
William  Crookes.  Many  members  of  the  Institution  helped 
to  swell  the  number  of  attenders,  who  so  filled  the  lecture 
theatre  and  gallery  that  not  a  seat  was  left.  One  boy  was 
heard  to  say  that  he  would  rather  go  to  Professor  Thompson's 
lecture  than  accept  an  invitation  to  a  pantomime  which 
was  offered  to  him. 

The  lectures  received  extraordinarily  full  reports  in  the 
daily  press.  The  Daily  News  had  a  leading  article  on  them 
after  the  conclusion  of  the  course,  in  which  it  said  : 

"  The  Christmas  lectures  for  the  young  at  the  Royal 
Institution  have  never  been  more  fascinating  than  they  are 

1  As  reported  in  Engineering,  October  16th,  1896. 


RESEARCHES  ON  LIGHT  AND  RADIATION     193 

this  season.  Of  the  discourse  of  Professor  Silvanus  Thomp- 
son on  Saturday  we  have  given  a  fuller  report  than 
usual,  but  no  reader  is  likely  to  think  it  too  long,  and  the 
children  who  had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  marvellous 
experiments  described  in  it  must  have  found  the  lecture 
itself  to  be  all  too  short.  Professor  Thompson  showed  a 
series  of  beautiful  vacuum-tubes  of  various  forms,  and 
remarked  that  no  discovery  was  ever  made  without  some- 
thing going  before  it,  and  showed  a  vacuum-tube  containing 
some  mercury  which  glowed  when  the  tube  was  shaken,  and 
he  asserted  that  Europe  was  as  much  excited  by  that  small 
instrument  nearly  200  years  ago  as  by  the  recent  discovery 
of  Roentgen." 

The  Standard  also  gave  long  accounts,  and  said : 

"  Professor  Silvanus  Thompson  on  Saturday  afternoon 
concluded  a  remarkably  able  '  course  '  at  the  Royal  Institu- 
tion, which  was  of  exceptional  interest.  The  universe,  he 
said  in  his  peroration,  was,  no  doubt,  full  of  vibrations  of 
which  we  have  not  as  yet  the  remotest  knowledge  or  the 
slightest  indication.  This,  however,  is  true  not  of  light  only, 
but  also  of  many  other  things.  No  one  had  known  that  the 
qualities  he  had  spoken  of  belonged  to  the  Crookes'  tube, 
and  yet  they  had  been  there  for  twenty  years.  '  As  year 
after  year  passed  by,  one  discovery  would  lead  to  another, 
and  thus  science  would  creep  on  from  point  to  point.  So 
we  should  gain  in  knowledge,  ignorance  being  rolled  a  little 
further  and  further  back,  and  we  should  have  light  where 
we  now  had  darkness.'  " 

These  lectures  were  published  as  a  volume  in  1897  by 
Messrs.  Macmillan  &  Co.,  and  each  lecture  was  enlarged 
and  elaborated  by  the  addition  of  notes  by  the  author.  Mr. 
Elihu  Thomson  wrote  in  November  from  Massachusetts : 

"It  is  a  book  which  I  think  will  be  very  useful  to  the 
many  enquiring  youths  who  cannot  be  present  at  your 
lectures.  I  wish  my  boys  could  hear  them.  I  like  the  book 
very  much,  and  think  that  something  of  the  kind  has  been 
needed.  I  should  like  to  join  the  Roentgen  Society." 

Reviewing  the  book,  The  Oxford  Magazine  said  : 

"  By  a  happy  combination  of  lucidity  and  apt  illustra- 
tion Professor  Thompson   succeeds  in   making  even   the 
13 


194  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

more  abstruse  phenomena  of  Optics  intelligible  to  the  lay 
mind." 

The  German  translator  of  the  book  was  Professor  Otto 
Lummer,  a  great  authority  on  Optics,  who  used  the  title 
Sichtbares  und  Unsichibares  Licht.  The  book  was  also 
translated  into  French  later  on,  when  it  was  in  its  second 
edition,  to  which  two  more  chapters  had  been  added. 

The  Saturday  Review  wrote  as  follows  : 

"It  is  delightfully  refreshing  to  get  away  from  the 
unending  stream  of  text-books  with  their  abrupt  transitions 
from  subject  to  subject,  and  their  dull  footnotes  on  stale 
researches,  of  which  no  one  in  his  senses  takes  the  least 
notice.  And  get  away  from  it  we  certainly  do  in  these 
lectures  of  Professor  Thompson,  which  more  than  accom- 
plish the  work  of  an  elementary  text-book,  and  are  full  of 
ideas  excellent  alike  for  teacher  and  pupil.  The  majority 
of  lectures  still  follow  in  the  old  rut  of  dry  definition  and 
drier  explanation,  with  the  inevitable  result  that  the  pupil 
gets  no  real  grasp  of  the  subject,  though  he  may  sometimes, 
with  their  aid,  blossom  to  the  dignity  of  a  degree.  Refrac- 
tion, achromatism,  polarisation,  and  the  like,  are  familiar 
words  to  many  students,  but  they  have  the  haziest  of  con- 
ceptions attached  to  them.  To  describe  these  things  in  the 
simplest  language,  to  introduce  all  possible  analogies,  to 
attach  to  them  the  most  definite  of  ideas — this  should  be  the 
aim  of  all  teachers,  and  has  of  late  been  the  method  of  the 
best. 

Professor  Thompson  is  capital  from  this  point  of  view. 
Step  by  step  experiment  and  theory  go  hand  in  hand  ;  if 
an  experiment  is  to  be  explained,  then  we  call  on  the  un- 
dulatory  theory  ;  if  the  theory  is  to  be  assisted  out  of  a 
tight  place,  then  experiment  comes  to  its  aid.  These  lectures 
may  lack  the  dignity  of  language,  the  wide  view  looking 
far  beyond  the  narrow  limits  of  the  subject  possessed  by 
Tyndall's  Lectures  on  Light  ;  but  Tyndall  lost  sight  of 
those  small  intermediate  steps,  so  all-important  in  making 
clear  the  principles  of  science,  and  only  those  who  have 
been  '  through  the  mill '  know  how  to  fill  up  the  gaps  appro- 
priately. The  explanation  of  refraction  by  the  wave  theory, 
for  instance,  hinted  at  rather  than  developed  by  Tyndall, 
is  so  expanded  by  Professor  Thompson,  that,  armed  with 
a  pair  of  compasses,  a  ruler,  and  the  most  elementary  know- 


f 

RESEARCHES  ON  LIGHT  AND  RADIATION     195 

ledge  of  theory,  the  student  may  work  out  experiments  in 
a  mechanical  way." 

The  second  edition  of  Light  Visible  and  Invisible  came 
out  in  1910.  The  two  chapters  which  were  added  to  it 
at  that  time  were  one  on  Radium,  with  portraits  of  Madame 
and  Monsieur  Curie,  its  discoverers,  and  the  other,  a  lecture 
on  "  The  Manufacture  of  Light  "  given  by  Thompson  to 
the  working  men  of  York  at  the  time  of  the  meeting  of  the 
British  Association  there  in  1906.  There  was  a  great 
demand  for  the  book  in  its  enlarged  form,  and  it  had  soon 
to  be  reprinted. 

The  subsidiary  effects  of  Rontgen  Rays,  by  means  of 
which  photographs  could  be  obtained,  were  at  first  rather 
scorned  by  the  physicists,  but  to  surgeons  and  medical  men 
they  seemed  to  be  much  the  most  important  part  of  the  dis- 
covery, and  they  were  eager  to  learn  more  about  them. 

In  March  1896  the  secretary  of  the  Clinical  Society  of 
London  wrote  to  Thompson  asking  if  he  could  give  to  their 
Society  a  demonstration  and  explanation  of  the  Rontgen 
Rays.  This  he  was  very  willing  to  do,  and  showed  all  that 
could  then  be  done  by  the  rays  at  a  meeting  of  the  Society. 
The  members,  who  included  some  of  the  most  eminent 
surgeons  of  the  day,  were  greatly  interested  and  impressed. 

Thompson  afterwards  received  many  letters  from  surgeons 
and  doctors,  and  took  a  great  interest  in  the  continued 
efforts  made  by  many  of  them  to  develop  this  new  instru- 
ment for  acquiring  surgical  knowledge  which  had  been  put 
into  their  hands. 

In  May  1897,  after  more  than  a  year  had  elapsed  since  the 
first  publication  of  Rontgen's  discovery,  a  number  of  the 
medical  men  of  London  decided  to  form  a  Rontgen  Society 
in  order  that  knowledge  of  advances  in  theory  and  practice 
might  be  diffused.  A  small  preliminary  council  was  formed, 
who  approached  Thompson  with  the  request  that  he  would 
be  their  first  President.  He  was  then  still  busy  with  research 
connected  with  the  subject,  and  had  just  sent  in  to  the 
Royal  Society  a  paper  on  "  Cathode  Rays  and  some  Ana- 
logous Rays,"  which  was  read  in  June  1897  and  after- 


196  LIFE    OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

wards  published  in  full  in  The  Philosophical  Transactions 
of  the  Royal  Society  (vol.  190). 

The  proposed  new  Society  met  with  Thompson's  full 
approval ;  he  accepted  the  office  of  President,  and  helped 
with  great  zeal  in  the  onerous  task  of  drawing  up  the 
constitution.  A  large  number  of  physicists  and  others 
interested  in  the  purely  scientific  side  of  the  problems 
joined  in  forming  the  Society,  though  even  at  the  beginning 
the  medical  profession  contributed  most  to  swell  its  ranks. 
Among  the  Vice-Presidents  were  Professor  Ferrier,  F.R.S., 
J.  Hall  Gladstone,  F.R.S.,  G.  Fletcher  Moulton,  Q.C., 
F.R.S.  The  first  Honorary  Members  were  Professor 
Rontgen,  who  was  much  interested  in  the  foundation  of 
the  Society,  and  Sir  William  Crookes.  The  first  general 
meeting  of  the  Society  was  held  in  June,  and  the  rules  were 
adopted.  The  election  of  officers  also  took  place. 

As  Thompson  went  that  autumn  to  attend  the  British 
Association  meeting  at  Toronto,  and  was  absent  from 
England  many  weeks,  the  Rontgen  Society  decided  not  to 
hold  their  opening  meeting  until  November.  This  meeting 
took  the  form  of  a  Conversazione,  held  in  St.  Martin's  Hall, 
the  President  gave  his  address,  and  various  pieces  of  appara- 
tus and  X-ray  photographs  were  on  exhibition.  The 
membership  in  the  first  year  reached  nearly  two  hundred. 
Thompson's  presidential  address  consisted  in  large 
measure  of  an  account  of  the  discovery  of  the  Rontgen 
Rays.  He  then  went  on  to  say  : 

"  No  sooner,  however,  was  Roentgen's  discovery  placed 
before  the  world  than  its  immense  importance  was  at 
once  seen  and  acknowledged.  No  discovery  of  our  time — 
or  of  any  other  time — has  been  followed  by  so  immediate 
and  universal  an  outburst  of  scientific  activity.  The 
revival  of  interest  it  has  caused  in  the  science  of  optics  has 
been  truly  remarkable. 

"  The  electrician  seized  upon  it  with  scarcely  less  avidity. 
Every  photographer,  amateur  and  professional,  found  in  it 
a  new  point  of  departure,  and  hastened  to  practise  the  black 
art  of  skiagraphy.  But  most  of  all  did  it  appeal  to  the 
medical  profession  as  affording  a  means  of  investigation  of 
the  most  astonishing  power,  revealing  in  the  living  body 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND   RADIATION      197 

deep-seated  structures,  which  previously  could  only  be 
diagnosed  from  the  exterior,  or  else  explored  directly  by  the 
probe  or  the  scalpel  of  the  anatomist.  Very  shortly  also 
the  Roentgen  Rays  were  discovered  to  possess  electrical 
and  chemical  properties  of  a  truly  remarkable  kind,  giving 
scope  to  the  physical  investigator,  and  demanding  his  most 
acute  discrimination. 

"  Meantime  the  nature  of  the  rays  themselves  gave  ample 
food  for  speculation  and  research.  Nearly  two  years  have 
elapsed  since  Roentgen's  discovery  was  made  public.  Dur- 
ing that  time  thousands  of  workers  all  over  the  globe  have 
busied  themselves  in  the  new  branch  of  science  thus  opened 
out  ;  and  of  these  thousands  a  few  have  been  able  to  make 
contributions  of  permanent  value  to  science.  Given  the 
discovery,  it  is  easy  to  follow  out  its  developments  : 

" '  All  can  raise  the  flower  now 
Most  have  got  the  seed.' 

"  As  our  Society  is  composed  of  those  who  are  desirous 
of  aiding  and  following  out  that  development,  it  is  ger- 
mane to  our  purpose  that  a  brief  review  of  that  which  has 
been  achieved  should  be  made." 

Thompson  then  dealt  with  the  improvements  in  the 
apparatus  which  had  been  made  during  the  two  years. 
Addressing  himself  to  a  society  principally  composed  of 
surgeons,  the  bearing  of  the  invention  upon  surgery  and 
medicine  occupied  the  most  important  place  in  this  eloquent, 
instructive,  and  scholarly  address.  Turning  to  advances 
in  the  results  attained  and  in  the  applications  of  the  dis- 
covery, he  said  : 

"  We  are  confronted  with  a  marvellous  record  of  progress. 
Excepting  only  the  introduction  into  surgery  by  Lord 
Lister  of  antiseptics,  and  the  discovery  of  anaesthetics,  no 
discovery  in  the  present  century  has  done  so  much  for 
operative  surgery  as  this  of  the  Roentgen  Rays." 

He  ended  his  discourse  thus  : 

"  It  is  clear,  then,  that  our  little  Society  has  an  abundant 
field  before  it  to  engross  the  activities  of  its  members,  not 
only  for  the  approaching  winter,  but  for  many  years  to 
come.  Already  there  are  three  journals  established — one 


198  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

in  England,  one  in  Germany,  one  in  America — for  the 
publication  of  observations  and  discoveries  connected  with 
the  Roentgen  Rays. 

"  The  pioneers  have  opened  the  way  into  the  wilderness ; 
not  until  every  corner  is  explored  and  charted  will  the  work 
of  our  Society  be  ended.  But,  while  life  is  short  and  art 
is  long,  science  expands  without  limit  or  term.  But,  whether 
working  in  a  modern  laboratory  equipped  by  the  foresight 
and  at  the  expense  of  an  enlightened  municipality,  as 
Roentgen  did,  or  whether  compelled  by  force  of  circum- 
stances to  experiment  in  isolation  or  obscurity,  the  scientific 
worker  who  patiently  tracks  out  the  unexplored  pathways 
of  Nature  is  certain,  sooner  or  later,  to  succeed  in  pene- 
trating a  little  further  into  the  mysteries  of  the  unknown. 
His  work,  however  unambitious,  is  not  in  vain. 

"  'Nature  never  did  betray  the  heart  that  loved  her.' ' 

During  his  year  of  office  as  President  Thompson  was 
diligent  in  attending  its  committees,  and  presiding  at  its 
Monthly  Meetings  generally  held  at  the  Medical  Society's 
rooms  in  Chandos  Street,  Cavendish  Square.  The  year 
was  a  very  successful  one,  both  as  regarded  the  papers  and 
discussions  and  the  membership  and  financial  support. 
The  Council  were  very  anxious  that  Thompson  should 
consent  to  be  elected  for  a  second  year,  but  he  could  not 
undertake  to  give  up  sufficient  time,  and  he  was  also  con- 
vinced that  the  next  President  should  be  a  medical  man. 

The  Society  continued  to  flourish,  and  as  a  rule  the 
Presidents  were  alternately  medical  men  and  men  who 
were  devoted  to  the  purely  scientific  problems.  In  1907  the 
Presidency  fell  to  the  late  Mr.  William  Duddell,  F.R.S., 
one  of  the  most  brilliant  young  scientific  men  of  the  day, 
who  had  been  a  student  at  the  Central  Technical  College, 
and  had  also  attended  Thompson's  courses  of  evening 
lectures  at  Finsbury.  He  frequently  consulted  with 
Thompson  about  the  Society,  and  was  most  devoted  to  its 
interests. 

The  Rontgen  Society  was  now  in  a  very  flourishing  con- 
dition ;  it  had  its  Library  and  its  own  Journal.  Since  the 
discovery  of  Radium  it  had  altered  its  rules  to  enlarge 
the  scope  of  its  studies,  and  include  in  addition  to  X-rays 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND  RADIATION     199 

"  allied  phenomena  in  their  relation  to  Medicine,  the  Arts, 
and  Sciences." 

The  last  piece  of  research  work  shown  to  the  Society  by 
Thompson  was  in  reference  to  the  physiological  effects  pro- 
duced by  putting  the  head  near  a  powerful  alternating 
electromagnet. 

When  preparing  Kelvin's  biography  he  found  in  the 
Popular  Lectures  and  Addresses  some  mention  of  earlier 
experiments  upon  what  he  himself  had  previously  noticed, 
faint  visual  effects  on  placing  his  forehead  near  an  alter- 
nating electromagnet,  with  which  he  was  experimenting. 

In  1908  he  had  written  to  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  about  it,  and 
received  the  following  reply  : 

"  I  do  not  much  like  the  idea  of  putting  my  head  in  an 
alternating  magnetic  field.  I  think  it  ought  to  be  a  steady 
magnet  to  give  a  really  new  effect. 

"  A  moving  or  alternating  magnet  must,  of  course,  induce 
E.  M.  F.  in  conducting  tissues,  and  it  is  only  a  question 
of  the  amount.  The  old  Volta  experiment  of  zinc  and 
silver  on  tongue  and  lip  shows  that  the  impression  of  a  flash 
of  light  may  be  caused  by  very  moderate  voltage.  I  am 
afraid,  therefore,  that  your  observation  may  be  only  a 
variant  of  that." 

Thompson,  however,  was  quite  convinced  that  what  he 
had  observed  was  not  akin  to  the  Volta  experiment,  and 
continued  his  research  into  the  cause  of  the  phenomena  at 
Finsbury,  and  in  1910  he  communicated  the  results  to  the 
Royal  Society  in  a  paper  entitled,  Physiological  Effects  of 
an  Alternating  Magnetic  Field.  In  December  1911  he 
received  a  letter  from  Mr.  A.  A.  Campbell  Swinton  saying  : 

"  I  was  requested  by  the  Council  to  approach  you  again 
to  see  whether  you  could  not  be  induced  to  show  to  the 
Roentgen  Society  your  experiments  with  the  alternating 
magnet  on  the  human  head.  Great  interest  was  expressed 
in  these  experiments,  particularly  by  some  of  the  medical 
men  present,  and  what  was  thought  was  that,  if  the  Society 
could  be  allowed  to  meet  one  evening  at  Finsbury  College, 
the  individual  members  might  be  allowed  to  put  their  heads 


200  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

in  the  magnet  as  a  preliminary,  and  we  might  then  after- 
wards have  a  discussion  on  the  subject." 

The  meeting  of  the  Society  in  Thompson's  laboratory 
took  place  the  following  March  1912,  and  was  attended  by 
many  well-known  medical  men. 

A  year  after  Thompson's  death  in  1917  the  Rontgen 
Society  decided  to  endow  a  Memorial  to  its  first  President, 
and  it  was  resolved  to  create  an  annual  lectureship,  to  be 
called  the  "  Silvanus  P.  Thompson  Memorial  Lecture," 
and  that  a  bronze  medal  bearing  his  portrait  should  be 
presented  to  the  lecturer. 

The  first  lecture  was  given  in  April  1918  at  Burlington 
House  by  Professor  Sir  Ernest  Rutherford,  F.R.S.,  who 
in  the  introduction  to  his  lecture  said  : 

"  I  feel  it  a  great  honour  to  be  asked  to  give  the  first 
of  the  annual  lectures  you  have  instituted  in  memory  of  the 
late  Professor  Silvanus  P.  Thompson.  ...  I  am  sure  we 
can  all  agree  that  the  Roentgen  Society  made  a  very 
fortunate  choice  in  selecting  Professor  S.  P.  Thompson 
as  their  first  President,  for  he  was  a  man  not  only  dis- 
tinguished as  a  teacher,  investigator,  and  writer  on  technical 
science,  but  was,  in  addition,  greatly  interested  in  the  advance 
of  pure  science,  especially  in  the  domain  of  optics.  This 
is  well  shown  by  his  contributions  on  Light,  and  by  that 
excellent  book  Light,  Visible  and  Invisible,  published  in 
1897.  It  was  his  interest  in  all  types  of  radiation  that  led 
him  to  make  experiments  on  X-rays  immediately  after 
their  discovery,  and,  I  understand,  he  was  one  of  the  first  to 
obtain  X-ray  photographs  in  this  country.  Subsequently 
he  was  able  to  show  that  the  efficiency  of  X-ray  tubes  was 
increased  by  the  use  of  heavy  elements  like  platinum  and 
uranium,  as  anticathode,  and  made  other  researches  on 
the  effect  of  a  magnetic  field  on  the  discharge  in  a  vacuum- 
tube.  With  his  interest  in  pure  science  and  its  application, 
it  must  have  been  a  gratification  to  him  to  become  your 
first  President,  and  to  guide  your  infant  steps  along  the 
path  of  progress.  Apart  from  his  presidential  address,  his 
most  notable  contribution  to  the  Society  was  an  account 
of  his  experiments  on  the  physiological  effect  on  the  head 
of  a  powerful  alternating  magnetic  field,  serving  as  an 


RESEARCHES   ON  LIGHT  AND  RADIATION    201 

illustration  of  the  catholicity  of  his  scientific  interest  and 
his  versatility.  .  .  . 

"  In  reading  again  the  admirable  presidential  address 
of  Professor  S.  P.  Thompson  to  this  Society  in  1897,  before 
a  brilliant  audience,  and  which,  we  are  told,  occupied  forty 
minutes,  one  cannot  but  recall  the  exciting  atmosphere  of 
that  time,  and  the  extraordinary  interest  that  was  aroused, 
in  the  lay  and  the  scientific  mind  alike,  by  the  discovery 
of  the  Roentgen  Rays.  Naturally  in  his  address,  prominence 
was  given  to  the  medical  application  of  those  rays  for  the 
advancement  of  which  the  Roentgen  Society  was  primarily 
founded,  and  for  which  it  has  done  such  admirable  work. 

"  But  an  interesting  account  was  given  also  of  the  ideas 
at  that  time  of  the  nature  and  origin  of  the  new  rays — ideas 
that  have  in  the  main  received  complete  verification  in 
recent  years." 

The  two  following  letters  from  Lord  Kelvin  to  Thompson 
should  be  quoted  here,  as  showing  the  estimation  of  Thomp- 
son's work  on  the  subjects  dealt  with  in  this  chapter  by 
his  great  contemporary,  although  they  have  been  already 
printed  in  the  Life  of  Lord  Kelvin. 

"  NETHEBHALL,  LAEGS, 

"  October  10th,   1899. 

"DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  I  have  looked  in  vain  in  encyclopedias  and  text- 
books for  something  that  every  one  doesn't  know  regarding 
the  phosphorescence  of  luminous  paint,  Canton's  phos- 
phorus, etc.  :  so,  as  you  know  more  than  encyclopedias  and 
text-books  put  together,  I  apply  to  you. 

"  (1)  Can  you  tell  me  what  is  known  regarding  the  effect 
of  temperature  ?  I  find,  with  little  copper  plates  and  a 
glass  plate  painted  with  Balmain's  luminous  paint,  that 
the  warmth  of  my  hand  greatly  increases  the  glow  due  to 
previous  illumination  ;  and  that,  if  of  two  similar  plates, 
equally  dosed  with  light,,  I  keep  one  for  an  hour  or  two 
warmer  by  10°  or  20°  C.  than  the  other,  it  glows  more 
brightly  than  the  other  till  it  cools,  and  becomes  darker 
than  the  other  in  a  minute  or  two,  when  it  is  cold  like  the 
other.  Hence  it  appears  that  the  warmth  causes  the  stored 
light  to  be  given  out  faster.  I  suppose  this  is  well  known, 
but  I  haven't  found  it  told  anywhere  that  I  can  remember. 

"  (2)  Is  there  good  information  as  to  the  excitement  of 


202  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

ordinary  phosphorescence  by  different  parts  of  a  homo- 
geneous spectrum  ?  I  have  heard  it  said  that  the  phos- 
phorescent light  may  be  of  either  shorter  or  longer  period 
than  the  originating  light.  In  Stokes's  fluorescence  he  found 
the  fluorescent  light  always  of  longer  period  than  the 
originating. 

"  (3)  Do  you  know  Dewar's  splendid  phosphorescence  of 
egg-shells  and  other  ordinary  solids  at  very  low  tempera- 
tures ?  Was  it  generated  by  incident  light  at  the  low 
temperature,  and  did  it  only  appear  brilliantly  when  the 
temperature  was  raised  ?  I  have  been  looking  through  the 
Phil.  Mag.,  and  can  find  nothing  of  it. 

"  (4)  Do  you  know  what  Edmond  Becquerel  did  in 
respect  to  effect  of  ultra-red  radiation  on  phosphorescence  ? 
I  remember  him  telling  me  of  it,  or  showing  it  to  me  a  great 
many  years  ago,  but  I  can't  remember  exactly  what  it  was. 

"  (5)  Do  you  know  anything  of  Stokes's  experiments  on 
the  subject  ? 

"  Yours  very  truly, 

"  KELVIN." 

Thompson's  reply  to  this  letter  is  unfortunately  not  to 
be  found,  but  the  sense  of  it  may  be  inferred  from  Kelvin's 
letter  of  a  few  days  later  : 

"  NETHERHALL,  LABGS, 

"  October  Uth,   1899. 

"DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  You  have  splendidly  verified  the  validity  of  my 
applying  to  you  for  information  '  not  to  be  found  in 
encyclopedias  or  ordinary  text-books '  on  a  very  interesting 
and  important  scientific  subject ;  and  I  am  most  grateful 
to  you  for  your  letter  of  the  llth,  and  the  copy  of  your 
Oxford  Lecture.  I  feel  now  that,  with  your  Oxford  Lecture 
and  your  Light  Visible  and  Invisible,  and  the  exceedingly 
interesting  answers  to  my  questions  in  your  letter,  I  have 
all  that  is  known  on  the  subject  arid  as  fair  a  view  as 
possible  towards  the  omne  scibile. 

"  In  respect  to  Becquerel's  effect  of  the  extreme  red, 
I  thought  it  likely  that  the  explanation  would  be  what  you 
tell  me  it  has  turned  out  to  be. 

"As  to  Stokes,  I  hope  to  see  him  at  Cambridge  at  the 
end  of  the  month,  and  to  extract  all  I  can  from  him,  which 
I  believe  will  include  something  vitally  important  not  yet 
published. 


RESEARCHES   ON   LIGHT  AND   RADIATION    203 

"  I  hope  to  see  yourself  still  sooner,  as  we  are  going  to 
London  on  Monday  next  for  the  opening  of  Parliament. 
I  would  like  to  come  and  see  you,  if  you  will  allow  me,  in 
Finsbiiry  one  of  these  days  ;  and  to  see  anything  you  could 
quite  conveniently  show  me  in  the  way  of  phosphorescence 
or  the  Phillips  phenomenon,  or  any  other  of  the  splendid 
things  you  may  chance  to  have  at  hand. 

"  Will  you  give  me  a  line,  addressed  Fleming's  Hotel, 
Half  moon  St.,  Piccadilly  (where  we  shall  arrive  on  Monday 
evening),  to  say  if  there  is  any  time  in  the  forenoon  of 
Wednesday,  Thursday,  or  Friday  (18th,  19th,  or  20th),  when 
it  would  be  convenient  for  you  that  I  should  come. 

"  As  to  the  Electrical  Engineers'  dinner  on  December  6th, 
I  am  afraid  I  must  not  come.  I  expect  to  be  settled  here 
for  the  winter  by  that  time.  .  .  .  However,  we  can  speak 
of  this  when  we  meet,  as  I  hope  we  shall,  next  week. 

"  Yours  very  truly, 

"  KELVIN." 


CHAPTER    X 

WORK    FOB    THE     INSTITUTION    OF     ELECTRICAL    ENGINEERS 
AND   INTERNATIONAL   ELECTRICAL  CONGRESSES 

SILVANUS  THOMPSON  was  proposed  as  a  member  of  the 
Society  of  Telegraph  Engineers  and  Electricians  by 
Professor  George  Carey  Foster,  F.R.S.,  in  the  year  1882. 
He  was  elected  that  year,  and  in  1883  read  his  first  paper 
to  the  Society,  "  Remarks  on  Contact  Resistance,"  after- 
wards printed  in  the  Journal. 

That  same  year  the  Society  changed  its  title  to  the  one 
it  now  bears,  "  The  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers." 
Thompson  was  not,  however,  able  to  attend  its  meetings 
with  any  regularity  until  he  removed  to  London  in  1885. 
These  meetings  were  at  that  time  held  in  the  Hall  of  the 
Civil  Engineers  in  Great  George  Street,  Westminster,  and 
it  was  not  until  many  years  later  that  the  present  institu- 
tion building  on  the  Embankment  was  purchased. 

In  1886  he  was  elected  a  member  of  the  Council,  on  which 
he  continued  to  serve  after  he  had  passed  the  Presidential 
Chair.  He  was  also  elected  on  to  many  of  its  committees, 
and,  as  Chairman  of  the  Research  Committee,  he  had  the 
pleasure  of  initiating  many  researches,  some  of  which  have 
proved  most  useful  to  the  electric  industry. 

He  frequently  took  an  important  part  in  its  discussions, 
and  in  1888  contributed  one  of  his  remarkable  historical 
papers,  "  The  Influence  Machine  from  1788  to  1888,"  which, 
Professor  Ayrton  said,  "  could  have  been  written  by  no 
other  man."  Another  noteworthy  communication  was  on 
"  Rotatory  Converters,"  which  he  gave  in  1898. 

After  he  had  held  the  office  of  Vice- President  for  several 
years,  it  seemed  probable  that  the  choice  of  the  Council 

204 


INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    205 

would  fall  upon  him  to  be  President  in  1899.  The  office  is, 
as  a  rule,  held  for  only  one  year,  and  during  1898  it  had 
been  filled  by  Sir  Joseph  Wilson  Swan. 

The  year  1899  was  a  remarkable  one  for  electricians,  as 
it  was  the  centenary  of  the  invention  of  the  Pile  by  the 
great  Volta.  The  Italians  were  celebrating  it  by  holding 
an  Electrical  Exhibition  at  Como,  his  birthplace.  His 
tomb  and  the  mausoleum  erected  to  his  memory  were 
situated  near  the  town. 

The  International  Electrical  Congress  had  arranged  to 
hold  its  next  meeting  at  Como  in  September,  and  Thompson 
had  planned  to  be  present,  and  during  the  previous  winter 
had  been  taking  conversational  lessons  in  Italian. 

Ever  since  his  first  visit  to  Italy  in  1892,  he  had  been 
keeping  in  touch  with  several  Italian  electricians  whom 
he  had  met  then,  and  subsequently,  at  Paris  and  Frankfort 
during  meetings  of  the  Congress. 

His  work  on  the  Dynamo  was  well  known  in  Italy,  as  his 
books  had  been  translated  into  Italian. 

In  November  1898  he  was  made  foreign  member  of  the 
"  Associazione  elettrotecnica  italiana";  this  was  announced 
to  him  by  Signor  G.  Colombo  (afterwards  Commendatore, 
and  Senatore  del  Regno)  of  Milan,  who  wrote  from  the  Reale 
Institute  Tecnico  Superiore  :  "  We  consider  it  a  very  great 
honour  to  have  you  among  us  in  the  Associazione,  and  are 
very  glad  that  our  Statute  admits  foreign  members.  We 
will  inscribe  you  in  the  section  of  Milan." 

In  1891  Thompson  had  already  been  made  a  Member  of 
the  Council  of  the  Societe  Internationale  des  Electriciens, 
and  a  Vice-President  of  the  Electrical  Exhibition  at  Frank- 
fort, where  the  Congress  was  held  that  year.  Accom- 
panied by  his  wife,  he  spent  several  weeks  in  July  of  that 
year  there.  He,  Professor  Ayrton,  Mr.  Preece,  Dr.  Hopkin- 
son,  Professor  Fleming,  and  Mr.  Kapp  were  appointed  on 
the  Commission  for  the  examination  of  the  exhibits.  The 
Exhibition  was  one  of  great  interest ;  it  was  lit  by  an  electric 
current,  brought  from  Laufen,  where  a  fall  in  the  river 
Rhine  provided  power  to  work  the  dynamos,  and  the 
current  was  carried  by  overhead  wires  to  Frankfort.  Visitors 


206  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

to  the  Exhibition  had  also  the  privilege  of  riding  on  the 
first  electric  tramway. 

Owing  to  the  Exhibition,  the  subjects  taken  up  by  the 
International  Congress  were  of  a  more  technical  character 
than  they  had  been  on  previous  occasions.  During  its 
sittings  Thompson  read  three  papers  in  different  sections ; 
one,  the  most  important,  on  "Alternating  Currents,"  he 
gave  in  German.  This  Congress  was  the  means  of  his  being 
introduced  to  many  of  the  electricians  of  Europe,  German, 
Russian,  Italian,  Swedish,  with  whom  he  afterwards  main- 
tained very  friendly  relations. 

It  ended  as  usual  with  a  banquet,  to  which  (not  as  usual) 
the  wives  and  daughters  of  members  were  invited.  This 
was  given  in  the  Palmengarten,  the  small  Crystal  Palace  of 
Frankfort. 

The  President  of  the  Congress,  Dr.  von  Stephan,  Post- 
master-General of  Germany,  presided,  and  many  speeches 
were  made.  Thompson  had  been  asked  to  propose  the  toast 
of  "  German  Science." 

He  spoke  partly  in  German  and  partly  in  English,  and  in 
the  course  of  it  made  an  eloquent  appeal  to  the  members 
that  science  should  be  made  more  and  more  international, 
and  that  scientific  men  should  rise  above  the  jealousies  of 
diplomatists  and  traders,  and  co-operate  for  the  benefit 
of  mankind,  ending  with  the  words  "  Lebe  hoch  !  die 
Deutsche  Wissenschaft."  This  speech  was  received  most 
enthusiastically,  members  of  the  Congress  coming  from  all 
parts  of  the  hall  to  congratulate  the  speaker. 

The  following  extracts  from  letters  to  his  wife  during 
her  absence  from  home  in  the  spring  of  1899  refer  to  matters 
connected  with  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers. 

"  March  23rd,  1899. 

"  Thursday's  meeting  at  the  Electrical  Engineers  went 
off  capitally.  Mrs.  Ayrton  [a  former  Finsbury  Student] 
delivered  her  paper  in  capital  style,  and  the  experiments 
worked  well.  She  has  made  a  really  important  discovery 
as  to  the  physics  of  the  arc  — namely,  that  the  hissing,  when 
it  occurs,  is  due  to  oxygen  getting  to  the  white-hot  carbon 
surface.  There  were  a  lot  of  ladies  present.  Mrs,  Swan, 


INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    207 

Mrs.  Mordey,  Mrs.  Maxim  —  also  Edie  and  Barbie  [the 
Misses  Ayrton].  Everybody  seemed  a  little  bit  excited, 
realising  that  it  was  a  somewhat  unusual  occasion.  I  spoke 
afterwards,  and  congratulated  Mrs.  Ayrton  on  having 
found  the  clue  and  furnished  a  disproof  of  one  of  the 
fallacies  which  I  had  had  more  than  once  to  contend 
against  in  that  room.  Swan  presided,  and  looks  in  perfect 
health. 

"  I  have  had  the  good  fortune  of  getting  an  Italian  lesson 
this  week  :  for  there  called  upon  me  yesterday  Signor 
Pescetto  of  Turin — an  old  friend  of  Ferraris  l — who  speaks 
scarce  a  word  of  English,  and  not  much  more  French. 

"  I  took  him  to  lunch  at  Spiers  and  Pond's  Restaurant  in 
the  City,  and  found  a  table  where  was  an  Italian  waiter. 
I  talked  Italian — after  a  fashion — with  him  for  two  and  a 
half  hours  !  He  intends  to  be  at  Como  ;  and  had  heard 
that  you  intend  to  be  there.  He  sent  his  compliments  to 
you  in  advance." 

"April  llth,  1899. 

"  I  have  some  news  for  you  to-day.  This  afternoon  the 
Council  of  the  Electrical  Engineers  unanimously  elected 
me  as  their  choice  for  the  Presidency,  though,  of  course, 
the  formal  election  by  the  General  Meeting  does  not  take 
place  until  a  month  hence. 

"  It  was,  I  am  told,  a  foregone  conclusion  that  the 
nomination  would  be  unanimous.  It  is  a  great  honour  ; 
and  to-night  I  have  had  the  responsibilities  of  the  office 
rather  than  its  dignities  upon  my  mind. 

"  However,  the  Council  is  pulling  well  together,  and  I 
shall  be  well  supported.  I  am  glad  that  there  is  an  end  to 
uncertainties. 

"  I  am  not  quite  sure  that  I  can  meet  you  at  Paddington 
on  Thursday.  If  I  can  I  will.  Thursday  evening  is  the 
continued  discussion  of  Mrs.  Ayrton's  paper  at  the  I.E.E. 
Will  you  come  to  this  ?  " 

It  was  the  custom  for  the  newly  elected  President  of  the 
Institution  to  receive  the  guests  at  the  Annual  Soiree,  of 
the  members  and  their  friends,  which  was  generally  held 
at  the  Natural  History  Museum,  South  Kensington,  in  the 
month  of  June. 

1  Mrs.  Thompson  had  translated  from  the  Italian  some  of  the  electrical 
publications  of  the  late  Professor  Galileo  Ferraris,  first  President  of  the 
Associazione  Electrotecnica,  who  died  in  1897  at  the  age  of  forty. 


208  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

It  was  with  some  consternation  that  Thompson  and  his 
wife  received,  towards  the  end  of  May,  a  proposal  from 
Colonel  Crompton,  the  commander  of  the  Electrical 
Engineers'  Volunteer  Corps,  that  the  volunteers  should  on 
this  occasion  provide  a  guard  of  honour  for  the  President 
and  his  wife  at  their  reception.  This  would  have  been  an 
innovation,  and  would  have  seemed  very  incongruous  in 
the  case  of  a  Quaker  President. 

The  following  letter  explains  the  feelings  with  which 
Thompson  regarded  the  proposal. 


"  May  Wth,  1899. 

"DEAR  COLONEL  CROMPTON, 

"  I  am  quite  sure  that  your  letter  of  the  20th  instant 
was  intended  to  be  for  the  good  of  the  Institution,  and  not 
for  the  purpose  of  compromising  me. 

"  But  you  must  surely  remember  that  from  the  very  first 
I  have  declined  to  have  anything  to  do  with  the  Electrical 
Engineers'  Volunteer  Corps,  and  that  on  the  occasion 
when  it  was  first  suggested  I  was  the  Member  of  Council 
who  on  principle  opposed  its  formation.  On  that  occasion 
I  was  in  a  minority  of  two.1  My  views  on  this  matter  have 
been  openly  known  from  the  first,  and  the  circumstance 
that  by  the  good-will  of  my  colleagues  I  have  been  chosen 
President  for  the  current  year  does  not  alter  them.  During 
my  year  of  presidency,  while  I  shall  certainly  defer  to  the 
wishes  of  the  majority,  and  so  far  sink  my  own  views  as  to 
remain  silent  in  my  opposition  to  the  movement  of  which, 
since  Dr.  Hopkinson's  lamented  death,  you  have  become 
the  head  I  shall  also  equally  certainly  decline  to  take  any 
new  step,  in  promoting  that  to  which,  as  a  matter  of  con- 
science, I  am  opposed.  I  am  fully  aware  that  your  efforts 
are  unselfishly  devoted  to  that  which  you  believe  to  be  for 
the  good  of  the  Institution. 

"  While  I  appreciate  gratefully  your  courtesy  in  thus 
consulting  my  wishes  before  moving  in  this  matter,  I  hope 
that,  under  the  circumstances,  you  will  not  put  me  into  the 
painful  position  of  having  to  oppose  any  suggestion  that 
might  emanate  from  you.  Believe  me,  dear  Mr.  Crompton, 
yours  always  sincerely." 

Mr.  Crompton  at  once  replied  in  the  most  friendly  manner, 
*  His  old  friend,  the  late  Professor  G.  Carey  Foster,  F.R.S.,  was  the  other. 


INSTITUTION  OF   ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS  209 

abandoning  the  proposal,  saying  that  it  was  intended  as  a 
special  honour  for  this  occasion.  He  also  remarked  that  he 
had  understood  that  the  Quaker,  John  Bright,  had  said  : 
"  If  you  want  to  prevent  war,  be  prepared  for  it."  Thompson 
in  his  letter  of  thanks,  retorted  to  this  last  remark, "  /  knew 
John  Bright,  and  you  did  not ;  his  actions  did  not  tally 
with  the  words  you  ascribe  to  him." 

This  was  not  the  only  time  in  the  career  of  Thompson 
that  he  was  uncompromising  in  his  attitude  towards 
militarism,  and  this  position  which  he  took  up,  and  main- 
tained throughout  his  life,  was  on  at  least  one  occasion  the 
cause  of  his  losing  the  chance  of  an  important  academic 
promotion.  It  was  with  extreme  regret  that  he  saw  the 
English  Universities  admitting  the  study  of  military  tactics 
into  their  curricula  and  promoting  that  spirit  of  militarism 
which  he  had  observed  to  be  producing  such  baneful  results 
on  the  continent  of  Europe. 

Thompson  was  no  mere  passivist ;  he  believed  in  trying 
to  be  a  pacifist  by  the  promotion  of  international  under- 
standing and  intercourse,  and  during  his  presidency  he  was 
able  to  inaugurate,  in  a  most  successful  manner,  one  means 
to  help  to  bring  this  about. 

His  gift  of  tongues,  his  constant  reading  of  foreign 
scientific  journals,  his  frequent  correspondence  with  men 
of  science  all  over  Europe,  had  placed  him  in  an  almost 
unique  position  for  the  promotion  of  these  ideas  of  inter- 
national friendship.  He  had  felt  for  many  years  that  the 
limitation  caused  by  a  far  too  narrow  and  insular  outlook 
on  electrical  science  was  gravely  to  the  disadvantage  of  the 
British  electrical  engineers.  So  when  he  became  President 
he  determined  to  arrange  excursions  to  various  centres  of 
electrical  development  abroad,  in  the  hope  of  educating 
at  least  many  of  the  younger  members  of  the  Institution 
in  knowledge  of  what  was  being  done  on  the  Continent. 

He  proposed  that  they  should  visit  Switzerland  first, 
and  undertook  to  get  permission  from  some  of  the  pro- 
prietors of  the  largest  electrical  engineering  works  in  that 
country  to  allow  members  of  the  Institution  to  see  them. 

The  proposal  was  taken  up  by  several  members  of  the 
14 


210  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Council,  and  a  committee  was  appointed  to  arrange  for  a 
visit  to  Switzerland  in  the  beginning  of  September. 

The  soiree  of  this  season  at  which  Thompson  presided 
took  place  at  the  Natural  History  Museum,  and  was  one 
of  the  largest  that  had  been  held.  Among  the  members 
present  were  large  numbers  of  his  old  students  and  their 
wives  and  fiancees,  and  many  were  the  introductions  which 
had  to  be  made.  The  scientific  circle  of  London  was  well 
represented,  and  personal  friends  of  the  Thompsons  also 
came  to  congratulate  them  on  the  new  position  of  honour. 

In  July  Thompson  received  a  letter  from  Professor  Oliver 
Lodge,  asking  if  he  could  give  a  lecture  to  a  Students' 
Society  in  Liverpool  during  the  autumn. 

His  reply  was  as  follows  : 

"  I  wish  I  could  say  yes  to  your  invitation  to  lecture  to 
your  Students'  Society  ;  but  I  must  not.  Next  autumn 
I  shall  have  a  very,  very  heavy  time.  For,  not  only  have 
I  the  presidency  of  the  I.E.E.  on  my  hands — no  light 
duty,  with  three  committees  on  an  average  every  week — but 
my  college  staff  is  almost  entirely  new,  Mr.  O'Keefe  being 
the  only  one  who  has  been  with  me  as  much  as  one  session ; 
even  my  lecture  preparer  is  new.  Hence  I  shall  have  no 
leisure,  and  dare  not  add  to  engagements.  The  question 
is  not  one  of  remuneration — for,  except  Royal  Institution 
lectures,  I  have  taken  no  fee  for  outside  lectures  for  several 
years  past." 

Thompson's  practice  as  a  Consulting  Electrical  Engineer 
had  grown  considerably  during  recent  years,  and  of  course 
his  position  as  President  of  the  Institution  brought  more 
work  of  that  kind  to  him.  He  was,  however,  obliged  to 
decline  a  good  deal  of  it  on  account  of  his  heavy  duties  at 
Finsbury,  although  he  had  obtained  permission  from  the 
City  Guilds  Committee  of  the  College  to  undertake  a  limited 
amount  of  such  outside  work.  He  was  very  frequently 
consulted  about  new  electrical  schemes  and  undertakings 
by  public  bodies  throughout  the  country. 

The  cessation  of  his  college  duties  early  in  July  found 
him  immersed  in  preparations  for  the  Swiss  visit,  for  the 
carrying  out  of  which  a  strong  committee  had  been  formed, 


INSTITUTION  OF   ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    211 

but  the  initial  approaches  to  the  Swiss  manufacturers  had 
to  be  made  by  himself. 

The  Secretary  of  the  Institution,  Mr.  W.  G.  McMillan, 
was  invaluable  as  an  assistant  in  this  scheme.  But  on 
July  8th  he  wrote  to  Thompson  that  he  was  still  much 
exercised  in  his  mind  on  the  difficulties  of  organising  a  trip 
across  Europe  for  about  two  hundred  people,  many  of  whom 
had  never  been  abroad  before,  and  spoke  no  language  but 
their  own.  Thompson  came  to  the  rescue,  and  about  a 
week  later  Mr.  McMillan,  who  had  been  sent  out  to  Switzer- 
land to  make  final  arrangements,  and  go  over  the  ground, 
wrote  from  Zurich  that  all  plans  seemed  to  be  going  forward 
satisfactorily. 

Thompson  spent  August  with  his  family  at  Whitby, 
taking  a  good  rest,  and  passing  many  hours  sketching  in  the 
picturesque  old  town. 

On  September  1st  he  and  Mrs.  Thompson  travelled  to 
Basle,  the  rendezvous  for  those  taking  part  in  the  Swiss 
Reunion. 

The  excursion  was  a  success  from  the  first  ;  people 
seemed  determined  to  make  the  best  of  any  little  contre- 
temps which  occurred,  and  the  programme  was  carried 
out  without  a  hitch.  The  power  station  at  Rheinfelden 
and  numerous  electric  engineering  works  were  visited. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  excursions  was  to  the  Jung- 
frau  Electric  Railway,  then  in  course  of  construction  and 
completed  as  far  as  the  Eiger  Glacier,  though  not  then  open 
to  the  public.  The  party  were  taken  up  by  train  as  far  as 
the  line  was  laid,  and  were  also  allowed  to  inspect  the 
works  of  the  Railway. 

At  the  conclusion  of  the  Swiss  Reunion  Thompson  and 
the  Committee  were  quite  satisfied  with  the  usefulness  of 
this  new  departure  in  the  history  of  the  Institution. 

From  Switzerland  the  Thompsons  went  on  into  Italy, 
and  had  a  few  days  of  quiet  at  Bellagio  before  the  com- 
mencement of  the  International  Electrical  Congress  at 
Como.  While  staying  there  they  visited  Signor  Colombo 
in  his  beautiful  villa  on  the  opposite  side  of  Lake  Como, 
and  also  made  the  acquaintance  of  several  of  the  Italian 


212  LIFE  OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

members  of  the  Congress,  who  were  staying  on  the  lake 
side. 

A  great  disaster  had  befallen  the  Exhibition  at  Como 
during  the  month  of  July,  when  it  had  been  almost  entirely 
destroyed  by  fire  and  large  numbers  of  most  precious  relics 
of  Volta  had  been  burnt.  With  undaunted  courage,  how- 
ever, the  Italians  rebuilt  their  Exhibition,  and  from  all 
over  Europe  scientific  bodies  and  individuals  did  their 
best  to  help,  by  loans  of  relics  or  manuscripts  relating  to 
Volta's  work. 

Thompson,  as  President  of  the  Institution,  had  been 
appointed  a  member  of  the  Comitato  Onorevole  of  the 
Exhibition,  and  he  had  at  once  written  to  Sig.  Cadenazzi, 
the  Mayor  of  Como,  offering  to  lend  MSS.  and  letters  from 
his  collection.  His  letter  making  this  offer  written  to  the 
Mayor  of  Como  was  printed  in  extenso  in  the  little  Como 
newspaper,  La  Provincia  di  Como,  of  July  21st,  with 
many  expressions  of  appreciation  of  his  sympathetic 
action. 

King  Humbert  and  Queen  Margharita,  accompanied  by 
the  Crown  Prince  and  Princess,  came  to  Como  to  reopen 
the  Exhibition,  and,  their  visit  coinciding  with  the  opening 
sitting  of  the  International  Electrical  Congress,  they  also 
attended  its  first  meeting. 

The  opening  address  was  given  by  Professor  Augusto 
Righi,  of  Bologna,  and  then  a  paper  was  given  by  Thompson 
on  Magnetic  Images.  He  gave  this  in  Italian,  and  it  was 
afterwards  published  by  the  Associazione  Elettrotecnica 
Italiana  at  Milan  in  1900  under  the  title  Intorno  alle  Im- 
magini  Magnetiche. 

A  few  days  later  the  Physical  Society  of  Italy  also  held 
a  Congress  at  Como  ;  at  its  second  session  Thompson  took 
part  in  a  discussion  on  a  paper  on  certain  phenomena  of 
magnetic  currents  given  by  Professor  Donati  of  Bologna. 

On  the  Sunday  following  the  Congress,  Thompson  and 
his  wife  drove  out  to  see  the  tomb  of  Volta  at  Camnago, 
a  few  miles  from  Como.  Here,  seated  in  a  corner  of  the 
little  graveyard,  he  made  a  very  successful  water-colour 
drawing, of  Volta's  tomb  amid  its  picturesque  cypresses. 


INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    213 

The  following  week  was  occupied  by  excursions,  to  visit 
Electric  Stations  at  Paderno,  Vizzola,  and  Milan.  At  the 
latter  city  a  meeting  of  the  Associazione  Elettrotecnica, 
of  which  Thompson's  good  friend  Signor  G.  Colombo  was 
President,  took  place.  He  attended  some  of  the  meetings, 
but,  after  this  surfeit  of  Congresses,  was  glad  to  get  home 
to  take  up  his  heavy  duties  of  the  autumn.  A  few  months 
later  he  received  from  Como  the  "  Diploma  di  Benemer- 
enza  "  for  his  work  in  connection  with  the  Exhibition  and 
Congress. 

The  Presidential  Address  to  the  Institution  was  given  on 
November  16th,  1899. 

It  was  devoted  to  the  subject  of  the  future  work  and 
development  of  the  Institution. 

"  The  advancement  of  Science,"  he  said,  "  depends 
largely  upon  the  initial  co-operation  of  science  workers 
and  of  the  Societies  founded  for  the  diffusion  and  co- 
ordination of  knowledge.  Rightly  conducted,  the  influence 
of  such  an  Institution  as  ours,  both  within  and  without  its 
borders,  is  very  great. 

"  It  may  do  a  real  and  lasting  service  in  directing  atten- 
tion to  the  things  that  make  for  progress.  The  develop- 
ment of  our  electrical  industry  is  determined  by  inter- 
national factors,  supplies  of  raw  materials,  cfest  of  transport, 
relative  technical  skill  and  training  of  our  designers  and 
manufacturers,  in  this  and  other  countries." 

These  extracts  may  serve  to  show  the  trend  of  his  address. 
In  proposing  a  vote  of  thanks  to  the  President,  Mr.  W.  M. 
Mordey  said  : 

"  Now  we  see  him  in  a  new  capacity — as  a  prophet,  for 
to-night  he  has  departed  from  the  usual  practice.  He  has 
dealt,  not  with  the  past — with  which  he  is  very  well  com- 
petent to  deal — as  are  all  successful  prophets — but  with 
the  future.  This  has  been  a  fighting  address.  Dr.  Thompson 
has  peered  into  the  future,  he  has  seen  things  that  are 
happening  in  that  future,  and  he  has  come  and  told  us  what 
those  things  are." 

Writing  in  The  Journal  of  Electrical  Engineers  many 
years  later,  Dr.  Alexander  Russell  said  of  this  Presidential 


214  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Address :  "  Much  of  the  advice  given  in  it  has  been  adopted 
by  the  Institution." 

At  the  annual  dinner  held  in  December,  Thompson  was 
supported  by  Lord  Kelvin,  Professor  David  Hughes,  Sir 
James  Crichton  Browne,  Sir  William  Roberts  Austen,  Sir 
William  White,  Sir  Henry  Roscoe,  Professor  Perry,  and 
about  250  members.  The  a£ed  Lord  Kelvin  proposed 
the  toast  of  "  Science,"  and  pointed  out  the  advantages 
which  electrical  engineers  had  derived  from  a  knowledge 
of  mathematics.  Sir  W.  Roberts  Austen  and  Sir  Henry 
Roscoe  responded. 

When  the  year  of  presidency  came  to  an  end  Thompson 
was  succeeded  by  Professor  John  Perry,  F.R.S.,  who 
enthusiastically  carried  on  the  idea  of  the  foreign  excursion. 
This  year  the  obvious  place  to  visit  was  Paris,  where  a 
huge  International  Exhibition  was  being  held.  The 
American  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  was  also  con- 
templating an  excursion  to  France,  so  the  two  Institutions 
agreed  to  make  it  a  joint  affair.  There  was  some  fear  on 
the  part  of  a  few  members  that  the  English  Institution 
would  not  be  received  in  a  friendly  manner  by  the  French 
owing  to  our  Boer  War  then  going  on,  which  was  so  un- 
popular in  Europe. 

Happily  these  fears  were  groundless,  for  the  scientific 
men  of  Europe,  gathered  in  Paris  for  numerous  congresses, 
rose  above  the  coldness  felt  towards  Britain  by  those  who 
had  no  international  bond. 

The  President  of  the  American  Institution  was  Professor 
Carl  Hering,  a  man  very  popular  with  English  electrical 
engineers.  A  special  steamer  was  arranged  for,  and  the 
journey  from  London  of  the  two  united  excursions  was  a 
very  lively  one.  Thompson  was  accompanied  on  this 
occasion  by  his  eldest  daughter  Sylvia,  as  well  as  by  his 
wife.  Professor  Ayrton  was  accompanied  by  Mrs.  Ayrton, 
now  an  honorary  member  of  the  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers,  the  first  woman  to  be  admitted,  and  their  two 
daughters.  The  two  families  had  both  chosen  to  stay  in 
the  quieter  part  of  Paris,  the  Quartier  Latin.  The  joint 
meetings  of  the  American  and  English  electricians  were 


INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    215 

held  in  the  Exhibition,  where  each  nation  had  its  special 
pavilion  erected  for  such  and  kindred  gatherings. 

The  whole  of  each  day  was  spent  in  the  Exhibition. 
Meetings  for  discussion  were  held  in  the  mornings,  and  the 
afternoons  were  devoted  to  the  visiting  of  the  electrical 
exhibits  under  the  personal  conduction  of  French,  American, 
or  English  engineers.  There  were  various  receptions  in 
the  later  afternoons,  and  of  course  several  banquets. 

One  of  these  given  by  some  of  the  American  electrical 
engineers  was  a  very  lively  occasion.  In  American  fashion 
the  guests  collected  the  signatures  of  those  present  by 
writing  on  the  back  of  the  menu  cards.  Professor  Perry 
had  unfortunately  been  prevented  from  being  present, 
and  an  empty  seat  marked  his  absence.  In  the  place 
where  his  signature  should  have  appeared,  Thompson 
rapidly  drew  on  each  menu  a  small  caricature  labelled 
"  Professor  Perry's  Ghost."  It  was  really  unmistakably 
like  him,  and  caused  great  amusement. 

In  June  1901  the  Annual  Excursion  of  the  Institution 
was  to  electrical  works  in  Germany.  Thompson  and  his 
wife  were  again  members  of  the  party.  Their  first  halting- 
place  was  Brunswick,  then  they  went  on  to  Berlin,  where 
they  were  most  hospitably  feasted  and  entertained  by 
the  heads  of  the  great  German  electrical  companies,  who 
also  opened  their  works  to  the  inspection  of  the  British 
engineers. 

After  leaving  Berlin  the  excursion  party  visited  Leipzig 
and  Dresden,  and  many  of  them  continued  the  trip  into 
Saxon  Switzerland.  Thompson  was,  however,  obliged  to 
return  to  his  duties  in  London,  and  cut  short  the  merely 
pleasure  part  of  the  excursion. 

In  the  spring  of  1903,  the  anniversary  of  the  death  of 
Volta,  the  Institution  visited  Northern  Italy.  The  Presi- 
dent of  the  year  was  Mr.  Robert  K.  Gray,  one  of  the  most 
generous  benefactors  of  the  Institution. 

Thompson  wrote  several  letters  to  his  wife,  describing 
the  excursion,  as  she  was  unable  to  accompany  him  on  that 
occasion.  He  went  to  Como  via  Zurich,  where  he  spent 
three  days  visiting  works  in  order  to  get  the  latest  informa- 


216  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

tion  about  the  progress  of  dynamo  construction  for  the 
new  edition  of  his  book.  The  weather  was  cold  and  snowy 
in  Switzerland,  and  he  contracted  a  severe  chill,  which 
developed  into  a  mild  influenza  attack  at  Como,  and  much 
hindered  his  enjoyment  of  the  excursion. 
He  wrote  from  Como,  April  2nd : 

"  I  reached  this  place  at  2.30  yesterday,  and  spent  the 
afternoon  on  the  hill-top  above  Brunate  in  the  sunshine — 
a  welcome  change  after  the  snowstorms  and  winds  at 
Zurich.  I  gathered  blue  bell-gentians,  and  periwinkles, 
and  vetches,  and  primroses,  and  green  hellebores.  It  was 
lovely.  In  the  evening  after  dinner  Poggi  looked  in : 
[Cencio  Poggi,  Director  of  the  Como  Museum],  and  I  am 
to  spend  most  of  to-day  with  him.  The  Editor  of  the 
Electrical  Engineer  is  here  ;  and  Blaky  writes  me  that  he 
will  be  here  to-morrow,  so  we  are  gathering  up.  Sir  John 
Wolfe  Barry  was  on  the  train  yesterday — on  his  way  to 
Brindisi." 

"April  4th. 

'"  At  6.30  this  evening  all  our  party  will  arrive,  and  then 
good-bye  to  much  time  for  writing.  The  Municipality  is 
going  to  send  the  city  band  to  greet  us  on  our  arrival  with 
musical  honours,  and  will  play  in  the  square  each  evening. 
We  are  also  to  have  the  square  illuminated  in  honour  of  our 
presence.  Signor  Franchi,  Sindaco  di  Camnago  has  just 
called,  to  talk  over  the  ceremony  of  Sunday  morning,  when 
we  are  to  put  a  wreath  on  Volta's  tomb." 

"April  5th. 

"  This  is  Sunday  afternoon,  and  almost  all  of  our  party 
have  gone  up  to  Brunate,  so  that  the  hotel  is  very  quiet. 
We  had  a  fine,  beautiful  warm  morning  for  the  drive  to  the 
tomb  of  Volta.  Sindaco  and  Signora  Franchi  and  Professor 
Alessandro  Volta  all  asked  after  you,  and  begged  to  send 
their  salutations  to  you.  We  presented  our  wreath,  and  the 
students  (per  Mr.  Hewett)  presented  a  bronze  shield. 

"  Speeches  were  made  by  Mr.  Gray  as  President,  by  me, 
by  Mr.  Gavey,  and  by  Mr.  Hewett.  In  reply  we  had  an 
admirable  speech  from  Sig.  Franchi  and  another  from 
Professor  Volta.  The  excursion  to  the  Valtellina  to  see  the 
electrical  plant  delighted  everybody.  I  did  not  go,  for  I 
was  feeling  shivery  from  a  chill,  caught  in  Zurich — I  think. 
So  I  stayed  in  Como,  kept  warm,  and  took  quinine.  To-day 
I  am  all  right,  I  am  going  to  the  Biblioteca  to  see  a  copy 


INSTITUTION  OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    217 

of  Gilbert's  De  Magnete  that  they  have,  and  then  on  to  the 
Museo  Civico,  where  at  5  o'clock  tea  is  to  be  given  by  the 
Sindaco. 

"  Gray  makes  a  perfect  leader  for  the  party — does  just 
the  right  thing  at  the  right  time,  and  pays  the  utmost 
attention  to  little  details  of  courtesy.  He  speaks  French 
fluently,  and  Italian  a  little.  To-morrow  we  go  on  to 
Milan  via  Varese.  There  we  shall  see  Senatore  Colombo, 
who  has  not  yet  been  with  us." 

In  Page's  Magazine  an  account  was  given  of  the  visit 
of  the  Electrical  Engineers  to  Italy.  It  says,  in  relation  to  the 
ceremony  at  the  tomb  of  Volta  :  "Dr.  Silvanus  P.  Thompson 
then  delivered  an  eloquent  address  in  Italian,  which  was 
listened  to  with  rapt  attention,  and  was  much  appreciated," 
then  follows  "  a  free  translation  "  of  it.  In  his  tribute  to 
Volta's  genius,  Thompson  said  of  him  : 

"  Truly  he  was  more  than  an  inventor  :  he  was  a  scientist 
of  the  first  order,  an  investigator  of  great  genius,  who 
accomplished  many  conquests  in  many  departments  of 
physical  science ;  who  did  many  things,  but  who  touched 
nothing  without  adorning  it." 

His  peroration  was  fine,  and  loses  by  translation : 

"  If  Italy  can  boast  of  the  names  of  Galileo  and  of  Leo- 
nardo da  Vinci,  we  can  also  boast  in  England  of  Gilbert, 
the  father  of  magnetism,  of  Newton,  the  creator  of  natural 
philosophical  mathematics.  You  Italians  have  Volta,  we 
are  proud  of  Faraday.  But  neither  Galileo  nor  Newton, 
nor  Volta,  nor  Faraday  belongs  exclusively  to  one  nation. 
Great  men  of  such  a  kind  belong  to  the  whole  world,  and 
we  pilgrims  of  science  gather  once  more  round  the  tomb  of 
Volta,  great  benefactor  of  humanity,  in  order  to  render  our 
tribute  of  reverent  knowledge  and  of  universal  recognition." 

While  in  Milan  Thompson  and  his  friend,  Mr.  W.  M. 
Mordey,  managed  to  find  time  to  spend  two  evenings  enjoying 
Italian  opera  at  La  Scala. 

The  expedition  to  Paderno  to  visit  the  great  power- 
station,  he  describes  as  follows  : 

"  You  will  remember  Paderno ;  first  we  went  over  a 
big  silk-mill  electrically  driven.  We  had  a  marvellous 


218  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

al  fresco  lunch  in  the  garden  of  the  old  village  hotel,  then 
we  drove  down,  in  ramshackle  brakes,  to  the  place  where  we 
dismounted  and  walked  down  to  the  canal — you  will  re- 
member the  old  canal  of  Leonardo  da  Vinci — and  the 
lovely  walk  all  along  it  through  the  woods  to  the  power- 
house at  Paderno.  The  power-house  is  quite  filled  now  with 
its  set  of  machinery — all  by  Brown — and  looks  magnificent. 
All  our  party  were  delighted  with  it.  Brown  himself  came 
over  from  Baden  for  the  day  to  meet  us." 

"April  11  th. 

"  The  trip  is  over  now,  and  the  party  is  dispersed.  We 
had  a  fine  excursion  to  Vizzola  yesterday,  followed  by  a 
visit  (which  tired  me  much)  to  Tosi's  Engineering  works  at 
Legnano.  However,  I  enjoyed  the  final  banquet  given  by 
the  Associazione  Elettrotecnica  Italiana,  at  which  I  sat 
next  to  Colombo.  It  was  a  great  success.  I  made  a  speech 
in  honour  of  the  two  Associations,  and  of  eternal  amity  of 
nations.  It  was  the  best  I  have  made  in  Italian,  and  I  felt 
quite  at  ease,  very  differently  indeed  from  the  time  four 
years  ago." 

As  he  was  very  weary  and  feeling  far  from  well,  Thompson 
decided  to  spend  Easter  quietly  at  Varese.  He  wrote 
from  there  : 

"  This  is  a  most  lovely  place,  just  between  the  extremities 
of  the  Lakes  of  Maggiore  and  Lugano.  The  view  of  the 
Monte  Rosa  range  across  the  little  Varese  lake  was  most 
exquisite.  My  room  on  the  second  floor  looks  out  over  a 
lovely  garden  with  pines  and  cypresses  and  palms  and 
lemon-trees,  then  the  tranquil  little  lake,  and  again  beyond 
are  low  purple  hills,  above  which  lies 'a  magnificent  pano- 
rama of  snow  summits. 

"  It  has  done  me  a  world  of  good  to  come  to  this  tranquil 
spot  to  rest.  I  have  spent  all  Sunday  quietly  sitting  in  the 
garden,  basking  in  the  blazing  sun.  This  is  the  first  really 
hot  day  that  we  have  had.  I  have  spent  my  time  reading 
Dante  :  the  first  time  I  have  even  tried  to  read  him  in  the 
original — and  he  is  quite  easy  to  follow.  I  have  come  across 
many  interesting  passages,  including  the  one  which  Tennyson 
alluded  to;  '  This  is  truth  the  poet  sings,  that  a  sorrow's 
crown  of  sorrow  is  remembering  happier  things ' : 

"  '  Ed  ella  a  me,  "  Nessun  maggior  dolore 
Che  ricordarsi  del  tempo  felice 
Nella  miseria.' " 


INSTITUTION   OF   ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS    219 

"  I  return  on  Wednesday  for  one  night  to  Milan,  whence 
I  shall  go  to  visit  the  electrical  works  at  Val  Tellina  which 
I  missed.  Then  on  to  Paris  to  meet  M.  Boistel "  (Trans- 
lator of  his  Dynamo  and  Electromagnet). 

In  Paris  he  attended  a  meeting  of  the  Societe  de  Physique, 
and  visited  M.  Curie's  laboratory  for  some  experiments  on 
radium. 

In  1907  Thompson  was  asked  to  be  President  of  the 
Engineering  Section  at  the  British  Association  Meeting  at 
Leicester.  His  address  consisted,  largely,  of  a  plea  for  a 
knowledge  of  pure  science  as  the  best  equipment  of  the 
engineer.  He  also  gave  a  resume  of  what  was  being  done 
at  that  time  for  the  education  of  the  young  engineer, 
rejoicing  at  the  gradual  disappearance  of  the  premium  system. 

"  In  the  engineering  industry,"  he  said,  "  Great  Britain 
is  slowly  following  the  lead  taken  in  America,  Germany, 
and  Switzerland  in  the  recognition  afforded  to  the  value  of 
a  systematic  college  training  for  the  young  engineer,  though 
there  is  still  much  apathy  and  even  distrust  shown  in  certain 
quarters.  Yet  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  stress  of  com- 
petition, particularly  of  competition  against  the  industry 
and  the  enterprise  of  the  trained  men  of  other  nations,  is 
gradually  forcing  to  the  front  the  sentiment  in  favour  of  a 
rational  and  scientific  training  for  the  manufacturer  and 
for  the  engineer.  As  William  Watson,  in  his  '  Ode  on  the 
Coronation,'  wrote  in  a  yet  wider  sense  of  England  : 

'For  now  the  day  is  unto  them  that  know, 
And  not  thenceforth  she  stumbles  on  the  prize; 
And  yonder  march  the  nations  full  of  eyes. 
Already  is  doom  a-spinning.  .  .  .' 

"  Truly  the  day  is  c  unto  them  that  know.5 
"  Knowledge,  perfected  by  study  and  training,  must  be 
infused  into  the  experience  gained  by  practice  :    else  we 
compete  at   very   unequal   odds   with   the   systematically 
trained  workers  of  other  nations.  .  .  . 

"  If  the  institutions,  schools,  colleges,  where  engineering 
training  is  offered  are  but  rightly  developed  and  co-ordinated 
the  engineers  of  Great  Britain  need  have  no  fear  as  to 
holding  their  own  against  the  trained  engineers  of  other 
countries.  It  is  for  the  employers  to  make  use  of  these 


220  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

institutions,  and  to  show  that  sympathetic  interest  in  their 
efficiency  which  is  essential  to  their  full  success." 

Of  his  work  in  the  section  Thompson  wrote  to  his  wife, 
who  was  in  Switzerland  : 

*'  For  the  last  two  days,  I  have  been  very  full  up — tied 
to  the  chair.  The  meeting  of  the  Association  has  been  a 
great  success  ;  all  the  local  arrangements  have  been  wonder- 
fully perfect,  thanks,  mainly,  to  Mr.  Colson's  excellent 
powers  of  organising.  DuddelPs  lecture  on  the  Arc  and 
Spark  in  Wireless  Telegraphy  was  a  most  brilliant  one. 
Lodge  proposed,  and  I  seconded,  the  vote  of  thanks.  Sir 
David  Gill's  presidency  is  the  right  thing  in  the  right 
place.  I  doubt  whether  I  can  get  away  on  Tuesday  from 
Leicester.  The  work  of  the  section  is  going  to  run  over  to 
Wednesday,  and  one  of  my  Vice- Presidents  has  gone  already. 
I  wish  I  were  back  with  you  and  the  girls  at  Wengen." 

During  this  year  Lord  Kelvin  had  been  President  of  the 
Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  for  the  third  time, 
having  held  the  office  in  1874  and  1889.  On  December  17th 
he  died  at  Largs,  aged  eighty-three.  In  memory  of  his 
work,  and  of  his  connection  with  the  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers,  a  Kelvin  Lecture  was  founded,  and  Thompson 
was  asked  to  give  the  first. 

It  was  delivered  on  April  30th,  1908,  and  printed  in  the 
Journal  of  the  Institution,  and  will  be  referred  to  in  a  later 
chapter. 

In  1912  Thompson  gave  to  the  members  of  the  Institution 
another  of  his  important  contributions  to  the  science  of 
Electrical  Engineering.  This  was  on  the  occasion  of  the 
Annual  Summer  Excursion,  which  that  year  was  held  in 
Scotland.  In  Glasgow,  where  there  was  already  a  strong 
local  branch  of  the  Institution,  meetings  were  held  at  the 
Technical  College  and  the  Glasgow  University. 

In  the  latter  building  Thompson  gave  a  lecture  on  "  The 
Magnetism  of  Permanent  Magnets."  In  a  report  of  the 
meeting  in  Electricity  of  June  21st  we  read  : 

"  After  alluding  to  Lord  Kelvin's  work  on  this  subject 
he  proceeded  \o  outline  the  advances  that  had  taken  place 


INTERNATIONAL  CONGRESSES  221 

during  the  last  quarter  of  a  century,  and  the  possibilities  of 
new  alloys  in  the  near  future.  Professor  Thompson's  lecture 
was  one  of  the  most  interesting  papers  of  the  Convention. 
Delivered  almost  without  notes  (they  consisted  of  a  few 
words  written  on  cards,  which  he  held  in  his  hand)  and  with 
a  fluency  and  charm  which  few  lecturers  possess,  he  made 
the  subject  almost  absorbingly  interesting. 

He  spoke  for  an  hour  and  a  half  to  an  audience  which 
contained  some  laymen  and  many  ladies  ;  and  the  address 
was  delivered  with  such  perfection  of  phrasing  that  it 
could  have  been  reprinted  verbatim  without  showing  any 
looseness  or  redundancy.  The  attention  of  the  whole 
audience  was  held  without  intermission  ;  and  the  applause 
at  the  finish  was  more  like  the  usual  appreciation  of  a 
political  oration  than  a  tribute  to  an  exposition  of  so  dry 
and  obscure  a  subject  as  permanent  magnetism." 

For  some  years  Thompson  was  on  the  Committee  of  the 
Institution  for  defining  and  deciding  upon  the  important 
question  of  "  Nomenclature  "  of  which  Mr.  A.  P.  Trotter 
was  chairman.  This  committee  worked  hard,  and  spent 
hours  over  lists  of  definitions,  sifting  all  the  numerous 
foreign  lists. 

The  beginnings  of  the  nomenclature  of  electrical  units 
dated  back  to  a  paper  read  at  the  British  Association  in 
1861  by  Sir  Charles  Bright  and  Mr.  Latimer  Clark.  This 
led  to  the  formation  of  a  Committee  on  Electrical  Standards, 
which  in  the  course  of  its  six  years'  labour  fixed  many  of 
the  important  names,  such  as  ohm,  volt,  coulomb,  etc. 

In  1881-2  the  Paris  Electrical  Exhibition  drew  large 
numbers  of  electricians  to  that  city,  and  the  first  really 
International  Congress  of  Electricity  was  held.  It  was 
formed  of  a  body  of  delegates  sent  officially  either  by 
Government  departments  or  by  scientific  institutions.  The 
foreign  Vice-Presidents  were  Lord  Kelvin,  Signer  Govi,  and 
Professor  von  Helmholtz.  Thompson  was  present,  but  was 
not  a  delegate.  At  this  Congress  the  name  of  the  unit  weber 
was  changed  to  that  of  ampere,  on  the  proposal  of  Von 
Helmholtz.  The  Second  International  Congress,  again  held 
in  Paris,  took  place  in  the  year  1889,  when  there  was  again 
an  Exhibition  going  on.  Thompson  and  his  wife  were  both 


222  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

present,  and  the  President  on  this  occasion  was  Mr.  Thomas 
Alva  Edison,  then  in  the  zenith  of  his  fame. 

In  1891  the  International  Congress  met  at  Frankfort, 
an  account  of  which  has  already  been  given.  Thompson 
was  present  in  Chicago  in  1893,  in  Como  in  1899,  Paris  1900, 
but  not  at  St.  Louis  in  1904,  when  a  new  departure  was 
made  for  securing  the  co-operation  of  the  Electrotechnical 
Societies  of  the  world,  and  the  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers  was  asked  to  undertake  the  inauguration  of  the 
organisation  of  an  Electrotechnical  Commission.  The 
delegates  of  fourteen  countries  were  called  together  in 
1906  under  the  presidency  of  Mr.  Alexander  Siemens.  Lord 
Kelvin  was  elected  first  President  of  the  International 
Electrotechnical  Commission.  Each  country  which  had  an 
Electrotechnical  Committee  had  the  right  to  send  delegates, 
and  each  country  was  represented  equally,  and  had  equal 
voting  power.  The  first  Commission  met  in  London  in 
1908.  Lord  Kelvin  had  died  in  1907,  and  M.  Mascart  of 
Paris,  who  should  have  succeeded  him  as  President,  also 
passed  away  in  August  1908,  so  Professor  Elihu  Thomson 
was  chosen.  In  1910  an  unofficial  conference  was  held  in 
Brussels  under  the  presidency  of  Professor  Eric  Gerard  of 
Liege,  and  a  small  committee  was  formed  to  discuss  inter- 
national nomenclature,  and  to  meet  between  the  times  of 
holding  the  International  Congresses.  Thompson  was 
elected  to  represent  the  British  Committee,  and  the  first 
small  committee  was  held  at  Cologne  in  May  1911.  Dr. 
Budde  came  from  Berlin,  M.  Brunswick  from  Paris, 
Thompson  from  England,  and  M.  Eric  Gerard  from 
Belgium  took  the  chair.  The  agreements  made  then  were 
subsequently  confirmed  at  the  next  meeting  of  the  whole 
commission  at  Turin  in  September  of  the  same  year. 

In  Turin  1911  a  Universal  Exhibition  celebrating  the 
first  fifty  years  of  Italian  autonomy  was  being  held,  also 
the  International  Congress,  at  which  nineteen  countries 
were  represented.  Thompson  and  his  wife  went  there  in 
September,  and  he  was  again  appointed  to  serve  on  a  Jury 
for  scientific  instruments  in  the  Exhibition.  The  Congress 
was  organised  by  the  Italian  Electrical  Society,  and  was 


INTERNATIONAL  CONGRESSES  223 

supported  by  the  International  Electrical  Commission. 
The  membership  was  about  five  hundred,  including  Govern- 
ment delegates  and  those  from  technical  societies.  Pro- 
fessor Elihu  Thomson,  the  President  of  the  Commission, 
was  there,  and  the  Italian  Committee  spared  no  pains  in 
making  the  meeting  a  great  success,  and  also  one  of  social 
pleasure.  Thompson  contributed  a  paper  in  Italian  (de- 
scribed as  lucido  in  the  local  press)  on  Rotating  Transformers. 
It  was  discussed  in  Italian  and  German,  the  proceedings 
being  interpreted  into  French  for  the  benefit  of  those  who 
did  not  understand  the  former  languages.  Many  old 
acquaintances  of  the  Thompsons  were  present,  among  them 
the  venerable  Professor  Pacinotti  and  his  wife. 

At  a  meeting  held  in  honour  of  Pacinotti,  when  a  testi- 
monial was  presented  to  him,  Thompson  made  a  speech  in 
Italian.  It  had  been  due  to  Thompson's  drawing  attention 
in  his  Dynamo  Electric  Machinery  to  the  invention  of  the 
earliest  form  of  ring  dynamo  by  Professor  Pacinotti  that 
the  fame  of  the  latter  had  spread  throughout  Europe,  and 
in  his  reply  speech  the  old  man  acknowledged  this  most 
touchingly. 

Many  of  the  delegates  stayed  in  the  same  hotel,  and 
during  the  blazing  hot  days  of  that  September  frequent 
informal  discussions  went  on  in  the  shady  courtyard,  some 
of  these  lasting  on  into  midnight  or  early  morning  hours. 
The  Congress  will  be  remembered  for  the  great  cordiality 
which  prevailed  among  all  the  delegates. 

Not  long  after  the  Turin  Congress  the  honoured  Professor 
Pacinotti  passed  away  at  Pisa,  where  he  had  lived  and 
worked  for  many  years.  Thompson  had  first  become  ac- 
quainted with  him  at  Pisa  in  1892,  when  he  called  on  him 
at  the  University.  In  his  notes  on  the  visit  he  says  : 

"  Professor  Ant.  Pacinotti  lectures  in  his  nonchalant 
style  to  nine  youths.  He  has,  besides  ordinary  physics,  to 
lecture  on  agricultural  physics  and  hydraulics  twice  a  week. 
No  laboratory  work  either  of  professor  or  students  visible. 
He  showed  me  his  original  machine  of  1860,  also  his  notes 
made  1858-9,  wherein  the  idea  of  the  ring  is  developed,  the 
notion  being  commutation  without  disjunction.  Sketches 


224  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

show  several  devices  for  having  two  circuits  (or  more)  from 
brush  to  brush,  of  which  only  one  at  one  time  broken. 
Original  machine  runs  on  cone-pivots,  and  has  wheel- 
contacts.  It  ran  very  well  with  one  bichromate  cell.  He 
showed  me  Note  D  in  De  la  Hive's  Electricity,  which  he 
said  had  set  him  speculating  in  1858.  He  was  then  but 
just  a  student  helping  his  father." 

Having  always  kept  up  his  interest  in  Pacinotti  and  his 
work,  Thompson  willingly  undertook  the  translation  of  his 
Description  of  a  Small  Electromagnetic  Machine  of  Dr.  Antonio 
Pacinotti  (extract  from  the  Nuovo  Cimento  of  June  1864), 
which  was  bound  up  with  the  French  translation  of  Professor 
Paul  Janet,  the  German  of  Professor  Gisbert  Kapp,  the 
Latin  of  Signor  P.  Rasi. 

In  1912  Thompson  read  a  paper  to  the  Institution  of 
Electrical  Engineers  entitled,  "  The  Aims  and  Work  of  the 
International  Electrotechnical  Commission,"  in  which  he 
gave  an  account  of  what  had  been  done  by  it,  and  of  what 
was  still  to  be  accomplished.  By  that  date  twenty-two 
countries  were  affiliated  to  the  movement.  He  closed  his 
paper  with  these  words : 

"  Last,  but  by  no  means  least,  these  regular  international 
gatherings,  during  which  national  prejudices  are  laid  aside, 
and  at  which  many  lasting  friendships  are  made,  between 
electricians  of  different  nationalities,  must  undoubtedly 
be  a  not  unimportant  factor  in  furthering  the  peace  of  the 
world." 

Professor  Elihu  Thomson  was  succeeded  as  President  of 
the  Electrotechnical  Commission  by  Professor  Budde  of 
Berlin,  the  President  also  of  the  small  committee  which 
met  at  Cologne  in  the  spring  of  1913.  Thompson  was  again 
appointed  delegate  of  the  British  Government  for  the  second 
plenary  meeting  to  be  held  at  Berlin  in  September  of  that 
year.  Colonel  Crompton  wrote  to  him  in  August : 

"  I  hope  you  will  be  able  to  come  to  the  Berlin  meeting. 
You  know  how  much  I  count  upon  you.  I  know  it  is  hard 


INSTITUTION   OF  ELECTRICAL  ENGINEERS   225 

to  interfere  with  your  holidays,  but  you  are  such  a  good 
international  diplomatist  that  your  presence  will  be  of 
great  value  to  us  in  trying  to  get  forward." 

During  that  summer  Thompson  was  spending  his  holiday 
in  the  Alps  with  his  wife  and  daughter  Dorothea,  and  was 
very  loath  to  tear  himself  away.  However,  his  interest 
in  the  international  movement  was  so  strong  that  again, 
and  for  the  last  time  he  took  part  in  one  of  these  great 
gatherings  of  electricians.  During  1914  he  again  revisited 
Germany  to  attend  the  small  committee  of  five  delegates 
under  the  Presidency  of  Dr.  Budde  of  Berlin,  who  soon 
after  retired  from  office.  Then  the  outbreak  of  the  great 
European  War  put  an  end  to  all  international  gatherings. 


15 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  GILBERT  CLUB  :  THE  LIBRARY  AND  LITERARY 
EXCURSIONS 

"Gilbert  shall  live  till  loadstones  cease  to  draw, 
Or  British  fleets  the  boundless  ocean  awe." 

So  sang  Dryden,  commemorating  the  great  Elizabethan 
doctor,  who  in  his  day  had  been  the  subject  of  two  savage 
couplets  from  the  pen  of  the  Oxford  epigrammatist,  John 
Owen  (Andoenus),  and  of  whom  it  was  written  in  the 
History  of  the  Worthies  of  England  (endeavoured  by  Thomas 
Fuller,  DJX,  London,  1662): 

"  Such  was  his  loyalty  to  the  Queen,  that,  as  if  unwilling 
to  survive,  he  dyed  in  the  same  year  with  her  in  1603.  .  .  . 

"  Mahomet's  tomb  at  Mecha  is  said  strangely  to  hang  up, 
attracted  by  some  invisible  Loadestone  ;  but  the  Memory 
of  this  Doctor  will  never  fall  to  the  Ground,  which  his  incom- 
parable book  De  Magnete  will  support  to  Eternity." 

Despite  the  brilliancy  of  the  fame  accorded  to  Dr.  William 
Gilbert  by  his  contemporaries,  not  only  in  England,  but 
throughout  the  then  civilised  world,  his  work  so  great  and 
so  original,  was  strangely  lost  sight  of  in  subsequent  genera- 
tions. Silvanus  Thompson  did  his  best  to  revive  the  fame 
of  "the  father  of  electrical  science,"  and  loved  to  do  honour 
to  the  memory  of  the  man  who  "  built  up  a  whole  experi- 
mental magnetic  philosophy  on  a  truly  scientific  basis,  in 
place  of  the  vague  and  wild  speculations  which  had  pre- 
viously been  accepted,"  and  who  "in  an  age  when  the 
fantastic  philosophies  of  the  schoolmen  still  prevailed  .  .  . 
calmly  worked  out  the  inductive  method  of  reasoning  from 
the  known  to  the  unknown,  trying  his  arguments  by  the 
touchstone  of  experiment." 

226 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  227 

Undoubtedly  Thompson  himself  was  profoundly  influenced 
by  the  reading  of  Gilbert's  work.  His  Elementary  Lessons 
from  the  first  page  onwards  contained  many  references  to 
Gilbert's  discoveries,  and  the  popular  lecture,  "The  Earth 
a  Great  Magnet,"  which  he  delivered  in  a  number  of  cities 
up  and  down  the  country  in  the  early  eighties,  dealt  with 
Gilbert's  greatest  discovery. 

In  1882  he  became  possessed  of  a  copy  of  that  treasured 
rarity  :  De  Magnete  Magneticisque  Corporibus,  et  de  Magno 
Magnete  Tellure  ;  PJiysiologia  noua  plurimis  <&  argumentis, 
&  experimentis  demonstrata.  Guelielmi  Gilberti ;  Colces- 
trensis  Medici  Londinensis.  Londini  Excudebat  Petrus 
Short  Anno  MDC. 

Ultimately  he  possessed  five  copies  variously  bound,  one 
with  the  cross  of  the  Inquisition  burnt  blackly  into  the 
edges  of  its  leaves.  The  "  library "  copy,  besides  being 
unusually  large  and  clean,  bore  on  the  title-page  the  signa- 
ture "  W.  Barlow,"  suggesting  that  the  volume  was  perhaps 
the  presentation  copy  to  Gilbert's  contemporary  and 
intimate  friend,  the  venerable  Archdeacon  of  Salisbury, 
author  of  Magneticall  Advertisements,  London,  1616,  which 
work,  together  with  his  other  writings,  found  a  place  in  the 
unique  collection  illustrative  of  the  history  of  magnetism 
and  electricity,  which  Thompson  gradually  amassed,  and 
in  which  he  took  increasingly  eager  delight  as  years  went  on. 

Enthusiasm  is  infectious.  Amongst  others  devoted  to 
the  study  of  this  worthy  was  Thompson's  friend  Mr.  Conrad 
W.  Cooke,  who  in  1889  wrote  an  article  in  Engineering 
entitled  "William  Gilbert  of  Colchester."  The  author 
described  himself  as  "  an  Honorary  Secretary  of  the  Gilbert 
Club."  He  quoted  from  Barlow's  Magneticall  Advertise- 
ments : 

"  Many  of  our  nation,  both  Gentlemen  and  others  of 
excellent  witts  and  louers  of  these  knowledges,  not  able  to 
read  Doctor  Gilbert's  booke  in  Latin  haue  bin  (euer  since 
the  first  publishing  thereof)  exceeding  desirous  to  haue  it 
translated  into  English,  but  hitherto  no  man  hath  done  it, 
neither  as  yet  goeth  about  any  such  matter,  whereof  one 
principall  cause  is  that  there  are  very  few  that  understand© 


228  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

his  booke,  because  they  haue  not  load-stones  of  diuers  formes, 
but  especially  round  ones.  .  .  . 

"  A  second  cause  may  be  for  that  there  are  diuers  wordes 
of  art  in  the  whole  course  of  this  booke  proper  to  this  subject, 
and  fitt  to  the  explication  of  his  figures  and  diagrammes 
which  cannot  be  understood,  but  by  the  helpe  of  the  Mathe- 
maticks  and  good  trauelling  in  the  Magneticall  practice." 

Thus,  though  already  desired  in  Gilbert's  life-time,  no 
translation  into  any  modern  language  was  made,  and  the 
book  itself  became  very  scarce,  never  being  reprinted  after 
1638.  Cooke's  article  continued  : 

"  We  are  happy  to  say,  however,  that  this  reproach  upon 
our  scientific  patriotism  will  very  soon  be  removed.  .  .  .  We 
are  approaching  the  tercentenary  of  De  Magnete,  and,  with 
the  object  of  celebrating  the  event,  a  Gilbert  Club  has 
recently  been  formed,  having  for  its  first  President  Sir 
William  Thomson. 

"  In  accordance  with  the  first  and  principal  object  of  the 
club,  we  are  glad  to  state  that  the  translation  of  De  Magnete 
is  well  in  hand,  and  will  be  printed  and  '  got  up  '  in  such  a 
manner  as  to  be  as  like  the  original  in  appearance  as  it  can 
be  made  ;  it  will,  in  fact,  be  a  facsimile  reprint  in  every- 
thing, except  the  language  in  which  it  is  reproduced." 

It  was  out  of  the  interest  of  these  two  friends  Cooke  and 
Thompson  that  the  Gilbert  Club  arose.  They  gathered 
together  a  small  group  of  scientific  men,  including  Mr. 
Latimer  Clark,  F.R.S.,  who  possessed  what  was  then  the 
finest  English  collection  of  electrical  books.  Having  the 
support  of  a  number  of  influential  names,  including  im- 
portant officials  of  the  Royal  College  of  Surgeons,  the  Royal 
Institution,  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers,  and 
The  Physical  Society,  they  were  permitted  to  hold  the 
Inaugural  Meeting  of  the  Club  at  the  Society  of  Arts  on 
November  28th,  1899,  and  henceforth  the  success  of  the 
publication  of  the  translation  of  the  De  Magnete  was  assured. 

They  were  successful  in  enlisting  the  support  of  several 
prominent  citizens  of  Colchester,  Gilbert's  birth-place,  one 
of  whom,  Mr.  Henry  Laver,  F.S.A.,  became  Treasurer  to  the 
Club. 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  229 

The  two  enthusiasts  became  honorary  secretaries,  together 
with  Professor  Meldola,  who  shared  also  this  enthusiasm  of 
his  colleague  and  friend;  and  in  later  years  they  were 
assisted  by  Mr.  H.  B.  Wheatley,  F.S.A.,  the  Bibliographer, 
the  possessor  of  many  books,  and  a  fellow-member  of  the 
"Sette  of  Odd  Volumes." 

The  actual  labour  of  translation  of  different  sections  of 
the  book  was  carried  out  by  ten  different  persons,  on  two 
of  whom,  the  Rev.  W.  C.  Ho  well,  M.A.,  and  Thompson, 
the  work  of  revision  and  correction  for  the  press  mainly 
devolved. 

The  Gilbert  Club  was  in  no  sense  a  social  body  ;  it  never 
met  as  a  whole  ;  most  of  its  activities  were  carried  on  in 
writing  in  a  casual  manner,  as  may  be  gathered  from  the 
following  letter : 

"  ATHENA UM  CLUB, 

"  September  2lat,   1891. 

"  MY  DEAR  BROTHER  SILVANUS, 

"  I  am  very  much  obliged  to  you  for  sending  me 
your  little  memoir  of  Sturgeon.  It  is  very  interesting,  and 
particularly  so  to  me. 

"  I  am  quite  sure  that  in  the  Day  of  Judgment  there  will 
arise  a  perfect  cloud  of  witnesses  to  give  expert  evidence 
on  your  behalf  of  good  tkings  you,  in  your  life-time,  have 
done  for  them,  whether  before  or  after  they  had  left  this 
world.  I  expect,  when  this  combustible  shall  have  put  on 
incombustibility  (gazing  through  a  powerful  asbestos 
telescope  with  lenses  of  alum),  to  see  a  great  procession 
going  forth  to  meet  you,  to  present  their  gifts,  Gilbert  leading 
the  mighty  throng  with  his  Terrella,  Reis  carrying  a  bung 
covered  over  with  the  skin  of  a  German  sausage,  Sturgeon 
with  an  electro-magnet,  Koenig  with  a  tuning-fork,  while 
S.  A.  Varley  l  will  be  running  up  and  down  with  a  six- 
shooter,  complaining  that  the  range  is  too  great  to  get 
at  you. 

"  Two  things  I  think  will  interest  you  ;  first,  that  I  have 
Dr.  Leigh's  copy  of  Sturgeon's  Scientific  Researches  (Bury, 
1850)  "Presented  to  John  Leigh,  Esq.,  in  token  of  sincere 
friendship  and  esteem  by  the  Author."  It  is  an  edition  de 
luxe  printed  on  thick  paper,  a  wide  margin,  and  very  hand- 
somely bound  in  russia  with  the  inscription  on  the  side. 
1  See  Chap.  XIV,  page  292. 


230  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Second,  that  there  is  one  slight  error  in  your  memoir,  namely, 
that  Sturgeon's  Reprint  of  Barlow  was  in  facsimile  ;  I  am 
writing  with  the  little  book  before  me,  and  it  is  rather  com- 
monly got  up,  and,  with  the  exception  of  the  letter  from 
Gilbert  to  Barlow,  even  the  spelling  is  modernised.  .  .  . 

"  What  is  happening  to  Gilbert's  book  ?  We  really  ought 
to  do  something  for  the  subscribers.  It  will  soon  be  two 
years  since  our  inaugural  meeting,  and  twenty  months  since 
the  last  meeting,  and  some  of  the  subscribers  have  already 
paid  their  subscriptions. 

"  How  do  matters  stand  ?  and  when  shall  we  have  some- 
thing to  show  ? 

"  With  my  very  kind  regards  to  you  and  Mrs.  Thompson, 
"-Ever  very  sincerely  yours. 

"  CONRAD  WV  COOKE." 

Though  the  Club  had  not  in  1916  wound  up  its  affairs  by 
disposing  of  the  few  remaining  copies  of  the  translation,  its 
life  virtually  ceased  when  the  volumes  were  distributed  to 
the  subscribers  in  1900,  just  three  centuries  after  the  publica- 
tion of  the  original. 

The  publication  was  anticipated  by  some  years  by  the 
appearance  in  New  York  in  1893  of  a  translation  by  Dr.  P. 
Fleury  Mottelay.  This  was,  however,  but  a  small  volume, 
and,  though  the  work  of  a  keen  bibliographer  of  electrical 
and  magnetical  sciences,  lacked  the  charm  of  the  luxurious 
facsimile  edition. 

While  editing  the  De  Magnete  Thompson  became  im- 
mensely interested  in  critical  discussion  of  the  texts,  and 
in  the  innumerable  allusions  to  men  and  things,  concerning 
which  he  tracked  down  further  information,  sought  out 
quotations  from  the  authorities  referred  to  by  Gilbert,  and 
published  his  researches  in  a  companion  volume  to  the 
translation,  under  the  title,  Notes  on  the  De  Magnete  of  Dr. 
William  Gilbert.  It  was  in  folio,  and  so  could  be  bound  in 
with  the  translation,  being  very  similarly  "  got  up,"  and, 
like  it,  a  limited  edition  privately  printed. 

In  the  course  of  these  ten  years  of  work  at  the  translation 
Thompson's  interest  betrayed  itself  more  or  less  publicly 
in  various  directions  :  first  in  the  appearance  of  a  small 
volume,  Opusculum  No.  XXII.  of  the  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes, 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  231 

Gilbert  of  Colchester  :  an  Elizabethan  Megnetizer,  issued  to 
the  members  of  the  Sette  by  their  Brother  Magnetizer  in 
1890.  Then  that  summer,  to  arouse  local  interest,  he 
delivered  at  Colchester,  to  The  Essex  Field  Club,  a  lecture, 
published  in  1891  as  one  of  the  articles  on  "  Essex  Worthies  " 
in  The  Essex  Naturalist,  "  William  Gilbert,  of  Colchester, 
Founder  of  the  Science  of  Electricity,"  illustrated  with  cuts 
and  a  portrait,  of  which  more  anon. 

In  1899  he  was  to  lecture  at  the  Royal  Institution.  Sir 
Frederick  Bramwell  wrote  : 

"  I  am  very  glad  that  you  fall  in  with  our  suggestion  of 
giving  a  course  of  two  Lectures,  in  the  forthcoming  After- 
Easter  Session. 

"  '  The  Myths  of  the  Magnet,'  in  these  days  of  allitera- 
tion, is,  no  doubt,  a  taking  title. 

"  I  see  your  difficulty  as  regards  the  Volta  Centenary 
at  Como,  and  I  believe  that  at  the  present  time  I  could  shift 
your  two  days  ;  .  .  .  but  I  certainly  do  not  wish  to  lose  the 
valuable  services  of  a  '  live  '  electrician  of  your  standing,  for 
the  sake  of  a  dead  one,  born  100  years  ago.  ..." 

Thompson  duly  lectured  on  The  Myths  of  the  Magnet ; 
it  had  taken  a  Gilbert  to  dispel  such  beliefs  as,  e.g.,  that 
the  magnet  refuses  to  act  in  the  presence  of  a  diamond,  or 
if  touched  with  garlic  ;  or  that  the  variation  of  the  compass 
is  due  to  imaginary  lodestone-mountains  like  those  described 
in  the  Arabian  Nights. 

Thompson  spent  a  great  deal  of  time  hunting  up  traces 
of  the  pedigree  and  arms  of  the  Gilbert  family  at  the  College 
of  Arms,  and  searching  for  portraits,  one  of  which  he,  at  a 
later  period,  discovered  and  purchased  from  an  antiquarian 
bookseller  in  London,  a  small  full-length  oil-painting  on  a 
wooden  panel ;  he  believed  it  to  be  a  genuine  portrait,  and 
found  no  other.  He  made  enquiries  at  Oxford  for  the 
Bodleian  portrait  of  which  there  existed  prints  which  he 
himself  used  to  illustrate  his  booklets  ;  but  the  painting 
itself  disappeared  some  hundred  years  ago,  removed  on 
account  of  its  dilapidated  condition,  and  the  then  general 
indifference  to  its  subject, 


232  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

In  1903  the  tercentenary  of  the  death  of  Queen  Elizabeth 
was  celebrated  in  London .  In  March  the  Royal  Geographical 
Society  held  an  exhibition  illustrating  the  progress  of 
geographical  enterprise  in  her  reign  ;  to  this  Thompson 
contributed  a  collection  of  "  Gilbertiana."  At  a  public 
gathering  discourses  were  read  by  distinguished  men  of 
learning  ;  Thompson  gave  a  short  address  on  "  William 
Gilbert  and  Terrestrial  Magnetism  in  the  Time  of  Queen 
Elizabeth  "  (which  was  afterwards  printed  as  a  booklet), 
wherein  he  claimed  that  "  To  the  names  of  the  men  who 
made  great  the  age  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  who  added  lustre 
to  the  England  over  which  she  ruled,  and  made  it  famous 
in  foreign  discovery,  in  sea-craft,  in  literature,  in  poetry,  and 
in  drama,  must  be  joined  that  of  the  man  who  equally  added 
lustre  in  science." 

Colchester  celebrated  the  Gilberd  Centenary  with  full 
civic  honours.  Thompson  was  invited  to  the  city  in 
September  1903,  and,  under  the  Presidency  of  Sir  Mount- 
stuart  Grant  Duff,  F.R.S.,  G.C.S.I.,  attended  by  the  Mayor 
and  Council  in  state,  delivered  a  lecture  in  the  ancient  Moot 
Hall,  illustrating  his  discourse  by  lantern  slides,  and  by 
repetitions  of  some  of  Gilberd's  experiments. 

The  electricians  of  the  country,  as  represented  by  the 
Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers,  did  formal  honour  to 
the  "Father"  of  their  science  on  December  10th,  1903, 
three  hundred  years  after  his  death.  The  Institution  had 
raised  a  fund  to  purchase  a  picture  painted  some  years 
earlier  by  Mr.  A.  Acland  Hunt ;  at  the  suggestion  of  Sir 
Benjamin  Richardson  he  had  depicted  Dr.  Gilberd  in  the 
act  of  showing  his  electrical  experiments  to  Queen  Elizabeth 
with  Drake  and  Raleigh  and  her  Court ;  this  picture  was 
now  presented  to  the  Mayor  for  the  Borough  of  Colchester, 
to  be  placed  in  the  Town  Hall,  there  "  to  maintain  and 
extend  the  fame  and  memory  of  Gilberd."  The  following 
summer  the  Council  of  the  Institution  paid  a  visit  to  the 
borough  to  be  present  at  the  unveiling  of  the  picture. 

Thompson  was  the  prime  mover  in  all  these  arrangements, 
and  was  most  generously  supported  by  the  President  for  the 
year,  Mr.  R.  K.  Gray.  From,  an  absentee  member  of  the 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  233 

Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  he  received  the  following 
letter  : 

"  I  should  not  have  liked  to  have  been  left  out  in  the  cold, 
so  please  accept  my  thanks  for  having  given  me  the  oppor- 
tunity to  stand  with  others. 

"  And  now  let  me  tender  you  my  congratulations  on  the 
success  of  your  efforts.  I  know  it  has  been  to  you  a  work 
of  great  love,  and  that  nothing  will  have  given  you  greater 
pleasure  than  in  thus  honouring  the  name  of  one  to  whom 
the  science  owes  so  much,  and  who,  but  for  yourself,  would 
scarcely  have  been  known." 

All  that  Gilbert  had  left  in  print  concerning  his  researches 
was  contained  in  a  single  chapter  in  the  second  book  of  his 
De  Magnete.  This,  reprinted  from  the  version  prepared  by 
the  Gilbert  Club,  with  notes  added  by  Thompson,  and  a 
reproduction  of  the  Colchester  picture,  was  issued  for  the 
Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  as  a  booklet,  beautifully 
printed  at  the  Chiswick  Press,  which  Thompson  employed 
for  all  this  work. 

His  Gilbert :  Physician,  also  privately  printed  the  same 
year,  was  a  brief  history  of  the  doctor's  professional  life, 
compiled  from  facts  obtained  by  literary  researches,  and 
supplementary  to  the  already  existing,  but  scanty  bio- 
graphical notices.  Thompson  had  searched  the  records  of 
the  Royal  College  of  Physicians  determined  that  no  trace 
should  escape  his  experienced  eye,  and  in  his  researches 
had  interested  several  members,  who  took  pleasure  in  the 
celebrations,  and  appreciated  the  little  volume. 

Nowhere  were  these  literary  achievements  of  Thompson 
more  appreciated  than  in  the  circle  of  "Ye  Sette  of  Odd 
Volumes."  Witness  this  letter  of  Dr.  John  Todhunter  : 

"  January  4th,  1904 

"DEAR  BRO.  SILVANUS, 

"  Best  wishes  for  the  New  Year  and  many  than 
for  your  Christmas  Card — very  artistic  in  design  as  usual. 
Thanks  also  for  your  very  dainty  pamphlet  on  Gilbert  of 
Colchester,  which  both  Mrs.  Todhunter  and  I  have  read 
with  very  great  interest.     You  have  managed  to  put  your 


234  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

materials  together  in  a  manner  that  rounds  off  the  too  scanty 
story  of  his  life,  while  giving  peeps  of  himself  and  his  sur- 
roundings which  give  a  pleasant  fillip  to  the  imagination  of 
the  reader  to  bring  from  the  '  dark  backward  and  abysm 
of  time '  a  ghostly  picture  of  the  worthy  doctor  in  his  habit 
as  he  lived.  I  like  his  indignant  support  of  the  experimental 
method  in  science." 

Everything  about  Gilbert  interested  Thompson.  The 
Jubilee  Meeting  of  the  Essex  Archaeological  Society,  happen- 
ing in  the  summer  of  1903,  was  held  in  Colchester,  and  at 
it  he  read  a  paper  on  "  The  Family  and  Arms  of  Gilbert  of 
Colchester,"  showing  a  surprising  familiarity  with  wills  and 
title-deeds,  heraldry  and  coats  of  arms. 

At  the  Oyster  Feast  at  Colchester,  about  a  year  later,  the 
Tercentenary  was  still  being  celebrated,  the  outgoing  Mayor. 
Mr.  Ernest  H.  Barritt,  presenting  to  the  company  a  souvenir 
pamphlet,  embodying  reproductions  of  Acland  Hunt's 
picture,  the  portrait,  illustrations  from  the  De  Magnete,  and 
other  features  of  interest.  Thompson,  who  by  this  time 
must  almost  have  become  a  familiar  civic  figure,  was  present 
as  the  guest  of  the  Mayor,  and  shared  with  Sir  Norman 
Lockyer  the  honour  of  responding  to  the  toast,  "  Science." 

At  Oxford  Thompson  had  stirred  up  a  little  dust  in  search 
for  Gilbert's  portrait.  At  Cambridge,  Gilbert's  University, 
there  appeared  to  be  no  visible  trace  of  him,  though  he  had 
been  for  some  months  Senior  Bursar  at  St.  John's  College 
before  entering  upon  his  foreign  travels,  and  his  studies  in 
Italy.  Before  1898  not  a  vestige  of  Gilbert's  handwriting 
was  known  to  exist  ;  but,  when  a  signature  was  unearthed 
at  the  Record  Office,  it  was  reproduced  and  sent  by  Thomp- 
son to  various  libraries  where  papers,  bearing  it,  might 
be  supposed  to  exist.  Four  such  were  subsequently  found 
in  the  books  of  St.  John's  College,  and  Thompson  did 
not  delay  going  to  Cambridge  to  see  them.  At  the 
British  Museum  there  was  much  material  in  which  the 
mention  of  his  name  might  possibly  be  found.  Thompson 
wrote  to  make  inquiries  about  the  Hardwicke  Papers,  and 
was  informed  by  Mr.  F.  G.  Kenyon,  of  the  British  Museum, 
who  was  his  correspondent  in  these  matters,  that  ; 


THE   GILBERT   CLUB  235 

"  There  are  quantities  of  State  and  private  papers  here 
of  the  Elizabethan  period,  especially  in  the  Cotton  and 
Lansdowne  collections  ;  but  to  search  through  all  of  them, 
on  the  chance  of  finding  William  Gilbert's  name,  would  take 
up  more  time  than  the  results  would  be  likely  to  justify. 
On  the  other  hand,  if  one  has  his  name  in  mind,  one  may 
light  upon  it  while  searching  for  other  things.  His  name 
occurs  sometimes  in  the  index  to  the  Domestic  State  Papers, 
published  by  the  Record  Office  ;  but  the  mentions  of  him 
do  not  seem  to  be  important.  .  .  . 

"  We  have  the  drawing  by  Camden  of  Queen  Elizabeth's 
funeral  procession,  together  with  a  coloured  enlargement  of 
it  recently  left  to  the  Museum  by  Baron  Ferdinand  Roths- 
child. We  have  just  been  putting  both  on  view  in  one  of 
the  show-cases,  as  being  of  special  interest  at  the  present 
time.  Gilbert  does  not,  however,  appear  in  them,  and,  as 
the  figures  are  clearly  not  portraits,  it  would  not  help  much 
if  he  did.  There  is  one  group  entitled  '  clerks  of  parliament 
and  doctors  of  medicine,'  which  may  contain  him,  but  the 
individual  names  are  not  given. 

"  If  I  should  come  across  any  mention  of  Gilbert  I  will 
let  you  know." 

Thompson  possessed  himself  of  a  copy  of  this  "  Procession," 
and  used  to  point  to  one  figure  in  the  group  of  physicians  as 
being  remarkably  like  the  portrait  of  Dr.  Gilbert. 

He  was  very  frequently  in  the  reading-room  of  the 
British  Museum,  comparing  the  library  copy  with  his  own 
latest  acquisition,  or  with  an  entry  in  some  catalogue  of 
rare  books,  of  which  multitudes  reached  him  from  all  quar- 
ters of  the  globe,  as  well  as  from  Tregaskis  and  Quaritch 
of  London.  Mr.  Bernard  Quaritch  was  an  "  Odd  Volume," 
and  took  personal  interest  in  Brother  Magnetizer's  library. 

Latimer  Clark's  collection  of  books  was  placed  at  his 
disposal : 

May  1893. 

"DEAR  SILVANUS  THOMPSON, 

"  I  have  looked  out  in  my  library  a  list  of  works 
prior  to  1600,  which  treat  of  the  magnet  and  lodestone,  and 
I  have  put  a  tick  to  those  which  I  think  worth  looking  at. 
They  are  unfortunately  rather  numerous,  but  they  are  all  in 
my  own  room,  and  very  easily  referred  to,  and  I  have 


236  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

indicated  on  the  cover  the  pages  at  which  the  notices  are  to 
be  found,  so  that  a  glance  at  them  would  show  you  what 
there  is  of  interest  in  them.  It  would  take  you  an  hour 
or  two  to  glance  at  the  whole  of  them. 

"  In  addition  to  those  on  the  list  there  are  some  others 
which  are  named  in  the  printed  pamphlet  enclosed. 

"  I  am  always  at  your  disposition,  etc. 

"  LATIMER  CLARK." 

Amongst  other  Elizabethan  collections  which  Thompson 
searched  was  that  of  the  Cecils  ;  by  permission  of  Lord 
Salisbury,  he  was  allowed  access  to  certain  papers  in  the 
Library  at  Hatfield  House  to  which  he  had  some  clue,  and 
where  he  thoroughly  enjoyed  his  expedition  and  found 
some  reward  for  his  labours. 

His  opportunity  to  make  more  of  his  work  known  in  London 
came  to  him  shortly  before  the  Tercentenary,  when  he  was 
invited  to  give  a  course  of  two  Saturday  afternoon  lectures 
at  the  Koyal  Institution.  He  wrote  to  Sir  William  Crookes  : 

"  MR.  Y writes  me  that  you  suggest  as  a  title  for 

my  two  lectures  '  Science  in  the  Days  of  Shakespear.'  But 
why  drag  in  Shakespear  ?  I  shall  be  expected  to  discourse 
on  the  Botany,  Astronomy,  and  Alchemy  of  the  Shakes- 
pearean plays — and  that  is  outside  my  ambit.  I  don't 
object  to  '  Magnetism  in  the  Days  of  Queen  Elizabeth  '  ; 
but  I  should  give  a  slight  preference  to  something  such  as 
the  following : 

"  'The  De  Magnele  and  its  Author. 

"'(i)  The  Book. 

"'(ii)  The  Man.' 

"  If  you  would  accept  the  former,  I  should  be  satisfied  ; 
but  I  rather  wanted  the  second  of  the  two  lectures  to  be 
devoted  particularly  to  some  personal  account  of  Dr.  Gilbert. 
I  have  unearthed  a  good  deal  about  him  in  the  last  two 
years.  , 

"  I  am  off  to  Italy  to-morrow  night :  please  reply  to 
Hotel  Bauer-au-lac,  Zurich,  where  I  shall  be  on  Sunday. 
[An  excursion  with  the  I.E.E.] 

"  P.S. — That  Radium  should  have  a  -f  temperature  of 
1J  deg.  centig.  above  surroundings  is  most  inexplicable.  I 
always  expected  it  would  have  a  slight  minus  temperature 
to  account  for  energy  flowing  into  it  from  the  environment, 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  237 

and  so  keep  up  its  activity   in  emitting  radiations.     It  is 
most  marvellous — if  substantiated." 

Sir  William  replied : 

"  MY   DEAR  SlLVANUS, 

"  Certainly,  we  would  not  on  any  account  ask  you 
to  lecture  under  a  title  to  which  you  have  the  least  objection. 
I  have  at  once  adopted  your  proposal,  and  will  announce 
the  lectures.  .  .  . 

"  I  am  being  torn  to  pieces  by  wild  newspaper  men, 
each  with  a  sillier  question  than  the  other.  Yesterday 
I  had  a  succession  all  day  long  !  Fortunately  I  was  out 
most  of  the  time.  Also  I  am  having  applications  from 
amateur  chemists  in  the  country,  asking  for  the  loan  of  a 
gramme  or  two  of  Radium. 

"  I  hope  you  will  enjoy  this  fine  weather  abroad.  I 
suppose  you  are  staying  over  Easter." 

Thompson  found  a  good  many  people  who  enjoyed 
being  "  helpful "  in  his  hunts.  His  book-loving  friends, 
many  of  whom  caught  something  of  his  interest  in  Gilbert, 
wrote  to  him  of  any  traces  or  clues  they  lit  upon.  One,  a 
biographer  of  Galileo,  wrote  from  Italy  of  his  inquiries 
and  researches  among  the  Galileo  relics,  and  the  archives  of 
Florence,  Padua,  and  Venice  for  the  papers  of  Gilbert's 
friends,  Fra  Paolo  Sarpi  and  Giovanni  Francesco  Sagredo. 
It  was  clear  from  the  De  Magnete  that  Gilbert  had  been  very 
familiar  with  Italian  science,  and  was  himself  as  well  known 
to  them  as  his  work,  of  which  Galileo  wrote  in  high  praise. 
When  in  Italy  with  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers, 
Thompson  found  time  to  explore  the  MSS.  of  the  Ambrosiana 
at  Milan,  and  on  his  way  home  saw  the  Perigrinus  at  Paris 
in  the  Bibliotheque  Nationale,  and  when,  in  1912,  he  found 
himself  again  in  Florence,  he  spent  a  good  deal  of  time  in 
the  Medici  library  pursuing  the  early  history  of  magnetism. 

In  Germany  Gilbert  had  found  an  admirer  in  Gustav 
Hellmann,  whose  bibliographical  notes  were  published  in 
America  ;  with  him  Thompson  kept  in  touch  in  this  interest 
for  over  twenty  years,  the  Hand  List  of  his  Library  sent  to 
Berlin  in  July  1914  being  the  last  link  in  their  friendship. 


238  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Across  the  Atlantic  there  were  other  enthusiasts  with 
whom  Thompson  kept  up  an  intermittent  exchange  of 
news.  Prominent  among  these  were  Brother  Potamian  (M.  F. 
O'Reilly)  of  Manhattan  College,  who  prepared  the  biblio- 
graphical catalogue  of  The  Latimer  Clark  collection,  pre- 
sented to  the  American  Institute  of  Electrical  Engineers  as 
"  The  Wheeler  Collection  "  ;  also  Mr.  W.  D.  Weaver,  con- 
nected with  the  same  library,  who  wrote  to  ask  Thompson's 
aid  in  the  compilation  of  the  catalogue,  as  he  considered 
"  that  no  one  else  in  this  world  has  an  equally  extensive  or 
exact  knowledge  of  the  subject  "  ;  and  Dr.  P.  F.  Mottelay, 
translator  of  the  De  Magnete.  Already  in  May  1903  the 
last-named  wrote  to  Thompson  : 

"  Goodness  me — still  at  Gilbert !  I  thought  he  had  been 
thoroughly  done  for.  You  certainly  are  a  delver,  and 
should,  indeed,  be  well  rewarded.  I  can  appreciate  what  it 
is  to  go  through  such  MSS." 

The  following  are  three  particular  instances  of  varied 
interest,  illustrating  the  manner  of  Thompson's  "  delving." 

In  1902  he  was  hotly  pursuing  Gilbert's  signature.  When 
passing  to  or  from  the  British  Museum  Library  he  used  to 
drop  in  at  the  workshop  of  Mr.  Douglas  Cockerell,  the 
bookbinder,  in  a  turning  off  Museum  Street.  There  he 
would  handle  some  of  the  interesting  old  books  that  came  to 
the  master-hand  for  repair,  and  there  he  took  several  of  his 
own  treasures  for  treatment  or  binding.  Mr.  Cockerell 
wrote  to  him  one  day  of  having  bought,  for  the  sake  of  its 
binding,  an  old  copy  of  Aristotle's  Stageritce  de  Naturali 
Auscultatione,  etc.,  dated  1542,  with  the  name  of  William 
Gilbert  amongst  others  on  the  title-page,  and  with  many 
marginal  notes.  Thompson's  enthusiasm  was  aroused. 
The  book  was  sent  to  him,  and  he  took  it  to  Cambridge, 
and  established  from  the  records  of  St.  John's  College  the 
authenticity  of  the  signature  beyond  any  doubt.  He  was 
also  able  to  identify  the  names  noted  at  the  end  in  Gilbert's 
handwriting  as  being  those  of  students  at  the  college  at  the 
time  of  his  Bursarship.  Some  of  the  marginal  notes  were 


THE  GILBEET  CLUB  239 

in  his  hand,  others  in  that  of  (Archdeacon)  Thomas  Drant, 
whose  autograph  was  on  the  same  page  with  Gilbert's.  It 
was  with  great  delight  that  he  established  the  identity  of 
the  book  as  Gilbert's  own  Aristotle,  and  with  equally  great 
joy  that  he  became  a  little  later  its  proud  possessor. 

An  earlier  excursion  had  taken  him  within  the  portals 
of  the  Bibliographical  Society,  where  he  read  a  paper  on 
"  The  Printers  at  the  Sign  of  the  Brazen  Serpent,  more 
especially  Peter  Short,"  and  stated  his  quest  thus  : 

"  Upon  the  title-page  of  the  De  Magnete  there  stands  a 
device  of  a  serpent  entwined  around  a  T-shaped  support, 
which  is  held  upright  by  two  clasped  hands  emerging  from 
rounded  masses  of  cloud.  The  design  is  executed  in  a  rather 
coarse  woodcut.  It  is  not  accompanied  by  any  explana- 
tion. .  .  . 

"  What  had  this  serpent  to  do  with  Gilbert's  De  Magnete  ? 
So  far  as  I  was  aware  none  of  the  myths  of  the  magnet  were 
connected  with  the  serpent.  It  could  not  be  part  of  Gilbert's 
armorial  bearings  :  for  these  were  known.  .  .  .  Could  it 
have  anything  to  do  with  Gilbert's  office  as  President  of  the 
Royal  College  of  Physicians  ?  The  caduceus,  so  often  used 
as  the  emblem  of  medicine,  required  two  serpents  entwined 
around  a  wand  ;  but  here  was  one  serpent  coiled  upon  a 
tau.  Lastly,  could  it  be  a  printer's  Mark  ?  " 

He  found  the  solution  eventually  in  the  British  Museum. 
He  described  his  researches  to  Mr.  T.  Bailey  Saunders,  then 
studying  Melanchthon,  in  a  letter  which  led  to  the  following 
correspondence  : 

"  March  Uth,  1907. 

"  DEAR  BAILEY  SAUNDERS, 

"  Your  remark  that  Erasmus  adopted  as  his  arms 
the  Brazen  Serpent,  explained  to  me  a  thing  that  I  noted 
as  a  mystery  ten  years  back,  and  which  has  remained  so 
till  now. 

"  Ten  years  ago  I  went  serpent-hunting,  i.e.,  I  tried  to  find 
the  significance  of  the  serpent  on  the  tau  which  is  imprinted 
on  the  title-page  of  Gilbert's  De  Magnete.  I  found  the 
immediate  solution  beyond  all  doubt  that  it  was  the  mark  of 
the  printer,  Peter  Short.  The  Bibliographical  Society  pub- 
lished my  research,  of  which  I  send  you  a  copy.  But 
incidentally  I  found  a  mystery  (see  p.  10),  that  one  Vincen- 


240  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

tius  Valgrisi  in  Venice,  and  his  successor  Felici  Valgrisi, 
who  used  a  serpent  mark,  described  their  books  as  being 
printed,  or  issued,  dal  segno  (TErasmo.  I  never  could  fathom 
this  collection,  which  was  unintelligible.  Could  you  refer 
me  to  your  authority — not  that  I  doubt  it,  for  it  is  abun- 
dantly clear — for  the  fact  that  Erasmus  adopted  this  device 
for  his  Waff  en  ?  I  want  to  know  the  year,  and,  if  possible,  his 
reasons  for  this  choice. 

"  Believe  me, 

"  Yours  most  sincerely, 

"SiLvs.  P.  THOMPSON." 


"  EASTBOUBNE, 
"  April  5th,  1907. 

DEAR  SILVANUS  THOMPSON, 

"  I  propose  to  come  to  town  on  Monday  next  for  one 
night  to  search  once  more  in  the  B.M.  reading-room 
before  the  bees  and  drones  there  are  expelled  from  that 
hive  at  the  end  of  the  week,  and  compelled  to  supplicate 
for  desks  in  other  parts  of  the  building.  Among  other  things 
I  want  to  settle  the  question  which  you  have  vexed  and 
ventilated,  of  the  serpent  on  the  tau  ;  I  want  to  get  out  all 
the  first  editions  I  can  of  Melanchthon  and  Erasmus,  and  see 
whether  the  theory  is  correct  that  it  is  only  a  printer's  mark, 
and  not  the  heraldic  device  of  either  of  them.  Could  you 
spare  an  hour  or  two  in  this  holiday  season,  on  Monday 
afternoon,  to  share  in  the  search  ?  Your  experience  and 
interest  in  the  subject  would,  I  confess,  be  of  much  advantage 
to  me  ;  and  perhaps  I  might  be  fortunate  enough  to  hear 
you  pay  the  same  compliment  to  me  ! 

"  I  observe  by  a  letter  in  The  Times  some  days  ago  that 
you  are  again  being  put  up  for  election  by  Convocation  to  the 
Senate.  I  sincerely  hope  that  you  have  been  already  elected, 
or  will  soon  be  so.  .  .  . 

"  Yours  ever  sincerely, 

"  T.  BAILEY  SAUNDERS." 


A  day  or  two  later  it  was  announced  that  at  an  election 
at  the  Athenaeum  Club,  under  Rule  2,  by  which  every  year 
a  few  persons  distinguished  in  Art,  Literature,  Science,  or 
Public  Service  are  specially  elected  members,  Silvanus  P. 
Thompson  was  one  of  the  three  to  secure  that  greatly  prized 
honour. 


THE   GILBERT  CLUB  241 

"  April  Wth,  1907. 

"DEAR  BAILEY  SAUNDEES, 

"  The  brazen  S — p — T,  that  is  for  the  moment  my 
alter  ego,  and  not  '  il  segno  d'Erasmo  ' — feels  quite  three 
digits  added  to  his  stature  at  the  congratulations  that  have 
been  pouring  in  upon  him.  Amongst  them,  yours,  buon 
amico  mio.  I  hope  not  long  hence  to  fraternise  with  you 
again,  not  at  the  sign  of  Erasmus,  but  at  the  sign  of  the 
Owl — non  invita  Minerva,  that  is  to  say.  [The  head  of 
Minerva  is  the  crest  of  the  Athenaeum  Club.] 

"  Now  you  ask  me  what  is  my  '  final  conclusion '  as  to 
the  meaning  of  the  phrase  dal  segno  d'Erasmo.  Well,  really, 
my  final  conclusion  is  still  far  distant.  Far  distant,  because 
(by  reason  of  my  Royal  Institution  lecture  next  Saturday) 
I  can't  go  again  to  the  B.M.  this  week  ;  and,  as  the  Reading- 
room  will  be  closed  for  six  months,  and  as  it  will  take  me 
perhaps  a  fortnight  to  hunt  up  all  the  books  printed  by 
Valgrisius,  I  may  be  able  perhaps  by  October  26  to  draw 
a  judgment,  possibly  a  final  one.  At  present  my  firm 
conviction  is  that  il  segno  d'Erasmo  was  the  designation  of 
the  officina  of  Vincentius  Valgrisius  :  why  so  I  don't  know  ; 
and  whether  it  was  symbolised  by  a  brazen  serpent  hanging 
on  a  tau  I  don't  know. 

"  I  suddenly  remembered  an  hour  ago  that  I  possess — 
an  heirloom  from  my  grandfather — a  copy  of  Erasmus' 
Encomium  Morice,  with  the  etched  illustrations  of  Holbein. 
I  looked  it  out,  for  as  some  of  the  cuts  are  unpresentable 
virginibus  puellisque  I  keep  it  in  a  locked  cupboard.  It  is 
'  MflPIAZ  EFKHMION.  Stultiticise  Laus  .  Des  .  Erasmi 
Rot.  Declamatio.  Figuris  Holbinianis  adornata.  Basilise 
MDCLXXVI.'  Pretty  late !  A  copper-plate  title-page, 
followed  by  an  ordinary  printed  one.  Then  comes  a  dedica- 
tion-page to  Colbert  with  an  engraved  head-piece  in  the 
middle  of  which  is  emblazoned  a  serpent ;  thus  :  [sketch]. 

"  He  is  not  suspended  on  a  tau.  Whether  these  are  the 
arms  of  Colbert  I  know  not.  It  is  not  a  printer's  mark,  for 
the  book  is  imprinted  '  Typis  Genathianis,'  and  the  printed 
title-page  has  an  astronomical  device  (as  a  mark)  of  an 
eclipse,  with  the  words  :  '  Patitur  nee  dissolvitur.'  Fancy 
the  moon  being  down  on  her  luck,  and  suffering  yet  resolute  ! 

"  I  have  a  note  that  in  Bagford's  Collection  of  title-pages 

in  the  B.  M.  there  is  an  exquisite  engraved  figure  of  Erasmus 

(in  copper-plate)  as  title  to  the  Colloquice  in  an  Amsterdam 

edition  printed  by  Guili.  Janson  (MDCXXI  ?) — in  Bagford's 

16 


242  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

volume  ix,  p.  23,  no.  142.  You  should  see  it.  But  it 
throws  no  light  on  the  great  serpent  problem,  which  re- 
maineth  still  '  wrop  in  mistry.' 

"  Ever  truly  yours  :  " 
[Signed  by  a  serpent  twining  to  make  S.  P.  upon  a  T]. 

These  letters  serve  to  show  the  thoroughness  with  which 
detail  was  pursued,  and  with  what  delight.  To  the  reprint 
of  the  paper  on  "  Peter  Short "  by  the  Bibliographical 
Society,  Thompson  appended  his  apologia  in  a  footnote  : 

"  This  paper  is  of  the  nature  of  a  literary  incursion.  One 
who,  whatever  his  experience  in  navigating  other  regions, 
has  without  compass  or  pilot,  without  sailing  orders,  with 
no  charts  save  the  Catalogue  of  the  British  Museum,  ventured 
forth  into  the  archipelago  of  Elizabethan  literature  must 
indeed  be  rash.  If  he  does  not  meet  with  deserved  ship- 
wreck, he  must  at  least  apologise  for  his  unwarranted 
adventure." 

The  De  Magnete  aroused  Thompson's  interest  in  gems. 
Besides  the  "  electric  "  amber  and  "  magnetic  "  loadstone 
there  were  others  of  which  Gilbert  wrote,  and  many  others 
which  he  knew  to  be  prized  by  the  ancients  for  their  virtues. 
For  further  enlightenment  in  this  particular  field,  Thompson 
turned  to  the  orientalists.  He  had  some  correspondence 
with  an  old  member  of  the  Society  of  Telegraph  Engineers 
resident  at  Teheran,  there  engaged  upon  the  works  of  three 
Persian  lapidaries,  and  delighted  to  send  notes  of  scientific 
interest  concerning  certain  stones. 

On  another  occasion  he  applied  to  Dr.  Murray  of  the 
Oxford  Dictionary,  and  received  by  return  post  a  reply 
written  on  the  back  sheet  of  this  note : 

"  DEAR  DR.  MURRAY, 

"  Can  you  tell  me  whether  the  word  vincentina  occurs 
in  English  as  the  name  of  a  mineral  ?  It  is  used  in  Latin,  by 
Dr.  Gilbert,  as  a  synonym  for  '  gemma  Vencentii  rupis  "  — 
the  Bristol  diamond  so  called — found  near  St.  Vincent's 
rocks  at  Clifton. 

"  Believe  me, 

"  Yours  very  truly, 

"  SILVANUS  P.  THOMPSON." 


THE  LIBRARY  243 

"DEAR  PROFESSOR, 

"  We  have  no  trace  of  the  term  Vincentina  in  Eng- 
lish, though,  not  having  yet  reached  V,  it  is  not  possible  to 
say  what  may  or  may  not  turn  up  in  the  meantime.  But 
the  term  is  not  in  Chester's  Dictionary  of  Names  of  Minerals, 
the  latest  and  fullest  known  to  me,  nor  among  the  synonyms 
in  Dana's  Index.  The  latter  would  indeed  condemn  the 
word  at  once  as  irregularly  formed,  since  he  ejects  all  names 
in  -ine  as  fancy  names,  not  scientific.  All  mineral  species 
are  named  in  -ite.  But  a  variety,  merely  popularly  recog- 
nised, like  serpentine,  might  retain  -ine,  and  in  this  respect 
'  vincentine,'  if  it  had  any  distinctive  meaning,  might  be 
allowed.  The  man  who  knows  best  about  mineral  names  is 

L.  F .    Ask  him. 

"  Yours  very  truly, 

"  J.  A.  H.  MURRAY." 

Thompson's  library  contained  a  number  of  books  on  the 
subject  of  gems  ;  amongst  the  earliest  of  its  printed  treasures 
was  an  anonymous  work,  Lapidarium  omni  voluptate  refertum, 
printed  in  Vienna  about  1506  by  Winter  burger,  the  owner 
of  one  of  the  earliest  presses  in  Vienna,  whose  books  are  much 
sought  after.  Of  later  date  there  were  Robert  Boyle's 
Essay  about  the  origine  and  virtues  of  Gems  ;  von  Franken- 
berg's  Magnetisches  Edelstein,  a  very  rare  book  unknown 
in  several  of  the  best  collections  ;  and  van  Helmont's  Ortus 
medicinw,  published  in  Amsterdam  in  1648,  and  particularly 
cherished  by  its  owner  for  its  accounts  of  the  Magnetic  Cure 
of  Wounds,  and  the  Magic  of  Amber. 

Thompson  wrote  and  read  several  lively  essays  on  such 
subjects  as  The  Virtues  of  Gemmes  and  Flies  in  Amber  at 
the  "  Odd  Volumes  "  and  the  "  Portfolio  Society,"  where 
the  literary  rather  than  the  scientific  outlook  was  pre- 
dominant. 

A  reference  in  the  De  Magnete  to  the  letter  of  Peter  the 
Pilgrim  set  Thompson  upon  yet  another  quest.  In  the  first 
of  his  "  Tyndall  Lectures  "  at  the  Royal  Institution  in  1907 
he  gave  to  the  public  the  results  of  his  labours  on  the  works 
of  Petrus  Peregrinus,  or  Pierre  de  Maricourt  of  Picardy,  a 
wandering  soldier  of  fortune  of  the  thirteenth  century.  In 
spite  of  his  profession  he  was  a  student  of  magnetism,  possess- 


244  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

ing,  for  that  early  date,  remarkable  scientific  method,  as  set 
forth  in  his  manuscript  Epistola  de  Magnete  in  1269. 

Only  twenty-eight  copies  of  his  manuscript  are  known  to 
exist.  Thompson  was  familiar  with  the  one  in  the  British 
Museum,  which  was  interesting  for  the  annotations  and 
explanatory  diagrams  by  the  hand  of  the  astrologer  Dr. 
John  Dee  (the  subject  of  yet  another  of  Thompson's  bio- 
graphical essays),  who  told  how  the  sailors  in  the  North  Sea 
used  to  keep  their  lodestone  locked  up  as  long  as  known 
land  was  in  sight,  and  took  it  out  to  toucji  the  compass 
needle  when  on  the  open  sea. 

The  Thompson  Library  copy  of  the  MS.  was  an  Italian  one 
of  the  fourteenth  century,  and  had  been  in  the  Library  of 
Prince  Boncompagni,  and  used  as  the  basis  of  the  printed 
version  by  Padre  Bertelli  in  the  sixteenth  century.  This 
printed  work  is  even  rarer  than  the  MS.  Thompson's  copy 
came  from  the  library  of  the  same  Prince,  and  was  the 
only  copy  not  in  public  collections.  He  had  another 
imperfect  English  MS.,  which  was  reproduced  in  facsimile 
by  Quaritch,  printed  in  black  with  the  red  and  blue  capitals 
of  the  original,  a  style  adopted  by  Thompson  in  the  printing 
of  his  translation,  except  that  the  coloured  lettering  was  all 
to  be  done  by  hand.  Thompson  himself  rubricated  a 
number  of  copies  in  leisure  minutes  during  winter  evenings, 
and  when  away  on  short  winter  holidays  at  Bath  or 
Torquay.  The  little  volume  was  privately  issued  by  the 
translator. 

The  British  Academy  published  a  memoir  on  P.  Pere- 
grinus  from  a  paper  Thompson  read  before  that  body  in  1 907, 
of  which  the  following  letter  from  Sir  William  Huggins,  the 
astronomer,  President  of  the  Royal  Society,  is  an  appre- 
ciation. 

"MY  DEAR  PROF.  THOMPSON, 

"  Many  thanks,  indeed,  for  the  welcome  gift  of  a  copy 
of  your  British  Academy  paper  on  Peter  P. 

"  One  is  at  a  loss  whether  more  to  admire  the  wideness  of 
your  scientific,  literary,  and  artistic  interests  and  powers, 
or  your  ability  of  microscopic  concentration  in  the  un- 
ravelling of  the  obscure  and  the  involved.  Of  all  this  your 


U)e  Sette  ot  ©fcfc  iDolumcs.  ,,/ 


:!Brotber  Stlvanus  p»  Ubompson,  ff»1R*£.t  on 
"  ff  lies  in  Ember." 


244] 


^NY;,:  .  •-  -; 

•*  l    r  c     ..  "    i       '    *       v  *         *  -ti^k**5' 


THE   LIBRARY  245 

paper  is  a  notable  illustration ;   which,  besides  on  its  own 
account,  is  of  great  interest." 

Thompson  followed  up  the  history  of  the  compass  from 
the  days  of  Peter  P.,  and  in  1913,  on  the  occasion  of  the 
International  Congress  of  Historical  Studies  held  in  London, 
when  he  represented  the  Royal  Society  on  the  Executive 
Committee  called  by  the  British  Academy  for  making  the 
necessary  preparations,  he  read  at  one  of  the  sectional 
meetings  of  the  Congress  a  paper  on  "The  Origin  and 
Development  of  the  Compass  Card  "  (Rosa  Ventorum).  He 
had  then  been  working  some  ten  years  at  the  subject,  and 
had  amassed  a  collection  of  compass-cards  dating  from 
1640  onwards ;  as  the  earliest  in  existence  date  from  1584 
his  collection  was  pretty  thoroughly  representative.  When 
giving  the  Odd  Volumes  an  evening  on  the  subject  in  1907 
he  wrote  to  Conrad  Cooke  : 

"  I  am  hoping  to  greet  you  to-morrow  night  at  the 
Dinner,  and  write  to  ask  whether  of  your  goodness  of 
heart  you  would  kindly  bring  round  with  you  your  Chinese 
Compass,  which  it's  a  beauty  and  didn't  owe  to  be  kept 
for  ever  in  the  dusk  and  Cimmerian  darkness  of  your  study. 
I  have  lots  of  compass-cards — but  never  a  Heathen  Chinee. 

"  Ever  fraternally, 

"  YE  MAGNETIZER." 

"  To  THE  MOST  NOBLE, 

AND  RIGHT  REVD. 

YE  MECHANICS." 

In  his  library  he  collected  a  number  of  old  treatises  on 
navigation  by  the  compass,  and  a  specimen  of  those  rare  old 
sailing  maps  with  decorative  wind-roses.  Amongst  his 
treasures  in  this  category  was  a  work  of  Blondus,  De  Ventis 
et  Navigations  Libellus,  printed  in  Venice  in  1546,  an 
excessively  rare  book,  containing  directions  for  sailing 
out  into  the  open  ocean  to  the  New  World.  The  wind-rose 
depicted  had  only  twenty- six  points  instead  of  the  thirty- 
two  of  the  ordinary  mariner's  compass,  and  was  unique. 
Another,  Mark  Ridley's  own  copy  with  marginal  notes  and 
corrections  of  his  Short  Treatise  of  Magneticall  Bodies  and 
Motions  published  in  1613,  contained  an  early  map  of 


246  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

Australia  ;  and  a  third  variety,  Maister  Thomas  Blundevile 
His  Exercises  .  .  .  in  the  Arte  of  Navigation  had  a  Wind- 
rose  and  told  of  the  legends  of  Flavio  Gioia  and  the  Lode- 
stone  Rock.  A  companion  volume  on  The  Theoriques  of 
Seuen  Planets  published  in  1602,  contained  as  addendum 
an  account  of  Gilbert's  work,  which  was  annotated  in  hand- 
writing, possibly  that  of  the  learned  doctor  himself. 

Thompson's  collection  of  books  was  of  particular  interest 
to  only  a  limited  circle,  but  its  fame  became  known  in 
America,  where  old  books  are  rarer  than  in  England.  Dr. 
Mottelay  came  to  England  in  1909,  and  visited  Thompson 
at  "  Morland  "  in  order  to  see  the  books?.  He  wrote  : 

"  I  have  not  yet  quite  recovered  from  my  agreeable 
surprise  at  your  very  extensive  collection  of  early  magnetical 
and  electrical  literature.  I  arrogate  to  myself  properly, 
the  right  to  say  that  I  know  as  much  as  '  the  next  man  ' 
does — Dr.  O'Reilly  not  excepted — about  the  Latimer  Clark 
collection,  which  I  have  handled  again  and  again,  and  I  will 
maintain,  and  can  very  easily  prove,  that  yours  surpasses 
the  latter  far  more  than  the  Clark  does  the  Ronalds  [collection 
in  the  possession  of  the  English  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers]  in  many  particulars.  You  not  only  have  practi- 
cally what  they  have,  but  you  can  claim,  what  the  others 
cannot,  that  your  collection  embraces  several  examples  of 
many  different  varieties  and  numerous  singularly  attractive 
bindings,  the  like  of  not  one  of  which  latter  can  be  found  in 
Latimer  Clark's. 

"  You  are  certainly  to  be  envied,  and  I  heartily  con- 
gratulate you.  I  think  so  much  of  your  collection  that  I 
shall  unselfishly  add  to  it  wherever  I  can.  .  .  .  When  I  am 
on  the  Continent  I  will  remember  that  you  want  more 
particularly  an  Affaydatus  .  .  .  but  not  another  1628 
Gilbert !  " 

Dr.  Mottelay  afterwards  became  more  familiar  with 
Thompson's  library,  and  rendered  him  very  considerable 
service,  especially  in  the  preparation  of  his  Hand  List,  printed 
in  1914,  when  he  had  decided  that  he  would  part  with  the 
collection  of  upwards  of  900  old  and  scarce  books  of  earlier 
date  than  1825,  should  he  find  some  institution  of  learning 


THE  LIBRARY  247 

or  science  desirous  to  possess  it.  It  seemed  most  likely 
that  this  would  be  across  the  Atlantic. 

After  his  death  a  movement  was  set  on  foot  by  his  friends 
among  the  Electrical  Engineers  to  purchase  his  books  for 
the  Institution,  and  when  this  was  carried  through  the 
collection  became  known  as  the  Silvanus  P.  Thompson 
Memorial  Library,  and  should  be  fitly  housed  in  the  Institu- 
tion Buildings  on  the  Thames  Embankment. 

At  "  Morland  "  the  books  were  not  arranged  in  a  fashion 
adequate  to  their  worth.  The  library,  built  for  a  billiard- 
room,  was  in  the  basement  at  the  back  of  the  house,  with  a 
large  bow  window  opening  to  a  flight  of  stone  steps  out  of  the 
area  up  to  the  garden,  green  in  summer  with  its  screen  of 
trees  and  creeper-covered  gables.  Inside,  the  whole  of  the 
walls  from  floor  to  ceiling  was  lined  with  books  and  papers. 
The  8,000  pamphlets  were  in  lockers  round  the  walls,  above 
books  and  below  books.  The  woodwork  was  only  black 
enamelled  deal,  but  in  the  panel  of  each  of  the  locker  doors 
Thompson  had  pasted  a  richly  coloured  Japanese  design, 
which  lent  a  certain  distinctive  air  to  the  shelves.  Most 
of  the  old  books  were  at  one  end  of  the  room,  and  their 
bindings  attracted  the  eye  at  once.  Over  the  fireplace  was 
a  large  painting  of  a  double  rainbow.  The  tables,  benches, 
cabinets,  window-ledges,  and  even  much  of  the  floor-space 
were  piled  with  scientific  periodicals  and  catalogues,  accu- 
mulations of  correspondence,  portfolios  into  which  were 
sorted  matter  relating  to  some  chapters  of  a  book  under 
construction  or  revision,  or  some  patent  case  seeking  his 
support  in  the  law  courts,  or  the  calculations  of  some 
practical  work  done  at  the  College.  His  private  secretaries 
used  to  work  there  intermittently.  The  room  was  never 
desecrated  by  the  housemaid's  duster,  and  was  generally 
referred  to  as  "  chaos  "  by  the  irreverent  younger  generation, 
who  did  not  fathom  its  method  ;  it  was  distinctly  a  place 
in  which  the  master  must  not  be  disturbed,  except  for  some 
very  grave  reason,  or  to  receive  the  good-night  salutation 
if  he  happened  to  be  there  at  bed-time. 

The  smaller  "  study  "  upstairs,  leading  out  of  the  drawing- 
room  held  a  good  many  of  the  most  choice  books  of  the 


248  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

collection,  as  well  as  shelves  full  of  theological  and  philo- 
sophical works. 

Thompson's  books  were  his  friends ;  he  knew  such  an 
extraordinary  number  in  an  almost  personal  way,  and  his 
pencil  left  comments  and  notes  on  fly-leaf  and  margin.  His 
book-plate  was  of  his  own  design,  with  the  family  coat  of 
arms  as  its  main  feature.  Many  of  the  books  were  treasured 
for  more  than  the  interest  of  the  contents,  some  being 
associated  with  his  particular  heroes  of  science.  For 
example  :  there  was  Sturgeon's  Course  of  Twelve  Lectures 
on  Galvanism,  with  an  autographic  dedication  by  the  author, 
the  only  piece  of  Sturgeon's  writing  Thompson  ever  found  ; 
these  books  had  belonged  to  Faraday,  with  his  book  ticket 
in  them,  one  his  own  autograph  copy  of  his  Experimental 
Researches  ;  his  De  Viribus  Electricitatis  of  Galvani  was 
Volta's  copy  with  "  ex  dono  auctoris  "  on  the  title-page  in 
his  handwriting.  Then  there  were  Descartes'  copy  of 
Galileo's  Dialogue  de  Systemate  Mundi  with  the  signature 
"  Cartesius,"  and  marginal  notes  in  his  handwriting  ;  and 
two  books  of  Ampere's  bearing  his  inscription.  One  book 
had  belonged  to  S.  T.  Coleridge,  another  bore  the  bookplate 
of  the  Penn  family  of  Pennsylvania,  a  first  edition  this,  of 
Franklin's  Experiments  and  Observations  on  Electricity ; 
and  yet  another  was  specially  chosen  out  for  the  sake  of 
its  printer's  mark,  the  Aldine  Anchor  in  one  of  its  rarest 
forms. 

There  were  other  books  in  these  lockers  ;  some  choice 
work  of  William  Morris,  printed  at  the  Caxton  Press  in  a 
style  Thompson  greatly  admired  and  imitated  in  his  booklets ; 
portfolios  of  trial  sheets  ;  books  on  printing  and  bookbinding 
and  the  care  of  books.  Another  little  collection  of  books, 
on  the  Legend  of  the  Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin,  and  other  rat 
episodes,  included  his  own  Opusculum ;  for  this  was  the 
subject  of  yet  another  paper  to  the  Sette,  being  an  account 
of  his  own  researches  as  to  the  origin  of  the  Piper  tale.  He 
loved  mysteries,  among  others  that  of  Edwin  Drood, 
speculative  literature  concerning  which  was  represented  on 
his  shelves. 

His  Piper  volume  has  a  frontispiece  picture  of  the  Pied 


THE    SETTE   OF   ODD  VOLUMES  249 

Piper  by  John  Hassall,  the  "  Limner  "  of  the  Sette,  and  has 
also  this  prefatory  page. 

"  An  Odd  Volume  of  a  Set  of  Books  bears  not  the  value  of  the  pro- 
portion to  the  perfect  set." — BENJAMIN  FRANKLIN. 

"DE  TE  FABULA  NABBATUB 

"  DE  TE — of  thee  thyself,  magnetic  Brother 
(And  well  the  Sette  wots  it  can  be  no  other), 
FABULA — the  Story — here  retold  anew — 
NABBATUR — runs,  though  now  no  tale,  but  true." 

[Added  after  the  reading  of  the  paper  printed  as  Opusculum  LIU.  ] 
"  To  His  ODDSHIP,  THE  MAGNETIZEB 

"Nay,  nay,  dear  Oddship,  theory  won't  avail — 
For  'neath  thy  sway  our  senses  have  grown  riper ; 
And  now  we  know  the  meaning  of  the  Tale  : 
We  play  the  Children's  part,  and  thou'rt  the  Piper. 

E.  S." 

This  illustrates  the  mariner  in  which  the  Sette  was  accus- 
tomed to  embellish  the  menu  and  programme  of  the  evening's 
entertainment,  with  caricatures,  and  apt  quotations  or 
original  rhymes.  One  form  of  versification  in  particular 
was  much  affected  for  some  years,  of  which  the  above  is  an 
example.  These  "  Quatrains  "  were  collected  for  distribu- 
tion to  the  Sette  in  1904  (the  year  of  Thompson's  Oddship — 
Presidency). 

When  he  was  elected  President,  Thompson  had  been  a 
member  of  the  Sette  some  fourteen  or  fifteen  years,  during 
which  he  had  not  only  supported  many  of  his  predecessors 
with  papers  and  discourses,  but  thoroughly  enjoyed  those 
of  others  and  played  his  part  in  the  discussions  and  speech- 
making,  and  the  thrust  and  parry  of  wit  in  the  good  company 
of  the  "odd  "  persons. 


"  Odd,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  sense  of  being  each  unlike  the 
other,  unlike  in  craft,  thoroughly  individual  in  our  unlikeness, 
each  unmatched — or  matchless,  if  you  prefer  it  so — yet  all 
united  in  a  common  possession  of  literary  tastes.  Each  of 
us  is  fond,  but  each  in  his  own  way,  of  books  ;  and  has  his 
own  special  bookinesses.  Some  of  us  love  books  for  what 
we  find  in  them  for  intellectual  food  or  spiritual  companion- 


250  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

ship  ;  some  for  good  paper  and  fine  printing  ;  some  for  the 
beauty  of  their  illustrations  ;  some  for  the  splendour  of  their 
binding  ;  some  for  literary  or  personal  associations  with 
them  or  their  authors  ;  some  for  the  book-plates  to  be  found 
in  them  attesting  their  pedigrees." 

The  Presidency  was  to  Thompson  quite  a  serious  affair, 
as  may  be  gathered  from  his  address  to  the  Brethren,  whom 
he  described  in  the  above  quotation. 

"  Once  a  month  we  meet  as  a  united  Sette  upon  the  shelves 
of  our  library,  to  find  our  respective  individualities  all  the 
.more  appreciated,  because,  the  more  individual  we  become, 
the  more  perfectly  do  we  each  fill  his  own  niche  upon  the 
shelf.  Our  sette  is  a  little  microcosm  which  the  more  truly 
represents  the  great  world  without,  the  more  diverse,  that  is 
the  more  odd,  we  its  constituent  items  may  be.  We  are 
all,  as  living  individuals,  filled  with  individual  aims  and 
ambitions,  we  have  objects  in  life,  literary  or  artistic  aspira- 
tions, hobbies,  and  tastes  ;  we  all  have  axes  to  grind  and 
logs  to  roll.  And  in  the  midst  of  a  wicked  and  ungrateful 
world,  where  literature  quarrels  with  science,  where  science 
despises  art,  where  art  mocks  at  learning,  where  learning 
spurns  amusement,  and  amusement  tends  more  and  more 
to  flout  art,  literature,  and  science,  there  is  much  need  for 
such  a  microcosm  which  the  world  might  well  regard  as  the 
image  of  what  it  should  itself  be.  For  in  the  perfect  Sette 
we  reverse  all  this.  To  heighten  and  exalt  literature,  it  must 
be  associated  with  art.  To  ennoble  art,  it  must  be  inspired  by 
poetry  or  nature-study  or  antique  lore.  To  honour  science, 
it  must  be  given  a  literary  setting.  To  music,  to  history, 
to  poetry,  to  painting,  to  travel,  to  the  drama,  to  the 
majesty  of  jurisprudence  and  to  the  constructive  arts,  the 
perfect  Sette  accords  its  welcome.  They  all  contribute 
toward .  the  rounded  conception,  the  harmonious  whole. 
Rightly  then,  coming  once  a  month  to  eat  at  our  common 
table,  we  mix  Mutual  Admiration  with  our  Conviviality 
(using  the  word  in  its  nobler  sense  of  knowing  how  to  live 
together),  and  enjoy  them  both  the  more  in  that  we  share 
them  both  with  those  guests  who  honour  us  with  their 
company,  and  learn  the  inner  meaning  of  our  mutual  bond." 

The  catholicity  of  Thompson's  friendships  might  be 
gathered  from  the  guests  he  brought  to  the  meetings ; 


THE   SEITE   OF    ODD   VOLUMES  251 

besides  his  family  on  Ladies'  Nights,  and  many  of  his 
scientific  colleagues,  he  introduced  on  different  occasions 
such  distinguished  guests  as  Lord  Alverstone,  Lord  Bryce, 
Sir  Francis  Carruthers  Gould ;  and  the  late  American 
Ambassador,  Dr.  Page,  accepted  his  invitation  to  one  of 
the  ordinary  meetings. 

But  Thompson  considered  that  "it  is  not  our  habit  of 
hospitality,  not  our  practice  of  conviviality,  not  our  breezy 
atmosphere  of  mutual  admiration  that  will  secure  immor- 
tality. By  our  permanent  contributions  to  the  literature  of 
England  we  shall  stand  or  fall."  He  was  not  satisfied  that 
their  efforts  should  end  in  the  publication  somewhat  irregu- 
larly of  "  Year  Bokes  that  chronicle  in  delightful  literary 
form  "  the  proceedings  of  the  evening  gatherings,  and 
occasional  Opuscula,  though  many  of  these  were  literary 
jewels. 

"  The  very  smallness  of  the  jewel  is  its  glory.  But  the 
jewel  must  be  genuine,  clear,  rightly  cut,  brightly  polished, 
well  set."  "  True  philosophy  neglects  not  the  small  for  the 
great."  "  The  less  ambitious  in  letters  is  often  the  more 
successful.  For  my  own  part,  I  prefer  Wordsworth's 
*  Sonnet  on  Westminster  Bridge '  to  his  '  Excursion,' 
Keats' s  '  Ode  to  the  Nightingale '  to  his  '  Lamia '  or 
'  Isabella '  ;  Tennyson's  '  Tears,  Idle  Tears '  to  the 
'  Idylls  of  the  King '  ;  Browning's  '  Pied  Piper '  to  his 
4  Sordello.'  ...  I  may  be  wrong,  but  I  prefer  the  sonnet 
called  '  Renouncement '  of  Mrs.  Meynell  to  the  whole  of 
William  Morris's  poems  :  I  had  rather  have  written  Matthew 
Arnold's  '  Scholar  Gypsy  '  or  his  '  Thyrsis  '  than  Byron's 
'  Childe  Harold.' ' 

He  reminded  them  that  the  early  members  of  the  Sette 
had  hoped  to  produce  from  time  to  time  some  greater  opus 
to  place  alongside  the  little  volumes,  the  Opuscula,  valuable 
as  some  of  these  were.  "  Behind  the  burlesque  ceremonial 
of  the  Sette  are  hidden  the  sterner  realities  of  its  literary 
being  :  we  have  learned  with  Horace  to  mix  a  little  folly 
with  our  wisdom  ;  to  play  the  fool  gently,  with  grace,  with 
art,  withal  not  forgetting  that  there  is  a  place  for  tears  as 
well  as  for  laughter  in  all  things  human." 


252  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

At  the  end  of  his  Oddship,  Thompson  received  congratu- 
lations from  a  number  of  the  Brothers  on  "  a  brilliant  year." 
Perhaps  his  ready  tongue  was  of  assistance  to  him  in  this 
position.  Sir  William  Crookes,  accepting  an  invitation  to  his 
Ladies'  Night,  wrote  : 

"  The  thought  of  having  to  rise  on  my  hind  legs  altogether 
upsets  the  pleasure  of  a  dinner  with  congenial  friends.  You, 
to  whom  speaking  comes  as  easily  as  breathing,  cannot 
understand  the  trouble  it  is  to  us  on  a  lower  linguistic  plane." 

His  genius  was  certainly  not  unappreciated  in  the  Sette. 
An  absent  Brother,  the  Apothecary,  wrote  later  : 

"  I  have  just  read  thro'  your  Year  Book  with  very  great 
interest  and  pleasure.  It  seems  to  take  me  back  to  the 
good  old  times  when  there  was  such  a  real  feeling  of  union 
and  brotherly  love  between  us  all." 

There  are  several  cartoons  of  "  The  Magnetiser  "  drawn 
by  Jack  Hassall ;  the  latest  adorned  the  programme  the 
night  Thompson  spoke  on  "  Crystals  of  Snow  and  Others," 
and  is  labelled  "  a  Many-sided  Crystal.  Very  rare.  The 
property  of  Ye  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes.  Not  a  Cubist 
Portrait." 

This  final  appreciation  is  from  the  pen  of  Dr.  John  Tod- 
hunter,  "  the  Playwright,"  perhaps  the  most  gifted  literary 
man  of  the  Sette;  and  to  Thompson,  one  of  the  most  con- 
genial in  spirit.  It  was  written  quite  near  the  end  of  his 
life,  when  he  had  been  long  absent  from  the  fraternity,  and 
appreciated  Thompson's  faithfulness.  He  had  just  received 
a  copy  of  the  paper  on  "  The  Wind-rose."  "  You  are," 
he  wrote,  "  one  of  the  few  members  of  the  Sette  who  knows 
and  can  explain  everything,  and  is  as  much  at  home  in  Art 
as  in  Science.  You  are  a  Brother  of  whom  it  may  truly  be 
said  :  '  Nihil  tetigit  quod  non  ornavit.'  Floreat  semper 
Frater  Silvanus  ! 


A  (Many  Sided  Crystal.      Very  rare.      The  property  of  Te  Sttte  of  Odd  Volwmtt.      NOT  a  Cubist  Portrait^ 

Brotber 


CHAPTER   XII 

WORK   ON   OPTICS  AND   ILLUMINATION 


"If  no  optical  invention  of  first  magnitude,  no  discovery  of  funda- 
mental importance  has  been  announced,  it  must  not  be  assumed  that  there 
have  been  no  advances.  Progress  there  has  been,  progress  solid  and  real, 
if  inconspicuous,  all  along  the  line.  No  branch  of  physical  science  can 
in  the  present  day  remain  stationary.  The  workers  are  too  numerous, 
the  rewards  of  success,  whether  in  the  joy  of  scientific  discovery,  or  in  fame, 
or  wealth,  are  too  tempting.  Moreover,  the  increase  of  knowledge,  the 
mastery  of  principles  over  phenomena,  the  conquest  of  the  forces  of  Nature, 
are  cumulative.  Every  attempt  at  wider  generalisations,  even  if  un- 
successful in  itself,  provokes  new  researches  and  extends  the  foundations 
for  further  advance.  To  this  truth  the  science  of  optics  forms  no  excep- 
tion. Progress  is  continuous,  even  though  the  work-a-day  world  hears 
little  of  it,  and  heeds  it  not.  For  the  true  pioneer  halts  not  to  listen  for 
the  sound  of  the  plaudits  :  he  toils  on  content  in  the  faith  that  some  day 
he,  or  those  after  him  for  whom  his  labours  will  avail,  will  arrive  at  the 
goal."  l 

Earlier  chapters  contain  references 2  to  Thompson's 
activities  in  optics  at  the  beginning  of  his  career.  Of  the 
seven  papers  published  during  1877  five  were  on  optical 
subjects  :  certain  properties  of  the  eye,  optical  illusions, 
and  polarising  prisms.  Though  this  proportion  of  his 
work  was  not  again  devoted  to  optics  until  late  in  his  life, 
he  did  not  ever  entirely  drop  his  activity  or  his  investigations 
in  this  field.  The  design  of  new  polarising  prisms  3  con- 
tinued to  be  his  favourite  optical  exercise,  and  in  1883  he 
gave  to  his  friends  R.  and  J.  Beck,  the  Quaker  firm  of 
manufacturers  of  optical  and  other  scientific  instruments, 
the  process  which  he  was  working  out,  that  they  might  try 
making  some  prisms  for  a  mineralogical  microscope.  His 

1  Presidential  Address  to  the  Second  Optical  Convention,  1912. 

2  See  pages  44,  46. 
8  See  page  61. 

253 


254  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

work  was  published  in  the  Journal  of  the  Royal  Microsco- 
pical Society,  when  he  read  a  paper  to  that  body  on  polarising 
apparatus  for  the  microscope. 

Thompson  acquired  a  very  large  collection  of  objects  for 
displaying  by  polarised  light,  both  for  the  microscope  and 
the  lantern,  objects  which  in  themselves  are  quite  colourless 
and  dull,  mere  bits  of  spar,  variously  arranged,  yet  in  the 
rays  of  polarised  light  transmitting  brilliant  combinations 
of  colour,  which  can  be  completely  changed  by  the  mere 
turning  of  one  of  the  prisms  through  a  small  angle.  To 
find  the  mathematical  explanation  of  these  colours  took  a 
genius  such  as  Newton's,  but  Thompson  used  to  offer  to  the 
public  some  attempt  at  an  explanation  in  a  popular  lecture, 
"  The  Colours  of  Polarised  Light."  This  was  his  subject 
when,  at  the  time  of  the  meeting  of  the  British  Association 
in  Newcastle,  1889,  he  delivered  a  lecture  in  the  large 
Tyne  Hall,  under  the  auspices  of  the  Sunday  Lecture 
Society. 

For  the  making  of  some  of  his  prisms  Thompson  sent  as 
early  as  1881  to  Germany,  and  had  some  correspondence 
with  a  firm  of  instrument-makers  in  Homburg.  In  1884  he 
was  informed  that  calcspar  polarisers  "  nach  Thompson  " 
were  being  made  in  Berlin.  His  work  on  the  subject  was 
known  over  there,  probably  more  widely  than  in  England. 
He  showed  himself  very  familiar  with  the  work  of  the 
Germans,  referring  in  his  papers  to  the  formulae  of  Dr.  Abbe 
and  to  the  new  kinds  of  optical  glass  of  Dr.  Schott  of  Jena. 
A  new  instrument  which  he  devised,  a  direct- vision  spectro- 
scope which  also  polarised  the  light,  was  the  outcome  of  a 
remark  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Ahrens,  the  Londoner,  who  did 
the  actual  cutting,  grinding,  and  setting  up  of  a  number  of 
his  prisms. 

None  of  this  polarisation  work  was  communicated  to  the 
Royal  Society  ;  several  papers  were  read  at  the  Physical 
Society,  and  published  in  the  Philosophical  Magazine.  It 
was  the  subject  of  the  only  Friday  Evening  Discourse 
at  the  Royal  Institution  which  he  ever  devoted  to  optics, 
his  first  Discourse,  in  1899,  on  Optical  Torque  (see 
page  158). 


OPTICS  AND   ILLUMINATION  255 

That  year  he  read  to  the  Physical  Society  a  paper  called 
"  Notes  on  Geometrical  Optics.  Part  I."  (no  other  part 
ever  followed)  which  he  introduced  with  the  following 
explanation  : 

"  The  division  of  optics  into  a  '  geometrical '  part, 
founded  upon  the  treatment  of  the  subject  from  the  ray 
point  of  view,  and  a  '  physical '  part,  founded  upon  the 
treatment  of  the  subject  from  the  wave  point  of  view,  has 
long  seemed  illogical.  Experience  in  the  teaching  of  the 
science  suggests  that  it  would  be  preferable  to  adopt  the 
wave  theory  as  a  common  basis,  provided  the  formulae  of 
lenses  and  mirrors  which  form  the  staple  of  geometrical 
optics  are  as  readily  established  on  wave  principles  as  on 
ray  principles.  Five  years  ago  the  author  of  these  notes 
made  an  attempt  to  rewrite  the  elementary  part  of  geo- 
metrical optics  on  wave  principles  ;  and,  though  hitherto 
he  has  published  nothing  on  the  subject,  he  has  subjected 
the  method  to  the  test  of  experience,  and  has  made  it  the 
basis  of  his  optical  lectures  year  by  year.  .  .  . 

As  all  teachers  of  the  subject  know,  the  very  first  assump- 
tions made  in  establishing  the  elementary  formulae  of 
spherical  mirrors  and  lenses  are  that  angles  may  be  written 
instead  of  their  sines,  and  tangents.  The  assumptions 
made  in  the  method  now  published  are,  it  is  true,  different, 
but  involve  no  greater  sacrifice  of  accuracy.  ..." 

Thompson  never  found  time  to  write  the  perfect  book  on 
optics  which  he  conceived  and  outlined  to  the  extent  of 
chapter  headings  and  a  preface.  But  his  method  of 
attacking  geometrical  optics  was  set  forth  in  the  appendix 
to  the  volume  of  Light  Visible  and  Invisible,  in  which  he 
expounded  those  parts  of  the  subject  that  are  necessary  to  a 
serious  student,  but  not  suitable  for  the  Christmas  Lectures 
(see  p.  192). 

He  was  engaged  in  some  refraction  work  in  early  years, 
no  doubt  undertaking  it  out  of  sympathy  with  the  work 
of  Dr.  J.  H.  Gladstone  who  wrote  to  him  in  November 
1890  : 

"  At  last  I  have  got  your  Refractometer  released  from  its 


256  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

incarceration  at  Burlington  House,  and  return  it  with  many 
thanks. 

If  you  should  happen  to  come  across  your  observations  on 
Toluene,  will  you  kindly  let  me  have  them,  and  they  shall  be 
added  to  the  long  table  of  refractive  indices  which  is  rapidly 
growing."  » 

About  this  time  he  was  actively  interested  in  the  measure- 
ment of  lenses,  devising  a  method  for  the  determination  of 
optical  constants  for  lens  combinations  of  short  focal  lengths. 
He  called  the  instrument  he  used  a  "  New  Focometer."  To 
have  it  properly  constructed  was  a  costly  business,  so  he 
applied,  with  success,  to  the  Royal  Society  for  a  Government 
grant  to  help  to  cover  the  cost,  and  subsequently  sent  a 
communication  through  Prof.  Carey  Foster  to  the  Royal 
Society,  his  only  paper  on  optics  presented  there.  He 
also  lectured  in  the  winter  of  1891-2  at  the  Society  of 
Arts  on  "  The  Measurement  of  Lenses."  His  method  evoked 
considerable  interest  amongst  the  more  highly  trained 
opticians,  but  the  apparatus  was  not  repeated,  and  the 
only  model  is  now  the  property  of  the  Northampton  Institute, 
Clerkenwell,  where  optics  has  been,  since  1898,  the  subject 
of  special  study. 

During  the  succeeding  ten  years  very  little  work  waa 
published.  There  was  one  paper  to  the  Physical  Society  on 
photometers,  showing  him  to  be  as  up-to-date  in  -this  branch 
of  the  subject  as  in  others,  and  referring  to  another  little 
invention.  His  thanks  in  this  case  were  due  to  his  friend 
Mr.  A.  P.  Trotter,  who  began  a  long  letter  dated  April  1893  : 
"  You  may  like  to  hear  the  very  latest  thing  (1)  in  photo- 
meters, and  (2)  in  photometry,"  and  proceeded  to  impart 
it  with  generous  detail  which  became  absorbed  into  the 
"  Notes  on  Photometry." 

That  year  he  published  also  an  "  Opusculum  "  on  The 
Magick  Mirrour  of  Japan.  He  had  become  interested  in 
these  mirrors  when  Professor  Ayrton,  lecturing  at  Bristol, 
displayed  the  peculiar  property  of  the  polished  metal  mirror 
of  casting  a  shadowy  image  of  the  pattern  on  its  back  in  the 
patch  of  light  obtained  by  reflecting  a  brilliant  beam  from 
its  silvery,  and  apparently  perfectly  smooth,  front  surface. 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  257 

It  was  just  the  kind  of  scientific  mystery  to  set  Thompson 
off  in  happy  quest  of  the  explanation. 

This  first  little  optical  book  was  soon  followed  by  the 
Light  Visible  and  Invisible,  and  in  1900  by  a  translation  from 
the  German  of  Otto  Lummer's  Contributions  to  Photographic 
Optics,  which  gave  the  first  account  in  English  of  the  remark- 
able work  of  Professor  von  Seidel,  of  Munich  ;  but  the 
many  elaborations  and  the  copious  additions  made  by  the 
translator,  with  the  author's  full  consent,  rendered  the  book 
almost  more  a  work  of  Thompson  himself  than  of  Professor 
Lummer.  He  was  led  to  undertake  this  work  by  an  acute 
sense  of  the  lack  of  optical  literature  for  technical  students 
who  were  not  masters  of  the  German  language  ;  the  existing 
English  text-books  were  nearly  all  written  "  by  university 
dons  for  university  students."  In  his  preparation  of  this 
book,  as  in  the  compilation  of  his  Optical  Tables,  Thompson 
drew  upon  the  advice  and  experience  of  the  highly  skilled 
experts  of  the  various  English  firms,  hoping  to  make  his 
work  as  one  "  by  an  optician  for  opticians." 

In  the  spring  of  1900  Thompson  took  a  week's  holiday 
alone  in  the  Thiiringen-wald,  with  a  view  to  visiting  the 
famous  Jena  works.  The  following  are  extracts  from  his 
letters  home.  He  travelled  by  Flushing  straight  through  to 

Weimar,  whence  he  wrote  : 

"April  Uth,  1900. 

"  The  line  as  far  as  near  Cassel  is  uninteresting :  but 
from  Cassel  onwards  it  is  quite  delightful  in  scenery.  It 
was  dark  when  we  reached  Eisenach,  the  beginning  of  the 
Thuringen- wald . 

"  Weimar  lies  outside  the  forest.  After  breakfast  I 
wandered  round  the  old  town,  which  is  very  quaint.  I 
visited  the  house  where  Goethe  lived ;  and  which  is  pre- 
served, just  as  he  left  it.  His  collections  of  antiquities, 
drawings,  portraits,  medals,  skulls  (for  his  study  in  com- 
parative anatomy)  and  herbarium  are  in  excellent  order. 
He  had  also  a  lot  of  optical  and  electrical  apparatus.  His 
Arbeit-zimmer,  and  the  room  in  which  he  died  are  just  as 
he  left  them. 

"  I  had  also  a  long  walk  in  the  park,  and  saw  the  house 
and  garden  where  he   sometimes  lived  in  the  summer." 
[Goethe  was  a  subject  of  Thompson's  enthusiasm.] 
17 


258  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

"  JENA, 
"April  15th,  1900. 

"  This  morning  brought  a  heavy  storm — rain  and  wind, 
and  made  me  change  my  plans.  I  had  thought  to  go  off 
early  by  train  to  Ilmenau  [the  chief  centre  of  Thuringian 
glass,  work].  .  .  .  Perhaps  I  shall  go  to-morrow. 

"  I  wrote  you  just  after  midday  dinner  that  I  was  going 
to  call  on  Professor  Abbe.  Do  you  remember  him  from 
Frankfort  days  ?  He  is  a  tall,  spare,  dark  man,  who  dresses 
rather  clerically  in  a  long  coat,  and  a  vest  that  buttons  tight 
under  the  chin.  As  he  was  in  1891,  so  he  is  to-day,  only  a 
shade  grayer.  I  found  him  at  home,  surrounded  by  a  circle 
of  his  family  .  .  .  and  various  friends,  Professor  Auerbach, 
.Dr.  Straubel,  and  their  wives.  ...  I  was  received  most 
cordially,  and  was  introduced  to  the  company,  and  drank 
Sunday  afternoon  coffee  with  them.  Then  Professor  Abbe 
proposed  a  walk,  and  we  set  out  up  the  '  Philosophen-weg  ' 
which  winds  up  the  hill-side,  toward  the  old  battle-field  to 
the  north-west.  It  was  fine,  and  quite  hot.  Beds  of  purple 
anemone  we  found  on  the  hill-side.  We  wandered  about 
leisurely,  visited  the  Napoleon-stein  from  which  tradition 
says  that  Napoleon  watched  the  battle.  Then  went  on  to 
a  little  village  to  find  the  inevitable  restaurant,  where  we 
drank  a  villainous  decoction,  seemingly  a  hybrid  between 
bitter-beer  and  lemonade.  Then  we  turned  homewards, 
and  divided  as  we  neared  the  town.  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Straubel 
took  me  off  to  supper.  Dr.  Straubel  is  assistant  to  Professor 
Winkelmann — Professor  of  Physics — in  the  University. 
They  are  very  pleasant  folk,  and  own  three  small  boys,  the 
eldest  a  '  Bubbles  '  of  about  five  years,  with  whom  I  made 
great  friends.  He  claimed  me  as  Onkel  forthwith.  Abbe 
holds  a  most  extraordinarily  high  place  in  the  esteem  of  the 
good  people  of  Jena.  He  came  to  Jena  about  1869,  as 
Professor  of  Astronomy.  He  found  an  optician  of  the  name 
of  Carl  Zeiss,  with  about  a  dozen  workmen  under  him,  in  the 
town.  He  helped  Zeiss  by  advising  him  about  his  instru- 
ments, calculated  new  lenses  for  him,  tested  his  microscopes 
and  adjusted  them,  finally  became  his  partner,  and  then, 
when  he  died,  his  successor.  The  firm  of  C.  Zeiss  now 
employs  over  1,000  workmen,  and  Abbe  is  director.  Also 
he  created  the  glass-works  of  Schott  &  Co.  for  making  optical 
glass.  And  the  glass-works  of  Schott — founded  in  1886, 
now  employ  also  about  1,000  workmen.  Abbe  owns  half 
this  concern.  But  now  comes  the  most  extraordinary  thing  ; 


OPTICS  AND   ILLUMINATION  259 

Abbe  has  turned  the  firm  of  Zeiss,  together  with  his  share 
in  the  Schott  glass-works,  into  a  '  Carl  Zeiss  Stiftung,'  that 
is  to  say,  into  a  sort  of  Socialist  Company,  in  which  all  the 
work-people  are  co-operative  owners.  He,  who  might  be 
deriving  an  income  of  £6,000  to  £8,000  a  year,  simply  draws 
a  salary  of  £600,  as  do  also  his  three  co-directors.  All  the 
other  profits  are  divided  amongst  the  employees.  And  it  is 
arranged  that,  whenever  Dr.  Schott  dies,  his  concern  shall 
entirely  merge  into  the  Carl  Zeiss  Stiftung.  They  say  that 
5,000  souls  depend  on  these  two  concerns  ;  that  they  are 
very  prosperous  ;  that  the  social  style  and  civilisation  of 
the  work-people  is  far  above  the  average  in  Germany,  and 
that  the  growing  prosperity  of  Jena  is  directly  attributable 
largely  to  the  genius  of  Dr.  Abbe. 

"  No  wonder  they  honour  him. 

"  As  it  was  wet  and  stormy,  I  stopped  indoors  after  break- 
fast, and  did  some  writing.  Just  before  noon  the  day  cleared 
up,  and,  though  it  is  very  windy,  it  is  bright.  So  I  went 
out  for  a  brisk  walk  along  the  high-road  up  the  Miihle-thal 
back  towards  Weimar.  ...  A  letter  has  just  come  from 
Elder,  saying  that  he  finds  to  his  dismay  that  ...  he  can't 
get  through  his  business  by  Tuesday  night,  so  won't  be  able 
to  come  on  here. 

"  Outside  the  window  of  my  bedroom  is  a  tablet  which 
has  the  announcement :  4  Hier  wohnte  Dr.  Martin  Luther, 
1522.'  In  the  next  room  to  mine  Bismarck  stayed  in  1892. 
This  also  is  commemorated  by  a  tablet  outside,  and  by  a 
silver  plate,  inscribed,  upon  the  bedstead. 

"  Many  of  the  houses  in  Jena  bear  tablets.  The  former 
residences  of  Hegel  and  Schlegel  and  Fichte  and  Wieland 
and  Schilling  are  all  marked.  Goethe  appears  to  have 
lived  in  four  or  five  houses.  I  crossed  yesterday  the  path 
where  he  walked  up  and  down  when  composing  the  Erlkonig. 
To-day  the  two  great  men  in  Jena  are  Haeckel  and  Abbe. 
There  is  an  Ernst  Haeckel  Strasse,  in  which  his  villa  stands. 
Abbe  lives  at  No.  7  in  Carl-Zeiss  Platz." 

"April  Wth. 

"  I  have  had  a  busy  morning  First  with  Dr.  Pulfrich  at 
Zeiss's  works,  showing  me  the  optical  laboratory ;  and 
afterwards  with  Professors  Straubel  and  F.  Auerbach  in  the 
Physical  Laboratory  of  the  University. 

"  Yesterday  was  also  a  busy  day.  In  the  morning,  which 
was  fine  but  cold,  I  took  a  walk  along  the  Unterer  Philo- 
sophen-weg  in  the  north-east  direction,  and  explored  some 


260  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

pretty  little  villages  running  from  the  river  towards  the  battle- 
field. I  found  several  plants  that  were  quite  unknown  to  me  ; 
one  a  thistle  (I  think)  with  wonderfully  decorative  leaves.  I 
came  back  for  middle-day  dinner,  and  then  went  about  2.30, 
to  Professor  Abbe's  house,  where  I  had  coffee  with  him 
and  Mrs.  Abbe.  Then  he  took  me  across  the  road  to  Zeiss's 
factory,  where  I  spent  most  of  the. afternoon.  I  saw  their 
lens-grinding  and  lens-polishing  machinery,  and  the  room 
where  they  test  the  photographic  lenses.  I  met  Dr.  von 
Rohr,  Dr.  Rudolph,  and  Dr.  Pulfrich,  all  men  of  distinction 
in  scientific  optics,  and  all  employed  in  this  firm.  After  I 
had  finished  this  tour  of  inspection  I  had  a  walk  by  the  river- 
side, and  then  returned  for  a  short  time  to  The  Bar  [his  hotel] 
before  going  to  Professor  Auerbach's  house  to  supper.  We 
were  a  party  of  seven — Professor  and  Mrs.  A.  (both  of  whom 
have  been  in  England),  Professor  and  Mrs.  Abbe,  and  Pro- 
fessor and  Mrs.  Straubel.  We  had  a  very  pleasant  evening, 
talking  of  German  literature,  of  the  reform  of  the  Univer- 
sities, and  of  minor  arts,  including  photography,  in  which 
Mrs.  Auerbach  is  an  adept.  I  find  that  my  book  on  Faraday 
is  read  and  appreciated  here. 

"  I  go  this  afternoon  to  see  Schott's  glass-works  ;  then 
for  another  little  walk,  and  to  supper  with  Dr.  von  Rohr. 
To-morrow  I  go  on  to  Eisenach,  the  first  stage  of  the  return 
homewards." 

"  EISENACH, 
'  "  April  20th,  1900. 

"  It  has  been  hot — hot  as  July  to-day.  I  had  a  little  walk, 
while  it  was  yet  fresh,  after  breakfast,  across  the  '  Princessin 
Garten  '  and  near  the  old  fortifications  of  Jena.  And  then 
once  more  I  went  to  Zeiss's  optical  works  to  select  some 
prisms  for  the  laboratory  at  Finsbury,  and  to  chat  with 
some  of  the  scientific  men  at  Zeiss's  works.  Two  of  them, 
and  Professor  Auerbach,  came  back  to  lunch  with  me  at  the 
Schwarzen  Baren  ;  and  after  lunch  I  called  on  Professor 
Abbe  to  say  adieu.  A 

"  I  reached  here  a  little  before  7  p.m.,  and  took  a  walk  up 
to  the  Wartburg  while  it  was  yet  twilight. 

"  The  town  is  dressed  in  festival  array  with  arches  and 
decorations  ;  for  they  expect  the  Kaiser  to-morrow.  I  did 
not  know  of  this.  I  think  I  shall  not  trouble  myself  about 
his  Imperial  Majesty,  but  shall  (after  seeing  the  interior  of 
the  Wartburg  early  in  the  morning)  take  a  long  walk  over 
the  Horselberg  to  hunt  for  relics  of  the  stout  knight  Tann- 


OPTICS  AND<  ILLUMINATION  261 

haiiser.  It  will  be  a  ten-mile  walk,  and  much  better  worth 
seeing  than  the  erratic  monarch  of  these  parts.  There  is 
evidently  some  very  fine  forest  all  about :  and  Baedeker 
is  a  sufficiently  detailed  guide  to  be  of  use. 

"  Possibly  I  may  be  home  before  this  letter  is  delivered." 

In  the  summer  of  1900  was  the  great  Exhibition  in  Paris  ; 
and  there  again  Thompson  was  brought  up  against  the 
German  optical  industries  in  the  exhibit  where  "  the  ad- 
vanced state  of  certain  branches  of  optics  in  Germany  was 
revealed  by  that  most  remarkable  catalogue  of  the  collective 
exhibit  of  the  opticians  and  instrument-makers  of  Germany." 

These  things  which  he  saw  abroad  aroused  his  patriotic 
ardour,  for  he  was  made  conscious  of  the  fact  that  his  own 
countrymen  were  lagging  behind  in  this  department,  and  he 
would  not  have  it  so.  "  Not  that  we  are  to  take  German 
methods  and  copy  them.  England  has  to  work  out  its  own 
problems  in  its  own  way." 

Thompson  had  early  shown  himself  thoroughly  alive  to 
the  broad  national  aspects  of  his  subject,  optics.  There  is 
a  letter  dated  December  1891  from  the  superintendent  of 
the  Observatory  at  Kew  saying  : 

"  Mr.  Galton  and  Major  Darwin  were, down  here  yesterday 
as  a  lens-testing  sub-committee,  arid  we  discovered  your 
kind  letter  just  to  hand.  Darwin  had  talked  over  the  matter 
of  the  term  astigmatism  with  Abney,  and  decides  that  you 
are  right,  and  that  it  ought  to  be  changed.  Galton  is  also 
of  that  mind,  but  Abney  is  decidedly  averse.  As  the  latter 
is  abroad  for  a  while  the  question  must  wait  for  his  return, 
meanwhile  if  aplanation  or  aberrancy  is  introduced  into 
optical  terminology,  we  will  make  note  of  it.  Personally,  I 
agree  with  you  in  preferring  the  first  term." 

Thompson  used  to  be  very  emphatic  about  the  importance 
of  the  right  use  of  terms  to  avoid  confusion  of  thought. 

Of  national  importance  too,  in  Thompson's  opinion,  was 
the  raising  of  the  status  and  the  training  of  members  of  the 
optical  industries.  A  beginning  had  been  made  by  the 
organisation  of  examinations  for  opticians  and  the  granting 
of  certificates  by  the  British  Optical  Association.  This 
was  followed  by  a  revival  of  activity  in  the  ancient  guild 


262  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

known  as  the  Spectacle  Makers'  Company,  which  led  to  this 
body  also  founding  a  scheme  of  examinations.  Early  in 
1898  plans  were  completed,  and  the  Upper  Warden  of  the 
Guild,  Mr.  H.  E.  Thornthwaite,  F.R.A.S.,  one  of  the  keenest 
supporters  of  the  movement,  undertook  (the  master  for  that 
year  being  the  Lord  Mayor),  to  enlist  the  aid  of  some  eminent 
scientist  to  act  as  a  third  examiner  in  conjunction  with  two 
members  of  the  Company.  Sir  William  Crookes  was  first 
approached,  but  work  for  the  British  Association  and  a 
prospective  voyage  prevented  his  assent,  even  to  dividing 
the  work  with  Thompson,  who  was  next  asked.  He  ac- 
cepted, and  so  from  the  beginning  had  the  honour  of  being 
associated  with  the  Spectacle  Makers'  Company  in  its 
endeavour  to  stimulate  opticians  to  acquire  proficiency  in 
the  technics  of  their  craft  by  offering  to  those  who  passed 
the  examination  a  diploma  and  fellowship  in  the  Company. 

The  city  press  evinced  considerable  interest  in  and 
approval  of  the  activities  of  the  Guild,  and  the  examinations, 
two  in  the  year,  were  well  patronised  by  members  of  the 
trades  both  in  and  outside  London.  The  Master  wrote 
gratefully  to  Thompson  of  all  he  had  done,  which  had  added 
so  much  success  and  eclat  to  the  scheme.  At  the  beginning 
of  the  second  year,  1899,  Thompson  was  admitted  to  the 
fellowship  of  the  Spectacle  Makers'  Guild,  and  became  a 
freeman  of  the  City  of  London.  The  Guild  had  an  influx 
of  distinguished  supporters  of  its  efforts  in  Mr.  Christie, 
the  Astronomer  Royal,  Sir  William  Crookes,  Lord  Kelvin 
and  Captain  Abney. 

Many  of  the  ophthalmic  surgeons  of  the  country  looked 
somewhat  askance  at  the  new  movement,  and  the  organisers 
realised  that  they  must  walk  warily.  The  Master  of  the 
Company  attended  in  person  many,  if  not  all,  of  the  earlier 
examinations,  and  addressed  the  candidates  on  the  use  and 
abuse  of  the  diploma,  the  standard  of  which,  it  was  intended, 
should  be  maintained  at  a  good  level. 

After  two  years  Thompson  offered  to  resign  his  post  of 
examiner,  and  at  the  same  time  analysed  his  experiences 
and  offered  advice  on  the  scheme,  demanding  evidence  of 
better  preliminary  training  from  candidates. 


OPTICS  AND   ILLUMINATION  263 

He  was  really  thoroughly  interested  in  the  scheme,  and 
continued  his  work  as  chief  examiner  for  some  years  more. 
His  colleague  for  many  years  was  Dr.  G.  Lindsay  Johnson, 
F.R.C.S.,  the  ophthalmic  surgeon.  They  both  had  con- 
siderable qualms  when  the  Guild  decided  to  accede  to  the 
desire  expressed  through  Lord  Kelvin  and  other  eminent 
men,  and  added  to  the  scheme  a  diploma  in  sight-testing, 
and  the  recognition  of  a  diseased  condition  of  the  eye,  which 
had  at  first  been  regarded  as  the  work  of  the  qualified 
medical  man.  A  committee  of  enquiry  had  been  employed, 
for  neither  of  the  examiners  would  have  consented  to  act 
without  a  reasonable  guarantee  against  abuse  of  the  diploma 
for  the  granting  of  which  they  were  responsible.  But 
common  sense  expressed  the  view  that,  as  the  general  public 
had  since  the  beginning  of  spectacles  gone  to  the  optician 
to  be  tested  (after  a  fashion),  and  fitted  out,  it  was  not  likely 
that  that  habit  would  alter,  and  it  was  much  better  that  the 
opticians  should  have  the  stimulus  of  the  Fellowship  of  the 
Guild,  which  also  could  be  made,  in  some  degree,  a  safeguard 
against  imposture.  When  Thompson  retired  in  1908,  under 
the  pressure  of  work  on  the  Kelvin  biography,  he  was 
succeeded  for  a  time  as  chief  examiner  by  Dr.  R.  T.  Glaze- 
brook  (afterwards  Sir  Richard  Glazebrook). 

The  increased  educational  activity  in  the  industries 
manifested  itself  in  the  establishment  in  1900  of  an  Optical 
Society  for  the  discussion  of  scientific  and  technical  matters. 
Thompson  was  elected  one  of  the  two  first  Vice-Presidents, 
and  gave  their  first  lecture,  inviting  the  members  to  meet 
at  Finsbury  Technical  College,  where  he  could  conveniently 
demonstrate  to  them  phenomena  which  he  classed  as 
"Aberrations."  In  his  lecture  he  referred  to  the  theories 
of  Professor  Siedel  of  Munich,  whose  German  publications 
were  largely  unfamiliar  even  to  the  leading  opticians  in 
this  country.  He  lectured  to  them  on  other  occasions,  but 
he  was  not  able  to  give  any  time  to  the  organisation  of  the 
Society,  and  retained  his  official  connection  only  under 
protest,  until  in  1903  he,  with  Dr.  Glazebrook,  was  shown 
the  appreciation  felt  for  services  rendered,  and  the  confidence 
won,  by  election  as  the  first  honorary  members  of  the  So- 


264  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

ciety.  In  the  year  of  his  Presidency  two  more  distinguished 
names  were  added,  Lord  Kelvin  and  Sir  William  Christie, 
the  Astronomer  Royal. 

The  subject  of  "  opto-technics,"  as  Thompson  termed 
all  the  questions  relating  to  the  training  of  opticians,  was  a 
matter  of  great  concern  to  him,  and  he  devoted  much  time 
and  energy  to  elaborating  one  of  his  comprehensive  surveys 
of  the  whole  subject,  which  he  delivered  in  a  lecture  at  the 
Society  of  Arts  in  April  1902.  Dr.  K.  T.  Glazebrook,  F.R.S., 
Director  of  the  National  Physical  Laboratory,  was  in  the 
chair,  in  the  absence  of  Sir  Wm.  Abney,  and  at  the  close 
of  the  lecture  "  pointed  the  moral  and  adorned  the  tale  " 
with  all  the  weight  of  his  position  at  the  head  of  the  institu- 
tion whose  function  it  was  to  foster  scientific  research  and 
ensure  technical  perfection  in  the  very  important  matter  of 
scientific  instrument  construction. 

In  his  lecture  Thompson  stated  what  facts  were  known 
about  the  condition  of  the  optical  trades,  which,  he  estimated, 
employed  perhaps  20,000  persons  in  the  London  district 
alone,  outlined  the  necessary  foundations  for  any  sound 
technical  knowledge  of  optics,  and  the  subsequent  course 
of  study  advisable  for  a  would-be  expert  optician,  then  pro- 
ceeded to  the  question  how  the  English  worker  was  to  obtain 
these.  He  analysed  the  statistics  provided  for  him  by  the 
Board  of  Education,  showing  the  rapid  decline  of  numbers 
of  students  in  the  classes  in  optics  all  over  the  country  since 
1890,  which  he  attributed  largely  to  the  failure  to  meet  the 
practical  needs  of  would-be  opticians ;  there  were  no 
teachers  with  the  requisite  knowledge  of  opto-technics  ;  and 
the  need  for  them  was  quite  as  great  as  for  the  then  fully 
recognised  teachers  in  recognised  institutions  for  electro- 
technics.  He  had  at  one  time  hoped  that  a  special  depart- 
ment might  have  been  added  at  Finsbury  Technical  College, 
and  had  drafted  a  scheme  for  the  establishment  of  one  as 
early  as  1886  ;  and  later,  when  the  London  Polytechnics 
were  being  established,  he  had  hoped  for  an  Optotechnical 
Institute  at  Clerkenwell,  the  district  in  which  the  trades 
centred,  holding  the  view  of  these  institutions  "  that  the 
less  they  have  of  poly,  and  the  more  of  technic,  just  so  far 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  265 

have  they  benefited  the  industries."  From  this  point  of 
view  he  warmly  commended  the  special  optical  work  of  the 
Northampton  Institute  in  Clerkenwell. 

His  experience  in  the  Spectacle  Makers'  Examinations 
convinced  him  of  the  immediate  necessity  of  establishing 
some  proper  system  of  education  of  opticians,  and  he  urged, 
as  a  matter  of  national  importance,  the  foundation  of  a  real 
Optotechnical  Institute,  properly  equipped  and  staffed  with 
picked  men,  and  responsible  for  a  "respectable  optical 
journal."  He  lamented  the  lack  of  good  optical  literature 
in  English,  and  his  opinion  in  this  matter  was  endorsed 
again  and  again  by  opticians.  The  whole  scheme  outlined 
by  Thompson  in  the  paper  met  with  approval  and  support 
from  all  parties  present  at  the  meeting,  representatives  of 
the  trade  in  various  branches,  and  academic  and  technical 
teachers  of  optics.  To  the  question  how  such  an  institution 
was  to  be  brought  into  existence,  he  replied  by  asking  why 
the  men  in  the  optical  industries  did  not  request  that 
the  money  which  was  granted  annually  to  the  Technical 
Education  Board  of  the  London  County  Council,  and  not 
used,  should  be  spent  in  the  instruction  of  opticians. 

Thompson's  work  bore  fruit  by  very  slow  degrees.  In 
1902  a  deputation  of  the  Optical  Society  was  received  by  the 
Technical  Education  Board,  and  strongly  advocated  the 
provision  of  further  facilities  for  instruction  in  technical 
optics ;  and  next  year  a  separate  department  was  formed 
at  the  Northampton  Institute,  "with  the  assistance  of  the 
Technical  Education  Board  of  the  L.C.C."-  The  Optical 
Society  had  earlier  shown  itself  alive  in  this  matter,  having 
appointed  an  Education  Committee,  and  the  members  had 
subscribed  every  year  to  the  support  of  the  classes  of  the 
Northampton  Institute.  This  was  the  only  local  support 
the  Institute  had  during  the  years  of  chaos  that  followed 
in  London  Education,  when  the  1903  Act  abolished  the 
Technical  Education  Board,  and  the  official  administration 
of  all  funds  passed  into  the  control  of  the  Education  Com- 
mittee of  the  L.C.C.  ;  and  little  money  went  the  way  of 
"  opto-technics,"  though  the  work  had  been  specially  com- 
mended to  the  care  of  the  new  authority  by  the  old. 


266  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

The  question  of  proper  provision  was,  however,  not  allowed 
to  rest.  In  1905  the  first  Optical  Convention  was  organised 
in  London  for  the  exhibition  of  the  work  of  the  trades,  and 
for  the  holding  of  discussions  upon  problems  of  interest  and 
importance. 

Consequently  the  position  of  President  of  the  Optical 
Society  for  that  year  was  likely  to  entail  additional  work. 
Thompson  was  chosen,  but  was  very  reluctant  to  accept 
the  burden  of  the  honour.  He  would  have  preferred  to 
have  seen  a  member  of  the  trade  in  the  position,  had  the 
verdict  of  the  Society  not  been  in  favour  rather  of  a  man  of 
academic  standing  for  this  occasion. 

The  year  before  Dr.  Glazebrook  in  his  Presidential  Address 
had  dealt  with  the  work  of  the  Society  under  three  heads  : 
co-operation,  education,  standardisation.  The  last  of  these 
was  his  own  special  field  of  work.  Though  well  qualified 
to  speak  upon  the  second,  Thompson  took  up  a  quite 
different  line  in  his  address,  and  gave  a  discourse  upon  "  The 
Early  Literature  of  Optics,"  illustrated  from  his  own  library. 

The  Convention  was  held  in  May  1905,  under  the  Presi- 
dency of  Dr.  Glazebrook,  and  was  very  successful.  The 
most  important  outcome  of  it  was  perhaps  the  stimulus  to 
the  interest  in  education.  Dr.  Mullineux  Walmsley  read  a 
paper  on  "  The  Present  Position  of  Education  in  Optics," 
quoting  frequently  from  Thompson's  lecture  to  the  Society 
of  Arts.  The  Convention  drafted  a  resolution  in  favour  of 
the  establishment  of  an  "  Optical  Technical  Institute," 
and  sent  a  deputation  to  the  L.C.C.  Education  Authority, 
headed  by  Dr.  Glazebrook,  with  Mr.  Conrad  Beck  as  spokes- 
man for  the  trade,  and  Thompson  for  the  Optical  Society. 

Five  years  later,  in  September  1910,  the  Education  Officer 
of  the  L.C.C.  instituted  an  enquiry.  Thompson  was  one 
of  the  witnesses.  This  was  followed  by  a  conference  at 
which  he  was  present  as  one  of  the  nine  outsiders  invited 
to  assist.  An  elaborate  report,  thirty-seven  quarto  pages, 
was  issued  in  March  1911,  and  then  the  matter  was  dropped. 
Meanwhile,  the  Northampton  Institute  work  went  on, 
cramped  in  funds,  cramped  in  equipment,  uncertain  of  the 
future. 


OPTICS  AND   ILLUMINATION  267 

It  was  suggested  in  the  extensive  report  that  the  more 
advanced  instruction  and  the  research  work  would  be  better 
under  a  separate  department,  and  that  the  best  place  for  this 
was  the  recently  established  Imperial  College  of  Science 
and  Technology  of  which  Sir  Alfred  Keogh,  K.C.B.,  was 
Director.  Shortly  after  the  Conference  with  the  L.C.C. 
Sir  Alfred  wrote  to  Thompson  : 

"  January  llth,   1911. 

"  I  am  now  returning  your  copy  of  The  Journal  of  the 
Society  of  Arts,  having  read  very  carefully  and  more  than 
once  your  paper  on  Opto-technics  and  the  discussion  thereon. 
It  is  a  strange  thing  that  nearly  nine  years  has  elapsed,  and 
practically  nothing  has  been  done.  As  far  as  I  am  con- 
cerned the  position  is  this.  It  is  now  proposed  to  realise 
your  ideal,  and  to  do  this  by  the  establishment  of  a  separate 
school,  or  of  a  special  department  in  Dr.  Walmsley's  Institu- 
tion. .  .  .  Towards  the  establishment  of  the  department 
I  can  of  course  do  nothing.  I  only  want  to  say  to  you  now, 
that  if  the  Imperial  College  is  required  to  take  a  part  in  the 
work  that  part  will  be  taken.  I  am  prepared  to  go  a  long 
way  towards  helping  this  important  work.  I  maj^  therefore 
be  called  upon  to  any  extent.  I  can  say  no  more. 

"  I  do  hope  action  will  not  be  delayed. 

"  Very  many  thanks  for  giving  me  the  opportunity  of 
becoming  acquainted  with  the  necessities  of  the  case." 

Still  no  Institute  of  Technical  Optics  was  founded. 

The  English  were  not  alone  in  their  efforts,  and  in  other 
countries  Thompson  was  a  recognised  authority.  In  1902  he 
received  a  letter  from  a  French  author,  who  was  preparing 
a  book  on  Les  kcoles  pour  les  Opticiens,  and  who  applied  to 
him  for  information  about  certain  points  in  English  affairs  ; 
and  in  1910  he  was  consulted  by  a  representative  of  the 
Bureau  of  Standards  of  the  Washington  Department  of 
Commerce  and  Labour  when,  there  too,  the  question  of 
improving  the  quality  and  increasing  the  quantity  of  optical 
manufactures  and  improving  facilities  for  instruction  in 
technical  optics  began  to  exercise  the  more  advanced  spirits 
of  the  U.S.A. 

During  these  years  of  endeavour  to  make  the  cumbersome 
machinery  of  bureaucracy  move  a  little  faster,  and  in  a  new 


268  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

direction,  Thompson  did  a  certain  amount  of  other  optical 
work.  In  1901  he  delivered  at  the  Exhibition  of  the  Royal 
Photographic  Society  at  the  New  Gallery  the  fourth  annual 
"  Traill  Taylor  Memorial  Lecture,"  for  the  enlightenment 
of  photographers  in  the  essential  science  of  their  art.  His 
subject  was  "  Zonal  Aberration,"  a  defect  of  lenses  that  is 
of  importance  to  users  of  cameras.  A  paper  on  this  subject 
was  published  also  at  Haarlem  in  Holland  ;  and  the  same 
year  he  was  preparing  a  paper,  in  Italian,  "  un  paradosso 
ottico,"  which  Professor  Rlghi,  as  President,  proposed  should 
be  read  to  the  Societa  Italiana  di  Fisica,  and  wrote  trying  to 
persuade  Thompson  to  be  present  himself  at  the  meeting  in 
Brescia  early  in  September. 

In  1902  he  received  certain  recognition  of  his  optical 
work  from  the  Royal  Society  in  the  form  of  a  request  to 
write  the  biographical  note  of  the  deceased  Foreign  Member, 
Alfred  Marie  Cornu,  a  leader  in  optical  research,  and  one 
of  the  most  distinguished  scientists  of  Paris. 

Another  little  bit  of  biographical  work  done  by  Thompson 
was  the  account  of  William  Nicol  with  which  he  concluded 
his  paper  to  the  first  Optical  Convention  "  On  the  Nicol 
Prism  and  its  Modern  Varieties."  He  wrote  to  Nature, 
and  obtained  a  good  deal  of  information  in  answer  to  his 
questions  there. 

This  paper  was  given  as  the  one  rather  formal  Evening 
Lecture  of  the  Convention,  of  which  most  of  the  time  was 
devoted  to  discussions  at  sectional  meetings.  At  this 
Convention,  besides  acting  in  his  capacity  as  President  of 
the  Optical  Society,  Thompson  was  chairman  of  the  papers 
sub -committee.  Dr.  Glazebrook  wrote  to  him  that  his 
appointment  to  this  position  was  "  one  of  the  various  things 
which  will  I  hope  advance  the  cause." 

This  first  Optical  Convention,  held  at  the  Northampton 
Institute,  and  lasting  from  a  Tuesday  to  the  following 
Saturday,  brought  people  from  all  parts  of  the  country, 
and  was  considered  so  much  of  a  success  that  it  was  decided 
to  repeat  the  experiment  whenever  opportunity  ripened. 
In  1908  it  was  quite  hoped  that  a  meeting  would  be  held 
the  next  year,  and  Thompson  accepted  the  nomination  as 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  269 

a  Vice-President.  Sufficient  support  was,  however,  not 
forthcoming,  and  it  was  not  until  1912  that  plans  for  the 
second  Optical  Convention  matured,  and  on  this  occasion 
Thompson  was  elected  to  serve  as  President.  His  near 
neighbour,  Mr.  J.  W.  Gordon,  was  the  Honorary  Secretary, 
and  they  both  had  a  busy  time  and  many  consultations 
long  before  the  week  set  apart  for  the  meetings.  Having 
prepared  a  statement  of  the  aims  and  achievements  of  the 
1905  meeting,  and  obtained  the  support  of  nearly  all  the 
important  scientific  societies,  they  approached  the  Board 
of  Education  for  leave  to  use  rooms  at  South  Kensington 
Museum,  and  this  they  eventually  obtained,  with  the 
Lecture  Theatres  of  the  Imperial  College  of  Science  and 
Technology  for  the  holding  of  lectures  and  discussions. 
The  exhibition  itself  was  representative  of  British  industries, 
and  the  advance  in  their  position  was  shown  in  the  catalogue, 
which  was  not  only  much  larger,  but  was  published  in 
French  and  in  German  for  the  information  of  foreign  pur- 
chasers of  English  optical  wares.  Apart  from  the  industrial 
exhibits  were  some  of  special  historical  and  educational 
interest.  Thompson  had  made  himself  responsible  for  an 
"  Isaac  Newton  "  room,  in  which  he  had  set  up  apparatus 
modelled  upon  the  descriptions  given  by  JSTewton  in  his 
Optiks  of  the  arrangements  which  he  himself  used  in 
some  of  his  principal  experiments.  Towards  the  expenses 
of  this  exhibit  Thompson  appealed  for  and  obtained  the 
financial  assistance  of  the  Worshipful  Company  of  Spectacle 
Makers,  whom  he  was  again  serving  as  chairman  of  the 
Examining  Board.  He  had  also  sent  to  the  library  exhibit 
his  collection  of  nearly  fifty  volumes,  "  the  classics  of 
optical  literature,"  many  belonging  to  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries. 

Except  for  the  exhibits  of  historical  interest  the  display 
was  confined  entirely  to  British  industries.  There  had  been 
suggestions  of  including  a  Foreign  Section,  but  this  was 
eventually  not  carried  out.  Thompson,  who  always  upheld 
the  international  aspect  of  science,  hoped  to  have  had  the 
assistance  of  representative  men  of  other  countries,  and 
wrote  both  to  German  and  Italian  friends,  inviting  them  to 


270  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

take  part.  He  was  again  chairman  of  the  papers  sub- 
committee, and  contributed  to  the  Convention  a  joint  paper, 
with  Professor  Coker,  on  "  The  Design  of  Large  Polariscopes," 
and  one  on  "  The  Trend  of  Geometrical  Optics,"  an  exten- 
sion of  his  work  on  the  Measurement  of  Lenses  ;  these  in 
addition  to  his  Presidential  Address,  which  was  reported 
thus  in  Engineering : 

"  The  address  of  Principal  S.  P.  Thompson  was  a  brilliant 
inauguration,  worthy  of  the  occasion,  and  abounding  in 
weighty  suggestions.  We  intend  to  reproduce  it  in  our  next 
issue.  It  was  a  long  address,  and  its  delivery  took  more 
than-  an  hour.  It  would  be  useless  to  attempt  to  abstract 
it ;  we  can  merely  pick  out  a  few  salient  points.  Charac- 
teristically he  dealt  at  first  historically  with  his  opening 
theme,  the  value  of  theory  to  practical  advances,  returning 
again  to  '  the  two  giants,  Newton  and  Huygens,'  to  illustrate 
his  points.  Modern  optics  he  classified  into  forty  groups 
of  phenomena,  and  reviewed  progress  in  various  of  these, 
referring  to  the  books  and  researches  of  his  brilliant  contem- 
poraries. In  conclusion,  he  pleaded  for  an  institute  in 
which  optics  should  properly  be  taught,  in  which  brain- 
craft  and  handicraft  were  united,  not  two  separate  schools 
for  calculation  and  for  workers,  not  under  the  baneful  in- 
fluence of  a  University.  The  optical  industry  was  in  deadly 
earnest  in  demanding  such  a  centre  of  optical  training." 

Before  the  Convention  took  place  Thompson  was  very 
hard  at  work  preparing  for  publication  his  translation  of  the 
Traite  de  la  Lumiere  of  his  second  "  giant  of  optics," 
Huygens.  This  book  was  ready  in  time  to  bring  it  before 
members  of  the  Convention  to  whom,  in  order  to  encourage 
them  in  the  study  of  good  ©ptical  literature,  by  agreement 
with  the  publishers,  Messrs.  Macmillan  &  Co.,  it  was  offered 
at  half  its  published  price.  This  work  was  described  in 
Science  the  following  year,  1913,  in  a  review  signed  H.  C. : 

"  Ever  since  its  birth,  in  1690,  the  wave  theory  of  light 
has  been  adapting  itself  to  environment.  Just  at  the  present 
moment  ...  an  English  translation  of  Christiaan  Huygens' s 
great  Treatise  on  Light  is  particularly  opportune.  The  fact 
that  this  translation  has  been  made  by  Professor  Silvanus  P. 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  271 

Thompson  is  an  ample  guarantee  that  it  has  been  done  in 
a  scholarly  and  sympathetic  manner.  Two  distinct  courses 
are  open  to  one  who  wishes  to  transfer  into  English  the 
thought  of  a  foreign  author,  who  lived  more  than  two 
hundred  years  ago :  either  he  may  employ  the  English 
phraseology  of  our  own  day,  or  he  may  use  that  which  he 
conceives  to  have  been  the  current  diction  of  the  period  in 
which  the  work  was  composed.  In  either  case  he  must  avoid 
anachronisms,  and  in  either  case  the  problem  is  difficult.  .  .  . 
It  is  the  second  of  these  alternatives  which  Professor  Thomp- 
son has  chosen.  The  result  is  that  the  volume,  including 
its  title-page,  table  of  contents,  text,  paper,  binding,  typo- 
graphy, size,  and  English  style,  is  as  nearly  as  possible  what 
it  would  have  been  if  Huygens  had  lived  and  worked  and 
published  on  the  other  side  of  the  English  Channel.  This 
is  not  to  be  understood  as  meaning  that  the  translation  is 
in  any  sense  a  literal  one,  for  it  is  precisely  the  spirit  of  the 
work  which  Professor  Thompson  has  caught,  and  has  faith- 
fully reproduced.  In  brief  the  volume  is  in  every  way 
worthy  of  the  great  contributions  to  science  which  it 
contains." 

This  was  Thompson's  last  considerable  contribution  to 
optics.  In  1912  he  again  rendered  service  to  the  Spectacle 
Makers'  Guild,  when  this  body  was  inaugurating  a  special 
series  of  lectures  on  the  study  of  elementary  optics  and 
sight-testing.  He  delivered  the  first,  on  Lenses,  showing 
experimentally  the  ill-effects  of  aberrations,  and  the  methods 
of  eliminating  these  for  various  purposes,  a  study  which, 
though  admittedly  far  from  the  simple  optics  of  the  spectacle 
dealer,  was  in  his  opinion  of  first  importance  in  optical 
industry  of  the  present  day.  In  1913  he  again  examined 
the  candidates,  and  passed  the  thousandth  diploma  since 
the  scheme  was  inaugurated. 

In  1915  Thompson  thought  the  time  had  come  to  urge 
upon  the  Guild  once  more  the  necessity  of  taking  immediate 
steps,  without  waiting  for  the  end  of  the  war,  to  organise 
the  teaching  of  optical  science.  He  considered  that  the 
success  of  its  examination  scheme  and  its  position  as  recog- 
nised and  most  ancient  head  of  the  industry  fitted  the 
Company  to  take  direct  action  in  this  work  of  national 
importance.  \ 


272  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

For  the  war  found  the  English  still  without  a  well-equipped 
school  of  technical  optics. 

When  nothing  came  of  the  conference  at  the  L.C.C. 
in  1911,  hopes  were  turned  in  the  direction  of  a  Depart- 
mental Committee  of  the  Board  of  Education,  appointed 
to  consider  the  carrying  out  of  the  proposals  of  the  Royal 
Commission  on  London  University.  Thompson  knew 
many  of  the  members  of  this  committee  through  his  previous 
work  in  university  affairs,  and  as  Senator  ;  but  he  had 
ceased  to  hope  for  much  there. 

The  next  move,  early  in  1914,  was  taken  at  the  instigation 
of  Sir  Thomas  Barlow,  when  the  aid  of  the  British  Science 
Guild  was  enlisted  to  assist  in  relieving  the  difficulties  of 
the  Northampton  Institute,  and  to  emphasise  the  needs  of 
the  general  trade  in  optical  instruments,  as  well  as  those 
of  the  Admiralty  and  War  Office.  Thompson  was  elected 
chairman  of  the  Technical  Optics  Committee  of  the  British 
Science  Guild,  and  this  body  was  about  to  approach  the 
Development  Commissioners  in  the  fateful  month,  July  1914, 
when  Thompson  had  already  gone  to  the  Dolomites  for 
an  earlier  holiday  than  usual. 

England  had  long  ago  depended  upon  imports  of  glass  of 
all  kinds  to  supplement  her  scanty  home  resources.  The 
war  rendered  the  shortage  alarming,  and  at  first  all  thought 
turned  in  that  directon ;  but  in  December  1914  the  Com- 
mittee of  the  Guild  once  more  urged  the  educational  .needs 
of  the  industries  upon  the  authorities. 

In  the  spring  of  1915  the  L.C.C.  took  up  the  scheme  again, 
and  Thompson  corresponded  upon  the  matter  with  Dr. 
William  Garnett,  the  technical  adviser,  and  was  invited  by 
the  Education  Officer  to  be  present  when  the  representatives 
of  the  trades  assembled  to  discuss  the  proposals  with  him. 
When  at  last  the  hoped-for  scheme  was  declared  ready  for 
adoption,  Thompson  was  missed  in  the  public  gathering, 
and  his  loss  deplored  by  the  chairman. 

Apart  from  his  interest  in  distinctively  optical  questions 
such  as  the  foregoing,  Thompson  showed  himself  alive  to  other 
aspects  of  the  study  of  Light,  in  particular  to  the  questions  in- 
volved in  the  supply  of  the  best  possible  artificial  illumination. 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  273 

He  had  been  early  engaged  in  the  electricity  versus  gas- 
light controversy  and  watched  the  developments  of  both 
with  keen  interest,  writing  from  time  to  time  to  the  press 
when  some  particular  point  was  in  question  on  which 
he  held  definite  views  that  others  had  not  expressed 
adequately. 

In  1893,  the  year  of  the  publication  of  Thompson's  Notes 
on  Photometry,  Sir  William  Preece,  as  Engineer-in-Chief  of 
the  Post  Office,  undertook  to  organise  a  committee  in  England 
to  act  with  a  similar  committee  in  the  U.S.A.  to  consider 
and  determine  if  possible  the  question  of  a  Standard  of 
Light  and  a  Standard  of  Illumination,  and  invited  Thompson 
to  become  a  member  of  it,  together  with  Abney,  Hopkinson 
and  Fleming.  In  this  capacity  Thompson  saw  Helmholtz, 
for,  as  Sir  William  wrote  to  him,  "It  is  very  important  to 
get  co-operation  with  our  German  friends,  and  I  will  write  to 
America  suggesting  the  formation  of  a  German  Committee." 
These  committees  were  doubtless  the  precursors  of  the 
International  Photometric  Commission,  which  was  active  at 
Zurich  in  1911. 

When  asked  in  1906  to  deliver  "the  Working  Men's 
Lecture  "  of  the  British  Association  at  York,  he  chose  as  his 
subject  "  The  Manufacture  of  Light,"  which  lent  itself  well 
to  experimental  illustrations  on  a  large  scale,  including  a 
photometer  which  extended  right  across  the  platform.  The 
lecture  was  very  successful ;  though  it  provoked  much  less 
enthusiasm  than  the  previous  one  in  Bradford  (see  pp.  73—4), 
it  satisfied  at  least  one  of  the  audience,  Mr.  J.  W.  Graham 
of  Dalton  Hall,  Manchester  University,  who  wrote  years 
afterwards  that  he  did  not  remember  ever  listening  to  so 
good  a  lecture  as  this  one.  Thompson  published  it  as  a 
booklet,  and  afterwards  incorporated  it  as  an  additional 
chapter  in  the  second  edition  of  Light  Visible  and  Invisible. 
It  sets  forth  the  claims  of  the  rival  systems  of  lighting  and 
concludes  with  the  paragraph  : 

"Sunlight  after  all. — No,  the  cheapest  source  of  light 

still  remains  to  be  the  commonest  and  most  universal,  the 

light  of  the  sun,  which  shines  alike  on  rich  and  poor,  and 

gives  us  — such  is  the  admirable  economy— a  light  of  which 

18 


274  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

the  dominant  wave-length  is  ...  just  that  to  which  our 
eyes  have  become,  in  the  long  evolution  of  the  ages,  the 
most  sensitive.  By  no  artificial  process  can  we  manu- 
facture light  so  cheaply  that  it  would  not  be  still  cheaper 
to  adjust  our  social  habits  to  the  hours  of  sunlight,  and 
do  our  day's  work  while  it  is  yet  day." 

Thompson  always  hoped  the  nation  would  adopt  "  day- 
light saving,"  and  lived  to  enjoy  a  few  weeks  of  the  pro- 
longed summer  evenings. 

Early  in  the  twentieth  century  a  movement  arose  among 
enterprising  spirits  in  the  various  branches  of  "  illuminating 
engineering  "  in  England  and  America,  who  got  together 
to  discuss  matters  of  interest  to  both  gas  and  electricity 
workers,  and  published  a  monthly  journal  to  expound  the 
position  and  the  problems. 

Within  two  years  a  society  was  formed  in  England, 
having  the  support  of  a  number  of  well-known  men. 
Thompson  was  approached  with  the  request  that  he  would 
become  the  First  President  of  the  Illuminating  Engineering 
Society  of  Great  Britain.  The  founders  sought  "  one  who 
is  in  sympathy  with  our  movement  and  has  taken  a  wide 
interest  in  light,  illumination,  and  illuminants  generally." 

From  its  inception  the  Society  was  supported  on  the 
Continent  and  in  America  by  many  corresponding,  as  well 
as 'ordinary  members,  and  Vice-Presidents  ;  and  at  the  first 
anniversary  dinner  at  the  Criterion  Restaurant  there  were 
present  representatives  of  many  "  kindred  Societies,"  the 
Royal  Society  of  Arts,  the  Physiological  Society,  the  Royal 
Sanitary  Institute,  as  well  as  the  Gas  and  the  Electrical 
Engineers. 

In  his  Inaugural  Address,  delivered  at  the  first  meeting 
of  the  Society  in  1909,  Thompson  set  before  the  assembled 
members  his  views  as  to  the  aims  and  objects  of  the  Society 
and  proposals  as  to  its  future  work. 

"  The  Society  has  been  founded  to  bring  together  all 
those  who  are  interested  in  the  problems,  practical  and 
theoretical,  of  the  art  of  directing  and  adapting  light,  that 
prime  necessity  of  civilised,  as  well  as  of  uncivilised  exist- 
ence, to  the  use  and  convenience  of  man.  By  day  the  sun, 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  275 

by  night  the  artificial  sources,  lamps  of  all  kinds,  provide 
mankind  with  light.  But  to  utilise  the  light  so  afforded, 
properly,  without  waste,  without  excess,  is  an  art,  a  business, 
concerned  with  many  more  things  than  the  mere  production 
of  light.  Few  members  of  the  community  at  large  are 
producers  of  light,  and  those  who  produce  light  have  many 
diverse  and  often  rival  processes.  But  all  members  of  the 
community  are  users  of  light.  And  between  the  producer 
and  the  user  there  stands  a  considerable  number  of  persons, 
mostly  professional  men,  not  middlemen  in  the  industrial 
sense,  but  persons  who  are  concerned  with  the  intermediate 
questions  of  distribution  and  utilisation  for  whom  no  pro- 
fessional name  has  hitherto  existed,  and  who  have  had  no 
organisation  to  bring  them  together  to  consolidate  their 
experience  or  to  voice  their  opinions.  Their  diverse  and 
individual  interest  centre  around  a  common  topic — and,  in 
default  of  a  more  appropriate  name,  that  topic  is  called 
'  illuminating  engineering.'  " 

He  summed  up  the  present  position  thus :  "  The 
ascertained  facts  are  few — all  too  few  ;  their  significance  is 
immense  ;  their  economic  and  social  value  great ;  but  the 
ignorance  respecting  them  generally  is  colossal !  "  He  put 
before  them  a  few  of  the  facts  known,  suggested  a  few 
specific  questions  in  which  he  saw  a  hopeful  field  for  investiga- 
tion, and  proposed  that  the  Society  should  work,  like  the 
British  Association,  by  forming  technical  committees, 
charged  with  the  duty  of  preparing  reports  on  the  different 
branches  of  the  subject.  He  went  on  to  deal  with  the 
subject  of  school-lighting,  and  referred  to  the  statistics  as 
to  the  light  arrangements  of  the  L.C.C.  schools,  and  the 
reports  of  ophthalmic  surgeons,  in  particular  that  of  his 
brother  Dr.  Tatham  Thompson  of  Cardiff,  on  the  eyesight 
of  school-children.  He  hoped  architects  would  find  a  place 
in  their  Society.  Among  the  many  other  problems  he 
referred  to  was  the  long  outstanding  one  of  the  production 
of  light  without  heat — accomplished  in  nature  by  the  firefly 
or  glow-worm.  "There  is,  indeed,  abundance  of  work 
before  us.  ...  To  sum  it  up,  the  work  before  us  is  to  diffuse 
the  light." 

The  year  following,  1910,  when  invited  to  lecture  at  the 


276  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Royal  Institution,  Thompson  chose  as  the  subject  of  his 
course,  "  Illumination  Natural  and  Artificial,"  and  there 
elaborated  his  theme. 

Following  the  suggestions  of  their  President,  the  Illu- 
minating Engineers  established  committees  of  enquiry 
into  the  questions  of  street,  school  and  library  lighting, 
and  kept  in  touch  with  groups  of  interested  workers  abroad. 
In  January  1912,  when  a  proposal  had  come  from  the 
American  Society  to  hold  an  International  Conference  on 
questions  of  Photometric  Nomenclature  and  Standards,  a 
meeting  of  representative  persons  was  summoned  to  the 
National  Physical  Laboratory,  and  in  the  absence  (owing 
to  illness)  of  Dr.  Glazebrook,  Thompson  presided  over  their 
deliberations,  and  so  once  more  became  associated  with 
international  enterprise.  At  the  time  of  his  death  he  was 
a  member  of  the  National  Illumination  Committee  of  Great 
Britain,  which  existed  as  a  representative  body,  affiliated 
to  the  International  Commission  on  Illumination. 

At  home  the  Society  engaged  in  useful  activities.  In 
1913  Thompson  was  still  the  President,  and  in  that  capacity 
served  as  Vice-President  at  the  National  Gas  Congress  and 
Exhibition  held  in  London  under  the  presidency  of  Lord 
Rayleigh.  Conferences  were  held  both  this  year  and  the 
next  with  educationists  and  persons  interested  in  school- 
lighting,  and  with  architects  on  the  subject  of  the  lighting 
of  museums  and  libraries,  and  on  both  occasions  Thompson 
gave  up  a  Saturday  afternoon  to  open  the  discussion  with 
an  introductory  paper. 

Of  his  work  for  the  Illuminating  Engineering  Society, 
Mr.  Leon  Gaster,  its  secretary,  wrote  in  the  following  terms,1 
a  few  weeks  after  Thompson's  death  : 

"  In  presiding  at  the  Annual  Meeting,  he  spoke  with  all 
his  accustomed  charm  and  idealism,  encouraging  us  by 
pointing  out  how  many  of  the  aims  and  objects  of  the 
Society — so  admirably  expressed  in  his  own  Inaugural 
Address  in  1909 — were  gradually  being  carried  into  effect. 
We  cannot  do  better  than  quote  from  what  we  now  feel  to 
have  been  a  farewell  message  : 

1  The  Illuminating  Engineer  (June  1916). 


OPTICS  AND  ILLUMINATION  277 

"  '  The  whole  function  of  the  Society  is  to  produce  good 
lighting  by  whatever  means,  and  the  fact  that  Departmental 
Committees  and  officials  of  the  Home  Office  are  now  per- 
suaded, and  more  than  persuaded,  that  this  is  a  step  to  be 
fostered  govermnentally  is  a  complete  justification  for  the 
existence  of  the  Society.  This,  however,  does  not  justify 
us  in  folding  our  arms  and  saying  that  our  work  is  done, 
but  it  is  an  encouragement  to  go  on  in  the  future  in  the 
same  direction  and  improve  lighting  of  all  lands  for  the 
benefit  of  the  community. ' ' 

"To  the  Illuminating  Engineering  Society  he  endeared 
himself  by  his  conscientious  execution  of  his  duties  as 
President,  and  the  admirable  way  in  which  he  smoothed 
away  conflicting  interests — always  cheerful  and  optimistic, 
with  a  generous  recognition  of  the  services  of  others,  and  a 
kind  thought  for  all  with  whom  he  came  in  contact.  .He 
seemed  by  instinct  to  know  the  right  thing  to  do  and  say  on 
each  occasion,  and  it  was  in  no  small  measure  owing  to  his 
influence  in  the  early  stages  that  the  Council  Meetings  of 
the  Society  have,  from  the  very  beginning,  been  carried  on 
in  such  an  amicable  and  friendly  manner." 


CHAPTER    XIII 

THE   WRITING   OF  THE   KELVIN   BIOGRAPHY 

IT  was  during  his  student  days  at  South  Kensington  in 
1876  that  Thompson  first  met  the  man  who  became  to  him 
in  later  years  almost  as  great  a  hero  as  was  Michael  Faraday. 

In  the  spring  of  that  year  he  wrote  home  to  his  father 
narrating  how,  when  one  day,  in  the  machinery  hall  of  the 
Inventions'  Exhibition,  which  was  then  going  on,  he  met, 
along  with  some  other  scientific  men  whom  he  knew,  Sir 
William  Thomson  of  Glasgow,  the  celebrated  Professor  of 
Natural  Philosophy,  and  great  mathematical  genius.  He 
had  also  heard  him  discoursing  on  some  electrical  apparatus 
which  was  on  show. 

In  the  same  year  Thompson  went  during  the  autumn 
to  Glasgow  to  attend  the  meeting  of  the  British  Association 
there.  At  this  meeting  Sir  William  Thomson  was  President 
of  the  Mathematical  and  Physical  Section,  and  his  wonder- 
fully patient,  courteous,  and  encouraging  manner  towards 
the  younger  men,  who  were  making  their  first  attempts 
to  bring  forward  their  own  results  of  researches  and  experi- 
ments, made  a  deep  impression  on  Thompson.  From  that 
time  onward  he  held  a  high  opinion  of  his  character. 

Although  never  privileged  to  be  a  worker  under  Sir  William 
like  Professor  Ayrton,  Professor  Ramsay,  and  some  of  his 
other  friends,  yet  Thompson  soon  grew  to  have  the  same 
warm  affection,  and  the  same  reverence  and  admiration 
for  him,  that  so  many  of  them  felt.  During  the  seventies 
and  eighties,  while  he  was  still  an  aspirant  for  success  in 
research  work,  he  very  frequently  received  most  kindly 
encouragement  and  signs  of  interest  from  him,  whom  he 
named  privately  the  "  Second  Isaac  Newton." 

278 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY    279 

Sir  William  Thomson  himself  a  few  years  later  seemed  to 
feel  the  attraction  of  the  younger  man's  keen  and  earnest 
personality. 

He  also  early  recognised  the  value  of  his  work  on  optics, 
and  it  has  been  already  shown  how  much  he  appreciated  his 
work  on  light  and  radiations. 

When  the  two  men  met  at  scientific  social  gatherings  they 
sometimes  entered  into  animated  discussions  on  subjects 
in  which  they  were  both  interested,  and  became  quite 
oblivious  to  their  surroundings. 

A  rather  amusing  scene  arose  out  of  this  on  one  occasion, 
which  Thompson  mentions  in  his  Life  of  Kelvin. 

Sir  William  Thomson  was  President  of  the  Royal  Society 
from  1890  to  1894,  and  in  1892  he  was  made  a  peer,  and 
took  the  title  of  Baron  Kelvin.  During  that  year's  office 
he  and  Lady  Kelvin  were  receiving  the  guests  at  the  Annual 
Ladies'  night  Soiree  in  the  Royal  Society's  rooms,  and 
were  standing  near  the  door  of  the  room  at  the  top  of 
the  staircase.  As  soon  as  Thompson  and  his  wife  were 
announced,  and  had  shaken  hands  with  their  host  and 
hostess,  Lord  Kelvin  grasped  Thompson's  arm,  and  hurriedly 
drew  him  to  one  corner  of  the  room,  and,  pointing  up  towards 
an  electric  light,  he  said  quickly  :  "  Look  at  that  lamp  : 
now  half  shut  your  eyes  :  tell  me  what  you  see."  Thompson 
said,  "  I  see  irregular  luminous  streaks  extending  above 
and  below."  "What  are  they  due  to?"  he  asked. 
Thompson  explained  that  he  always  "  supposed  them  to  be 
due  to  the  film  of  moisture  at  the  edges  of  the  eyelids, 
acting  as  an  irregular  cylindrical  lens."  "  Where  did  you 
find  that  ?  Who  told  you  that  ?  "  Kelvin  asked  excitedly. 
Thompson  was  just  beginning  to  say  that  he  had  known 
it  for  a  long  time,  and  had  been  giving  that  explanation 
to  his  students  in  past  years,  when  Lady  Kelvin,  who  with 
Mrs.  Thompson  had  been  noticing  with  some  consternation 
that  several  more  guests  had  arrived,  and  were  waiting  to  be 
received,  put  her  hand  on  his  arm  and  said,  "  William,  there 
are  people  waiting."  As  Kelvin  hobbled  back  to  his  former 
position  (he  was  then  very  lame),  in  front  of  the  door,  he 
said,  "  I  want  to  talk  to  you  about  this  later." 


280  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Afterwards  he  told  Thompson  that  he  had  been  reading 
some  papers  belonging  to  his  late  brother,  James  Thomson, 
Professor  of  Engineering  at  Glasgow,  who  had  died  in  May 
of  that  year,  and  had  found  an  explanation  of  this  pheno- 
menon, which  he  thought  had  never  been  published.  Now 
he  considered  it  was  not  worth  while  to  publish  it,  as  Thomp- 
son had  been  teaching  it  to  his  students  for  several  years. 

Another  time  Kelvin  met  Thompson  on  the  stairs  leading 
up  to  the  gallery  of  the  Natural  History  Museum.  A 
Soiree  of  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  was  in 
progress,  and  it  was  the  most  crowded  time  of  the  evening, 
when  hundreds  of  people  were  going  up  and  down  the  broad 
staircase.  He  began  asking  Thompson  about  something 
which  required  a  somewhat  lengthy  explanation,  and  the 
two  absorbed  scientists,  and  their  two  patient  wives,  con- 
tinued to  be  for  some  time  a  serious  block  to  the  passers 
up  and  down,  and  were  the  cause  of  many  smiles  of  amuse- 
ment on  the  part  of  those  who  were  familiar  with  Lord 
Kelvin's  little  ways. 

In  1896  the  jubilee  anniversary  of  Kelvin's  appointment 
as  Professor  at  Glasgow  University  was  celebrated.  It  took 
place  in  June,  a  time  when  many  universities  are  not  in 
session,  and  was  attended  by  an  extraordinary  number  of 
their  representatives  from  all  over  the  civilised  world. 

Thompson  was  one  of  those  presenting  addresses,  and 
and  he  and  Mrs.  Thompson  were  present  at  the  ceremonies, 
of  the  presentation,  of  the  granting  of  honorary  degrees  to 
many  of  the  foreign  professors,  and  the  reception  of  the 
delegates  and  their  friends  in  the  Bute  Hall  by  Lord  and 
Lady  Kelvin  in  the  evening. 

Three  years  later  Kelvin  retired  from  his  professorship, 
and  went  to  live  at  Netherhall,  Largs,  a  house  which  he  had 
built  for  himself.  After  this  he  was  nruch  more  frequently 
in  London,  and  had  a  house  in  Eaton  Place,  where  he  some- 
times spent  several  months  of  the  year. 

During  Thompson's  Presidency  of  the  Institution  of 
Electrical  Engineers  it  was  his  pleasant  duty  to  inform 
Lord  Kelvin  that  he  had  been  elected  an  honorary  member 
of  the  Institution. 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGEAPHY    281 
He  received  the  following  letter,  dated  January  17th,  1899  : 

"  I  warmly  appreciate  the  personal  kindness  of  members 
of  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers  in  wishing  me  to 
be  its  first  honorary  member,  and  I  beg  you  to  convey 
to  the  Institution  my  cordial  thanks  for  the  resolution  to 
confer  on  me  this  distinction,  which  you  tell  me  has  been 
adopted. 

"  I  value  the  honour  very  highly,  and  shall  ever  continue 
to  be  fully  interested  in  the  work  of  the  Institution  and 
its  ever-increasing  usefulness." 

In  1904,  when  Colchester  was  having  its  Annual  Oyster 
Feast,  and  the  Mayor  was  anxious  to  include  several  elec- 
tricians at  the  dinner,  he  asked  Thompson,  who  was  a 
personal  friend,  to  try  and  get  Lord  Kelvin  to  honour  the 
feast  by  his  presence. 

Kelvin  replied  from  Largs,  September  8th,  1904. 

"DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  I  have  been  at  an  oyster  feast  before.  Lord 
Rayleigh,  who  was  then  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Essex,  was  at 
it  also,  and  it  really  was  very  interesting  and  amusing.  It 
has  also  the  merit  of  time-honoured  antiquity.  Will  you 
thank  the  Mayor  for  his  kindness  in  thinking  of  inviting  me 
this  year  ?  It  would  have  been  a  great  pleasure  to  me  if  I 
could  have  accepted,  but  my  whole  free  time  will  be  taken 
by  several  important  and  unavoidable  engagements  in 
Scotland  and  England  at  different  times  during  the  month 
(October),  which  make  it  practically  impossible  for  me  to 
have  the  pleasure  of  being  one  of  his  guests  at  the  Oyster 
Feast  this  year. 

"  I  am  feeling  less  and  less  satisfied  with  the  orthodox 
explanation  of  the  radiometer  :  that  the  motion  is  due 
solely  to  the  difference  of  temperature  on  the  two  sides  of 
each  vane,  and  its  influence  on  the  molecular  impacts  of  the 
enclosed  air.  Do  you  know  if  any  one  has  published  any- 
thing with  respect  to  the  cup  radiometer  ? 

"It  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  see  how  the  difference  of 
temperature  explanation  could  be  applied  to  this. 

';  I  have  had  a  little  cup-radiometer  since  1881,  when  I 
was  staying  with  Helmholtz  in  Berlin,  and  bought  it  there. 
I  don't  remember  his  having  any  explanation  for  it.  I  had 
the  impression  that  its  action  was  not  very  satisfactory ; 


282  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

but  yesterday  and  to-day  here,  I  have  been  trying  it  and 
finding  it  just  about  as  sure  as  an  ordinary  radiometer, 
though  it  does  not  go  round  so  fast. 

"  Yours  very  truly, 

"  KELVIN." 

Thompson  replied  to  this  on  September  llth  : 

"  DEAR  LORD  KELVIN, 

"  I  have  written  to  the  Mayor  of  Colchester  of  your 
decision.  I  know  he  will  be  sorry  that  you  cannot  come  to 
the  Oyster  Feast. 

"As  to  the  radiometer  question,  the  cup  form  of  radio- 
meter has  never  seemed  to  me  to  depend  on  exactly  the  same 
facts  as  the  ordinary  one  that  has  one  set  of  faces  blackened. 
In  the  case  of  the  blackened  faces,  something  happens  at 
the  face  which,  whether  it  penetrated  deeply  or  not,  must 
be  equivalent  to  a  rise  of  temperature.  Possibly  it  is  con- 
fined only  to  a  very  thin  layer  of  molecules.  May  it  not  be 
somewhat  similar  to  that  which  occurs  in  the  phospho- 
rescence of  rubies  (for  example)  in  a  Crookes'  tube  ?  Is 
not  the  surface  layer  of  molecules,  which  is  emitting  this 
phosphorescent  light,  actually  and  truly  red  hot  ? 

"  That  is,  these  molecules  are  in  the  same  intense  vibration 
as  they  would  be  if  the  temperature  of  the  whole  mass  were 
to  be  raised  to  800°  C.,  or  more.  Then  the  layer  of  mole- 
cules on  a  radiometer  vane  must  be  raised  in  temperature 
by  the  radiation  that  falls  on  them,  and  those  surfaces  that 
do  not  reflect  much  of  the  radiation  must  be  thus  raised 
in  temperature  more  than  those  that  are  good  reflectors. 
But  then  not  even  a  blackened  radiometer  will  revolve,  unless 
there  is  within  reasonable  distance  an  opposing  bulb  wall. 
The  same  vanes  that  run  round  quickly  in  a  small  bulb 
run  round  quite  slowly  in  a  large  bulb,  with  the  same 
vacuum  and  under  the  same  illumination. 

"  Hence  when  one  goes  to  the  case  of  the  cup-radiometer, 
where  there  is  no  apparent  reason  for  any  difference  of 
temperature  between  a  convex  and  a  concave  face  of  equal 
polish,  the  only  thing  that  is  not  the  same  for  the  two  faces 
(neglecting  any  question  of  direct  ether  pressure)  is  the 
geometrical  distance  between  the  vane  surface  and  the 
bulb  surface." 

Only  on  one  occasion  did  Thompson  have  the  pleasure 
of  receiving  Lord  Kelvin  in  his  own  home  at  Hampstead. 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY    283 

It  was  rather  too  far  off  for  an  evening  visit,  with  all 
Kelvin's  numerous  engagements  ;  but  he  and  Lady  Kelvin 
were  able  to  attend  an  afternoon  reception,  which  Thompson 
had  arranged  in  order  to  introduce  his  friend  M.  Henri 
Beequerel  of  Paris  to  some  of  the  members  of  the  Physical 
Society,  and  there  was  a  numerous  gathering  of  scientific 
worthies,  whom  Kelvin  enjoyed  meeting. 

It  was  not  until  Kelvin  had  passed  the  four-score  years 
that  Thompson  began  to  entertain  the  idea  of  writing  a 
biography  of  him. 

The  great  success  and  appreciation  with  which  his  Life 
of  Faraday  had  met  led  him  to  believe  that  he  could 
make  a  similar  success  with  a  biography  of  one  even  more 
renowned  in  the  scientific  world. 

In  March  1906  he  summoned  up  courage  to  approach 
Lord  Kelvin,  then  living  in  London,  on  the  subject,  sending 
him  at  the  same  time  a  copy  of  his  Life  of  Faraday. 

The  following  was  the  reply  he  received  : 

"  DEAR  THOMPSON, 

"  Three  days  ago  I  received  your  beautiful  book 
on  Michael  Faraday,  and  I  have  been  reading  it  with  great 
interest  and  much  pleasure.  It  gives,  I  believe,  a  thoroughly 
truthful  view  of  his  scientific  work  and  of  his  life.  As  you 
kindly  told  me  you  had  been  thinking  it  possible  you 
might  wish  to  undertake  writing  an  account  of  my  own 
scientific  work,  I  can  say  that  I  would  feel  complete  confi- 
dence that  in  your  hands  it  would  experience  thoroughly 
satisfactory  treatment.  If  you  are  inclined  to  talk  over 
the  matter  just  now,  shall  we  meet  one  of  these  days,  at 
any  time  that  would  suit  you — either  morning  or  about  tea- 
time  after  the  working  day  is  over  ? 

"  Yours  always  truly, 

"  KELVIN." 

Soon  after  this  it  was  agreed  between  Kelvin  and  Thomp- 
son that  the  latter  should  come  and  have  interviews  with 
him,  and  talk  about  the  scientific  work  done  in  the  early 
days  at  Cambridge  and  Glasgow. 

During  the  spring  of  1906  Thompson  had  several  of 
these  "  sittings,"  as  he  called  them,  and  afterwards  made 


284  LIFE   OF  SILVAN  US  THOMPSON 

voluminous  notes  of  the  grand  old  man's  reminiscences. 
Then,  when  the  London  season  was  over,  Kelvin  went  to  his 
home  at  Largs,  and  it  was  not  until  late  in  October  that  they 
were  able  to  meet  again.  Kelvin  wrote  to  Thompson  on 
October  1 8th  from  Largs,  in  answer  to  him : 

"  Many  thanks  for  your  letter.  I  was  glad  to  receive  it 
yesterday.  I  do  not  think  my  Siphon  Recorder  can  help 
in  respect  to  wireless  telegraphy.  An  ordinary  relay  is  more 
suitable.  The  only  merit  of  my  Siphon  Recorder  would  be 
to  work  with  a  less  strong  current.  Its  merit  for  submarine 
telegraphy  is  that  it  indicates  continuously  varying  strength 
of  current ;  and  this  is  not  wanted  in  wireless  telegraphy. 

"  We  are  going  to  London  on  Tuesday  next  for  the, 
Autumn  Session.  I  do  not  know  how  long  we  may  be  kept, 
but  I  shall  hope  to  see  you  before  we  leave,  and  to  talk  over 
Helmholtz  and  Clausius  and  some  other  interesting  subjects." 

So  a  few  more  sittings  took  place  in  the  autumn,  and 
again  in  the  sprung  and  early  summer  of  the  following  year. 

In  Thompson's  note-book  for  1907  many  entries  headed 
"  Kelviniana  "  are  to  be  found,  and  he  had  begun  to  plan 
his  book,  which  was  intended  to  be  in  one  volume,  and  was 
to  be  published  by  Messrs.  Macmillan.  The  titles  of  the 
nine  chapters  of  which  it  was  to  consist  were  outlined,  and 
a  list  made  of  the  plates  which  were  to  illustrate  it. 

He  used  to  put  down  lists  of  the  names  of  persons  from 
whom  reminiscences  of  Kelvin  might  be  got.  Some  of  these, 
when  acquired,  were  very  characteristic  of  the  man.  For 
instance,  Sir  William  Crookes  told  how,  when  Kelvin  first 
saw  his  radiometer,  he  sat  in  silence  gazing  at  it  for  an  hour. 
Another  story  was  of  a  -meeting  of  the  British  Association, 
at  which  Crookes  had  read  a  paper  in  Section  A,  Sir  William 
Thomson  presiding.  Various  remarks  had  been  made, 
and  then  the  next  business  was  taken.  On  the  same  evening 
Crookes  met  Sir  William  at  dinner.  "  Oh,"  he  said,  "  oh, 
Mr.  Crookes,  I  wish  you  had  been  in  the  Section  to-day : 
there  was  such  a  beautiful  paper  read.  It  would  have 
interested  you  so  much.  I  looked  all  round  the  room  for 
you,  but  I  couldn't  see  you  anywhere  !  "  (Crookes  had 
been  on  the  platform  beside  him.) 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY     285 

At  the  British  Association  at  Leicester  in  1907,  when 
Thompson  was  presiding  in  the  Engineering  Section,  he 
again  saw  a  good  deal  of  Lord  Kelvin,  who,  despite  his  age 
and  his  indifferent  health,  was  entering  with  surprising 
activity  into  the  discussions. 

But  this  was  the  last  occasion  on  which  they  met.  After 
the  Kelvins  had  returned  to  Largs  in  the  autumn,  Lady 
Kelvin  was  struck  down  with  a  paralytic  seizure,  from  which 
she  only  partially  recovered.  The  shock  of  this  sudden 
illness  of  his  wife,  and  anxiety  about  her,  were  too  much 
for  the  aged  Lord  Kelvin,  who  fell  ill  and  died  in  December. 

He  was  buried  in  Westminster  Abbey,  and  an  immense 
concourse  of  scientific  men  was  present.  Delegates  from 
Societies  and  Institutions  followed  the  coffin  in  procession, 
and  among  these  Thompson  represented,  by  special  request, 
the  Associazione  Elettrotecnica  Italiana,  of  which  he  was  a 
member. 

For  a  long  time — about  six  months — it  was  very  difficult 
for  Thompson  to  make  much  progress  with  his  biography. 
Owing  to  Lady  Kelvin's  state  of  health,  he  could  not  obtain 
permission  to  borrow  papers  and  letters  which  were  necessary 
to  his  work.  In  January  of  1908  he  was  in  correspondence 
with  Dr.  J.  T.  Bottomley,  nephew  of  Lord  Kelvin.  There 
seems  to  have  been  a  desire  expressed  by  the  family  that 
Thompson's  book  should  be  the  official  biography  of  Kelvin. 

In  answer  to  an  enquiry  from  Dr.  Bottomley  about  the 
scope  of  his  proposed  book,  he  wrote  as  follows  : 

"  The  plan  which  was  adopted  from  the  first  was  a  one- 
volume  book,  and  there  was  no  intention,  if  it  should  have 
been  published  in  Lord  Kelvin's  life-time,  of  printing  in  it 
any  considerable  number  of  letters.  Nor  was  it  the  inten- 
tion to  give  any  deeply  scientific  analysis  of  Lord  Kelvin's 
papers,  as  it  was  to  be  suited  to  non-mathematical  readers. 
The  very  last  time  I  saw  him,  he  told  me  he  had  himself 
been  setting  down  some  further  notes  for  me." 

The  decision  that  the  book  was  to  be  a  full  biography  of 
Kelvin  threw  on  Thompson  a  heavy  responsibility  and  a 
most  difficult  task,  which  occupied  all  his  spare  time  and 
most  of  his  holidays  for  the  next  two  years.  Of  course, 


286  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

much  other  work  and  writing  had  to  be  laid  aside  until 
its  completion. 

His  friend  Mr.  M.  F.  O'Reilly  (Brother  Potamian)  wrote 
him  in  January  1908  from  Manhattan  College  : 

"  We  have  lost  our  Mentor  :  our  great  instructor,  who 
instructed  as  much  by  his  noble  example  as  a  Christian 
gentleman  as  he  did  by  his  writings,  lectures,  and  discourses. 
I  was  glad  to  learn  that  you  will  do  for  Lord  Kelvin  (I  prefer 
the  plain  name)  what  you  have  so  beautifully  done  for 
Faraday.  My  wonder  is  how  you  get  time  to  accomplish 
so  much." 

For  several  months  Thompson  struggled  with  the  diffi- 
culties of  finding  out  the  facts  of  Kelvin's  early  life  and 
work  from  the  few  surviving  contemporaries  whom  he  was 
able  to  trace.  At  last  an  application  to  the  Registrar  of 
St.  Peter's  College,  Cambridge,  for  some  information  was 
by  him  passed  on  to  one  of  the  Fellows  of  the  College, 
Mr.  J.  D.  Hamilton  Dickson,  who  was  an  old  pupil  of 
Lord  Kelvin's.  This  was  a  most  fortunate  occurrence  for 
Thompson,  for  Mr.  Hamilton  Dickson  was  a  most  enthu- 
siastic admirer  of  Kelvin,  in  fact  regarded  him  with  some- 
thing amounting  to  hero-worship.  He  replied  to  Thompson's 
enquiry  in  the  most  kind  and  friendly  manner,  and  offered 
to  do  anything  he  could  to  help  him  in  his  great  under- 
taking. 

Thompson  was  delighted,  and  used  to  pour  out  questions 
relating  to  all  sorts  of  events  which  occurred  in  Kelvin's 
student  days  in  Cambridge.  His  first  letter  to  Mr.  Hamilton 
Dickson  was  written  in  June  1908  : 

"DEAR  SIB, 

"  From  your  exceedingly  kind  note  on  the  postcard, 
I  infer  that  you  conjectured  that  my  enquiry  about  Professor 
Fuller  was  connected  with  my  biography  of  Kelvin.  This 
is  so.  I  am  much  obliged  for  the  reference.  But  I  am  much 
more  indebted  to  you  for  the  additional  information  as  to 
the  testimonials  which  he  sent  to  Glasgow  in  1846. 

"  This  is  indeed  a  '  find '  for  me.  I  shall  be  most  grateful 
for  the  sight  of  the  copy  of  the  testimonials,  which  shall 
be  returned  at  the  earliest  opportunity.  With  many 
thanks  for  your  kindness." 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY     287 

During  the  early  summer  Thompson  paid  visits  to 
Glasgow  and  to  Newcastle  to  see  the  nephews  of  Lord  Kelvin, 
and  to  try  to  gather  up  all  kinds  of  information  about  his 
family  and  friends. 

He  overworked  very  much  at  that  time,  and  was  ordered 
to  take  a  long  holiday  during  the  vacation.  He  had  perforce 
to  obey,  and  went  for  six  weeks  to  Switzerland  with  his  wife 
and  family,  living  among  the  high  Alps  at  Axalp  and  Stein 
in  the  Oberland,  and  devoting  his  time  to  botanical  rambles 
and  water-colour  sketching. 

He  returned  to  London  refreshed,  and  wrote  to  Mr. 
Hamilton  Dickson  on  September  8th  : 

"  If,  as  is  probable,  this  letter  will  find  you  away  from 
Cambridge,  please  do  not  attempt  to  answer  it  until  you 
return.  I  write  while  I  have  the  leisure,  for  with  the  end  of 
September  comes  the  [Administrative]  deluge  upon  me. 
First  I  wish  to  tell  you  that  I  have  definitely  identified  the 
'  Field  '  whom  Lord  Kelvin  mentioned  as  a  member  of  the 
1  Fleet.'  He  was  the  Rev.  Thomas  Field,  of  St.  John's, 
who  took  the  Classical  Tripos  in  1844,  and  was  for  many 
years  Tutor  at  John's." 

Then  follow  about  a  dozen  questions  about  matters  which 
could  only  be  found  out  by  hunting  up  registers  at  Cam- 
bridge. Mr.  Dickson  was  untiring  in  his  help,  and  unsparing 
in  his  devotion  to  the  small  details  of  information  which 
Thompson  required  in  order  to  picture  the  surroundings  of 
his  hero's  college  life. 

He  wrote  again  on  September  17th  : 

"  Again  you  have  laid  me  under  obligations,  and  things 
are  becoming  clearer.  But  there  are  some  outstanding 
points." 

Then   follows    another    string    of    questions   about     the 
Cambridge  British  Association  Meeting  of  1845. 
In  January  1909  he  writes  : 

"I  have  your  list  of  Lord  Kelvin's  distinctions —it  is 
considerably  fuller  than  mine,  but  I  think  I  can  add  one  or 
two  entries.  Pray  let  me  keep  it  a  few  days  to  verify  the 


288  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

list  point  by  point — or  rather,  to  check  it  against  mine. 
Thanks  also  for  information  about  rooms  in  Peterhouse. 

"  I  take  the  opportunity  to  offer  you  a  literary  trifle  that 
may  interest  you." 

Mr.  Hamilton  Dickson  replied  : 

"  I  cannot  rest  till  I  thank  you  for  your  kind  letter  and 
its  two  enclosures.  I  know  I  shall  enjoy  reading  both — 
Petrus  for  his  own  sake,  and  the  pamphlet  on  Petrus  for  the 
sake  of  its  writer  ;  for  is  it  not  well  known  that  its  writer  is 
the  most  learned  on  all  that  deals  de  magnete  ?  Thank  you 
again  heartily." 

A  few  days  later  he  wrote  again : 

"  Your  Petrus  de  Magnete  is  very  interesting — both  the 
lovely  little  bookie  (rubricated  by  S.  P.  T.)  and  your  capital 
monograph  on  it  and  him.  I  have  read  the  most  of  the 
monograph,  but  not  so  much  of  the  Petrus  :  however,  that 
is,  a  treat  to  come." 

As  the  months  went  on  their  correspondence  became 
more  and  more  frequent,  and  to  save  time  they  began  to 
imitate  Thomson  and  Tait's  manner  of  addressing  one 
another,  and  wrote  "0.  T."  or  u  0.  D.,"  ending  up  with 
the  word  "  Salaams,"  of  which  Thompson  wrote  : 

"  This  convenient  orientalism  saves  a  lot  of  rigmarole 
of  '  Kind  regards  '  and  '  belie ve-mes,'  and  for  the  friends  to 
whom  I  address  it  means  far  more  than  such  convention- 
alities mean  to  Tom,  Dick,  Harry,  Brown,  Jones,  and 
Robinson.  Non  ragionar  di  lor." 

In  July  Thompson  visited  Cambridge,  and  gathered  much 
information.  His  letter  to  Mr.  Hamilton  Dickson  after  his 
return  must  be  quoted  : 

"I  had  a  curious  journey  back  from  Cambridge  on 
Monday  evening.  Alone,  most  way  in  the  compartment. 
I  was  trying  to  read  proofs,  and  to  piece  together,  and 
carve  on  memory,  the  hundred  and  one  things  that  you  had 
told  me.  And  all  the  while  I  was  haunted  by  an  idea  that 
I  couldn't  throw  off,  and  that  recurs  each  day  since,  that 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY     289 

you,  and  not  I,  ought  to  be  writing  this  biography  of  the 
wonderful  old  man.  You,  who  knew  him  at  far  more  close 
quarters  than  I.  You,  who  knew  Glasgow,  and  the  old 
College,  and  White's,  and  the  development  of  the  recorder, 
and  the  Lalla  Rookh  ;  and  who  knew  Cambridge  at  first 
hand,  and  for  so  many  years  in  the  very  spot  that  knew  him. 
And  yet  it  is  I,  and  not  you,  who  is  to  be  supposed  to  know 
all  about  him.  I  shall  have  to  send  you,  when  they  are 
complete,  the  proofs  of  the  parts  that  relate  to  Cambridge, 
and  to  the  Laboratory  corps.  I  tremble  at  the  crop  of 
innocent  blunders  that  lie  there  awaiting  the  blue  pencil  of 
the  master  who  knows  (maestro  di  color o  chi  sanno  !)  " 

In    January    Thompson    sought    help    from    Professor 
Kennelly  of -Harvard: 

"  Your  kind  greetings  for  the  New  Year  duly  arrived. 
Mrs.  Thompson  bids  me  to  add  her  acknowledgements  to 
Mrs.  Kennelly  and  yourself.  We  sent  out  no  cards  this 
winter,  for  my  mother-in-law  Mrs.  Henderson,  who  has 
lived  with  us  for  many  years,  died  just  at  the  end  of 
November,  and  with  this  upset,  and  the  great  pressure  on 
me  in  trying  to  complete  the  Kelvin  biography,  I  had  no 
time  to  design  a  greeting  to  send  to  our  friends. 

"I  find  myself  in  a  difficulty  as  regards  some  of  the 
American  honours  of  which  Lord  Kelvin  was  recipient.  So, 
wanting  to  make  the  list  as  complete  as  possible,  I  venture 
to  trouble  you  with  the  enquiry  whether  you  can  help  me 
to  complete  the  list.  I  believe  Lord  Kelvin  received  several 
hon.  degrees  in  1902,  his  last  visit  to  the  States.  Did  not 
Harvard  give  him  an  honorary  degree  ?  " 

At  the  end  of  July  1909  Thompson  wrote  to  Sir  William 
Crookes,  whose  portrait  had  just  been  painted  for  the  Royal 
Society  by  Mr.  E.  A.  Walton,  R.S.A.,  brother-in-law  of 
Thompson  : 

"DEAR  SIB  WILLIAM, 

"  May  I  reply  quite  briefly  ?  Your  letter  does  not 
say  what  hour  you  are  leaving  for  Sark.  I  am  going  down 
to  Wenhaston  for  my  holiday  next  Tuesday,  and  shall  see 
Edward  Walton  that  evening  :  the  house  we  have  taken 
being  next  door  to  his.  So  I  will  find  out  what  he  wishes. 
But  if  you  leave  for  Sark  before  a  letter  can  reach  you,  then 
19 


290  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

I  think  it  will  be  all  right  if  the  portrait  is  left  locked  up  as 
you  suggest.  I  have  been  wanting — much  wanting — to  come 
over  to  see  you  and  the  portrait.  But  for  three  weeks  past 
I  have  simply  abandoned  every  other  engagement  whatever, 
to  stick  to  the  writing  of  the  last  chapters  of  my  Life  of  Lord 
Kelvin.  It  was  my  only  chance  of  getting  the  thing  done 
this  summer.  And  even  now  I  shall  have  to  finish  two  of 
the  chapters  at  Wenhaston. 

"  It  takes  a  weary  time  to  write  the  connective  tissue, 
even  after  all  the  events  and  principal  paragraphs  are  com- 
pleted in  themselves.  Nothing  but  a  steady  grind,  with  all 
reference  books  and  entries  round  one,  will  enable  one  to  do 
this.  So  I  have  been  a  hermit  for  the  last  three  months 
(partially)  and  totally  since  July  8th.  But  for  this  I  would 
have  certainly  dropped  in.  About  one-third  of  the  book 
is  in  type  already." 

From  St.  Michael's,  Wenhaston,  August  llth,  he  wrote 
to  Mr.  Bailey  Saunders  : 

"  I  believe  this  is  the  correct  date — but  one  loses  count  of 
time  in  the  lazy  days  of  a  real  summer,  and  in  rural  seclusion, 
even  though  one  has  one's  work  with  one,  as  I  have  with  my 
Kelvin  biography,  on  the  last  tenth  of  which  I  am  still 
perforce  at  work.  My  immediate  purpose  in  writing  is  to 
draw  upon  your  long-suffering  friendship  for  a  reference 
that  here  is  totally  inaccessible.  You  are  a  Hegel  scholar, 
though  I  fancy  not  a  Hegelite — at  least,  not  a  bald-headed 
one.  But  you  probably  know  where  to  find  in  his  philosophy 
a  passage  in  which  he  attacks  Newton's  theory  of  planetary 
movement,  according  to  universal  gravitation,  and  says 
something  about  the  planets  not  being  pulled  this  way  or  that 
way  like  so  many  stones,  but  that  they  move  of  themselves  in  their 
orbits  like  the  blessed  gods.  I  want  the  passage  itself  (either 
in  German  or  English)  and  the  reference  to  page  and  volume. 
It  used  to  rouse  Lord  Kelvin  to  a  white  heat  of  fury.  '  If 
these,  gentlemen,  be  his  physics,  what  must  his  metaphysics 
be?' 

"  And  how  does  your  opus  magnum  progress  ?  You  used 
to  say  mine  would  be  out  before  yours.  I  can't  by  any 
possibility  be  out  before  November  :  and  the  printers  are 
going  very  slowly." 

Mr,  Bailey  Saunders  replied  from  the  Athenaeum  : 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY     291 

"  Your  letter  reaches  me  here  on  my  way  back  to  East- 
bourne on  Monday. 

"  I  wish  I  had  any  claim  to  be  a  real  Hegel  scholar,  and 
were  then  enabled  to  answer  your  question.  The  only 
work  of  his  which  I  have  read; — many  years  ago — was  the 
Phdsomenologie  der  Geiste  (I  am  not  sure  that  I  have  even 
got  the  title  right),  and  I  cannot  recollect  anything  about 
Newton  therein,  though  I  have  heard  of  Kelvin's  famous 
dictum  on  Hegel's  physics.  Nor  can  I  find  any  one  to  help 
me  to  the  utterance  of  that  philosopher,  whose  works  I  should 
doubtless  seek  in  vain  in  the  library  here.  I  have,  in  fact, 
just  been  to  look  for  his  name  in  the  Catalogue,  where  of 
course  it  is  emphatically  not. 

"  You  will  get  out  the  biography  in  November  ;  my  opus 
will  appear  when  ?  das  weiss  der  kuk-kuk  ! 

"  If  you  like  hot  weather,  you  must  be  as  jubilant  now  as 
I  am  depressed.  Please  remember  me  very  kindly  to  the 
verehrte  Frau  Professor. 

"  P.S. — Thanks  for  the  Melanchthon  letter  references.  I 
will  look  it  up  in  the  Corpus  Reformatorum." 

Thompson,  in  another  letter  to  Mr.  Bailey  Saunders  on 
September  21st,  writes  from  home  : 

"  I  am  still  labouring  at  the  two  remaining  chapters  of 
Kelvin — pure  plod — dates,  facts,  letters,  but  not  a  bit  of 
science  or  philosophy  in  them,  needed  to  complete  the  tale. 

"  Volume  I.  is  paged  up  and  indexed,  Volume  II.  is  four- 
fifths  in  type,  and  partly  paged.  I  want  three  weeks  of 
uninterrupted  time — but  doubt  whether  I  shall  have  so 
many  days  without  distractions.  We  are  all  well.  Come 
and  see  us  when  you  are  in  town.  Salaams." 

Thompson,  in  fact,  had  accomplished  an  enormous  amount 
of  work  on  the  book  during  the  six  weeks  at  Wenhaston, 
but  at  the  expense  of  needed  rest  of  brain,  and  exercise. 
Proofs  were  pouring  in  all  the  time,  and  during  the  glorious 
weather  of  that  summer  he  spent  hours  at  a  time  sitting 
out  on  the  lawn  correcting  them.  The  daughters  and 
nephews  and  nieces  found  it  difficult  to  persuade  him  to  join 
any  of  their  excursions  or  picnics. 

He  went  one  expedition  quite  willingly,  and  that  was  to 
meet  Mr.  Hamilton  Dickson,  who  was  staying  a  few  miles 


292  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

away  near  Dunwich,  and  he,  later,  kindly  came  over  to  Wen- 
haston,  so  that  they  were  able  to  consult  verbally  over  many 
difficult  points.  Mrs.  Thompson's  services  were  also 
requisitioned  to  do  the  indexing. 

One  of  those  who  had  known  Kelvin  for  many  years  was 
Sir  Joseph  Swan,  and  Thompson  had  some  correspondence 
with  him  while  at  Wenhaston.  On  September  9th  he 
wrote  : 

"DEAR  SIB  JOSEPH, 

"  Your  long  and  interesting  letter  puts  me  deeply 
into  your  debt.  I  presume  I  am  at  liberty  to  use  it  in  my 
biography.  I  return  the  letter  about  Varley  :  it  is  the 
more  interesting,  because  Varley  (this  Varley — Samuel 
Alfred,  not  Cromwell — )  had  attacked  him  in  1888-9  in  The 
Electrical  Review" 

With  Professor  Chrystal,  the  Astronomer  Hoyal  for 
Scotland,  he  had  also  considerable  correspondence  about 
the  publication  of  his  letters  to  Kelvin.  Writing  to 
Thompson,  Professor  Chrystal  said  : 

"  I  must  not  neglect  to  congratulate  you  on  the  approach- 
ing completion  of  your  book.  You  seem  to  enjoy  a  ha,ppy 
share  of  the  great  energy  that  to  the  very  last  characterised 
your  great  namesake  without  a  '  p  '." 

It  happened  once  or  twice  during  Thompson's  career, 
that  he  was  confounded  with  his  great  namesake.  The 
first  time  was  when  he  was  Vice-President  of  the  Frankfort 
Exhibition,  when  the  portrait  of  Sir  William  Thomson  was 
displayed  in  the  German  newspapers  as  that  of  Professor 
Silvanus  Thompson.  Sometimes,  too,  he  was  supposed  to 
be  his  son. 

In  October  Thompson  sent  portions  of  his  book  in  proof 
sheets  to  various  people  for  correction  and  criticism  before 
finally  finishing  it  for  the  press.  The  difficult  chapter  on 
"  Thermodynamics J'  was,  among  others,  submitted  to  Sir 
Oliver  Lodge,  who  wrote  : 

"DEAR  SILVANUS, 

"  Thank  you  for  sending  me  Chapter  XXIII  of  your 
book.  I  have  read  it  (rather  hastily  it  is  true,  in  the  train) 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY     293 

with  considerable  admiration  for  the  way  you  have  treated 
a  most  complicated  affair.  The  essential  feature  is  that  he 
started  with  dynamical  determination,  and  found  that  it 
led  him  into  a  cul-de-sac. 

"  Whether  posterity  will  take  the  same  view  it  is  not  for 
me  to  say,  but  that  it  appears  thus  to  us  is,  I  think,  sufficiently 
and  fairly  brought  out  in  your  chapter  ;  and  that  is  what, 
it  seems  to  me,  ought  to  be  brought  out — of  course  in  an 
entirely  complimentary  manner." 

He  then  went  on  to  make  various  small  and  helpful  criti- 
cisms on  the  chapter,  closing  with  the  remarks : 

"  It  seems  to  me  thoroughly  good  for  its  purpose,  and, 
though  long,  not  dull.  Posterity  will  be  grateful  to  you, 
even  if  the  present-day  public  are  not. 

"  I  would  not  attempt  to  shorten  it.  Length  is  part  of 
the  essence  of  the  Kelvin  prolificness." 

Sir  George  H.  Darwin,  of  Cambridge,  wrote : 

"  I  have  read  the  portion  of  the  Life  with  interest.  I 
entirely  agree  with  you  in  the  omission  of  certain  passages. 
I  think  you  will  make  the  Life  a  success.  It  is  an  arduous 
undertaking." 

Thompson's  volume  did  not  issue  from  the  publishers 
until  January  1910.  The  book  had  been  eagerly  expected 
by  Kelvin's  many  admirers,  and  from  a  host  of  them  it 
received  a  most  flattering  and  warm  reception. 

Scores  of  letters  from  scientific  men  were  sent  to  the 
author.  Many  of  them  ranked  the  biography  with  the  best 
biographies  of  modern  times.  Professor  Perry  considered 
it  as  good  as  Trevelyan's  Life  of  Macaulay,  others  com- 
pared it  with  Morley's  Gladstone.  Thompson's  old  friend 
Sir  William  Preece,  P.R.S.,  wrote  in  March  1910  : 

"  I  have  been  through  your  Life  of  Kelvin  with  great  care, 
and  with  infinite  pleasure.  It  reflects  the  very  highest  credit 
on  your  labour,  your  skill,  and  the  marvellous  gift  you  have 
of  picking  the  plums  out  of  the  pudding,  and  dressing  them 
with  tasty  sauce  and  ornamenting  them  with  clear,  bold 
English.  I  found  it  most  interesting,  for  I  knew  him  in  his 
Atlantic  days,  and  we  were  always  on  very  intimate  and 


294  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON^ 

friendly  relations.  I  am  proud  to  have  commenced  my 
own  career  under  the  powerful  influence  of  Faraday,  and 
to  end  it  under  the  aegis  of  Kelvin,  for  I  am  now  nearly 
played  out.  I  am  now  in  my  seventy-seventh  year. 
Your  proofs  have  been  very  carefully  read,  for  I  have  come 
across  extremely  few  errors.  Doubtless  you  will  soon  have 
a  second  edition,  and  I  send  the  few  points  I  have  noted. 
There  is  nothing  I  admire  in  your  book  more  than  your 
handling  so  many  intricate  questions,  without  the  aid  of  his 
Own  language." 

The  criticism  of  the  book  in  the  press  was  extremely 
favourable,  though  in  many  papers  its  scientific  basis  was  a 
stumbling-block  to  the  reviewers,  who  contented  themselves 
with  picking  out  various  tit-bits  of  lighter  vein,  and  leaving 
serious  discussion  of  the  work  to  more  technical  journals. 

Sir  Oliver  Lodge  reviewed  it  in  The  World.     He  wrote  : 

"  An  extremely  difficult  duty  was  committed  to  Pro- 
fessor Silvanus  Thompson  when  he  undertook  to  produce 
a  popular  and  readable  Life  of  Lord  Kelvin,  and  admirably 
has  he  executed  the  task.  I  cannot  see  how  any  one  could 
have  done  it  better. 

"  Lord  Kelvin  has  been  fortunate  in  his  biographers.  .  .  . 
Now  the  main  incidents  of  his  life,  and  the  general  tenor  of 
his  thought  and  work,  have  been  narrated  with  consummate 
industry  and  skill  by  the  present  author." 

The  Outlook  said : 

"  This  work  is  a  distinguished  savant's  biography  of  one 
greater  than  himself  ;  a  book  therefore  primarily  for  men 
of  science,  largely  made  up  of  letters  and  discussions  dealing 
with  matters  that  to  the  general  reader  are  much  more  hope- 
lessly incomprehensible  than  Greek.  But  there  is  through- 
out it  abundant  humanity  and  the  fascination  of  a  trans- 
cendent mortal  life  ;  nor  would  we  leave  the  impression 
that  the  volumes  are  without  a  strong  salt  of  the  gaiety  that 
goes  with  high  activities."^  £* 

The  Saturday  Review  said  : 

"  Professor  Thompson  has  treated  the  two  phases  of 
Kelvin's  life  as  few  men  would  be  competent  to  do,  and 


THE  WRITING  OF  THE  KELVIN  BIOGRAPHY    295 

with  equal  skill.  He  has  combined  the  refractory  elements 
into  a  narrative  which,  for  all  its  bulk,  its  immense  range  of 
time  and  material,  and  its  multifariousness  of  topics,  is 
not  only  smooth  and  literary,  but  more — artistic  and  vivid. 
Professor  Thompson  has  given  us  a  real  and  great  bio- 
graphy ;  and,  though  Lord  Kelvin's  work  required  so  much 
dry,  technical  description,  his  personality  pervades  every- 
thing in  the  book,  and  shines  brilliantly  through  it." 

In  1911  Thompson  received  a  letter  from  Mr.  Sidney  Lee, 
editor  of  The  Dictionary  of  National  Biography,  in  which 
he  wrote  : 

"  Would  you  render  the  Dictionary  the  great  service 
of  contributing  the  memoir  of  Lord  Kelvin  ? 

"  Your  full  biography  is  the  standard  authority  for  his 
life,  and  it  is  only  right  that  the  summary  account  which 
we  need  should  be  from  your  pen.  I  trust  you  may  see  your 
way  to  accept  this  proposal." 

Thompson  wrote  the  article  as  requested  ;  it  was  not 
the  only  one  which  he  contributed  to  the  Dictionary. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS 

"  I  have  indeed  lived  nominally  fifty  years,  but  deduct  out  of  them  the 
hours  I  have  lived  to  other  people,  and  not  to  myself,  and  you  will  find  me 
still  a  young  fellow.  For  that  is  the  only  true  Time,  which  a  man  can 
properly  call  his  own,  that  which  he  has  all  to  himself ;  the  rest,  though 
in  some  sense  he  may  be  said  to  live  it,  is  other  people's  time,  not  his." — 
ELIA  ;  Extract  copied  in  the  "  little  blue  note-book  "  for  1911. 

FROM  his  earliest  years  Thompson  had  acquired  the  botanical 
bent  of  his  family.  Of  butterfly  and  bird  he  never  made  a 
special  study,  and  had  no  claims  to  be  considered  an  all- 
round  naturalist ;  but  in  the  Yorkshire  dales  he  became 
thoroughly  at  home  with  the  British  Flora,  and,  as  school- 
children, he  and  his  brothers  and  sisters  knew  every  haunt 
of  the  rarer  plants  within  a  considerable  radius  of  Settle. 
They  were  familiar,  too,  with  the  many  fascinating  geological 
phenomena  that  are  characteristic  of  the  region  of  the 
great  Craven  Fault,  where  the  Mountain  Limestone  presents 
curious  structural  and  stratigraphical  features,  with  its  dry 
valleys,  its  tarns  and  becks,  its  waterfalls  and  underground 
"  churns,"  its  Ebbing  and  Flowing  Well,  its  extensive 
caves  and  "  horrid  chasms "  like  "  Gaping  Gill "  and 
"  Alum  Pot." 

In  the  summer  of  1890  Thompson  with  his  wife  and 
small  girls  spent  the  holiday  with  his  sisters  at  Settle  and 
he  once  more  explored  the  old  haunts.  That  year  he 
identified  in  a  new  locality  Arenaria  Gothica  Fries,  a  species 
his  sister  Rachel  had  earlier  discovered  close  to  Ribble 
Head  Station.  Dozens  of  collectors  were  reported  as 
having  come  in  search  of  the  rarity  that  year,  and  there  were 
fears  lest  it  should  meet  with  extinction.  But  in  1905 
Thompson  went  again,  accompanied  by  his  daughters  Helen 

296 


HOBBIES  AND  HOLIDAYS  297 

and  Dorothea,  to  seek  the  little  white  flower,  guided  by  the 
entries  on  the  family  maps,  and  found  it  still  extant. 

In  1890  Professor  Meldola  and  his  wife  also  spent  their 
holiday  in  Settle,  seeking  moths,  so  there  were  joint  excur- 
sions of  the  colleagues.  Thompson  determined  if  possible 
to  solve  one  of  the  local  mysteries,  namely  the  course  of  the 
stream  which  flows  out  of  Malham  Tarn  (one  of  the  largest 
sheets  of  enclosed  water  in  Yorkshire),  and,  after  pursuing 
its  way  over  the  moors  for  about  half  a  mile  with  slight 
gradient,  suddenly  sinks  into  stony  ground  and  disappears. 
A  dry  valley,  once  a  considerable  watercourse,  leads  on 
downwards  about  a  mile,  and  then  ends  abruptly  at  the  top 
of  Malham  Cove,  a  limestone  cliff  over  300  feet  in  height, 
from  the  foot  of  which  issues  a  stream  about  equal  in  bulk 
to  the  Tarn  waters,  but  popularly  believed  to  come  from  some 
other  source,  the  Tarn  waters  being  supposed  to  issue  at 
"  Airehead,"  a  perennial  spring  in  the  middle  of  a  green 
field  about  a  mile  below  the  Cove. 

He  sent  a  paper  to  the  "Geological  Section  of  the  British 
Association  that  year,  in  which  he  described  the  experiment 
he  had  made  "  On  the  Sources  of  the  River  Aire."  Professor 
Meldola  had  suggested  to  him  that  he  should  use  uranin, 
the  soluble  form  of  the  dye  fluorescein,  of  which  a  minute 
quantity  colours  without  polluting  the  water.  Thompson 
made  satisfactory  tests  with  this  in  a  simple  case  of  a  known 
underground  course  of  a  stream,  but  when  he  set  watchers 
at  the  two  suspected  issues  of  water  at  Malham  Cove  and 
Airehead,  and  sent  his  dye  stuff  down  the  sink-hole,  he 
obtained  no  results.  The  Association  Meeting  was  suffi- 
ciently interested  to  appoint  a  committee  to  investigate  the 
matter,  Thompson  being  secretary ;  but,  on  applying  to  the 
owner  of  the  Tarn,  they  were  informed  that  investigations 
had  already  been  made  by  Bradford  naturalists,  who,  on 
allowing  a  sudden  rush  of  water  out  of  the  Tarn,  saw  an 
increase  in  flow  at  Airehead  about  eighty  minutes  later, 
and  not  till  about  an  hour  after  did  it  show  at  the  Cove, 
pointing  to  complicated  passages  and  lakes  in  the  subter- 
ranean connections. 

In  1905  Thompson  rambled  over  the  old  district  delightedly 


298  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

pointing  out  its  peculiarities  to  the  younger  generation, 
with  whom  he  discussed  the  possibilities  of  investigating, 
on  strictly  scientific  lines,  the  ebb  and  flow  of  the  famous 
well  near  Settle. 

Elsewhere  such  interests  added  zest  to  his  excursions 
on  which  he  always  sought  company,  and  was  only  rarely 
and  accidentally  alone. 

From  a  letter  to  his  wife  : 

"  THURINGENWALD, 

"April  1900. 

"  This  is  Sunday.  .  .  .  After  breakfast  I  started  south- 
wards up  the  forest  road — a  mere  mule- track — to  a  Forst- 
haus  on  the  ridge  above.  ...  I  reached  the  pine  woods, 
carpeted  at  every  clearing  with  undergrowth  of  hepaticas — 
the  ground  was  just  blue  with  them  in  places,  like  the  prim- 
roses in  the  clearings  of  our  woods,  only  blue  instead  of 
yellow.  In  a  few  places  they  grew  pink  instead  of  blue. 
Also  I  noticed  a  blue  rush  which  I  should  have  called, 
Luzula  cerulea,  if  there  is  such  a  plant.  Then  in  the  forest 
clumps  of  the  delicious  Daphne  Mezereon,  and  here  and 
there  a  yellow  flowering  tree  that  I  have  never  seen  before  ; 
I  think  it  must  be  a  sort  of  Rhamnus. 

"  After  I  had  walked  about  an  hour  amongst  the  pines 
and  oaks  at  the  top,  I  came  on  a  patch  of  the  most  glorious 
purple  anemones — the  Ancemone  pulsatilla.  I  enclose  a 
couple  of  them.  They  are  indescribably  beautiful  as  seen 
in  mass.  They  are  said  to  grow  occasionally  in  England. 

"  I  had  a  fine  round  on  the  high  ground.  It  resembles 
the  Schwarzwald  a  good  deal,  and  particularly  in  having 
everywhere  excellent  Wegweisers  to  show  the  routes. 

"  The  geological  formation  is  curious.  At  first  I  thought 
it  oolite  ;  but  in  places  there  is  red  marl  with  satin-spar 
among  it.  I  think  it  must  belong  to  the  Keuper  beds. 

"  The  girls  would  have  gone  just  wild  over  the  beds  of  blue 
hepaticas.  At  any  rate  their  pa  did  !  " 

A  few  years  later  Thompson  spent  a  week  of  his  Easter 
holiday  in  the  New  Forest,  exploring  on  foot  in  company 
with  his  daughter  Dorothea.  In  one  of  the  clearings  they 
came  upon  a  whole  bed  of  a  small  flowering  shrub,  which  he 
could  not  place  at  all,  and  which  was  identified  by  the 
authorities  at  Kew  as  an  American  species  sometimes  grown 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  299 

in  gardens,  but  never  recorded  before  as  a  wild  plant,  and 
not  easily  accounted  for  in  the  middle  of  the  forest. 

Part  of  the  joy  of  the  holidays  in  Switzerland  arose  from 
the  glory  of  the  flowers  of  the  Alps,  though  in  August  it  was 
only  on  the  heights  well  above  the  tree-line  that  these 
beloved  blue  gentians  could  be  found,  and  more  than  once 
the  season  had  been  so  advanced  that  there  remained  none 
of  the  rich  red  of  the  Alpenrose  for  foregrounds  to  sketches. 
The  family  had  a  particularly  happy  time  with  flowers  in 
1907,  when  they  got  away  early  in  July  to  Axalp,  above 
Lake  Brienz,  where  the  snows  were  longer  than  usual  in 
retreating,  so  that  the  full  glory  of  unmown  alpine  hay-fields 
was  theirs  to  enjoy,  until  Thompson  was  due  back  at  the 
British  Association.  On  returning  again  next  year  to  the 
same  place,  half  the  charm  had  gone  with  the  flowers,  and 
it  was  only  at  the  higher  levels  that  Thompson  was  tempted 
to  sketch  on  the  few  fine  days  during  that  wet  August.  Some 
thousand  feet  above  the  hotel,  and  above  the  steep  tree-clad 
slope,  stretched  gradually  ascending  alps  to  the  foot  of  a 
great  range  of  cliffs.  An  immense  fall  of  rock  had,  perhaps 
some  forty  years  earlier,  strewn  many  acres  of  the  alp  with 
a  belt  of  stony  fragments  that  created  a  perfect  garden, 
with  damp  sheltered  nooks  and  warm  dry  banks.  Fir-trees 
perched  themselves  in  all  manner  of  unexpected  ledges  and 
crannies,  and  rich  patches  of  Alpenrose  lent  the  warm  tinge 
needed  to  relieve  the  cold  colouring  of  the  green  and  the 
grey.  Hither  one  fine  morning  came  Thompson  armed 
with  his  boards  and  palette,  and  Dorothea  with  a  volume 
of  poems.  There  they  spent  a  whole  day,  one  always 
memorable  ;  for  he  came  down  in  the  evening  carrying 
no  less  than  three  sketches  of  the  stone-fall,  perhaps  the 
most  living  of  all  his  tree  pictures,  and  with  his  memory 
stored  with  the  music  of  Keats' s  "  Ode  on  a  Grecian  Urn," 
which  Dorothea  had  been  reading  over  to  him  while  he 
painted. 

All  through  his  life  Thompson  associated  with  people  of 
the  same  bent  as  himself.  In  early  days  he  was  a  member 
of  the  Bristol  Naturalist  Society,  and  aftet  his  removal  to 
London  he  became  connected  with  the  Hampstead  Scientific 


300  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Society,  of  which  he  was  a  vice-president  and  president, 
though  he  was  not  often  present  at  its  meetings,  which  were 
held  the  same  night  in  the  week  as  the  members'  meetings 
at  the  Royal  Institution. 

Through  Professor  Meldola  he  was  introduced  to  the 
Essex  Field  Club,  in  whose  autumn  ramble  and  fungus  foray 
in  Epping  Forest  he  occasionally  joined,  taking  with  him 
his  youngest  daughter  Irene,  who  was  the  keenest  naturalist 
of  the  four,  and  who  acquired  considerable  skill  in  repre- 
senting her  plants,  fossils,  and  insect  pets  in  water-colour 
sketches. 

In  1907  Thompson  was  President  of  the  South-Eastern 
Union  of  Scientific  Societies,  which  linked  together  some 
sixty  local  groups  of  naturalists  and  archaeologists  of  seven 
counties.  His  predecessor  in  office  was  Sir  Francis  Darwin, 
and  he  was  succeeded  by  Sir  Archibald  Geikie,  the  ex- 
President  of  the  Royal  Society.  His  presidential  address 
throws  much  light  upon  his  manner  of  thought  outside  the 
prescribed  circle  of  his  daily  avocations  and  duties  in  the 
field  of  science.  He  took,  as  the  foundation  of  his  theme, 
Pliny's  dictum,  "  Nesutor  supra  crepidam  judicaret,"  which 
has  passed  into  the  English  proverb,  "  Let  the  cobbler 
stick  to  his  last  "  ;  and  also  the  English  poet's  fallacious 
sentiment : 

"  A  little  learning  is  a  dangerous  thing  ; 
Drink  deep,  or  taste  not,  the  Pierian  spring." 

He  ardently  defended  the  amateur  in  an  amusing 
imaginary  conversation  with  his  "  friend  Supracrepidarius," 
and  produced  evidence  from  "  the  achievements  of  the 
supracrepidarians — the  cobblers  who  have  become  im- 
mortal by  not  sticking  to  their  lasts  :  Herbert  Spencer,  who 
left  engineering  to  create  a  synthetic  philosophy ;  Keats, 
who  left  surgery  to  write  the  '  imperishable  odes  '  ;  the 
curate  of  Selborne  ;  Thomas  Hodgkin,  the  banker,  one  of 
the  greatest  historians  of  his  day."  His  particular  interest 
in  the  literary  men  who  cultivated  scientific  studies  led 
him  on  to  dilate  upon  the  works  of  Tennyson  and  Goethe ; 
but  at  the  end  he  turned  to  another  aspect  of  non-pro- 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  301 

fessional  science  :    the  zest  it  gives  to  life  and  particularly 
to  travel : 

"  There  is,  perhaps,  nothing  that  contributes  more  to  the 
enjoyment  of  travel  at  home  or  abroad  than  a  little  know- 
ledge of  botany,  geology,  and  entomology,  particularly 
botany.  Abroad  one  watches  with  the  keen  delight  of 
novelty  the  unfamiliar  plants  and  the  strange  and  beauti- 
ful flowers.  One's  first  sight  of  the  fields  of  narcissi  in  the 
pastures  around  Lausanne  and  Vevey — familiar  as  the 
Narcissus  is  to  us  as  a  garden  plant — is  almost  as  exhilarating 
as  the  first  glimpse  of  the  Soldanella  rearing  its  tiny  bells 
through  the  melting  snows  of  the  higher  alps.  You  know 
the  story  of  the  great  Linnaeus,  how  he  fell  on  his  knees  in 
ecstasy  before  the  golden  gorse-bushes  on  Wandsworth 
Common.  One  begins  to  understand  the  feelings  of  Linnaeus 
when,  travelling  in  Norway,  one  first  finds  the  exquisite 
trails  of  the  Linncea  borealis  peeping  through  the  mosses 
under  the  pine-trees.  Travelling  in  Canada,  it  is  a  peculiar 
joy  to  discover  for  one's  self  that,  in  all  the  neglected  corners 
and  roadsides  where  one  would  expect  untidy  clumps  of 
golden  ragwort,  their  place  is  taken  by  masses — no  less 
untidy  in  truth — of  Michaelmas  daisies  ;  the  purple  Aster 
replacing  the  yellow  Senecio.  At  home  the  memories  of  old 
rambles  revive  in  every  nook  one  revisits.  Crossing  York- 
shire less  than  a  week  ago,  I  found  such  recollections  crowd- 
ing in  upon  me.  There,  as  the  train  flew  by,  was  the  identical 
bog  where,  as  a  schoolboy,  I  used  to  find  the  rare  Lastrcea 
ihelypteris.  ...  A  mile  or  two  further  on  I  catch  a  glimpse 
of  the  sandy  field  beneath  the  fir-tree  where  for  several 
successive  years  I  found  the  almost  extinct  Veronica  triphyllos. 
Back  there  comes  the  memory  of  a  sunny  Good  Friday 
afternoon  when  I  hunted  that  field  and  counted  no  fewer 
than  eleven  specimens  ;  and  I  am  filled  with  a  glow  of 
conscious  self-righteousness,  of  which  I  am  not  ashamed, 
when  I  remember  that  I  took  but  three  of  these,  hoping 
the  remaining  eight  would  fructify  and  yield  a  good  crop 
next  year  .  .  .  and  I  think  of  the  field  of  marshy  hillocks, 
ten  miles  further  north,  where  as  a  boy  I  used  to  gather 
Liliputian  nosegays  of  Primula  farinosa,  the  fairy  flower, 
and  where,  later  in  the  year,  one  could  find  orchises,  epi- 
pactis,  yellow  woad,  and  curling  fronds  of  moonwort. 
Alas,  that  fairyland  is  fairyland  no  longer.  They  have 
turned  it  into  golf-links — have  smoothed  out  flat  teeing 


302  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

grounds,  and  disfigured  it  with  silly  bunkers.  The  fairies 
dance  there  no  more,  the  birdseye  primrose  has  disappeared, 
the  orchises  and  epipactises  have  been  exterminated,  and 
the  moon  wort  is  as  extinct  as  the  dodo.  Up  the  valley,  a 
few  miles  to  the  north-east,  I  see  the  line  of  crags  where  the 
holly-fern  used  to  grow.  It  grows  there  no  longer,  thanks 
to  the  greed  of  the  fern-hunters,  and,  across  the  valley, 
almost  in  the  shadow  of  Ingleborough,  lie  the  spots — wild 
horses  would  not  drag  from  me  the  secret  of  their  situation 
— where  twelve  [?]  years  ago  I  found  in  unquestionably 
wild  state  the  little  Arenaria  gothica  ;  the  only  specimen  of 
it  from  British  soil  ever  before  recorded  having  come  from 
the  doubtful  habitat  of  a  railway-yard.  .  .  .  The  happy 
day  spent  in  the  field  or  the  forest  amongst  the  birds  and 
insects,  or  in  the  quarry  with  the  hammer,  writes  its  own 
record  on  the  tissue  of  the  brain.  And,  as  with  the  phono- 
graph, one  may  take  out  some  cylinder  long  ago  inscribed,  and 
place  it  on  the  instrument,  and  listen  anew  to  the  voices  of 
those  who,  it  may  be,  have  passed  into  the  silence  beyond, 
so  may  we  bring  out  the  records  of  our  happy  field-days, 
and  live  them  anew,  while  the  sunshine  and  the  bird-songs, 
and  the  hum  of  the  bees  and  the  sound  of  the  wind  in  the 
pines  are  ours  once  more,  and  the  things  of  beauty  have 
become  joys  for  ever." 

He  made  two  practical  suggestions  to  the  Union,  one 
relating  to  the  co-ordination  of  the  local  and  partial  surveys 
of  different  regions,  in  which  the  amateur  might  happily 
play  his  part,  and  the  second — what  the  Selborne  Society 
(of  which  he  was  Vice-President)  has  done  for  the  protection 
of  wild-birds  might  surely  be  repeated  for  our  wild-flowers 
before  it  is  too  late  : 

"  The  bee-orchis  is  growing  scarcer  year  by  year  on  the 
Surrey  hills,  though  even  on  Box  Hill  it  is  still  found.  The 
fritillary  still  rears  its  snaky  head  in  the  Thames  Valley, 
though  every  year  the  rapacity  and  thoughtlessness  of 
man  is  thinning  it  out.  .  .  .  We  sorely  need  the  public 
to  be  indoctrinated  with  the  wholesome  view  that  a  wild- 
flower  is  the  property  of  the  community,  to  be  enjoyed  by 
all,  and  therefore  not  to  be  selfishly  grabbed  or  rooted 
up.  .  .  .  What  England  owes  to  the  voluntary  workers  in 
science  no  man  can  declare  or  measure.  .  .  .  It  is  a  work  of 
national  importance  which  [the  societies]  are  carrying  on  in 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  303 

spreading  the  scientific  culture  and  in  fostering  influences 
which1  correct  the  bias  of  industrial  and  commercial  careers, 
and  broaden  out  the  narrownesses  of  our  educational  system. 
"  Yes,  England  has  need  of  those  whose  scientific  work 
is  done  for  love  and  not  for  money  ;  of  those  who  recognise 
that  in  the  intellectual  sphere  also  it  is  everlastingly  true 
that  a  man's  life  consisteth  not  in  the  abundance  of  the 
things  he  possesseth." 

Thompson  possessed  many  things,  but  he  did  not  collect 
any  of  the  usual  things  pursued  by  the  naturalist :  books, 
prints,  and  autographs  descended  to  him  from  the  older 
generation,  and  he  added  much  to  these  collections  ;  but 
he  began  and  gathered  for  himself  a  small  and  very  lovely 
little  selection  of  uncommon  precious  stones,  many  of  which 
he  valued  for  their  optical  properties,  others  for  their  sheer 
beauty  of  colour  and  brilliance  when  properly  cut. 

An  intimate  friend  of  Thompson  once  remarked  about 
him  that  "  for  him  a  holiday  was  merely  freedom  from 
routine  work,  and  a  change  of  scene  to  begin  some  long- 
cherished  project."  No  one  was  more  industrious  on 
holidays  than  he,  and  during  many  summers  he  added 
considerably  to  his  collection  of  water-colour  sketches  of 
Alpine  scenery  or  of  some  favourite  haunt  nearer  home. 
As  years  passed  on  he  became  more  and  more  devoted  to 
drawing  and  sketching  among  mountain  scenery,  either  in 
Scotland,  Switzerland,  or  the  Tyrol. 

In  1883,  after  his  visit  to  Germany  to  hunt  up  details  for 
his  Life  of  Philip  Eeis,  he  and  his  wife  went  on  into  Switzer- 
land, and  spent  three  delightful  weeks  in  the  Oberland, 
where  he  made  his  first  really  successful  sketches  of  glaciers 
and  snow-peaks,  though  in  those  days  he  did  not  attempt 
to  work  on  a  large  scale.  For  some  time  they  stayed  at  a 
small  hotel  on  the  pass  from  Meiringen  to  Grindelwald, 
where  were  gathered  together  some  six  or  eight  artists  of 
considerable  note,  among  them  Sir  Robert  Collier  (after- 
wards Lord  Monks  well),  Colin  B.  Philip,  Walter  Severn, 
then  President  of  the  Dudley  Gallery,  and  the  President  of 
the  Swiss  Academy,  who  was  a  wonderful  colourist. 

Talking  with  these  men  and  watching  their  way  of  work- 


304  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

ing,  Thompson  learned  much,  and  some  of  his  sketches  of 
the  Rosenlaui  Glacier  and  the  peaks  of  the  Wetterhorn  were 
exhibited  in  the  Dudley  Gallery  in  London  in  1884. 

During  the  next  nine  years  he  had  no  opportunity  of 
working  at  his  favourite  ice  subjects,  except  when  he 
sketched  from  the  deck  of  an  Atlantic  Liner  an  iceberg  which 
he  saw  in  the  Straits  of  Belle  Isle.  But  during  those  years 
he  did  some  very  good  work  in  Scotland  at  Glen  Sannox, 
and  on  the  Yorkshire  coast. 

In  1889,  after  the  death  of  their  mother  in  the  spring,  the 
Thompson  brothers  and  sisters  nearly  all  met  together  at 
Sandsend  near  Whitby,  where  Silvanus  and  his  brother-in- 
law,  Ellwood  Brockbank,  had  taken  houses  for  the  summer 
months.     That  year  he  painted  dozens  of  studies  of  sea 
and  sky  effects,  and  gained  greatly  increased  facility.     So 
much  so  that,  when  he  went  to  Italy  in  1892,  although 
most  of  his  time  was  taken  up  with  sight-seeing  on  first  visits 
to  Florence,  Rome  and  Venice,  yet  he  was  able  to  make 
some  most  effective  sketches  in  odd  moments.     The  holiday 
in  Italy  lasted  six  weeks.    Thompson  and  his  wife  joined  her 
father  and  mother  and  two  younger  sisters,  who  had  made 
the  tour  before.     In  Pisa  he  made  a  sketch  of  the  wonderful 
group  of  Campanile,  Baptistery  and  Cathedral,  which  was 
exquisite  in  delicate  drawing  and  colouring.     In  Rome  he 
stole  a  few  hours  from  visiting  churches,  and  painted  two 
sketches,   one  in  the  English  cemetery,  of  the  graves  of 
Keats,  Severn  and  John  Bell,  and  another  just  outside  the 
walls.     In  Southern  Italy,  where  the  party  spent  Easter  at 
Amalfi,  he  revelled  in  the  glorious  colouring,  and  loved  to 
get  studies  of  olive-trees  against  the  background  of  Mediter- 
ranean blue.     He  succeeded  in  making  three  vivid  pictures. 
Assisi  also  proved  a  happy  sketching  ground,  for  the  sun 
shone  brilliantly,  and  several  days  were  devoted  to  recording 
in  colour  views  in  that  historical  city.     One  of  the  few  days 
devoted  to  Venice  was  spent  in  going  by  gondola  to  Torcello. 
Thompson  sketched  the  fairy-like  sail-boats  as  they  crossed 
the  Lagoon,  and  at  Torcello  made  a  study  of  the  ivory-tinted 
marbles  of  the  courtyard  and  fountain  with  the  Cathedral 
in  the  background. 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  305 

Most  of  the  Italian  sketches  had  to  be  left  unfinished.  On 
his  revisiting  the  same  scenes  in  the  spring  of  1912  the  weather 
was  cold  and  showery,  and  no  sketching  could  be  done. 

In  1894  began  the  first  of  a  long  series  of  holidays  in  the 
Alps,  in  which  his  sister  Rachel  and  the  young  daughters 
began  to  share.  At  Riffel  Alp  that  year  he  attempted  work 
on  a  much  larger  scale,  and  his  pictures  of  the  Matterhorn 
in  storm  or  sunshine,  and  studies  of  the  Findelen  and 
Gorner  Glaciers,  were  some  of  the  best  work  he  ever  did. 

He  was  now  a  member  of  the  Royal  Water  Colour  Society 
Art  Club,  which  included  many  professional  artists,  among 
them  David  Murray,  Colin  B.  Philip  and  Wilfrid  Ball.  The 
club  held  an  exhibition  every  autumn,  to  which  Thompson 
frequently  contributed  the  results  of  his  summer  sketching 
in  the  Black  Forest,  Evolena  Valley,  Arolla  heights,  and 
Northern  Tyrol. 

In  later  years  some  of  his  many  friends,  who  were  members 
of  the  Alpine  Club,  and  whom  he  used  to  meet  in  Switzerland, 
invited  him  to  exhibit  at  their  winter  show  in  the  hall  of 
the  Club,  and  there  his  work  was  seen  at  its  best.  In  1910 
he  did  some  very  fine  glacier  painting  at  Saas  Fee,  and 
Macugnaga,  where  he  first  began  to  go  with  a  guide  among 
the  crevasses  and  seracs,  returning  after  a  long  day  on  the  ice 
with  one  or  two  rapid  sketches  of  its  wonders  and  glories. 

The  summer  of  1911  was  very  fine  and  hot,  and  he  and 
his  wife  and  Helen  went  for  a  month  to  the  Chamonix 
Valley.  Here  he  produced  as  much  work  as  many  a  pro- 
fessional artist  accomplishes  in  a  whole  season.  While 
staying  for  three  weeks  at  Hotel  Planet  above  Argentiere, 
he  made  the  acquaintance  of  an  English  artist,  Mr.  George 
Flemwell,  who  was  spending  the  season  there,  painting 
flowers  for  a  botanical  book,  which  he  was  producing  in  con- 
junction with  Mr.  H.  S.  Thompson,  a  botanist,  who  was  also 
living  at  Le  Planet. 

Thompson  and  Flemwell  soon  found  that  they  had  much 
in  common,  and  used  to  have  long  discussions  over  botany 
and  painting,  and  made  excursions  together.  Afterwards 
they  kept  up  a  correspondence,  but  never  succeeded  in 
meeting  again  in  the  Alps.  In  the  autumn  of  that  year 
20 


306  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Thompson  had  six  large  pictures  in  the  Alpine  club  show, 
two  painted  on  the  Glacier  des  Bossons  at  Chamonix,  three 
on  the  Glacier  d'Argentiere  and  one  of  "  Twilight  on  Mont 
Blanc,  from  Le  Planet." 

In  August  1912  Thompson  wrote  to  Flemwell  from 
Strathyre,  Perthshire. 

"  We  shall  not  see  Switzerland  this  year  ;  for  my  wife 
claimed  her  privilege  as  a  Scotswoman  to  have  this  year's 
vacation  in  her  native  country. 

"  I  love  Scotland  ;  but  I  love  Switzerland  more,  and  I 
am  wearying  for  a  sight  of  real  peaks,  and  for  ice. 

"  The  braes  and  banks  of  Balquhidder  are  all  very  well, 
and  the  heather  is  lovely — when  the  sun  shines  on  it.  But 
that  is  precisely  what  the  sun  is  not  doing  this  year.  Dull 
days  and  everlasting  drizzle  is  our  fate  so  far  :  and  when  a 
fitful  episode  of  sunshine  occurs,  it  is  a  miserable,  washed- 
out  sun  with  no  warmth  and  no  persistency.  Here's  more 
than  a  whole  week  of  my  short  holiday  gone  :  and  I  have 
not  put  a  paint-brush  to  paper. 

"  The  Scotch  hotel-keepers  declare  that  Scotland  is  almost 
empty.  They  don't  blame  Switzerland  :  they  say  it  is  all 
along  of  Mr.  Lloyd  George,  and  the  strikes  and  the  industrial 
unrest ! 

"  I  came  across  a  lovely  patch,  in  a  garden  here,  of  a  most 
lovely  white  variety  of  Epilobium  Angustifolium.  Have 
you  ever  seen  it  wild  ?  I  bethought  me  of  that  pink  patch 
above  Les  Tines.  That  reminds  me  that,  just  before  leaving 
home,  I  got  Mr.  Stuart  Thompson's  book  with  your  plates 
of  flowers.  They  are  lovely,  but  are  you  right  about  St. 
Bruno's  Lily  ?  I  thought  it  was  smaller.1  Is  not  the  one 
you  have  drawn  the  Paradise  Lily  ?  Your  white  Alpenrose 
(Rhododendron)  is  just  exquisite.  More  power  to  your 
elbow." 

Next  year,  1913,  Thompson  returned  again  to  Argentiere, 
after  first  spending  a  fortnight  at  Zinal,  which  was  fruitful 
in  achievement.  Mr.  Flemwell  sent  him  a  letter  welcoming 
him  back  "to  Switzerland,  her  seracs  and  her  ice-falls  !  " 
but  was  not  able  to  come  himself  into  the  High  Alps  that 
summer.  Dorothea,  the  third  daughter,  accompanied  her 
father  and  mother  this  time ;  but  she  was  not  well,  and 
*  Mr.  Flemwell  was  quite  right. 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  307 

severe  attacks  of  asthma  prevented  her  from  venturing 
on  ice  excursions,  and  caused  them  great  anxiety.  So  the 
holiday  joy  was  somewhat  clouded. 

Mr.  Flemwell  wrote  in  later  years  to  Mrs.  Thompson : 

"  As  you  know,  Dr.  Thompson  was  never  happier  than 
when  painting  ice ;  neither,  as  I  think,  was  his  work  ever 
happier.  Ice  is,  for  painters,  one  of  Nature's  problems, 
and  I  have  never  met  any  one  who,  with  his  brush,  went 
more  truthfully  to  the  heart  of  ice  than  did  Dr.  Thompson. 
His  method  was  simplicity  itself,  his  technique  broad  and 
direct.  By  quick,  simple  washes,  well  calculated  before- 
hand, he  arrived  at  giving  the  substance,  body  and  texture, 
of  ice,  better  than  any  one  else  of  my  acquaintance. 

"  And  he  revelled  in  it.  So  much  so,  in  fact,  that  I 
remember  being  nervous  for  him  planted  for  hours  in  the 
midst  of  these  treacherous  seracs  below  the  great  ice-fall  on 
the  Argentiere  Glacier,  and  I  induced  him  to  take  a  guide 
with  him — some  one  who  could  keep  an  eye  on  the  move- 
ment of  the  ice. 

"  But  in  all  things  Alpine  he  had  keen  interest  :  birds, 
butterflies,  flowers — he  could  talk  about  them  all,  and  with 
always  something  informing  to  tell  one  about  them. 

"  One  day  we  left  the  Planet  and  scrambled  up  above 
the  railway,  before  it  crosses  the  river  to  call  at  Les  Tines, 
and  there  we  lay  in  wait  for  the  sunset  glow  upon  Mont 
Blanc — lay  in  wait  to  slay  it  with  our  paints  and  brushes. 

"  Literally  we  did  slay  it,  too  ! — for  its  gorgeous,  fleeting 
colouring  was  more  than  a  match  for  our  powers — and  we 
had  nothing  to  show  to  anybody  when  we  returned  to  the 
hotel ! 

"  The  next  day,  however,  up  to  Montanvert,  Dr.  Thomp- 
son did  a  really  fine  thing,  catching  to  the  life  the  bleak 
and  terrible  austerity  of  the  Aiguille  du  Dru — whilst  I  with 
my  back  to  him  painted  Les  Charmoz. 

"  Well  do  I  remember  that  walk  up  to  Montanvert,  and 
the  chat  we  had  about  Ruskin,  and  the  scraps  of  Tennyson 
which  Dr.  Thompson  chanted  to  Mont  Blanc — '  Come  down, 
O  maid,  for  Love  is  of  the  valley,  come  thou  down."  .  .  . 

"  I  remember  pointing  out  to  him  that,  probably,  the 
lady  was  safer  where  she  was,  and  knew  more  about  real 
love,  up  there  '  With  Death  and  Morning  on  the  Silver 
horns,'  which  tickled  him  immensely. 

"Afterwards,  when  he  returned  to  England,  he  copied 


308  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

out  the  passage  in  full  from  Tennyson,  and  sent  it  to  me. 
I  have  it  now." 

During  several  summers  when  neither  Switzerland  nor 
Scotland  was  visited  he  painted  some  successful  colour 
studies  on  the  coast  of  Suffolk  near  Walberswick.  One  of 
these,  a  golden  sunset  seen  across  the  marshes,  he  gave 

to  his  friend  Sir  William  Crookes,  on  the  occasion  of  the 

'  * 

celebration  of  his  golden  wedding.  In  later  years  he 
exhibited  in  the  Royal  Academy  occasionally,  but  he  did 
not  put  prices  on  his  pictures  for  many  years,  and  only 
parted  with  them  as  gifts  to  some  of  his  friends. 

One  little  sketch  which  he  made  of  the  old  town  of  Dinant 
on  the  Meuse,  with  its  quaint  church  spire,  and  picturesque 
house  roofs,  has  now,  since  the  war,  a  melancholy  and 
tragic  interest.  It  was  made  in  1897  when  he  and  his 
(artist)  brother  Tom  went  for  a  tour  at  Easter-time  in  the 
Belgian  Ardennes. 

In  1916  the  following  letter  appeared  in  The  Spectator 
written  by  a  man  who  had  met  Thompson  at  Dinant : 

"  The  late  Silvanus  Thompson  was  an  expert  in  the 
manufacture  of  French  limericks.  In  the  spring  of  1897 
he  was  staying  at  the  Tete  d'Or  at  Dinant  (now,  alas,  a  heap 
of  rubble  !),  and  quickly  made  friends  with  all  the  party 
there.  Most  of  us  went  with  him  one  afternoon  to  Givet, 
and  after  tea  at  the  hotel  he  started  a  French  limerick  com- 
petition. His  was  easily  the  best,  but  unfortunately  I 
remember  only  my  own  effort.  ...  A  short  time  after 
several  of  the  party  met  with  pre-arrangement  at  Laroche, 
and  here  Thompson  had  a  reverse.  Sitting  down  to  make 
a  water-colour  drawing  of  the  steep  little  street  which  leads 
up  to  the  chapel,  he  was  surrounded  by  children  and  some 
grown-ups.  To  the  uninstructed  eye  of  the  writer,  the 
drawing  seemed  to  possess  some  charm,  but  a  workman, 
passing  by,  asked  a  bystander,  '  Is  it  any  good  ?  '  '  Oh, 
no,'  was  the  answer,  given  with  decision  and  a  shrug  of  the 
shoulders.  .  .  . 

"  From  Houffalise  the  next  day,  as  we  drove  back  in  the 
dark  to  Laroche,  through  the  woods,  the  owls  were  very 
noisy.  Some  one  in  the  carriage  started  the  fable  : 

"Maitre  hibou,  sur  un  arbre  perch.6, 
Tenait  en  son  bee  un  fromage.  ..." 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  309 

"  The  driver  at  once  leant  back  from  his  seat  and  supplied 
the  correction  : 

"Maitre  corbeau.  sur  un  arbre  percb.6." 

"  Thompson  produced  another  fable,  then  the  driver 
his  in  turn,  and  it  was  Thompson  whose  memory  lasted 
the  longer." 

From  Laroche  Thompson  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  This  is  our  last  day  in  the  Ardennes,  and,  unfortunately, 
it  is  a  dull  and  showery  morning. 

"  Yesterday  was  a  fine  bright  da,y,  and  we  went  an  expedi- 
tion to  Houffalize.  In  the  neighbourhood  both  of  Laroche 
and  of  Houfialize  the  country  is  fine,  and  the  four  miles 
drive  along  by  the  river  Ourthe  was  splendid. 

"  So  far  I  have  got  but  two  sketches — one  of  Dinant,  the 
other  of  the  castle  of  Montaigles,  and  neither  of  them  very 
satisfactory.  I  hope  the  weather  will  let  me  get  one  here 
before  we  go." 

Thompson  used  occasionally  to  have  small  reproductions 
made  of  some  of  his  sketches,  generally  by  photogravure 
processes.  He  used  these  as  Christmas  cards,  and  often 
received  appreciatory  messages  about  them  from  his  friends. 
In  1897  he  reproduced  one  of  his  sketches  of  the  Glacier 
above  Lake  Louise  in  the  Canadian  Rockies. 

During  the  week's  excursion  to  the  Rocky  Mountains, 
in  company  with  his  fellow  members  of  the  British  Associa- 
tion, Thompson  made  about  twenty  sketches,  all  most 
effective,  though  sometimes  only  taken  from  a  railway  plat- 
form or  an  observation  car.  When  he  reached  Banff,  near 
Lake  Louise,  he  spent  a  whole  day  sketching,  while  the  rest 
of  the  party  made  an  excursion  elsewhere. 

Of  another  Christmas  card,  a  reproduction  of  a  sketch  of 
the  "  Aiguille  Verte,"  Mr.  R.  Catterson  Smith,  the  head  of 
the  Art  Department  at  Birmingham,  wrote :  "  I  have  just 
received  your  extremely  nice  Xmas  card.  It  is  a  .fine 
and  romantic  composition,  full  of  the  loneliness,  mystery 
and  glisten  of  the  Alps." 

From  Mr.  A.  W.  Rimington,  an  artist  friend,  Thompson 


310  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

received  great  encouragement  to  hold  a  special  exhibition 
of  his  work.     He  wrote  : 

"  I  was  much  struck  by  your  Alpine  water  colours. 

"  I  think  some  of  them  are  quite  exceptionally  interesting 
and  beautiful,  and  it  seems  to  me  a  pity  you  should  not 
exhibit  them  as  a  series. 

"  If  I  could  be  of  any  use  to  you  in  arranging  for  an 
exhibition  of  them — which  I  do  not  think  would  be  difficult, 
please  let  me  know." 

Thompson  talked  sometimes  of  having  a  "  one  man  " 
show,  but  the  leisure  to  arrange  and  prepare  for  it  did  not 
come.  During  later  years,  however,  when  he  began  to  take 
a  rather  longer  holiday,  he  used  to  finish  up  his  sketches  in 
September  after  returning  home,  and  then  invited  his 
friends  to  come  and  see  them  on  a  Saturday  afternoon 
at  "Morland."  Some  were  sent  also  to  the  Annual 
Exhibition  of  the  Friends'  Portfolio  Society,  held  in  a  large 
drawing  room  or  studio. 

After  his  death  over  a  hundred  of  his  pictures  and  sketches 
were  exhibited  in  the  large  hall  of  the  Alpine  Club,  kindly 
lent  for  the  purpose  by  the  committee  of  the  club.  They 
were  arranged  and  hung  by  a  member  of  the  committee, 
Mr.  J.  Walter  West,  R.W.S.,  and  the  artist's  daughter 
Sylvia  (Mrs.  W.  Hanbury  Aggs).  Some  of  the  finest  pictures 
were  lent  by  members  of  the  family  or  friends  to  whom 
they  had  been  presented.  The  show  included  four  un- 
finished sketches  begun  at  Misurina  in  the  Italian  Alps  in 
July  1914,  and  interrupted  by  the  tragedy  of  the  European 
War. 

During  the  exhibition,  which  lasted  a  fortnight,  most  of 
the  pictures  were  bought  by  Thompson's  friends.  A  large 
sketch  of  a  natural  ice  arch  on  the  Argentiere  Glacier  was 
purchased  by  the  Old  Scholars'  Association  of  Bootham 
School,  where  it  now  hangs,  along  with  another  of  trees  and 
rocks,  the  "  Gorge  of  the  Giessbach,  Axalp,"  presented  by 
an  old  scholar. 

Of  the  art  of  music,  especially  of  orchestral  music, 
Thompson  was  an  ardent  devotee.  From  the  time  of  his 
student  days  in  London,  when  he  heard  a  number  of 


THE  AIGUILLE  VERTE  FROM  "Ls  PLANET. 

From  a  water-colour  by  S.  P.  Thompson. 


310] 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  311 

Wagner's  orchestral  works  performed  in  the  Albert  Hall, 
he  had  a  great  admiration  for  them.     While  living  in  Bristol 
he  used  to  be  a  frequenter  of  the  weekly  orchestral  concerts 
in  the  Colston  Hall,  conducted  by  Mr.  George  Riseley. 
In  1880  he  wrote  to  him  : 

"  Will  you  allow  me,  as  a  humble  supporter  of  your 
Monday  Concerts,  to  thank  you  personally  for  the  excellent 
performances  you  have  been  giving  us  of  late,  and  in  par- 
ticular for  the  Tannhaiiser  Overture  of  last  week  ?  You  are 
to  be  congratulated  most  heartily  on  the  progress  of  your 
work.  I  am  desirous  of  doing  what  little  I  can  to  help  on 
the  success  of  this  movement,  so  I  hope  you  will  pardon  me 
for  the  suggestion  I  now  wish  to  make.  Accompanying 
this  note  is  a  copy  of  the  score  of  Wagner's  Ride,  of  the 
Valkyries,  with  which  you  are  doubtless  acquainted  already. 
Your  success  with  the  Tannhaiiser  Overture  is  quite  enough 
to  prove  that  this  other  morceau  is  quite  within  the  capa- 
bilities of  your  excellent  band." 

To  this  Mr.  Kiseley  replied  : 

"  You  know  I  am  always  glad  to  have  a  chat  with  you  on 
music.  Do  you  think  the  Ride  will  take  ?  I  am  going 
to  do  the  two  introductions  in  Lohengrin  at  the  next.  If 
at  any  time  you  know  of  anything  worth  playing,  do  please 
advise  me." 

On  several  occasions  Thompson  suggested  pieces  which 
he  had  heard  elsewhere,  and  which  did  generally  "  take  " 
well  in  Bristol  also. 

When  writing  to  Miss  Henderson  he  mentioned  meeting 
Mr.  Riseley,  and  said  : 

"  We  had  a  lot  of  talk  about  music,  etc.  He  asked  me  to 
write  an  account  of  Tannhatiser  for  the  next  programme. 
I  wrote  off  last  night  to  Alice,  begging  her  to  send  me  the 
libretto  that  I  brought  north — at  Easter,  I  think  it  was." 

Thompson  did  all  he  could  to  persuade  his  wife  and  her 
sisters  to  play  Wagner's  music  as  arranged  for  the  piano. 
They  did  their  best  for  him,  as  it  gave  him  great  pleasure, 
recalling  what  he  so  much  enjoyed  on  the  orchestra  ;  but  the 
result  was  never  very  satisfactory  from  the  musical  point 
of  view. 


312  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

When  he  came  to  live  in  London,  he  and  his  wife  were 
constant  attenders  of  the  orchestral  concerts  given  in  the 
old  St.  James's  Hall  under  the  baton  of  Henschel  or  Richter ; 
and  later  on,  but  not  so  frequently,  at  the  Queen's  Hall  under 
various  conductors.  He  was  always  much  interested  in 
the  art  of  conducting,  and  delighted  to  sit  sometimes  behind 
the  orchestra  and  watch  .Richter  or  Sir  Henry  Wood. 

Fortunately,  his  own  family  were  musical.  His  eldest 
daughter  Sylvia  began  to  learn  the  violin  when  very  young, 
and  studied  afterwards  at  the  Royal  College  of  Music  under 
Senor  Arbos  for  five  years.  Thompson  often  went  to  the 
College  Concerts  during  the  years  when  Sylvia  was  playing 
in  the  orchestra,  then  conducted  by  Sir  C.  Villiers  Stanford, 
and  greatly  enjoyed  them. 

A  few  years  later  Dorothea  began  to  play  the  'cello,  and, 
with  either  their  mother  or  Helen  at  the  piano,  he  was  able 
to  enjoy  home  trios,  without  having  the  fatigue  of  going 
to  town  and  returning  late  at  night.  He  always  found 
great  rest  and  refreshment  in  listening  to  music.  His 
youngest  daughter  Irene  had  a  good  soprano  voice,  which 
was  well  trained,  and  her  singing  gave  him  much  pleasure. 

In  September  1910  he  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  Helen  and  I  went  last  evening  to  the  Queen's  Hall  to 
hear  the  Siegfried  Idyll  and  other  music.  Every  seat  in 
the  hall  was  sold,  when  we  got  there,  except  orchestra  seats. 

"  So  we  sat  behind  the  violins,  and  heard  all  from  behind. 
The  horn  player  was  magnificent,  and  the  kettle-drum 
performer  a  perfectly  amazing  musician — an  artist  to  the 
finger-tips.  The  singers  were  good — both  Germans — but 
we  did  not  hear  them  to  advantage. 

"  To-day  has  been  a  lovely  day — with  an  Italian  sky  and 
warm  sunshine.  I  walked  across  the  Heath  this  morning, 
and  returned  from  Finsbury  at  four  p.m.  to  do  a  bit  of  painting 
before  daylight  faded.  I  have  been  pulling  together  the 
Macugnaga  Glacier,  and  find  it  a  tough  job — but  it  is  like 
ice.  To-night  we  have  had  a  lot  of  music  ;  Irene  is  in  good 
voice.  Dorothea  played  the  piece  given  her  by  the  local 
composer  at  Halesworth.  It  is  not  bad." 

In  a  lecture  given  at  the  Royal  Institution  on  the 
"  Physical  Foundation  of  Music  "  Thompson  aptly  expressed 


HOBBIES  AND   HOLIDAYS  313 

some  of  his  thoughts  and  feelings  about  that  art.  After  a 
long  experimental  demonstration  of  the  physical  pheno- 
mena of  music,  he  closed  by  saying  : 

"  Though  a  science,  music  is  before  all  an  art,  and  can 
be  interpreted  only  by  the  artist.  ...  No  analysis,  however 
searching,  will  explain  away  the  thrill  that  runs  through 
us  as  we  listen  to  some  simple  phrase  or  motif  which  recalls 
the  passionate  andante,  the  gay  barcarolle,  the  massive 
triumphal  march,  or  the  wailing  Miserere.  .  .  .  Art  that  is 
true  fears  nothing  from  analysis  ;  it  is  beyond  and  above 
its  reach. 

"  And  music,  the  most  refined,  the  most  subtle,  the  most 
spiritual  of  the  arts,  defies  analysis  more  effectually  than 
any.  Our  enquiry  leaves  its  emotional  and  spiritual  power 
untouched,  unchanged : 

"  For  music,  which  is  as  a  voice, 
A  low  voice  calling  fancy,  as  a  friend, 
To  the  green  woods  in  the  gay  summer-time, 
Seeing  we  know  emotions  strange  by  it, 
Not  else  to  be  revealed  .  .  . 
.     .     .     is  earnest  of  a  Heaven." 

Thompson  was  well  read  in  Browning,  and  had  a  profound 
admiration  for  much  of  his  work,  though,  unlike  so  many 
others  with  whom  he  shared  this  sentiment,  he  also  enjoyed 
Tennyson's  melodious  verse  with  its  rich  illustration  from 
natural  phenomena.  These  two  poets,  and  Matthew 
Arnold,  inspired  him  in  the  production  of  verses  which  have 
been  much  appreciated  where  they  have  come  to  be  known. 
In  the  first  instance  they  were  read  at  meetings  of  the 
Westminster  Portfolio  Society,  and  afterwards  in  1892 
were,  with  one  other  poem  by  another  writer,  privately 
printed  for  presentation  to  the  members  in  the  form  of  a 
little  booklet  called  Monodies.  His  feeling  for  poetry  finds 
its  best  expression  in  these  verses,  which  are  therefore  quoted. 

AFTER    READING    "PARACELSUS" 

"I  shall  arrive,"  he  said,  "in  His  good  time. 
I  see  my  way  as  birds  their  trackless  way. 
God  guides  me  and  the  bird."     O  faith  sublime 
Of  him  who  dares  aspire  nor  feel  dismay 
To  learn  the  workings  of  the  Master  Mind, 
To  climb  transcendent  heights  nor  look  behind, 


314  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

To  win  the  secret  of  the  Universe. 
'Tis  God  who  calls  us  to  aspire — to  KNOW  ; 
For  ignorance  is  the  great  human  curse. 
Knowledge  is  God-like  :  though  the  way  I  go 
I  know  not.     By  what  crooked  paths  or  plain 
The  circuit  leads,  the  toil  will  not  be  vain 
That  brings  me  onward  to  the  unseen  goal. 
Error  decays,  but  knowledge  shall  survive. 
Clear  is  the  call.     "  I  go  to  prove  my  soul. 
In  some  time — His  good  time — I  shall  arrive." 


ALFRED    TENNYSON 

1809-1892 

I   (FIRST   OF   THREE   VERSES) 

"  Master  of  mystic  music,  thy  great  voice 
Is  heard  no  more.     Across  the  moonlit  space 
Whence  thou  art  passed  thy  footfalls  leave  no  trace 
Like  the  great  King,  the  Arthur  of  thy  choice, 
Blameless  in  deed  and  fearless  in  the  fight, 
First  in  the  quest  and  foremost  in  the  field, 
Borne  through  the  tingling  darkness  of  the  night 
After  his  last  weird  battle  in  the  West 

Into  the  valley  of  Avilion 

Valley  of  silence  and  of  endless  rest — 
So  thou  into  the  Vale  of  Death  art  gone, 
By  weeping  shades  into  the  darkness  borne  : 
Perchance,  like  Arthur,  in  the  promised  morn 
Of  golden  ages,  when  thy  wound  is  healed, 
To  come  again  to  claim  thy  sword  and  crown, 
Thy  plumed  casque,  thine  own  untarnished  shield, 
O  stainless  singer  of  undimmed  renown, 
Master  of  mystic  music,  whom  we  mourn." 

Of  the  value  he  placed  upon  good  prose  and  proper 
literary  setting  of  all  thought,  he  spoke  in  his  Presidential 
Address  to  the  "Sette  of  Odd  Volumes"  (see  p.  250),  but  apart 
from  the  form  which  he  chose  as  fitting  for  his  own  par- 
ticular literary  matter,  he  was  greatly  interested  in  style 
of  speech  and  of  versification.  This  was  apparent  in  some 
of  his  slighter  essays  for  the  Portfolio  Society,  such  as  those 
on  "  Ballades  "  and  "  Bouts- rimes,"  for  illustrating  which 
he  used  his  knowledge  of  Swinburne.  He  delighted  in  the 
most  difficult  of  all  the  poetical  forms,  the  sestina,  his 
favourite  example  being  one  by  Dora  Sigerson  Shorter.  For 
modern  poetry,  with  the  less  rhythmical  form  he  cared  little, 


HOBBIES  AND  HOLIDAYS  315 

but  he  often  cut  poems  out  of  current  papers  and  periodicals, 
and  kept  them,  though  he  enjoyed  no  leisure  to  make  a 
literary  scrapbook. 

Thompson  had  an  excellent  memory,  and  up  to  his 
fiftieth  year  never  used  his  pocket  diary,  except  to  enter 
occasional  appointments,  or  to  remind  himself  of  the  birth- 
days of  his  numerous  relations. 

But  in  1900  he  adopted  the  habit  of  carrying  about  note- 
books, after  the  manner  of  Kelvin's  "  little  green  books," 
his  being  blue,  and  stamped  with  the  sign  of  Finsbury 
Technical  College. 

A  friend  once  remarked  to  one  of  Thompson's  daughters, 
"  I  always  imagine  your  father  must  have  some  extra  coils 
in  his  brain,  which  seems  to  master  so  many  more  branches 
of  knowledge  and  skill  than  an  ordinary  one."  If  it  were 
possible  to  reproduce  the  pages  of  his  little  blue  note-books, 
readers  might  find  there  some  indication  of  the  workings  of 
his  mind.  He  used  to  fill  the  note-books  from  both  ends, 
beginning  at  the  back  with  theology  and  philosophy, 
frequently  reserving  the  first  page  or  two  for  noting  down 
the  names  of  books  to  be  read  and  "  books  to  be  lookt  at," 
and  crossing  them  off  when  seen.  One  year  the  numbers 
ran  up  to  forty,  another  year  to  fifty-two.  Then  would 
follow  extracts  and  quotations,  frequently  in  one  of  his  five 
foreign  languages,  Latin,  Greek,  French,  German  or  Italian, 
these  last  generally  from  Dante  ;  extracts  ranging  in  date 
from  the  writings  of  the  early  Fathers  to  the  current 
periodicals,  mostly  prose,  some  poetry.  The  other  end  was 
mainly  devoted  to  scientific  work,  again  lists  of  books, 
perhaps  headed  "To  be  lookt  at  in  the  B.M.,"  followed  by 
notes  on  visits  to  works,  notes  of  and  for  important  lectures, 
diagrams  of  all  kinds  of  apparatus,  calculations  of  dynamos, 
graphs,  or  harmonic  curves  (the  paper  was  finely  ruled 
in  squares  on  purpose  for  such  work) ,  hints  of  speeches  at  the 
University  or  some  technical  school,  caricatures  of  people 
present  at  the  meeting ;  the  latest  Marconi  development, 
some  new  device  for  producing  an  effect  of  polarised  light 
like  the  atmospheric  effects;  a  note  headed  "Optics  and 
Artists,  ;Beata  Beatrix'  of  Rossetti,  see  the  shadows  on 


316  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

the  dial ;  evidently  it  was  about  1  a.m.  in  the  Arctic  Circle 
with  the  sun  at  least  30°  above  the  northern  horizon  !  " 
A  few  pages  further  on  :  "  Influence  of  Accuracy  of  Language 
on  Accuracy  of  Thought,  incorrect  use  of  terms,  Ambiguity, 
Neglect  of  study  of  Greek,  Shunt  Dynamo,  Polarity, 
Entropy."  Then  a  page  of  queries,  some  of  a  mathe- 
matical nature :  "Is  there  a  9-point  sphere,  the  analogue 
in  solid  of  the  9-point  circle  ?  "  with  a  Latin  quotation 
about  it ;  following  closely  on  the  same  page :  "  What  is  it 
that  remains  permanent  in  permanent  magnets  ?  Magneto- 
motive force  ?  Flux  ?  Energy  ?  How  does  interior  reluct- 
ance change  ?  "  A  little  further  on  is  a  page  headed  "  Science 
and  Temperament,"  with  a  dozen  sub- headings,  references 
to  Newton,  Huxley,  Faraday,  Poincare,  and  the  note, 
"  Germany :  No  scientific  amateurs ;  No  society  enter- 
tainers." In  the  next  year's  volume  the  same  theme 
appeared  again,  with  considerable  additions  and  many  new 
sub-headings.  The  writing  is  occasionally  hardly  legible, 
indicative  of  crowded  underground  carriages  and  omnibuses, 
for  he  often  made  use  of  these  opportunities  for  consulting 
his  little  blue  book  and  adding  to  its  contents.  Between 
the  leaves  are  some  small  botanical  specimens,  brought 
from  a  holiday  walk  for  identification ;  on  another  page  is 
a  note  of  the  names  of  some  plants,  Pyrus  eleagneaifolia 
(wild  olive- leaved  pear),  etc.  There  is  half  a  page  devoted 
to  quotations  from  St.  L.  Strachey  and  Rudyard  Kipling, 
followed  by  a  cramped  compilation  headed,  "  A  Scientific 
Man's  Views  on  Politics,"  facing  a  page  of  short  quotations 
from  Virgil,  Diderot,  Carlyle,  Nietzsche,  Huxley,  Ruskin,  etc., 
on  the  Philosophy  of  Life.  A  few  pages  further  on  is  a  four- 
line  extract  from  Barry  Cornwall. 

"  A  picture  varying  with  the  varying  years  ; 
A  long  Love-dream,  some  hopes  and  many  fears  ; 

"  A  battle  (lost  or  won)  blood-red  with  strife, 
Is  that  dim  human  Riddle  called — A  life  !  " 

One  of  the  books  noted  in  the  same  volume  is  Warren's 
Death  of  Virgil,  and  on  another  page  an  extract  from  it, 
repeated  in  the  next  volume,  and  sent  to  a  friend,  an  Oxford 


HOBBIES  AND  HOLIDAYS  317 

man,  with  the  reproach,  "  What !  you  don't  know  the  finest 
bit  of  English  poetry  that  Oxford  has  produced  since 
Matthew  Arnold's  time  ?  Fie  upon  you  !  You  are  just 
absorbed  into  the  sixteenth  century  I  think."  The  quota- 
tion was  : 

"  To  know,  to  do,  and  on  the  tide  of  time 
Not  to  drift  idly  like  the  cockle-sailor 
Whose  pearly  shallop  dances  on  the  blue,  * 
Fanned  by  soft  airs  and  basking  in  brief  sun, 
Then  at  a  cloudlet  sinks,  with  scarce  a  ripple ; 
But  to  steer  onward  to  some  purposed  haven 
And  make  new  waves  with  motion  of  our  own,— 
That  is  to  live." 

With  these  lines  Thompson  closed  his  Life  of  Kelvin. 


CHAPTER    XV 

RELIGIOUS   TEACHING   AND   WRITINGS 

"  Truth  is  not  to  be  found  by  refusing  to  seek  it ;  nor  in  the  quest  must 
we  count  the  cost.  There  are  many  ways  of  arriving  at  truth  ;  many 
views  of  truth.  There  are  other  windows  opening  on  to  heaven  than 
those  of  the  nursery  in  which  we  were  brought  up  ;  and  some  are  wider, 
and  some  face  toward  the  dawn." — From  the  "  Quest  for  Truth" 

THOMPSON  was  born  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends, 
according  to  the  regulations  of  that  body  which  registers, 
as  members,  those  children  whose  parents  are  both  in 
membership,  and  he  remained  a  Friend  to  the  end  of  his  life. 

At  the  time  of  his  birth  the  Society  had,  with  nearly 
all  other  English  religious  bodies,  shared  in  the  great  wave 
of  Evangelical  thought  which  swept  through  the  country 
in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century.  A  good  many 
members  of  the  Society  had  adopted  these  beliefs  and 
opinions  with  so  much  fervour  and  so  little  reserve  as  to 
become,  as  Thompson  in  later  years  phrased  it,  not  merely 
evangelical,  but  ultra-evangelical  in  their  attitude  of  mind. 

In  the  home  life  of  the  Thompson  family  the  religious 
atmosphere  was  a  very  quiet  one,  and  the  parents  were 
more  concerned  to  live  the  Quaker  life  than  to  talk  about 
it.  But  in  those  middle  years  of  last  century  there  was  a 
great  deal  of  preaching  to  the  boys  and  girls  of  the  schools, 
and  visiting  ministers  were  constantly  putting  before  them 
the  evangelical  point  of  view.  To  its  appeal  a  considerable 
proportion  of  young  Friends  responded  with  great  enthu- 
siasm and  whole-hearted  devotion.  Thompson  especially 
came  very  much  under  its  influence,  owing  to  his  association 
with  his  mother's  younger  brothers,  Richard  and  Joseph 
Tatham  of  Settle,  both  deeply  religious  young  men  of  fervid 
and  saintly  character.  John  Ford,  the  first  Head  Master 

318 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS       319 

of  Bootham,  was  also  a  man  of  the  quiet  and  gentle  evan- 
gelical school. 

While  still  a  junior  master  at  Bootham  the  study  of 
science  led  Thompson  to  question  some  of  the  articles  of 
faith  laid  down  by  those  who  belonged  to  the  extreme 
evangelical  school  of  thought.  In  religion  he  was  always 
deeply  interested,  but  he  felt  a  repulsion  from  some  of  the 
forms  in  which  it  was  presented.  At  the  age  of  twenty  he 
was  already  seeking  to  reconcile  the  teachings  of  science  and 
religion.  In  an  article  published  in  the  Bachelors  Papers  in 
1871  he  wrote  : 

"  The  notion  of  irreconcilability  probably  arises  from  a 
double  misunderstanding  :  first  of  the  theologians,  who  are 
vexed  that  science  should  take  upon  herself  to  explain  the 
manner  of  those  vital  causes  of  which  they  imagined  them- 
selves to  possess  the  key  ;  and,  secondly,  of  the  physicists 
who,  by  the  rigorous  logic  of  their  intellectual  training,  are 
unable  to  understand  that  in  other  departments  truth  may 
be  attained  by  other  methods  than  those  of  the  five  senses." 

He  then  went  on  to  discuss  religious  beliefs  in  the  earlier 
ages  of  history,  showing  how  religion  was  gradually  evolved 
until  the  time  of  the  Christian  era,  and  how  in  the  Middle 
Ages  Christianity  was  in  the  trammels  of  priestcraft,  and 
even  after  the  Reformation  permitted  small  range  to  the 
scientific  enquirer.  He  then  touched  on  the  theory  of 
scientific  evolution,  and  ended  with  the  following  conclusion  : 

"  Sincere  scientific  study,  conducted  even  to  the  furthest 
limits  of  research,  revealing  everywhere  the  evidence  of  a 
grand  purpose  running  throughout  all  the  realms  of  material 
nature,  cannot  fail  to  exalt  the  glory  of  Him  of  whom,  and 
through  whom,  and  to  whom  are  all  things." 

Thus,  even  before  he  began  his  studies  under  Huxley, 
Frankland  and  Tyndall,  Thompson  had  arrived  at  being 
in  the  position  of  a  seeker,  and  in  the  meetings  he  attended 
was  not  afraid  to  speak  of  the  faith  which  was  his.  But 
he  began  to  question  the  popular  terms  of  expression  of 
religious  ideas  more  and  more,  and  at  length,  for  some 
years,  he  felt  it  best  to  wait  and  be  silent.  In  1880,  when 


320  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

first  talking  of  these  questions  with  his  future  wife,  he  said, 
"  I  am  now  considered  a  bit  of  a  heretic."  His  heresy  con- 
sisted chiefly  in  his  not  being  able  to  repeat  the  shibboleths 
of  the  current  expressions  of  religious  truth.  These  were 
seldom  used  in  the  more  reserved  atmosphere  of  the  Scottish 
Quaker  home  of  the  Hendersons,  who  followed  the  old 
Quaker  way  of  life  in  simple  fashion,  but  with  wider  sym- 
pathy for  art  and  literature  than  Thompson  had  known  at 
home. 

When  living  in  Bristol,  Thompson  was  a  constant  attender 
of  the  Friends'  Meetings,  and  occasionally  spoke  in  them. 
Later,  on  his  removal  to  London,  he  attended  Westminster 
Meeting  in  St.  Martin's  Lane. 

He  gradually  came  to  feel — and  his  opinions  were  shared 
by  others — that  the  Society  of  Friends  during  the  seventies 
and  eighties  was  drifting  more  and  more  into  Methodism 
and  approaching  nearer  to  other  Nonconformist  bodies, 
while  forgetting  its  ancient  call  to  a  mystical  and  inner 
religion. 

Still  he  remained  loyally  devoted  to  the  Society,  and, 
although  his  life  was  a  very  busy  one,  he  did  not  shirk 
what  he  felt  to  be  his  duty  in  taking  a  share  of  the  work 
for  it. 

Having  no  paid  ministers,  the  Society  depends  on  the 
voluntary  services  of  its  members.  Each  congregation  has 
its  appointed  secretary,  called  the  Preparative  Meeting 
Clerk.  For  three  years  Thompson  acted  in  that  capacity, 
which,  in  a  large  meeting  of  over  300  members,  entailed  a 
considerable  amount  of  work. 

About  1889  he  began  to  take  more  part  in  preaching  in 
the  meeting.  One  of  his  fellow  members  of  the  congrega- 
tion described  his  ministry  thus  : 

"  He  spoke  with  deliberation  and  great  reserve.  There 
was  a  fine  wideness  of  vision,  studied  emphasis,  courage  and 
fervour,  but  also  balance,  detachment,  and  wisdom.  There 
was  no  declamation,  no  gesture,  and  very  little  direct  appeal. 
But  the  effect  was  wonderful,  and  the  hearers  very  willing, 
reverent,  and  responsive.  He  would  choose  as  his  text 
a  line  from  Browning,  Tennyson,  George  Meredith,  or  the 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      321 

Book  of  Wisdom  ;  or  he  would  dig  up  from  a  long  dead, 
hidden  treasure-house  some  brilliant  and  glistening  gem  of 
thought  and  polish  it  before  our  eyes.  He  would  draw  his 
similes  from  the  ends  of  the  earth,  from  history,  science, 
literature,  art  or  music,  and  he  would  unfold,  reveal,  pro- 
phesy. He  was  a  seer,  and  he  came  to  teft  us  what  he  had 
seen — and  so,  all  unconsciously,  and  as  if  by  accident,  he 
became  a  prophet.  I  well  remember  how  I  discovered  he 
was  a  prophet.  One  Sunday  morning  in  1892,  he  rose  from 
his  seat  on  the  side  gangway  at  Westminster,  and  lifted 
our  hearts  and  minds  into  the  vast  spiritual  world  in  which 
he  dwelt.  I  had  never  heard  a  Quaker  sermon  like  it. 

"  He  spoke  of  what  he  had  seen,  and  what  he  knew.  He 
spoke  with  courage,  fervour,  vision. 

"  At  that  time  he  spoke  but  rarely,  and  always,  as  it 
seemed,  with  a  definite  message,  a  live  coal  from  the  altar 
had  touched  his  lips."  1 

It  was  soon  after  this  occasion  that  Silvanus  Thompson 
was  appointed  to  the  office  of  elder,  and  frequently  it  was 
his  duty  to  sit  in  the  gallery  facing  the  congregation.  Seeing 
assembled  before  him  the  members  with  all  their  varied 
spiritual  needs,  messages  began  to  come  to  him  more  often, 
messages  which  brought  comfort,  hope,  and  strengthening 
of  faith  to  many  present. 

In  the  year  1895,  at  the  request  of  some  of  the  Friends 
who  were  concerned  for  the  state  of  the  Society  at  that 
time,  a  Conference  was  appointed  to  be  held  in  the  autumn 
at  Manchester.  This  Conference  was  epoch-making  in  the 
history  of  the  Society.  Papers  were  read  by  many  of  the 
most  advanced  thinkers  among  its  members.  Professor 
Rendel  Harris  of  Cambridge,  the  profound  Oriental  scholar, 
Principal  Graham  of  Owens  College,  Manchester,  Dr.  Robert 
Spence  Watson  of  Newcastle,  were  among  those  who  took 
part.  Miss  Frances  Phillips  Thompson  of  Birkenhead, 
Thompson's  cousin,  read  a  paper,  and  he  himself  contri- 
buted one  entitled,  "  Can  a  Scientific  Man  be  a  Sincere 
Friend  \  "  From  Manchester  he  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  I  snatch  a  few  minutes  before  Conference  resumes. 
This  morning's  discussion  of  social  questions  was  very  good. 
Dr.  Spence  Watson  opened  well.  Cousin  Fanny  Thompson 

1  Written  by  Sir  George  Newman  in  Friends'  Quarterly  Examiner. 
21 


322  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

followed  with  an  admirable  modern-view  paper.  Except 
for  a  few  croakers  the  speakers  kept  a  very  high  level — and 
the  tone  was  to  be  admired  throughout.  This  afternoon 
Edward  Grubb  leads  off,  then  I  follow.  I  shall  have  a  very 
large  audience — there  were  over  a  thousand  this  morning, 
and  there  will  be  more. 

"  We  went  with  Ellwood  and  William  Brockbank,  a  party 
of  twenty  of  us,  including  Cousin  Charles  Thompson  of 
Morland,  Luke  Woodard  of  Carolina,  Joshua  Rowntree, 
etc.,  to  lunch  at  the  Reform  Club." 

Thompson  began  his  paper  by  saying : 

"  Please  to  note  that  the  question  on  which  1  have  been 
asked  to  write  a  short  paper  is  not  whether  a  Friend  can 
be  a  scientific  man,  but  whether  a  scientific  man  can  be  a 
sincere  Friend.  The  former  query  is  sufficiently  answered 
by  the  mere  mention  of  three  names  :  John  Dalton,  Luke 
Howard,  Daniel  Hack  Tuke — all  Friends,  all  indisputably 
men  of  science.  The  other  question  before  us  can  only  be 
answered  by  inverting  for  the  time  our  point  of  view,  and, 
starting  from  the  position  of  the  man  of  science,  enquire 
whether  that  position  is  compatible  with  the  acceptance  of 
the  particular  views  of  Christianity  which  distinguish  the 
Friends  from  other  bodies  of  Christians. 

"  You  know  beforehand  what  my  answer  will  be.  Were 
it  not  an  affirmative  answer,  I  should  not  stand  here  to- 
day !  .  .  .  What,  then,  is  Science  ?  " 

This  question  he  proceeded  to  answer,  then  went  on  to 
say  that  he  did  not  admit  that  there  could  be  any  conflict 
between  science  and  religion.  "  That  which  is  divine 
truth,  modern  thought  will  leave  wholly  untouched,  or  will 
touch  but  to  confirm." 

He  closed  with  the  words  : 

"  Being  Friends,  we  are,  to  the  unspeakable  gain  of  our 
souls,  preserved  alike  from  those  diseased  word-battlings 
that  afflict  so  many  honest  and  sincere,  but  less  enlightened 
Christians,  and  from  the  torturing  fear  that  science  may 
one  day  undermine  our  faith.  We  have  a  stronger,  because 
a  purer  faith.  We  have  learned  that  sin,  being  a  spiritual 
disease,  requires  a  spiritual  remedy.  We  have  advanced 
beyond  the  materialistic  notion  that  sacrifice  is  better  than 
obedience.  We  have  learned  that  there  is  no  infallible 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      323 

Pope,  no  infallible  church,  no  infallible  book.  We  have 
learned  that  creed  is  not  separable  from  conduct ;  that  a 
man's  religion  is  not  what  he  professes,  but  that  which  he 
lives.  .  .  .  All  that  is  true,  all  that  is  real,  all  that  is  vital 
will  remain,  will  prosper,  will  grow.  .  .  . 

"'  Thanks  to  Him, 

Who  never  is  dishonoured  in  the  spark 

He  gave  us  from  His  fire  of  fires,  and  bade 
Remember  whence  it  sprang,  nor  be  afraid 

While  that  burns  on,  though  all  the  rest  grow  dark  ?  '  " 

The  papers  read  at  the  Manchester  Conference  were  after- 
wards bound  together  and  published  as  a  volume.  Thomp- 
son's paper  was  also  printed  in  pamphlet  form.  His  friend 
Sir  William  Ramsay  said  to  him,  after  reading  it,  "  Almost 
thou  persuadest  me  to  be  a  Friend,"  and  went  on  to  express 
his  agreement  with  much  of  its  reasoning. 

From  Baltimore,  U.S.A.,  he  received  a  letter  from  a 
revered  Friend,  Joseph  J.  Cornell,  whom  he  had  met  at 
Chicago  in  1893,  thanking  him  for  his  testimony  to  the  old 
Quaker  doctrine  of  "  the  Indwelling  of  the  Divine  Spirit 
in  the  soul  of  man."  He  concluded  by  writing  : 

"  But  I  need  not  weary  thee  with  many  words.  I  remember 
with  feelings  of  deep  satisfaction  our  short  meeting  and 
mingling  in  Chicago,  and  the  savor  of  thy  testimony  to  the 
sufficiency  of  the  Inner  Light,  in  our  Meeting,  is  vividly 
fresh  in  my  memory,  and  so  I  felt  impelled  to,  in  this  form, 
send  thee  a  loving  greeting  of  sympathy  and  encouragement 
for  thy  strong  words  in  that  Conference." 

In  1903  Thompson's  gift  as  a  preacher  was  recognised  by 
the  Westminster  Monthly  Meeting,  and  he  was  recorded  as 
a  Minister  of  the  Society  of  Friends. 

In  a  memorial  drawn  up  by  direction  of  this  Monthly 
Meeting,  soon  after  his  death,  the  following  words  occur  : 

"  A  feature  we  would  notice  in  our  friend's  character 
may  be  spoken  of  as  his  sense  of  worship.  The  man  of 
science  resisted  the  temptation  to  arrogance,  which  know- 
ledge sometimes  brings,  .  .  .  that  he  might  humble  him- 
self before  God.  In  the  '  real  presence  '  he  found  that  the 
link  between  man  and  his  Maker  needed  no  outward  symbol. 
His  influence  as  a  worshipper  in  his  own  Meeting  at  West- 


324  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

minster  was  felt  to  be  precious.  It  was  not  alone  his  own 
approach  to.  God,  expressed  oftentimes  in  prayer,  in  which 
he  would  lead  the  thought  of  the  Meeting  with  very  simple 
and  sincere  words ;  but  also  his  sense  of  the  worship  of 
others,  so  that  the  Meeting  became  a  true  fellowship  in 
which  his  own  or  other's  service,  silent  or  vocal,  might 
find  its  fitting  and  harmonious  place. 

"  The  gifts  of  one  did  not  mar  those  of  a  brother  or 
sister.  A  preacher  of  power  himself,  he  would  hold  back, 
and  often  sit  silent  when  he  felt  that  the  word  was  given  to 
another ;  and  when  something  seemed  to  hinder  the  course 
of  true  worship  he  was  often  able  to  bring  it  back  into  its 
true  direction." 

There  exist  several  printed  addresses  which  Thompson 
gave  on  special  occasions,  though  many,  including  some  of 
the  best,  were  never  written  or  printed.  In  1905  the  Friends 
decided  to  give  special  public  addresses  in  the  chief  cities  of 
northern  England  at  the  time  of  holding  their  Yearly  Meeting 
at  Leeds  for  the  first  time  for  two  centuries  out  of  London. 
The  subject  chosen  was  "  Christ  hi  Modern  Life,"  and 
Silvanus  Thompson  was  asked  to  deliver  the  address  at 
Liverpool.  Each  speaker  was  free  to  interpret  the  subject 
as  he  pleased.  On  May  29th,  1905,  he  wrote  to  his  wife  : 

"  The  evening  meeting  in  the  old  meeting  house  at  Liver- 
pool was  very  large  ;  it  was  quite  full,  some  650  people  being 
present,  of  whom  nine- tenths  were  certainly  not  Friends. 
Dr.  Thorp  made  a  good  President.  The  people  listened  most 
attentively — hung  upon  my  words,  and  seemed  to  realise 
that  I  really  had  a  message  for  them.  A  number  of  folk 
came  to  me  afterwards,  amongst  them  Roy  Coventry,  J.C., 
my  old  Flounder's  tutor,  a  former  Bristol  student,  and  one 
of  Professor  Marchant's  demonstrators.  They  all  asked  for 
copies  of  my  address." 

In  the  following  year  Thompson  spoke  very  strongly  in 
the  Yearly  Meeting  on  the  drift  of  the  Society  of  Friends 
away  from  its  first  principles,  and  the  consequent  loss  of 
members  by  their  joining  other  religious  bodies.  In  plead- 
ing that  Friends  should  return  to  the  principle  for  which 
they  had  stood  from  the  beginning  he  said : 

"  But  what  do  we  as  Friends  stand  for  ?    Not  for  a  bundle 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      325 

of  negations,  not  for  a  partitioning  of  the  country  into  dis- 
tricts called  Quarterly  Meetings,  nor  for  an  organisation  of 
a  hierachy  of  elders,  overseers,  and  ministers.  These  are 
all  the  veriest  details,  which  might  be  abundantly  varied 
without  departing  from  the  truth.  What  was  it  that  George 
Fox  and  his  fellow  workers  went  out  to  preach  ?  What  was 
the  revelation  committed  to  them  ?  What  was  it  but  the 
fundamental  principle  of  the  Inner  Light  of  Christ  shining 
into  the  heart  and  vitalising  the  man  from  within  ?  What 
was  it  but  the  Divine  Immanence  in  the  soul,  making  dis- 
cipleship  the  conscious  obedience  to  the  inwardly  revealed 
Will  of  God  ?  It  was  an  evangel  of  Inspiration,  a  Gospel 
of  Divine  Illumination  which  had  entered  into  their  lives.  .  .  . 
All  the  rest  followed  from  this  principle  ;  the  non-necessity 
of  the  purely  institutional  and  traditional  things — no  priest, 
no  ritual,  no  liturgy,  no  ordinances.  Men  were  to  be  saved, 
not  by  machinery,  not  by  articles,  nor  ordinances,  nor 
liturgies,  nor  by  priestcraft,  but  by  listening  to  the  Voice 
of  God  and  by  doing  His  Will." 

He  went  on  to  show  how  degeneration  from  these 
ideals  had  crept,  and  was  creeping,  into  the  Society : 

"  The  Society  must  awake,"  he  cried,  "  must  renounce. 
It  must  be  willing  to  lose  itself,  to  save  itself.  .  .  .  We 
must  neither  include  nor  exclude  too  widely.  .  .  .  We 
know  of  no  Inner  Light  but  that  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
in  the  soul.  Let  us  not  be  slaves  of  words.  We  recognise 
no  Inner  Light  that  is  not  the  emanation  of  God  Himself. 
By  whatever  name  we  call  it — whether  Inner  Light,  or  Holy 
Spirit,  or  Christ  within — it  is  the  same  thing. 

"  So  far  from  our  mission  being  ended,  it  has  scarcely 
begun.  More  than  ever  does  the  world  need  the  message 
the  proclamation  of  which  was  laid  upon  our  forefathers 
in  this  body,  and  which,  after  two  centuries  and  a  half,  it  is 
still  called  to  uphold  ...  to  forsake  the  c  Lo  !  here '  and 
*  Lo  !  there '  of  the  popular  churches,  and  to  look  to  the 
Christ,  who  is  still  the  need  of  to-day — the  Christ  within." 

In  the  same  year  1906  Thompson  was  invited  to  give  an 
address  at  York  Meeting  House  during  the  time  of  the 
holding  of  the  British  Association  Meeting  in  that  city. 
It  was  given  on  the  Sunday  evening,  and  was  very  largely 
attended  by  members  of  the  Association,  as  well  as  by  the 
Friends  who  usually  formed  the  congregation  there. 


326  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

He  chose  as  his  subject  a  discussion  of  that  aspect  of 
religion  known  as  Mysticism ;  the  address  was  afterwards 
incorporated  in  an  article  published  in  the  Friends9  Quarterly 
Examiner,  under  the  title  of  "  Intuitional  Religion."  He 
took  as  his  text  the  motto  which  the  ancient  University  of 
Oxford  has  used  for  centuries,  Dominus  Illuminatio  Mea, 
and  showed  forth  the  growth  of  the  ideas  of  Divine  Illumina- 
tion, of  the  Light  of  Conscience,  the  Inward  Light,  warning 
his  hearers  lest  they  should  be  misled  by  analogies  and 
metaphors  drawn  from  a  study  of  light  in  its  physical  sense. 
From  the  mystic  writers,  William  Law,  Erskine  of  Linlathen, 
Henry  More,  etc.,  he  gave  many  quotations.  He  classified 
Mysticism  under  the  heads  of  poetical,  apocalyptic,  ethical 
and  quietist,  illustrating  his  classification  by  examples. 

The  address  lasted  about  an  hour.  Sir  William  White, 
a  member  of  the  Association,  described  it  to  another  scientific 
man  as  the  best  lay  sermon  to  which  he  had  ever  listened. 
When  the  Yearly  Meeting  met  at  Birmingham  in  1908  he 
again  gave  a  public  address,  this  time  on  "  Agnosticism  and 
Christianity." 

Many  requests  for  Sunday  evening  addresses  from  Meet- 
ings up  and  down  the  country  now  began  to  reach  him. 
But  he  was  too  busy  to  devote  much  time  to  going  about. 
One  of  the  last  of  these  public  addresses  was  given  in  1913, 
in  a  large  public  hall  to  an  appreciative  audience ;  it  was 
entitled  "  The  Sacrament  of  Life,"  and  with  another  on 
"  Materialism,"  of  about  the  same  date,  appeared  as  chapters 
of  the  book  A  Not  Impossible  Religion.  His  Sunday 
evenings  were  largely  devoted  to  their  preparation. 

During  the  years  which  followed  the  first  holding  of 
Yearly  Meeting  out  of  London  in  1905,  and  partly  as  a 
result  of  fresh  enthusiasm  awakened  then,  there  arose  among 
the  younger  Quaker  members  a  great  revival  of  interest 
in  the  meetings  for  worship.  Groups  of  young  Friends 
were  formed  to  visit  the  meetings  throughout  the  country, 
and  to  try  to  bring  into  them  a  renewal  of  the  spirit  of  the 
gatherings  of  the  early  Friends,  in  which  there  was  more 
willingness  to  wait  in  silence  for  a  spiritual  message  to  be 
given. 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      327 

Numbers  of  the  students  at  Oxford,  Cambridge,  Birming- 
ham and  elsewhere  were  interested  in  this  movement,  and 
Thompson  was  asked  on  several  occasions  to  come  to  their 
meetings  and  speak  to  them.  Twice  he  went  to  the  Wood- 
brooke  Settlement,  near  Birmingham,  to  address  the  students 
there,  and  he  paid  two  or  three  visits  to  Cambridge  for  the 
same  purpose. 

When  visiting  the  latter  town  he  several  times  stayed 
with  the  venerable  Canon  Bonney,  the  geologist,  with 
whom  he  enjoyed  many  talks  on  scientific  and  religious 
topics. 

This  revival  among  the  younger  Quakers  came  to  be 
known  as  the  "  Young  Friends'  Movement,"  and  it  rapidly 
extended  over  the  country.  Thompson's  third  daughter 
Dorothea,  a  London  college  graduate,  took  an  active  part  in 
it,  and  was  a  member  of  the  central  Committee. 

In  1912  she  went,  with  other  members  of  the  Committee, 
to  visit  some  of  the  large  bodies  of  Friends  in  the  United 
States,  where  there  was  a  similar  revival  of  interest  among 
the  young.  Thompson  was  deeply  interested  in  the  form 
of  this  revival.  Some  of  its  permanent  effects  were  soon 
after  tested  by  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  when  most  of  its 
young  men  members  took  up  the  strongest  position,  main- 
taining the  Society's  testimony  to  the  unchristian  character 
of  all  war,  and  many  suffered  imprisonment  as  conscientious 
objectors  to  military  service. 

In  the  summer  of  1914  Thompson  was  invited  to  deliver 
the  "  Swarthmore  Lecture  "  at  the  next  Yearly  Meeting  of 
the  Society.  This  Lecture  is  an  endowed  one,  founded 
by  Friends  about  1907,  and  is  given  annually. 

The  Lectureship  has  a  twofold  purpose — first,  to  interpret 
further  to  the  Society  of  Friends  their  message  and  mission  ; 
and,  secondly,  to  bring  before  the  public  the  spirit,  the  aims, 
the  fundamental  principles  of  the  Friends.  The  Lecture 
is  always  published  in  book  form  on  the  day  that  it  is 
delivered. 

Thompson  chose  as  his  title  The  Quest  for  Truth,  and  began 
at  once,  during  the  summer  vacation,  to  prepare  the  material 
for  it.  Fortunately  much  was  done  before  the  outbreak 


328  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

of  the  European  War  had  begun  to  throw  extra  work  and 
strain  upon  him. 

It  was  during  his  Easter  vacation  in  1915,  spent  with  his 
daughter  Dorothea  at  Falmouth,  that  he  finally  prepared 
the  volume  for  publication,  she  assisting  him  with  helpful 
criticism  and  correction  of  proofs. 

As  the  Lecture  is  always  publicly  advertised,  it  was  known 
that  the  audience  would  be  a  large  one,  so  it  was  arranged 
that  it  should  be  delivered  in  the  Central  Hall,  Westminster, 
which  is  much  larger  than  the  large  Friends'  Meeting  House 
at  Bishopsgate.  It  is,  however,  not  so  well  adapted  for 
speaking  in.  About  1,600  people  were  present.  The  Lecture 
was  only  briefly  reported  in  the  daily  papers,  but  the 
printed  volume,  which  contained  a  great  amount  of  matter 
not  read  by  the  author,  in  addition  to  the  numerous  and 
lengthy  footnotes,  was  reviewed  in  many  of  the  publications 
of  the  religious  press. 

A  good  review  appeared  in  One  and  All,  from  the  pen  of 
Dr.  Currie  Martin,  M. A.  The  following  quotations  give  some 
idea  of  the  scope  of  the  Lecture. 

"  The  Professor  sets  out  by  giving  a  fresh  and  interesting 
account  of  the  differences  between  truth,  error,  and  false- 
hood, and  of  the  vital  distinction  between  truth  and  veracity. 
This  treatment  of  words  is  not  only  useful  in  itself,  but  is  a 
fine  object-lesson  in  the  importance  of  accurate  language. 

"  The  importance  of  maintaining  intellectual  integrity 
is  next  dealt  with,  and  the  great  danger  that  besets  us  all  in 
becoming  the  victims  of  prejudice.  In  a  couple  of  pages 
the  writer  sets  clearly  before  us  the  most  common  forms  of 
hindrances  to  the  Quest  for  Truth ;  these  consist  in  over- 
respect  for  authority,  false  humility,  the  aversion  from 
doubt,  the  tendency  to  temporise,  the  craving  for  originality, 
and  want  of  precision  in  language  and  clarity  of  thought. 

"  We  come  next  upon  the  passage  containing  the  treat- 
ment of  the  Quest  for  Truth  in  various  departments  of 
knowledge. 

"  The  Professor  gives  a  striking  instance  of  how  mere 
accuracy  may  be  misleading,  and  thus  we  see  that  a  proper 
use  of  imagination  is  an  essential  element  in  the  true  Quest 
for  Truth. 

"  Of  special  interest  to  us  is  the  section  dealing  with 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS        329 

religion  and  morals.  This  is  illustrated  by  a  somewhat 
lengthy  treatment  of  pious  frauds,  legends  and  folklore,  full 
of  suggestion  and  illumination. 

"  Careful  study  of  this  book  can  have  only  one  result — 
clearness  of  vision  and  uplift  of  soul.  It  will  be  found  to  be 
of  far  higher  practical  value  and  of  more  permanent  effect 
than  many  volumes  which  at  the  first  glance  seem  to  give 
richer  promise  of  such  results." 

Another  criticism  in  the  Bristol  paper,  The  Western  Press, 
said  : 

"  The  book  is  marked  by  the  same  lucidity  of  statement 
and  force  of  argument  as  characterised  Dr.  Silvanus  Thomp- 
son's public  speeches  in  this  city  in  bygone  years.  In  addi- 
tion the  book  is  remarkable  for  the  wide  range  covered  by 
its  author  in  his  search  for  the  opinions  of  others  on  the 
points  under  discussion.  These  very  numerous  quotations 
in  letterpress  and  footnotes  are  extremely  apt,  and  add 
considerably  to  the  value  of  the  volume." 

A  reference  in  the  Lecture  to  the  strange  use  of  words 
employed  by  Mrs.  Eddy  in  her  writings  on  Christian  Science, 
brought  upon  its  author  several  letters  in  defence  of  her 
language.  He  also  had  a  lengthy  correspondence  with 
some  members  of  the  Society  of  Friends  who  had  not  fully 
understood  some  of  the  points  of  his  arguments. 

Thompson  did  not  by  any  means  confine  his  attention 
to  the  Quaker  aspect  of  religious  truth.  He  was  a  wide 
reader  of  theological  works,  both  ancient  and  modern.  His 
friend  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  published  several  works  on  religion 
and  philosophy  which  interested  him  greatly. 

In  1904  he  wrote  to  him  : 

"  Many  thanks  for  your  address  on  '  Mind  and  Matter,' 
which  will  give  me  food  for  many  days. 

"  In  the  main  I  agree  with  the  line  you  take.  There  must 
be  a  monism,  ultimately ;  but  no,  not  HaeckeFs. 

"  What  a  pity  that  any  scientific  man  should  be  so 
blatant !  He  is  doing  little  better  than  set  up  a  new  dog- 
matism, which  can  at  best  be  little  better  than  the  old,  and 
may  be  far  worse. 

"  But  what  do  you  mean  by  the  sentence,  '  Direction  is 
not  a  function  of  energy  '  ? 


330  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

"  Surely  it  is,  just  as  much  so  as  matter  ?  Are  there  not 
energy-paths,  for  the  existence  of  which  Poynting,  and  you 
yourself,  are  responsible  as  sponsors  ?  Are  not  these  the 
trajectories  of  energy,  just  as  truly  as  the  parabola  of  the 
projectile  or  the  stream- line  of  the  fluid  ? 

"  Energy  is  an  undirected  quantity  in  one  sense,  just  as 
truly  as  mass  is  an  undirected  quantity.  Is  that  all  that 
you  mean  ? 

"  Have  you  yet  read  the  Life  of  Bishop  Creighton  ?  It  is 
most  deeply  interesting.  I  came  across  the  following, 
written  in  1887,  when  he  was  Professor  at  Cambridge  [after 
noticing  the  number  of  Universities  in  foreign  countries  in 
comparison  with  '  only  two  in  England '] :  '  The  English 
character  loathes  a  multiplicity  of  ideas — so  bewildering '  ! 
Only  two  I  I  He  totally  ignores  Durham,  London  and 
Victoria  :  to  say  nothing  of  the  Scottish  four.  With  all  his 
breadth,  he  is  occasionally  curiously  narrow." 

About  1907  Thompson  joined  a  small  number  of  men  of 
various  denominations,  who  had  formed  themselves  into 
what  they  called  "  The  London  Society  for  the  Study  of 
Religion."  He  and  T.  Edmund  Harvey,  Warden  of  Toynbee 
Hall  (afterwards  to  become  his  son-in-law),  were  the  only 
Quaker  members.  He  describes  the  Society  to  Sir  0. 
Lodge  in  a  letter  to  him  in  1912. 

"  You  may  have  heard  of  our  London  Society  for  the 
Study  of  Religion,  founded  about  seven  years  ago,  in  which 
members  of  a  number  of  different  beliefs,  Jews,  Romans, 
Anglicans,  Baptists,  Unitarians  and  Agnostics,  etc.,  take 
part.  We  are  but  forty  members  or  so,  and  have  got  to 
know  and  esteem  one  another  very  thoroughly.  Baron  von 
Hiigel,  Joseph  Wicksteed,  Rev.  A.  S.  Lilly,  Claude  Monte- 
fiore,  Professor  Israel  Abrahams,  Rev.  P.  T.  Forsyth,  Mr. 
C.  S.  Mead  and  various  other  men,  whose  names  you  will 
know,  are  active  members. 

"  We  seldom  meet  less  than  twenty-five  in  number  once  a 
month,  to  read  and  discuss  papers.  We  have  had,  as 
visitors,  Sabatier,  Father  Semaria,  Dr.  Thomas  Hodgkin, 
etc.  At  the  end  of  each  session  we  conclude  with  a  dinner, 
when  we  try  to  have  some  visitor  with  us  to  discourse  to  us 
informally,  and  at  short  length  after  dinner.  I  am  asked  by 
the  Council  to  write  to  you  to  ask  you  whether  you  would 
honour  the  Society  by  being  its  guest  at  our  next  dinner. 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      331 

"  I  hope  you  will  be  able  to  come  ;  and,  if  so,  that  you  will 
consider  this  house  your  home  for  the  night." 

Sir  Oliver  was,  unfortunately,  too  much  occupied  to  be 
able  to  come  to  the  dinner. 

Thompson,  at  intervals,  read  papers  to  the  London  Society, 
and  was  a  member  of  its  committee,  and  also  served  as 
President  for  one  session.  Their  meetings  were  held  at  a 
small  hall  in  Westminster.  In  October  1912  Thompson 
again  wrote  to  Sir  0.  Lodge  : 

"  I  have  been  looking  into  your  Modern  Problems,  which, 
if  you  will  pardon  me  for  saying  so,  seems  to  me  the  best  of 
your  lay  (i.e.  non-scientific)  books.  It  will  go  on  the  shelves 
beside  such  works  as  Huxley's  Lay  Sermons. 

"  Since  Huxley's  days  there  is  no  scientific  man  who  has 
got  the  ear  of  the  public  as  you  have,  except  the  late  Grant 
Allen,  whose  biology  appealed,  perhaps,  more  to  people 
interested  in  living  things  than  physics  does.  And  he  had  a 
poor  philosophy  behind  him. 

"  I  don't  pretend  to  have  read  all  the  essays  ;  but  I  wel- 
come some  old  friends  as  well  as  new  ones.  I  like  your 
chapter  on  Arbitration  as  far  as  it  goes  ;  but  it  seems  to  me 
that  it  scarcely  sufficiently  emphasises  the  point  that  when 
mankind  has  really  got  into  the  scientific  frame  of  mind  in 
which  the  instinct  will  be  to  resolve  problems  by  applying 
principles,  and  abhorring  prejudice,  there  will  be  no  chance  of 
squabbles  being  settled  in  any  other  way  than  by  law  and 
arbitration,  national  and  international. 

"  You  have  the  ear  of  the  public.  Have  you  realised  that 
the  public  needs  to  be  told,  not  once,  nor  twice,  that  our 
rulers,  politicians,  administrators,  legislators,  are — (that  is 
95  per  cent,  of  them)  trained  up  in  a  non-scientific  school 
of  thought  or  no- thought ;  and  that  their  current  measure 
of  truth  is — even  when  they  are  honest — of  truth  unsifted, 
of  truth  that  has  never  been  tested  by  first  principles  ?  " 

Three  of  Thompson's  oldest  friends,  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Sir 
William  Barrett,  and  Sir  William  Crookes,  as  well  as  some 
of  his  Thompson  cousins,  were  deeply  interested  in  Psychical 
Research,  and  in  investigation  of  supposed  spiritual  mani- 
festations. For  a  time  he  studied  the  publications  of  the 
Society,  but  he  could  never  accept  as  proven  the  supposed 
messages  from  the  spirits  of  departed  friends.  He  could 


332  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

never  believe  in  the  absolute  honesty  of  the  medium,  and 
considered  that  there  was  nothing  manifest  which  could 
not  be  explained  by  telepathy  or  thought  transference, 
conscious  or  unconscious,  on  the  part  of  the  living. 

Occasional  references  to  the  subject  occur  in  his  letters 
to  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  ;  in  his  intercourse  with  Sir  William 
Crookes  it  was  carefully  avoided. 

The  following  two  letters  to  Mr.  T.  Bailey  Saunders  are 
further  evidence  of  his  devotion  to  modern  studies  in  religion. 

The  first  was  written  during  the  winter  vacation  of  1907  : 

"  Many  thanks  to  you  for  your  kind  gift  of  your  Quest 
of  Faith.  I  shall  have  a  first  reading  of  it  to-morrow  after- 
noon in  a  snug  arm-chair,  and  promise  myself  a  treat. 

"  I  see  that  your  earlier  chapters  deal  with  Huxley.  I 
sat  at  his  feet  for  a  time — literally,  as  a  student — and  had  a 
tremendous  admiration  for  him  as  a  man,  though  I  always 
thought  him  too  much  inclined  to  a  dogmatism  of  his  own. 
A  few  months  ago  I  took,  in  company  with  a  friend^— a 
biologist  and  a  thinker — a  Sunday  afternoon  walk  across  the 
fields  to  Finchley  to  the  Cemetery  to  revisit  Huxley's  grave. 
Already  the  tombstone  is  growing  green.  On  the  stone  are 
these  words : 

" '  Be  not  afraid,  ye  waiting  hearts  that  weep, 
For  still  "  He  giveth  His  beloved  sleep  "  ; 
And  if  an  endless  sleep  He  wills — so  best.' 

"  I  know  not  whence  these  lines  come,  and  it  is  not 
perhaps  without  significance  that,  whoever  caused  them  to 
be  inscribed  there,  thought  it  needful  to  put  the  text  from 
the  Psalms  into  quotation  marks. 

"  But  to  find  them  there  at  all  is  of  much  more  significance, 
if  it  be  that  their  inscription  was  by  any  direction  of  his. 

"  Entbehren  sollst  du  ?  Of  course  I  was  familiar  with  this  ; 
and  it  was  not  this  mocking  phrase  that  was  in  my  thoughts. 
It  is  some  other  passage  that  I  have  read  elsewhere,  possibly 
in  the  Eckermann  volume,  but  which  I  cannnot  now  find, 
where  the  ethical  significances  of  enibehren  and  entsagen  are 
contrasted.  If  you  find  it,  please  remember  me." 

The  next  letter  is  written  in  June  of  1907. 

"  You  were  so  good  as  to  lend  me  two  books  :  As  Others 
Saw  Him  and  The  Great  Enigma. 

"  These  I  now  return  to  you  with  apologies  for  having 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS       333 

kept  them  so  long.  But  only  to-day  have  I  managed  to  finish 
the  former.  It  is  distinctly  good  and  interesting.  As  to 
Lilly's  book,  while  there  are  plenty  of  interesting  things,  I 
cannot  read  it  without  continually  finding  myself  pulled  up 
by  some  implication  or  some  ignoratio  elenchi  most  subtly 
interwoven  in  the  argument.  It  may  not  be  consciously 
dishonest,  but  it  is  certainly  disingenuous.  There  is  always 
an  arriere  pensee  somewhere  lurking  round  the  corner.  I 
must  re-read  your  Quest  of  Faith  now  that  I  have  read  the 
Enigma.  The  chapter  on  Spencer  wearied  me.  1  remember 
that  your  chapter  on  Spencer  was  also  tedious  to  my  thinking. 
I  believe  I  was  rude  enough  to  tell  you  so. 

"  I  suppose  the  fact  is  that  years  ago  I  found  Spencer 
wanting,  and  his  philosophisings  on  the  deeper  things 
wearied  me.  Certainly  I  prefer  Spinoza  as  philosopher. 
But  just  now  my  head  is  full  of  other  things  :  I  am  in  the 
middle  of  a  discourse  to  be  let  off  as  a  presidential  address 
to  the  amateur  scientific  folk  of  the  South  Eastern  Union 
of  Scientific  Societies  next  week. 

"  It  includes  an  attempt  to  whitewash  the  Farbenlehre 
of  Goethe,  that  masterpiece  of  amateur  science.  Where 
and  when  did  Goethe  say  :  '  Lasst  uns  doch  vielseitig  sein  ? ' 
I  can't  find  it  in  the  Eckermann  volumes — perhaps  you 
may  know." 

It  was  in  1905,  two  years  previously,  that  Thompson  had 
been  making  a  special  study  of  the  idea  of  Monism.  In  a 
printed  paper  entitled  "  Reconstruction  and  Restatement " 
he  discussed  some  of  the  arguments  employed  by  the 
advocates  of  that  school  of  philosophy,  pointing  out  that 
"  there  is  undoubtedly  bottom  truth  underlying  the  idea 
that  life  is,  in  its  widest  sense,  one"  But  he  felt  the  philo- 
sophy as  interpreted  by  Haeckel  to  be  very  inadequate. 

The  last  paper  read  by  Thompson  in  1916  to  the  London 
Society  for  the  Study  of  Religion  was  entitled  "  The  Postu- 
lates of  Religion,"  in  which  he  stated  that  in  religion  "  some 
matters  must  be  deemed  to  be  true,  because  the  denial  of 
them  would  land  us  in  absurdity  or  intellectual  nihilism. 
Others  are  statements  of  permissive  action,  which  none 
would  dream  of  refusing."  These  he  considered  to  repre- 
sent the  postulates  and  axioms  which  exist  in  religion, 
though  no  universal  agreement  on  such  has  been  formulated. 


334  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

He  brought  forward  sixteen  of  these  postulated  proposi- 
tions, together  with  the  implications  which  they  involved,  and 
the  discussion  which  followed  was  a  very  deep  one,  in  which 
many  members  took  part. 

As  one  of  his  friends  said : 

"  Thompson  was  uncompromising  and  sometimes  severe 
in  exposing  error,  or  in  dissecting  half-truths,  or  perversions 
of  the  truth.  He  may  also  have  sometimes  over-emphasised 
aspects  of  truth  which  appealed  to  the  scientific  mind.  But 
he  was  actuated  solely  by  the  love  of  truth  itself,  for  loyalty 
to  it  was  the  very  Distinct  of  his  soul.  If,  however,  he  wielded 
a  trenchant  pen,  in  personal  touch  and  converse  he  was 
gentle  and  genial." 

Professor  Frederic  L.  Paxon  of  California,  who  had  at 
various  times  visited  Westminster  Meeting  and  heard 
Thompson  preach  there,  wrote  the  following  reminiscences 
in  the  Friends'  Intelligencer  of  August  1916. 

"  Ten  years  ago  a  group  of  college  teachers  were  discussing 
the  habits  of  their  European  colleagues,  and  one  of  them 
chanced  to  remark  that,  in  Europe,  total  abstinence  was 
rare.  To  this  statement  two  of  the  group,  strangers  to  each 
other,  objected  vigorously,  and  each  gave,  as  proof  of  his 
objection,  the  name  of  Dr.  Silvanus  Thompson.  It  was 
not  an  accident  that  this  name  occurred  simultaneously  to 
two  casual  acquaintances,  for  the  impressive  personality  of 
Dr.  Thompson  was  such  that  men  naturally  seized  upon  his 
attributes  to  give  point  and  illustration  to  their  arguments. 
To  many  of  his  American  acquaintances,  London  and 
Westminster  Meeting  can  never  be  the  same  now  that  he  is 
gone.  Truly  balanced,  far-sighted,  sane,  he  had  much  of 
the  practical  spirituality  of  William  Penn.  He  was  a  man 
versatile  beyond  our  American  custom." 

During  the  terrible  war  years,  when  men's  minds  were  in 
great  unsettlement,  the  head  of  the  Browning  Hall  Settle- 
ment at  Walworth  decided  to  hold  a  week  of  lectures  by 
scientific  men  to  show  that  science  and  religion  are  not 
incompatible.  Seven  men  of  science,  most  of  them  Fellows 
of  the  Royal  Society,  were  found  who  were  willing  to  give 


RELIGIOUS  TEACHING  AND   WRITINGS      335 

these  addresses.  Professor  Sims  Woodhead  spoke  on  the 
"  Continuity  of  Life,"  Thompson  on  the  "  Continuity  of 
Religion,"  dealing  in  particular  with  the  evolution  of  man's 
spiritual  perception. 

He  had  great  sympathy  with  the  work  of  the  Browning 
Settlement,  and  helped  to  find  speakers  to  complete  their 
programme.  He  attended  several  meetings.  He  had  ex- 
pressed much  hesitancy  about  speaking  himself,  as  he  had 
then  such  onerous  duties  at  College,  and  it  would  take  two 
or  three  weeks  to  prepare  such  an  address.  The  committee 
said  it  was  precisely  because  so  much  thought  went  into  his 
addresses  that  they  wished  to  secure  him. 

Sir  Oliver  Lodge  had  given  the  first  address  on  "  Help 
from  the  Unseen."  All  the  addresses  were  afterwards  pub- 
lished as  a  volume  entitled  Religion  and  Science  by  Seven 
Men  of  Science,  and  a  Dutch  translation  was  afterwards 
published  at  Haarlem. 

It  was  during  the  last  few  years  of  his  life  that  Thompson 
decided  to  publish  anonymously  some  of  the  various  addresses 
he  had  given,  and  began  to  arrange  and  prepare  them  for 
that  purpose.  He  had  also  written  down  several  suggested 
titles.  This  work  was  interrupted  by  his  sudden  illness, 
and  left  unfinished.  T.  Edmund  Harvey,  his  son-in-law, 
edited  the  manuscript  for  publication.  One  or  two  chapters 
had  to  be  omitted,  and  it  was  also  much  to  be  regretted  that 
for  the  final  chapter  only  the  title,  "  Finis  Coronat,"  was 
written. 

Thompson  had  already  prepared  a  preface  to  the  book, 
in  which  he  explained  that  the  various  chapters  had  been 
written  at  different  times  during  ten  years.  He  wrote  : 

"  Doubtless  the  objection  will  be  raised  that  the  book 
does  not  present  a  consistent  whole,  but  is  made  up  of  frag- 
ments ;  that  there  is  no  connected  system,  no  unifying  theo- 
logical basis.  This  is  precisely  so  ;  the  chapters  are  merely 
aper$ust  and  do  not  claim  to  be  other.  A  grievous  error  for 
centuries  past  has  been  that  the  theologians — well-inten- 
tioned, learned,  and  pious  men — have  tried  to  weave  a 
consistent  whole  out  of  imperfect  aper$us,  and,  having 
framed  a  system  of  logical  consistency  on  this  defective 


336  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

basis,  forthwith  have  branded  as  heresy  any  view  of  truth 
that  did  not  fit  in  with  their  system.  .  .  . 

"  To  these  outcasts  of  orthodoxy,  to  the  honest  and 
reverential  seekers  after  spiritual  enlightenment  does  the 
author  now  address  himself.  Of  several  things  he  is  pro- 
foundly convinced.  First,  that  the  day  is  gone  by  when  the 
essence  of  Christianity  can  be  regarded  as  consisting  in 
either  dogma  or  literature.  .  .  .  The  author  publishes  this 
work  with  the  conviction  that  no  advance  in  religious 
thought  is  possible  unless  the  quest  for  truth,  without  fear 
of  the  consequences  to  accepted  tradition,  be  ever  accom- 
panied by  at  least  an  equal  regard  for  the  preservation  of 
a  reverential  spirit." 

The  volume  entitled  A  Not  Impossible  Religion,  published 
in  1918  by  John  Lane,  met  with  an  instant  success,  and  in 
two  months  a  second  edition  was  issued.  It  seemed  to  meet 
the  need  of  the  spirit  of  unrest  and  questioning  which  arose 
in  the  years  of  war. 

The  reviews  were  almost  unanimously  favourable,  and 
The  Times  Literary  Supplement,  The  Westminster  Gazette, 
The  Guardian,  The  Daily  News,  The  Friend,  and  many 
others  gave  great  praise.  Most  of  the  faults  found  were 
those  .which  the  author  had  already  acknowledged  in  his 
Preface.  Reviews  appeared  in  daily  papers  all  over  the 
country,  from  The  Bristol  Times  and  Mirror  to  The  Montrose 
Standard.  In  the  Nation's  Book  Supplement  the  book  was 
described  as  follows : 

"It  is  the  loftiest  idealism  summed  up  in  the  words 
*  Follow  Me,'  with  all  their  implications,  that  it  preaches, 
and  there  never  was  a  time  in  the  history  of  the  world  when 
such  a  message  might  have  come  with  greater  pregnancy." 

The  Christian  Commonwealth  said : 

"  By  distinguished  work  in  his  own  profession,  Dr. 
Silvanus  Thompson  left  no  mean  legacy  to  the  world ;  and 
this  book  gives  him  a  further  title  to  be  named  among  the 
bridge-builders  who  would  make  the  seekers  of  truth  and 
the  men  of  faith  realise  that,  so  far  from  having  any  estrange- 
ment, they  are  brothers,  whose  faces  are  set  towards  the 


RELIGIOUS   TEACHING  AND  WRITINGS      337 

same  light.  Surely  it  is  eccentricity  rather  than  diversity 
that  would  prevent  any  man  from  yielding  to  the  persua- 
siveness of  such  words  as  these  :  '  All  duty  is  divine,  every 
place  holy,  every  hour  sacred,  everything  outward  spiritu- 
ally correlated  with  the  inward.  And  the  sacraments  of 
God,  if  we  would  reckon  them  up,  are  not  to  be  counted  as 
two  or  seven,  but  are  untold  as  the  sands  of  the  seashore.'  " 


THE    HIGHER    MYSTERY 

'  Heaven  lies  about  us  in  our  infancy '  ; 
We  try  to  touch  it,  but  the  blue  recedes. 
The  mystery  fades  ;   no  longer  can  we  see, 
When  Knowledge  seems  to  overthrow  our  creeds, 
Heaven  all  about  us.     Gone,  the  light  of  old  : 
The  rainbow's  foot  no  longer  touches  gold. 
Yet  as  the  years  beyond,  'mid  joy  and  pain, 
Bring  fuller  knowledge,  to  our  souls  again 
Comes  a  deep  sense  that  life  is  not  a  show 
Ending  in  nothingness.     God's  guidings  flow 
In  golden  threads  unseen  athwart  the  gloom. 
And  we,  with  clearer  light  that  knowledge  brings 
Learn  the  deep  mystery  of  common  things, 
An  earnest  of  the  heaven  which  is  our  home." 

S.  P.  T.,  from  "  Monodies. 


22 


CHAPTER   XVI 

LATER   YEARS 

THOMPSON  once  laughingly  said  that  his  ideal  of  rest  and 
retirement  was  "to  be  an  old  man  in  a  garden,  with  a 
pipe."  But  those  nearest  to  him,  who  witnessed  his  keen 
interest  in  life,  and  his  indomitable  energy,  could  never 
imagine  him  reaching  such  a  culmination. 

The  last  ten  years  seemed  just  as  full  of  endeavour  and 
achievement  as  any  previous  decade,  in  spite  of  the  threads 
of  joy  and  grief  woven  into  them,  and  the  added  responsi- 
bilities. 

In  1906  when  Helen,  his  second  daughter,  was  finishing 
her  course  for  the  Natural  Science  Tripos  at  Newnham 
College,  Cambridge,  the  engagement  and  marriage  of 
Sylvia,  the  eldest,  to  William  Hanbury  Aggs,  a  young 
barrister,  one  of  a  family  who  were  fellow  members  of 
Westminster  Meeting,  broke  up  his  home  quartette. 

During  the  next  few  months  the  loss  of  his  sister  Rachel 
Thompson,  who  had  so  often  been  one  of  the  happy  holiday 
company  when  they  went  abroad,  and  of  his  artist  brother 
Thomas,  were  a  great  grief  to  him.  He  also  had  a  long  time 
of  anxiety  about  his  youngest  brother,  Dr.  Tatham  Thomp- 
son of  Cardiff,  who  had  to  undergo  a  serious  operation. 
He  seemed  to  make  a  good  recovery,  but  about  three  years 
later  was  attacked  by  a  malignant  disease  from  which  he 
died  in  the  spring  of  1911,  leaving  his  family  of  four  children 
to  finish  their  education,  and  to  be  established  in  careers. 
The  two  elder  girls  in  succession  became  members  of  the 
family  at  "  Morland "  while  studying  in  London.  So, 
some  years  later,  did  Douglas,  the  youngest  and  only  boy, 
who  was  attending  the  Technical  College,  Finsbury,  the 
session  before  his  uncle's  death. 

338 


LATER   YEARS  339 

The  years  during  which  Thompson  was  writing  the 
Kelvin  biography  were  almost  entirely  absorbed  by  it,  and 
it  was  some  months  before  he  made  up  arrears,  and  was 
ready  for  fresh  undertakings.  He  wrote  in  June  1910,  in 
answer  to  Sir  William  Crookes,  Secretary  of  the  Royal 
Institution  : 

"  I  have  quite  made  up  my  mind  to  assent  to  the  proposi- 
tion to  give  the  next  Christmas  Lectures  ;  and,  as  I  have 
had  some  talk  with  Dewar,  I  quite  see  your  point  about  the 
change  of  outlook  in  the  last  sixty  years,  and  will  keep  to 
one  branch  of  physics. 

"  I  think  I  shall  have  no  difficulty  in  occupying  the  six 
lectures  with  Sound,  if  one  may  go  rather  far  afield  in  some 
parts  that  border  on  optics  and  electricity.  A  suitable 
title  seems  not  easy  to  find  ;  but  that  may  wait." 

He  later  chose  the  title  "  Sounds  Musical  and  Non- 
Musical."  Again  he  had  crowded  audiences  of  young  and 
old,  and  again  he  delighted  them  all  with  his  lively  explana- 
tion of  the  innumerable  experiments  on  sound,  which  he 
performed  for  them.  It  was  hoped  that  the  lectures  might 
form  a  companion  volume  to  Light  Visible  and  Invisible, 
but  he  never  succeeded  in  finding  time  to  write  it. 

In  June  1911  he  wrote  to  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  whose  birth- 
day preceded  his  by  a  few  days : 

"  0  SEXAGENARIAN  ! 

"  I,  who  am  about  to  follow  in  your  train,  salute  you  ! 
May  the  returns  of  the  day  of  the  year  be  yet  many,  and 
joyful,  and  may  the  years  be  golden,  and  their  successive 
harvests  of  wisdom  abundant.  And  may  you  never  lack 
friends,  old  and  young,  to  greet  you  as  the  years  go  by. 

"  Ever  truly  yours, 

"  SlLVANUS  P.   T." 

To  this  Sir  Oliver  replied  : 

"  MY    DEAR   SlLVANUS, 

"  I  am  grateful  for  your  good  wishes  and  kind  remem- 
brance. I  had  quite  a  number  of  congratulatory  epistles 
this  year — but  none  more  welcome  than  yours. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  0.  J.  L." 


340  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Thompson  was  in  joyful  mood  that  summer,  for  he  was 
much  pleased  with  the  engagement  and  marriage  of  his 
daughter  Irene  to  T.  Edmund  Harvey,  then  Warden  of 
Toynbee  Hall.  Son  of  an  old  school-fellow,  William 
Harvey  of  Leeds,  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  he 
shared  several  special  interests  with  Thompson,  among 
them  the  study  of  religion  and  the  collection  of  old  books. 

Before  going  to  the  Alps  in  August^  Thompson  went 
with  Professor  Ferguson,  F.R.S.,  to  represent  the  Royal 
Society  at  Breslau  University,  which  was  celebrating  its 
Tercentenary.  He  was  guest  of  Professor  0.  Lummer,  the 
translator  of  his  Light  Visible  and  Invisible,  whose  work  on 
Optics  he  himself  had  translated  into  English.  This  cele- 
bration was  considered  very  important  by  the  Germans, 
and  was  presided  over  by  the  Crown  Prince.  It  was  a 
busy  and  fatiguing  time  for  Thompson,  as  the  following 
letter  to  his  wife  shows  : 

"  Yesterday  was  so  full,  from  morning  to  night,  that  I 
could  not  write  a  line.  For  the  first  time  in  my  life  I  put 
on  evening  dress  before  breakfast  at  8  a.m.  Over  this 
my  doctor's  gown,  unique  of  its  kind  amidst  hundreds  of 
university  costumes.  We  drove  to  the  great  hall  of  the 
University,  where  the  function  of  presenting  addresses  and 
speech-making  lasted  till  2  p.m.  Then  lunch,  then  other 
receptions,  then  a  formal  dinner  at  5  p.m.  !  which  lasted 
till  8  (the  Crown  Prince  figuring  at  all  these  things).  Then 
a  garden  party  in  the  park,  with  13,000  people  (!)(?)  present, 
and  fireworks,  and  a  fancy  costume  ball  in  the  hall  in  the 
park  .  .  .  and  so  home  to  bed  at  2  a.m.  !  !  To-day  (9  a.m.) 
we  have  just  breakfasted — in  evening  dress — and  my  gown 
is  ready.  The  ceremonies  will  last  till  1  p.m." 

Leaving  Breslau  the  same  evening,  Thompson  travelled 
across  Europe  and  met  his  wife  and  Helen  at  Chamonix, 
glad  to  spend  a  few  days  in  quiet  before  beginning  his  glacier 
climbing  and  sketching,  and  his  informal  discussions  of  the 
problems  of  the  universe  with  the  professional  artist  and  with 
the  professional  theologian  who  sought  his  company  under 
the  evening  stars  night  after  night. 

In  the  following  year  the  Royal  Society  celebrated  its 


LATER   YEARS  341 

250th  anniversary.  Thompson  was  now  serving  on  the 
Council  for  a  second  term  (the  first  was  in  1907),  so  had  a 
busy  time  in  connection  with  committees  and  arrangements. 
Delegates,  accompanied  by  their  wives  and  daughters,  came 
from  all  over  the  world  to  present  addresses  of  congratula- 
tion to  the  Society,  and  to  share  in  the  three  days  of  cere- 
monies and  festivities.  Among  the  foreign  delegates 
Thompson  found  many  old  friends  ;  he  had  invited  as  his 
guests  Sir  William  Barrett  of  Dublin,  and  Madame  Curie  of 
Paris,  the  discoverer  of  radium,  who  was,  however,  on  the  eve 
of  the  gathering  prevented  by  home  circumstances  from 
coming  to  London.  The  ceremonies  began  with  a  service 
in  Westminster  Abbey,  especially  arranged  for  the  occasion, 
followed  by  a  reception  at  Windsor  Castle,  when  the  Presi- 
dent, Sir  Archibald  Geikie,  the  Council,  including  Thompson, 
and  the  foreign  delegates,  were  received  in  audience,  and 
presented  to  the  King  and  Queen.  Afterwards  they  and  all 
the  Fellows  of  the  Royal  Society,  with  their  wives  and 
daughters,  were  invited  to  the  royal  garden  party  in  the 
grounds  of  the  Castle.  The  evening  soiree  at  Burlington 
House  on  the  following  day  was  a  very  gorgeous  one  ;  the 
Fellows  and  delegates  appeared  in  various  robes  and  hoods 
which  quite  eclipsed  even  the  most  brilliant  toilettes  of  the 
ladies. 

From  about  this  year  onwards  Thompson  gave  more 
time  to  the  affairs  of  the  Royal  Society.  He  served  on  the 
International  Committee  among  others.  He  was  chairman 
of  one  which  continued  for  several  years,  as  it  was  entrusted 
with  superintending  the  catalogue  of  the  library,  and  had 
also  the  duty  laid  upon  it  of  directing  the  preparation  of 
the  catalogue  of  scientific  papers.  On  this  he  rendered  in- 
valuable service  ;  the  director  of  the  work,  Dr.  Herbert 
McLeod,  F.R.S.,  became  seriously  ill,  and  Thompson  gave 
many  hours  of  his  spare  time  in  trying  to  fill  his  place.  He 
continued  his  services  in  this  capacity  until  the  time  of  his 
sudden  illness,  and  afterwards  a  special  acknowledgment 
and  appreciation  of  his  "  ever  courteous  and  tactful  enthu- 
siasm for  work  "  was  published  in  the  preface  to  the  sub- 
sequent volume  of  the  catalogue. 


342  LIFE   OP  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

Another  Royal  Society  Committee  for  which  Thompson 
acted  as  chairman  was  instituted  to  make  enquiries  as  to 
the  manufacture  of  optical  glass  in  this  country,  a  matter 
in  which  he  had  long  been  interested  ;  but  it  was  only  when 
the  war  broke  out  that  others  than  the  enthusiasts  woke  up 
to  the  necessity  of  taking  active  steps  to  encourage  the 
manufacturers  in  this  country. 

Devotion  to  scientific  work  did  not  prevent  Thompson 
from  taking  an  interest  in  public  affairs,  and,  although  no 
politician,  he  sometimes,  if  only  rarely,  would  express  a 
strong  opinion.  At  the  time  when  society  was  very  much 
disturbed  by  the  controversy  which  was  going  on  between 
the  supporters  and  the  opponents  of  the  granting  of  the 
parliamentary  franchise  to  women,  and  a  certain  party 
who  demanded  the  vote  had  adopted  violent  tactics  in 
striving  to  call  attention  to  the  grievances  from  which  vote- 
less  women  were  suffering,  Thompson  showed  the  sympathy 
which  he  had  always  felt  for  the  women's  demand. 

In  1912  a  Bill  to  enfranchise  a  small  proportion  of  women 
was  before  Parliament ;  on  the  morning  of  the  day  when  the 
second  reading  was  to  take  place  a  long  letter  appeared  in 
The  Times  from  a  London  physician,  trying  to  prove  that 
women  were  too  hysterical,  and  too  unbalanced  as  a  sex  to 
be  trusted  with  the  power  of  the  vote,  and  arguing  that 
their  interests  were  quite  fully  and  sufficiently  considered  by 
their  male  relations. 

The  letter  caused  a  storm  of  indignation  among  a  great 
many  women  engaged  in  philanthropic  and  public  work,  but 
it  came  very  conveniently  for  the  opposers  of  the  Bill  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  who  did  not  fail  to  quote  its  arguments 
in  the  debate.  The  Bill  was  lost.  Next  morning  there 
appeared  in  The  Times  the  following  letter  from  Thompson  : 

"  SIR, 

"  Sir  Almroth  Wright's  trenchant  letter  would  carry 
more  weight  if  it  did  not  ignore  or  deny  the  one  thing  which 
has  made  into  advocates  of  the  suffrage  many  women  who 
are  bitterly  opposed  to  the  deplorable  tactics  of  the  Pank- 
hurst  rabble.  That  thing  is  the,  continued  violation  by 
law,  and  under  the  aegis  of  law,  of  the  very '  covenant '  which 


LATER   YEARS  343 

Sir  Almroth  Wright  declares  to  be  within  the  frontiers  of 
civilisation  !  There  is,  in  fact,  a  continued  failure,  both  of 
the  law  as  administered  and  of  the  unwritten  code  of  social 
law,  to  put  an  end  to  crimes  against  the  person  of  women. 
The  absurdly  low  sentences  against  men  convicted  of  assault, 
the  utterly  inadequate  protection  against  seduction,  the 
tolerance  by  society  of  a  double  standard  of  morals  in  the 
premarital  state,  the  advocacy,  even  by  an  eminent  Judge, 
of  an  inequality  between  man  and  woman  in  the  laws  of 
divorce — these  are  the  things  which  give  the  lie  to  Sir 
Almroth  Wright's  complacent  assumption,  that  under  this 
covenant  a  full  half  of  the  programme  of  Christianity  has 
been  realised. 

"  Half  of  the  facts  having  been  conveniently  omitted,  his 
argument  from  physiology  is  at  least  half  a  fallacy  ;  and 
even  a  fallacy  need  not  degenerate  into  a  tirade." 

Thompson  received  letters  of  thanks  from  several  women, 
including  Mrs.  Hertha  Ayrton,  Lady  Barlow,  and  some  of 
the  women  physicians  and  surgeons,  and  earned  the  gratitude 
of  many  of  the  younger  university  women,  including  his 
own  daughters  Helen  and  Dorothea. 

During  these  later  years  Thompson  received  several  marks 
of  recognition  from  academic  bodies,  and  was  always  frankly 
pleased  and  interested  by  such  honours.  In  1909  the  newly 
constituted  University  of  Birmingham  took  the  step  of  con- 
ferring honorary  degrees  upon  a  number  of  distinguished 
men  and  women.  Thompson  was  the  recipient  of  the  Hon. 
LL.D.,  and  was  presented  to  the  Vice-Chancellor  by  Principal 
Sir  Oliver  Lodge  in  the  following  words  : 

"  The  Principal  of  the  Finsbury  Technical  College,  London, 
an  able  and  renowned  electrician,  is  the  author  of  many 
standard  treatises,  highly  valued  by  electrical  engineers, 
and  is  exceptionally  familiar  with  scientific  history.  Brilliant 
as  a  lecturer  and  expositor,  skilled  as  an  artistic  draughts- 
man, clear-headed  as  a  thinker,  and  learned  as  an  historian  of 
science,  he  has  maintained  a  wide  interest  in  many  depart- 
ments of  study,  and  it  is  with  pleasure  that  I  present  a  friend 
well  known  to  many  of  us,  Silvanus  Phillips  Thompson." 

Three  years  later  he  had  the  gratification  of  revisiting  the 
old  College  at  Bristol,  now  constituted  a  University,  to 


344  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

receive  an  honorary  degree  of  Doctor  of  Science.     That  he 

was  still  remembered  there  was  evidenced  by  the  applause 

with  which  he  was  greeted  when  he  went  up  for  presentation. 

In  June  1913  Thompson  wrote  to  T.  Bailey  Saunders : 

"  DEAR  T.  B.  S., 

"  It  is  my  turn  to  ask  for  succour.  I  received  to-day 
a  marvellous  Latin  diploma,  informing  me  that  the  Accademia 
delle  Scienze  at  Bologna  (oldest  of  the  Italian  Academies) 
had  elected  me  as  a  Foreign  Member. 

"  I  must  write  an  acknowledgment.  If  it  had  been 
in  Italian  I  would  have  vamped  up  some  elegant  nonsense 
by  way  of  gracious  thanks  for  election  to  so  distinguished  a 
body.  But  it  is  in  Latin  !  Had  I  an  hour,  and  brain  activity 
enough,  and  an  inspiration,  I  might  by  duly  thumbing  a 
dictionary  concoct  at  best  a  lame  and  clumsy  attempt. 
The  inspiration  has  come — '  Ask  your  best  friend  among 
the  scholars  to  frame  you  a  reply.'  So  therefore,  amicorum 
intime,  do  me  the  honour  to  excoct  a  gorgeous  epistle  of 
thanks  suitable  to  the  occasion. 

"  To  drag  in  references  to  the  phosphorescence  of  the 
Bologna  stone,  shining  in  darkness,  or  to  the  marvellous 
consequences  of  Galvani's  observations  of  frogs'  legs  spas- 
modically kicking  were  perhaps  redundant. 

"  But  the  Accademia  is  so  famous  a  body — vide  its  history 
in  Minerva — that  the  honour  it  has  accorded  to  my  unworthy 
self  requires  some  unusual  response.  I  shall  find  my  head 
swelling  if  I  cannot  compass  a  little  letting  of  blood — by 
deputy  ! 

"  And  your  petitioner  will  ever  pray  ! 

"  Salaams, 

"S.  P.  T." 

Foreign  travel  occupied  a  great  part  of  Thompson's  leisure 
in  1913.  Early  in  March  he  had  to  spend  a  few  days  hi 
Cologne,  as  in  1912,  in  connection  with  the  Electrotechnical 
Commission.  He  wrote  from  the  Dom-Hotel  to  his  wife  : 

"  Professor  Budde  is  expected  here  hi  an  hour's  time. 
I  have  had  a  delightful  walk  by  the  Rhine  since  breakfast — 
in  brilliant  sunshine,  and  with  a  frost-nip  in  the  air.  I  have 
just  been  lunching  in  the  self-same  dining-room  where, 
many  years  ago,  we  brought  four  hungry  little  girls,  whose 


LATER  YEARS  345 

eyes  glistened  and  opened  wide  at  the  gorgeous  beefsteak 
garni  which  was  served  to  us,  when  we  lunched  here  on  our 
way  to  the  Schwartz wald.  Those  are  happy  memories." 

Easter  vacation  was  spent  in  Florence,  when  he  and  his 
wife  stayed  with  her  sister,  Mrs.  J.  W.  Cruickshank,  and  her 
husband  in  their  villa  on  the  hill  near  San  Miniato.  Thomp- 
son spent  a  good  many  afternoons  in  the  ancient  libraries 
among  his  favourite  manuscripts  and  books.  A  few  days 
were  also  devoted  to  the  art  treasures  of  Siena,  and  a  flying 
visit  was  paid  to  his  friend  Professor  Righi  at  Bologna. 

A  holiday  in  Switzerland  and  Savoy,  followed  by  a  visit 
to  Berlin  to  attend  the  Conference  of  the  International 
Electrotechnical  Commission,  completed  his  travels  that 
year. 

About  this  time  Thompson  felt  obliged  to  decline  the  offer 
of  an  important,  but  rather  arduous  and  not  very  remunera- 
tive piece  of  work,  and  received  the  following  from  the 
scientific  friend  of  many  years,  through  whom  it  had  come  : 

"  I  was  greatly  disappointed  when  reading  your  letter, 
but  I  quite  understand.  .  .  .  You  have  done  great  work  in 
your  life,  and  not  merely  in  electricity,  not  merely  in 
physical  science,  but  your  faculties  have  been  so  cultivated 
that  you  have  sent  out  sympathetic  tentacles  in  all  directions 
and  give  comfort  to  others  without  seeming  to  exert  yourself. 
You  must  be  very  proud  of  your  career,  and  you  will  leave 
your  daughters  what  is  much  more  important  than  thousands 
of  pounds.  To  me  personally  your  conduct  has  been  of 
great  value  on  countless  occasions." 

As  may  have  been  gathered  from  previous  pages, 
Thompson  had  no  very  great  admiration  for  the  philosophical 
teaching  of  Herbert  Spencer,  but,  as  a  psychologist  and 
biologist,  he  regarded  him  as  a  great  man.  Therefore, 
when  he  was  invited  in  1914  to  go  down  to  St.  Leonards 
to  unveil  a  Memorial  to  Herbert  Spencer,  who  had  lived  and 
worked  there  during  the  last  few  years  of  his  life,  he  willingly 
consented.  The  ceremony  took  place  whilst  a  Pageant 
of  Heroes  was  being  held  at  Hastings.  Thompson  gave  an 


346  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

address,  dealing  with  the  different  fields  of  thought  covered 
by  the  writings  of  Spencer,  whom  he  claimed  as  Hero  as 
Thinker,  equally  to  be  recognised  by  the  side  of  the  poets 
and  dramatists,  and  the  more  familiar  men  of  action. 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  address  he  dealt  sympathetically 
with  Spencer's  ideas  of  social  reform,  and  quoted  from 
his  essay  on  "  The  Rebarbarisation  of  England,"  written  to 
show  the  social  after-effects  of  the  Boer  War.  He  closed 
by  saying  that  the  hero  whom  they  were  commemorating 
was  one  "  who  could  stand  in  the  face  of  a  crowd,  and  say 
an  unpopular  thing  which  he  believed  to  be  right ;  one  who 
loved  truth  for  its  own  sake,  and  who  never  hesitated  to 
stand  for  truth,  when  he  felt  it  to  be  in  place." 

After  a  busy  session,  and  the  fulfilment  of  many  engage- 
ments, the  prospect  of  rest  and  holiday  was  eagerly  looked 
forward  to  by  Thompson  this  year,  and  he  had  planned  to 
go  to  a  new  field  for  sketching  and  painting. 

About  the  middle  of  July,  he  and  his  wife  started  for  Lake 
Misurina,  travelling  through  Switzerland  and  via  the 
Brenner  Pass  into  Tirol.  Then,  crossing  the  frontier,  they 
settled  down  in  an  hotel  on  the  banks  of  the  lake  surrounded 
by  the  Dolomites  of  the  Italian  Alps. 

He  had  begun  some  promising  paintings  of  the  mountains 
from  various  points  of  view,  when  quite  unexpectedly  his 
holiday  was  interrupted  by  the  news  of  the  declaration 
by  Austria  of  war  against  Serbia.  A  few  days  before  a 
number  of  Austrians  in  the  hotel  had  taken  their  departure, 
saying  that  they  feared  that  war  was  coming,  for  the  tone 
of  the  Austrian  newspapers  was  ominous.  But,  being  over 
the  Pass,  and  actually  in  Italy,  Thompson  did  not  realise 
the  danger,  and  they  were  still  intending  to  return  to  Switzer- 
land through  the  Trentino,  when  on  August  1st  a  telegram 
brought  the  news  that  Germany  was  mobilising  against 
Russia  and  France. 

At  once  a  stampede  began  among  the  visitors  of  all  nation- 
alities, all  seeking  to  get  away  from  the  frontier.  On  Sunday 
some  English  friends  of  the  Thompsons  and  most  of  the 
Germans  managed  to  secure  carriages,  and  went  off  down 
the  Pass  into  Austria. 


LATER   YEARS  347 

On  August  2nd  Thompson  wrote  to  the  Registrar  of  the 
College  : 

"  We  are  avoiding  Austria  by  going  down  into  Italy,  and 
back  into  Switzerland  through  the  Gotthard  Tunnel.  We 
expect  to  reach  Hotel  Belvedere,  Furka  Pass,  Switzerland, 
on  August  5th,  and  to  stay  there  three  or  four  days.  After 
that  Hotel  Victoria,  Brieg,  till  about  August  12th." 

This  did  not  reach  its  destination  until  August  26th,  for 
all  international  postal  communication  seemed  to  come  to 
a  dead  stop  for  two  or  three  weeks.  Thompson  was  anxious 
to  communicate,  too,  with  his  daughter  Helen,  who  had 
gone  to  the  Oberland  on  a  walking  expedition,  in  company 
with  a  college  friend  ;  they  had  arranged  to  meet  at  Brieg 
on  August  12th.  That  Sunday  was  spent  in  walking,  with 
minds  full  of  anxiety  and  dismay,  round  the  beautiful 
Lake  Misurina,  the  great  dread  being  lest  Italy  should 
come  into  the  war  on  the  side  of  her  former  Allies. 

Early  on  the  Monday  they  managed  to  secure  a  carriage 
and  horses  for  the  long  drive  down  to  the  railway  line.  The 
drive  through  Cadore,  the  country  of  Titian,  was  glorious. 
A  year  later  the  same  places  were  the  scenes  of  most  terrible 
battles,  and  every  village  was  reduced  to  a  ruin. 

At  Belluno  station  they  found  themselves  in  a  throng  of 
refugees  from  the  Tirol,  Americans,  French,  Italians. 

Arriving  at  Milan,  next  day,  they  found  the  Swiss  frontier 
closed  to  all  except  Swiss  people,  so  Thompson  had  to 
make  up  his  mind  to  stay  in  Italy  until  some  other  way  of 
returning  to  England  should  open  out.  The  shock  to  him 
of  hearing  that  England  had  declared  war  against  Germany 
was  very  great,  though,  after  hearing  of  the  German  invasion 
of  Belgium,  he  admitted  that  there  seemed  no  other  course 
open  to  the  Government.  He  was  also  very  anxious  about 
Helen,  telegraphing  to  friends  in  Switzerland  and  in  England 
to  try  to  find  out  where  she  was  ;  at  length  in  ten  days  a 
reply  reached  him  that  she  was  safe.  But  he  never  quite 
recovered  from  the  strain  ;  happily  in  Milan  he  had  some 
kind  friends  amongst  the  electrical  engineers,  who  assisted 
him  in  many  ways. 


348  LIFE   OF   SILVANUS   THOMPSON 

The  plight  of  friendless  and  stranded  tourists,  unable  to 
change  notes  and  cheques,  was  very  much  worse,  and  the 
various  consular  offices  were  besieged.  About  the  middle 
of  August  the  British  Embassy,  acting  with  the  Consuls  in 
various  towns,  chartered  a  White  Star  liner  The  Cretic,  which 
was  lying  in  Genoa  harbour.  All  intending  passengers  had 
to  prove  their  British  nationality  to  the  Consul  at  Genoa 
before  being  allowed  to  sail.  This  caused  much  delay,  and 
a  number  of  Englishmen,  including  Thompson,  formed  a 
committee  to  help  the  Consul  with  this  duty.  Spite  of  all, 
some  very  dubious  characters  got  on  board,  and  thefts  were 
frequent  during  the  voyage. 

All  passengers  had  to  pay  first  class  fare,  but  the  very 
poor  went  free.  There  were  over  700  on  board,  and  only 
cabins  for  400.  The  rest  had  to  go  down  into  the  emigrants' 
quarters.  Women  and  children  were  allotted  cabins  first, 
then  a  few  of  the  older  men.  The  heat  in  the  Mediterranean 
was  intense.  In  writing  to  his  sister,  Mrs.  Brockbank,  after 
their  return  Thompson  described  the  voyage  : 

"  We  had  a  scratch  crew  of  Lascars  on  board,  so  the 
passengers  formed  a  night  patrol  among  themselves.  We 
had  only  half  the  usual  complement  of  stewards — and  not 
a  single  stewardess  on  board.  The  meals  the  first  day  were 
a  kind  of  free  fight,  after  that  they  settled  down.  The  food 
was  unappetising,  and  all  the  plates  and  cups  and  knives 
were  dirty. 

"  Happily,  and  it  was  the  one  saving  thing — the  weather 
was  superb.  Even  the  Bay  of  Biscay  was  like  an  oiled  mill- 
pond.  Janie  was  not  ill  at  all,  and  only  one  day  did  she 
stav  on  deck  for  meals.  We  stopped  three  hours  in  Gibraltar 
harbour,  and  had  no  adventures  with  cruisers,  though  one 
night  we  were  ordered  to  put  the  lights  out. 

"  We  had  quite  a  large  number  of  acquaintances  on  board, 
chiefly  people  whom  we  had  met  at  Alpine  resorts  in  Switzer- 
land in  former  years. 

"  So  beyond  the  physical  discomforts  of  dirt,  and  vermin, 
and  overcrowding,  there  was  not  much  to  complain  of, 
beyond  general  lack  of  management  of  the  ship.  But 
neither  of  us  would  wish  to  repeat  the  experience  of  being 
refugees  again.  There  were  many  poor  creatures  worse  off 
than  we,  who  had  no  money,  who  had  lost  their  baggage,  or 


LATER   YEARS  349 

who  had  no  friends  to  go  to.  Their  miseries  were  reflected 
in  the  general  state  of  depression,  until  the  last  two  days 
as  we  neared  England.  Had  the  weather  been  stormy 
the  state  of  things  (during  these  nine  days)  would  have 
been  truly  dreadful." 

The  captain  was  sailing  under  sealed  orders,  and  it  was 
not  until  the  last  day  that  the  passengers  knew  that  they 
were  to  be  landed  at  Liverpool.  People  in  England  knew, 
however,  and  a  list  of  those  on  board  had  been  published 
in  the  papers.  So,  on  landing,  the  Thompsons  received  a 
warm  welcome  from  the  Birkenhead  Thompson  cousins, 
and  their  own  two  daughters  Sylvia  and  Dorothea,  who  had 
come  away  from  the  East  Coast  and  brought  the  little 
granddaughter  Gulielma  Mary  Aggs  to  safer  quarters  in  the 
West. 

Sylvia  and  Gulielma  came  back  with  them  to  "  Morland," 
but  they  had  another  week  of  anxious  waiting  until  Helen 
and  her  friends  reached  London  on  August  28th,  having 
come  across  France  to  Dieppe  in  special  trains  run  by  the 
Swiss  and  French  Governments  to  bring  back  refugees.  At 
that  time  the  Germans  seemed  to  be  sweeping  on  to  Boulogne. 

Every  week  brought  increasing  perplexity  as  to  the  future 
carrying  on  of  the  College,  as  numbers  of  the  young  assist- 
ants and  older  students  volunteered,  or  applied  for  com- 
missions in  the  new  armies  which  were  being  formed. 

Thompson  had  no  heart  for  painting  now,  brushes  and 
paints  were  laid  aside,  and  never  taken  up  again,  though 
one  of  his  1913  glacier  pictures  appeared  on  the  walls  of 
the  Royal  Academy  in  1915. 

Soon  after  College  opened  the  young  son  of  Professor 
Omer  De  Bast  of  Liege  had  to  flee  to  England,  and  came 
with  a  letter  to  Thompson  from  his  father.  The  boy,  Yves, 
was  anxious  to  go  on  with  his  studies  in  science,  in  prepara- 
tion for  a  medical  career.  Thompson  invited  him  to  live 
with  him,  and  obtained  a  free  place  for  him  at  University 
College,  where  he  studied  for  a  session,  and  then  was 
called  up  to  be  trained  for  military  service  in  the  Belgian 
army. 

Thompson   became   much   attached  to   him,  and  Yves, 


350  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

reciprocating  the  affection,  always  afterwards  spoke  of  him 
as  "  mon  seconde  pere." 

Thompson  gave  this  autumn  a  course  of  university 
lectures  on  Magnetism  at  University  College.  He  wrote 
in  December  to  his  wife  : 

"  My  third  and  last  University  Lecture  went  off  very  well. 
I  think  the  audience  was  a  little  larger  than  at  the  previous 
two.  Carey  Foster  came  up  to  town  for  it.  I  finished  a 
little  review  of  the  Life,  of  Lubbock  for  The  Friend  last 
night  after  my  evening  lecture.  It  is  quite  interesting, 
though  the  author  has  no  style. 

"  At  the  College  Committee  on  Monday  afternoon  the 
members  present  were  very  gloomy  about  the  prospects  of 
the  Institute  in  this  crisis.  They  say  that  several  of  the 
Companies  have  been  very  hard  hit.  About  your  question 
in  your  last  letter,  the  new  Thermophone  is  interesting  as  a 
piece  of  scientific  apparatus  ;  but  it  is  not  a  very  practical 
thing.  I  had  a  visit  to-day  at  College  from  a  post  office 
official — a  very  courteous  one — to  look  for  my  (non-existent) 
wireless  installation,  which  he  had  orders  to  seal  up  !  He 
did  not  propose  to  capture  any  of  my  coils  or  Leyden 
Jars  !  " 

One  of  Thompson's  scientific  friends  did  not  get  off  so 
lightly  over  the  question  of  his  wireless  installations  ;  he 
was  attacked  in  one  of  the  spy-hunting  newspapers,  and 
Thompson  wrote  a  vigorous  letter  to  the  press  in  his 
defence,  explaining  the  real  facts  of  the  case. 

The  Christmas  of  1914  was  a  sad  one  for  Thompson, 
for  private  grief  at  the  death  of  his  favourite  sister,  Marie 
Brockbank,  after  a  few  days'  illness,  was  added  to  the  public 
sorrow,  and  to  depression  caused  by  the  growth  of  hatred 
and  war-fever  around  him. 

Next  spring  brought  increasingly  hard  work  at  the 
College,  as  his  colleague,  Professor  Meldola,  who  had  been 
overworking  very  much  at  chemical  advisory  work  for  the 
Government,  was  attacked  by  serious  illness  and  had  to 
undergo  an  operation.  Also  a  considerable  part  of  the 
laboratory  space  of  the  College  was  commandeered  for 
army  research  work  purposes. 


LATER   YEARS  351 

Professor  Meldola  recovered,  and  was  able  to  act  as 
chairman  to  the  research  department  of  British  Dyes,  in 
which  three  of  his  former  students  at  the  Technical  College 
took  prominent  part,  Dr.  C.  T.  Morgan,  F.R.S.,  Professor 
W.  J.  Pope,  F.R.S.,  and  Dr.  M.  0.  Forster,  F.R.S.  The 
last-named  had  helped  to  carry  on  the  chemical  work  at 
College  during  Professor  Meldola' s  illness.  This  part 
played  by  college  students  was  a  gratification  to  Thompson. 

As  the  war  progressed  the  increasing  hatred  shown  in  this 
country  towards  Germans  was  a  great  trouble  to  him,  and 
utterances  by  the  clergy  with  regard  to  this  led  him  to 
make  both  public  and  private  protests. 

One  of  the  latter  led  to  a  correspondence  with  his  old 
friend,  Canon  Wilson  of  Worcester,  which  was  quite  friendly, 
though  he  failed  to  convince  him.  He  also  wrote  to  a 
Swedish  paper,  Svenska  Dagbladet,  which  was  making 
enquiries  in  European  countries  as  to  the  effect  of  the  war 
on  international  co-operation  for  progress  in  science. 
Thompson,  who  was  on  the  Nobel  prize  committee,  expressed 
his  opinion  that  : 

"  Men  of  good- will  in  all  nations  (including  nations  now 
combatant)  will  see  to  it  that  the  evil  passions  of  jealousy, 
distrust,  domination,  and  hate  shall  not  be  permitted  to 
interfere  with  progress  and  civilisation.  These  passions  are 
the  causes  of  war,  not  its  consequences.  When  this  war  is 
ended  those  who  continue  'to  foster  these  passions  will  be 
the  enemies  of  mankind  and  of  progress,  in  whatever  nation 
they  are  found." 

Towards  the  end  of  the  year  the  Council  of  the  Institu- 
tion of  Electrical  Engineers,  urged  thereto  by  some  of  its 
members,  tried  to  bring  forward  a  resolution  expelling 
all  members  of  enemy  origin  or  nationality.  Knowing 
how  much  electrical  engineering  owed  to  German  inven- 
tions and  improvements,  Thompson  vigorously  opposed  this. 
He  succeeded  so  far  that,  when  the  resolution  was  put 
before  the  special  general  meeting  in  March  1916,  there  was 
a  considerable  divergence  of  opinion,  and  finally,  after  an 
adjourned  meeting,  it  was  decided  not  to  expel  members 


352  LIFE  OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

of    enemy   origin   who   had  been  naturalised,   and    were 
approved  by  the  Council. 

Although  led  by  his  convictions  into  opposition  to  many 
of  his  oldest  friends,  Thompson's  views  were  always  sym- 
pathetically received,  being,  as  many  of  them  felt,  and  said, 
in  harmony  with  his  actions  and  conduct  throughout  life. 

During  the  summer  of  that  year  Dorothea,  who  had 
become  very  seriously  affected  by  the  asthma  trouble  from 
which  she  suffered,  was  ordered  to  take  a  long  voyage,  as 
the  only  hope  of  checking  the  disease.  Early  in  August  she 
started  with  her  sister  Helen  for  New  Zealand  via  the  Cape. 

It  was  just  at  the  time  that  the  submarines  were  beginning 
to  attack  steamers,  and  Thompson  had  an  anxious  time 
until  a  cable  from  Cape  Town  announced  their  safety,  and 
much  improved  health  for  the  invalid. 

Not  long  after,  the  sudden  death  of  Professor  Raphael 
Meldola,  his  colleague  of  thirty  years,  gave  him  a  great  shock. 
His  other  colleague  Professor  Margetson,  who  had  not  long 
succeeded  Professor  E.  G.  Coker,  was  not  sufficiently  ex- 
perienced in  the  work  of  the  Technical  College  to  be  able 
to  help  and  counsel  him  as  Professor  Meldola  had  done. 

This  loss,  supervening  on  his  hard  work,  made  him 
seriously  ill.  He  consulted  a  physician,  who  warned  him 
that  he  must  take  great  care,  and  rest  more,  a  counsel 
which  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  follow.  The  work  at 
College,  however,  through  the  circumstances  of  the  war, 
was  to  some  extent  lightened  in  that  the  Evening  Classes 
Department  had  to  be  closed  in  consequence  of  the  air 
raids. 

Christmas  was  spent  quietly  at  home,  and  his  eldest 
daughter  brought  her  two  little  children,  Gulielma  and 
Silvanus  Hanbury  Aggs,  to  cheer  up  the  contracted  circle. 

One  of  Thompson's  favourite  poems  had  long  been 
Victor  Hugo's  "  L'Art  d'etre  grandpere."  He  delighted 
in  its  descriptions  of  the  little  "  Georges  et  Jeanne,"  and 
he  now  greatly  enjoyed  practising  that  art  himself. 

Writing  at  the  close  of  the  year  to  his  old  friend  Conrad 
Cooke,  he  says  :  "  I  have  my  two  grandchildren  staying  with 
me  ;  the  girl  aged  three  and  a  half,  the  boy  nine  months. 


SILVANUS  P.   THOMPSON  AND  HIS  FIRST  GRANDCHILD,  GULIELMA  MARY 

AGGS. 

From  a  photograph  taken  by  T.  Edmonds  Hull  in  1914. 


362] 


LATER  YEARS  353 

They  are  a  perfect  delight,  and  most  entertaining  com- 
panions."    In  the  same  letter  he  says : 

"  In  spite  of  all  the  war  wearinesses,  and  overwork  that 
it  entails,  I  am  finding  every  now  and  then  odd  moments 
to  rewrite  my  book  on  the  Electro-magnet. 

"  I  have  now  been  eight  years  over  it ;  and  it  may  take 
a  year  or  two  more." 

After  the  safe  return  of  Helen  from  New  Zealand,  where 
she  had  left  her  sister  in  much  improved  health,  Thompson 
accompanied  Sylvia  and  the  grandchildren  on  their  return  to 
Amersham,  where  he  spent  a  quiet  week. 

During  the  next  three  months,  while  still  actively  going 
about  his  duties,  his  friends  noticed,  with  growing  anxiety, 
how  tired  and  exhausted  he  often  looked. 

The  appointment  to  the  Chair  of  Chemistry  of  Dr.  G.  T. 
Morgan,  who  had  been  trained  in  the  Finsbury  tradition, 
was  a  help  to  him,  but  many  details  had  of  course  to  be 
readjusted  and  arranged. 

In  March,  however,  he  found  time  to  prepare  and  deliver 
a  Friday  evening  discourse  at  the  Royal  Institution,  on 
the  phenomena  of  the  Electric  Corona,  which  was  given 
with  his  usual  ease  and  richly  illustrated  by  interesting 
experiments. 

Owing  to  the  darkening  of  London  streets,  the  Friday 
gatherings  of  members  now  took  place  before  seven  o'clock, 
and  were  in  consequence  shorn  of  many  of  their  attractions, 
and  often  very  small. 

For  several  months  another  of  Thompson's  old  friends, 
Sir  William  Ramsay,  had  been  gradually  going  down  into 
the  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  suffering  from  a  painful 
illness,  from  which  there  was  no  hope  of  recovery.  Thomp- 
son visited  him  several  times  out  at  High  Wycombe,  and 
after  the  last  occasion  Lady  Ramsay  wrote : 

"  I  have  two  of  the  very  kindest  letters  I  ever  had  to 
thank  you  for.  Your  visit  was  a  real  treat  to  my  husband, 
and  later  on  it  would  be  really  kind  to  repeat  it.  You 
brought  an  atmosphere  of  peace  and  brightness,  and  it 
remained.  Perhaps  you  might  telephone  in  case  it  was  one 
23 


354  LIFE   OF  SILVANUS  THOMPSON 

of  my  husband's  bad  days,  and  it  would  be  well  to  avoid 
that." 


Soon  after  this  Thompson  and  his  wife  went  for  three 
weeks  to  Bath.  He  always  enjoyed  this  old  and  beautiful 
city,  and  the  fine  country  surrounding  it.  The  visit  seemed 
to  bring  him  much  benefit,  and  he  returned  looking  brisk 
and  fresh  to  take  up  his  tasks  again. 

The  passing  of  the  Compulsory  Military  Service  Acts 
brought  great  and  special  anxieties  to  members  of  the 
Society  of  Friends.  Although  a  conscience  clause  had  been 
put  into  the  Act,  yet  it  was  left  to  the  discretion  of  tribunals, 
often  ignorant,  and  militarist  in  spirit,  to  decide  whether  a 
man  was  "  conscientious  "  or  not,  with  the  consequence  that 
very  soon  well-known  Quakers  were  being  court-martialled 
for  refusing  to  obey  military  orders,  and  older  men  who 
published  protests  against  this  also  became  liable  to  trial 
under  the  Defence  of  the  Realm  Act. 

The  Yearly  Meeting  in  May  was  a  time  of  great  anxiety 
to  the  older  Friends,  and  Thompson  took  his  share  in  the 
deliberations.  On  the  last  Sunday  of  the  month  he  was 
appointed  to  give  a  special  address  at  Westminster  Meeting 
on  "  What  the  Society  of  Friends  stands  for."  He  spoke 
calmly  and  eloquently  for  an  hour,  without  once  referring 
to  his  notes,  and  his  address  made  a  deep  impression  upon 
the  congregation. 

The  lowering  to  eighteen  of  the  age  of  those  who  "came 
under  the  Military  Service  Acts  seemed  to  bring  con- 
sequences which  were  very  hard  for  Thompson  to  bear, 
both  for  the  students  themselves,  and  because  of  the  needs 
of  the  country  for  trained  chemists  and  engineers. 

At  eighteen  the  students  were  just  finishing  their  second 
year's  course,  and  for  many  it  meant  the  ruin  of  their 
scientific  career  to  be  interrupted  then.  This  was  especially 
true  in  the  case  of  the  chemists,  and  by  great  effort  Thompson 
succeeded  in  getting  exemption  for  some  of  them  through 
the  Education  Office. 

But  grief  and  worry  and  overwork  told  on  him  severely. 
One  Saturday  morning  he  went  to  the  College  to  try  and 


LATER   YEARS  355 

arrange  for  the  exemption  of  one  of  the  assistants.  He  was 
disappointed  in  his  efforts,  and  that  evening  seemed  very 
tired  and  exhausted. 

Early  on  Sunday  morning  he  had  an  attack  of  cerebral 
hemorrhage,  which  rapidly  rendered  him  unconscious,  and 
he  passed  peacefully  away  on  Monday  night,  June  12th, 
a  week  before  his  sixty-fifth  birthday. 

After  cremation,  his  ashes  were  placed  in  the  burial- 
ground  near  the  Old  Friends'  Meeting  House,  at  Jordans, 
Buckinghamshire,  which  he  had  sometimes  visited  and 
admired. 

A  memorial  Meeting  was  held  at  Westminster  Meeting 
House  in  St.  Martin's  Lane.  It  was  crowded  by  fellow 
members  of  the  congregation,  large  numbers  of  old  students, 
and  many  scientific  men  who  represented  all  the  Societies 
and  other  bodies  with  which  he  had  been  connected. 

There  were,  besides,  many  other  representatives  of  litera- 
ture, art,  and  science,  and  many  old  friends. 

The  Meeting  was  solemn  and  reverent.  Lines  from 
Browning  quoted  by  Edward  Grubb,  an  old  friend  of  him 
whom  they  mourned,  seemed  very  appropriate : 

"  One  who  never  turned  his  back,  but  marched  breast  forward, 

Never  doubted  clouds  would  break, 

Never  dreamed,  though  right  were  worsted,  wrong  would  triumph, 
Held  we  fall  to  rise,  are  baffled  to  fight  better, 
Sleep  to  wake." 


APPENDIX 

LIST    OF   HONOURS   AND   DEGREES,   ETC. 

1867  Matriculation  in  the  University  of  London. 

1869  Bachelor  of  Arts,  London. 

1875  Fellow  of  Royal  Astronomical  Society. 

1875  Bachelor  of  Science,  London. 

1875  Member  of  Physical  Society  of  London. 

1878  Doctor  of  Science,  London. 

1882  Member  of  Society  of  Telegraph  Engineers  and  Electri- 

cians. 

1883  Honorary  Member  of  Physical  Society  of  Frankfurt-am-M. 
1886    Member    of    the    National    Electric    Light    Association 

(U.S.A.). 

1886  Member  of  the  Royal  Institution  of  Great  Britain. 

1890  Member  of  the  "  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes." 

1890  President  of  the  Junior  Institution  of  Engineers. 

1890  Member  of  the  Council  of  the  Societe  de  Physique,  Paris. 

1890  Vice-President  of  the  Physical  Society.  London. 

1890  Hon.  Vice-President  of  the  Electrical  Exhibition,  Frank- 

furt. 

1891  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Society. 

1891  Member  of  the  Administrative  Committee  of  the  Societe 
Internationale  des  Electriciens. 

1894  Foreign  Member  of  the  Royal  Academy  of  Science, 
Stockholm. 

1894  Hon.  Degree  of  Doctor  of  Medicine  and  Surgery,  Univer- 
sity of  Konigsberg. 

1897    Hon.  Member  of  Yorkshire  Philosophical  Society. 

1897  First  President  of  the  Roentgen  Society,  London. 

1898  Foreign   Member   of   the   Associazione   Elettro-technica 

Italiana. 

1899  Diploma  de  Benemerenza,  International  Electrical  Con- 

gress, Como. 

1899    President  of  the  Institute  of  Electrical  Engineers. 

356 


APPENDIX  357 

1899  Freeman  of  the  City  of  London. 

1900  Elected  Member  of   the  Senate  of    the  University  of 

London. 

1900    Honorary  Member  of  the  Roentgen  Society. 

1901-2    President  of  the  Physical  Society  of  London. 

1902    Member  of  the  American  Philosophical  Society,  Phila- 
delphia. 

1902    Foreign  Member  of  the  Socie*te  Neerlandaise  des  Sciences. 

1902    President  of  the  Hampstead  Scientific  Society. 

1902  President  of  the  Friends'  Guild  of  Teachers. 

1903  Honorary  Member  of  the  Optical  Society. 

1904  Honorary  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Microscopical  Society. 

1905  President  of  the  Optical  Society. 

1905    President  of  the  "  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes." 

1905    Honorary  Member  (number  limited)  of  The  Essex  Field 

Club. 

1907    Member  of  the  Council  of  the  Royal  Society. 
1907    President    of    the   South-Eastern   Union    of    Scientific 

Societies. 

1907    Member  of  the  Athenaeum  Club,  elected  under  Rule  II. 
1909    First  President  of  the  Society  of  Illuminating  Engineering. 
1909    Honorary  Degree  LL.D.,  University  of  Birmingham. 

1911  Honorary  Member  of  the  Friends'  Guild  of  Teachers. 

1912  President  of  the  Optical  Convention  (Second). 

1912  Honorary  Degree  D.Sc.,  University  of  Bristol. 

1913  Foreign  Member,  Accademia  delle  Scienze,  Bologna. 

1914  Honorary  Member  of  the  American  Institute  of  Electrical 

Engineers. 

1914    Vice-President  of  the  Institute  of  Ophthalmic  Opticians. 
Vice-President  of  the  Selborne  Society. 


LIST   OF   PRINTED   BOOKS 

1879  Technical  Education. 

1881  Elementary  Lessons  in  Electricity  and  Magnetism. 

1883  Life  of  Philipp  Reis,  Inventor  of  the  Telephone. 

1884  Dynamo-electric  Machinery. 

1890  Translation  of  Guillemin's  Physique  (Electricity). 

1891  Thev  Electromagnet  and  Electromagnetic  Mechanisms. 

1895  Polyphase  Electric  Currents. 

1896  Light  Visible  and  Invisible. 
1898  Life  of  Faraday. 


358  APPENDIX 

1900    Photographic  Optics.     From  the  German  of  0.  Lummer. 
1903    Design  of  Dynamos. 
1906    The  Manufacture  of  Light. 
1910    Life  of  Lord  Kelvin. 
1910    Calculus  made  Easy  (by  F.R.S.). 
1912    Translation  of  Huyghens'  Treatise  on  Light. 
1915    The  Quest  for  Truth. 
1918  (posthumous)     A  Not  Impossible  Religion. 

<* 

PRIVATELY   PRINTED 

1891     William  Sturgeon  the  Electrician. 

1891     Gilbert    of     Colchester  :     An    Elizabethan    Magnetizer. 

(Opusculum    of  "Sette  of    Odd  Volumes'*) 
1893    The  Magick  Mirrour  of  Old  Japan  (Opusculum,  O.V.). 
1898    Reprint  (with  preface),  Two  Tracts  on  Electricity  and 

Magnetism  by  the  Hon.  Robert  Boyle    (Opusculum, 

O.V.). 
1900    Notes  on  the  De  Magnete  of  Gilbert,  to  accompany  the 

Gilbert  Club  translation. 

1902  Translation  of  the  Epistola  de  Magnete  of  Petrus  Pere- 

grinus. 

1903  The  Family  and  Arms  of  Gilbert  of  Colchester. 
1903    Gilbert:    Physician. 

1903    Gilbert  of  Colchester,  Father  of  Electrical  Science. 
1903    William  Gilbert  and  Terrestrial  Magnetism  in  the  Time  of 

Queen  Elizabeth. 
1905    The  Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin  (Opusculum,  O.V.). 

ADDRESSES    AND    COMMUNICATIONS   TO    SOCIETIES, 

ETC. 

1876 

On  Some  Phenomena  of  Induced  Electric  Sparks  (Phil.  Mag.t 
Proc.  Physical  Soc.). 

1877 
On  the  Chromatic  Aberration  of  the  Eye  in  Relation  to  the 

Perception  of  Distance  (Phil.  Mag.). 

Note  on  a  Curious  Effect  of  the  Absorption  of  Light  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  Interference  Fringes  within  the  Nicol  Prism  (Proc.  Physical 

Soc.). 


APPENDIX  359 

On  an  Improved  Lantern  Galvanoscope  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

On  the  Relative  Apparent  Brightness  in  Monocular  and  Bino- 
cular Vision  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

Some  New  Optical  Illusions  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

Sur  les  Figures  Stroboscopiques  (Bull.  Soc.  Fran$aise  de  Physique). 

Binaural  Audition,  Part  I  (Phil.  Mag.). 

Methods  of  Physical  Science  (Introductory  Address,  Bristol 
University  College). 

1878 

On  Technical  Education.  Where  it  should  be  given  (Social 
Science  Congress). 

On  Permanent  Plateau's  Films  (Phil.  Mag.,  Proc.  Physical 
Soc.). 

Magnetic  Figures  illustrating  Electrodynamic  Relations  (Phil. 
Mag.,  Proc.  Physical  Soc.). 

New  Magnetic  Figures  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

On  Certain  Phenomena  accompanying  Rainbows  (Brit.  Assoc., 
Phil.  Mag.). 

Binaural  Audition,  Part  II  (Brit.  Assoc.,  Phil.  Mag.). 

L' Audition  Binauriculaire  (Assoc.  Fran9aise  par  TAvancement 
des  Sciences). 

On  Unilateral  Conductivity  in  Tourmaline  Crystals  (in  con- 
junction with  Dr.  0.  J.  Lodge)  (Brit.  Assoc.,  Phil.  Mag.). 

1879 

Apprenticeship  Scientific  and  Unscientific  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

Suggested  Scheme  for  a  Central  Institution  for  Technical  Educa- 
tion. 

On  the  Retardation  of  Phase  Vibrations  transmitted  by  Tele- 
phone (Brit.  Assoc.). 

Notes  from  the  Physical  Laboratory  of  University  College, 
Bristol  (Phil.  Mag.). 

The  Pseudophone  (Phil.  Mag.). 

The  Action  of  Magnets  on  Mobile  Conductors  of  Current  (Phil. 
Mag.). 

A  Study  in  Magnetism  (Nature). 

On  a  Law  of  Retinal  Activity  (Brit.  Assoc.,  Section  D). 

1880 

Apprenticeship  of  the  Future  (Contemporary  Review,  Sept.). 
Apprenticeship  Schools  in  France. 


360  APPENDIX 

Lecture  Experiments  in  Acoustics  (Phil.  Mag.). 

Optical  Illusions  of  Motion  (Brain,  October). 

The  First  Telephone  (Bristol  Naturalists'  Soc.). 

Science  Readings  for  the  Magic  Lantern  in  three  parts.  Mag- 
netism and  Electricity,  Telephone,  Microphone  and  Phono- 
graph, Electric  Light  and  New  Inventions. 

On  the  Electric  Conductivity  and  Diehroic  Absorption  of  Tour- 
maline (Brit.  Assoc.). 

1881 

The  Storage  of  Electricity  (Jour,  of  Soc.  of  Arts).- 
Binaural  Audition,  Part  III  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  the  Conservation  of  Electricity  and  the  Absolute  Scale  of 

Electric  Potential  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  Volta-Electric  Inversion  (Brit.  Assoc.). 
On  the  Opacity  of  Tourmaline  Crystals  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  a  New  Polarising  Prism  (Brit.  Assoc.,  Phil.  Mag.,  Jour,  de 

Physique  ;  Centralzeitung  f.  Optik.  u.  Mech.,  1882. 
Notes  on  the  Construction  of  the  Photophone  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Labour  and  Science  (Jour,  of  National  Chamber  of  Trade). 

1882 
How  can  Technical  Education  be  best  associated  with  Primary 

Schools  ?    (Social  Science  Congress). 
Dynamo-Electric  Machinery.    Cantor  Lectures  (Jour.  Soc.  of 

Arts). 

On  the  Electric  Resistance  of  Carbon  under  Pressure  (Phil.  Mag.). 
The    Age    of    Electricity.    Introductory    Lecture,    University 

CoUege,  Bristol. 
A  New  Phonautograph. 

The  Beats  of  Mistuned  Consonance  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  the  Function  of  Two  Ears  in  the  Perception  of  Space  (Phil. 

Mag.). 

1883 
Remarks  on  Contact  Resistance  (Jour.  Soc.  Telegraph  Engineers 

and  Electricians). 
On  the  Graphic  Representation  of  the  Law  of  Efficiency  of  an 

Electric  Motor  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Recent  Researches  on  Dynamo-electric  Generators  (Proc.  Bristol 

Naturalist  Soc.). 
Polarising  Prisms  (Phil.  Mag. ;  English  Mechanic,  962  ;    Jour. 

Roy.  Microsc.  Soc.). 
Experiments  on  Bolometry  (Brit.  Assoc.), 


APPENDIX  361 

1884 

Recent  Progress  in  Dynamo-Electric  Machinery  (Jour.  Soc.  of 

Arts). 
Note  on  the  Theory  of  the  Magnetic  Balance  of  Hughes  (Proc. 

Roy.  Soc.). 

On  a  Modified  Resistance  Balance  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  the  Adjustment  of  Resistance  Coils  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  a  New  Insulating  Support  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Communication    on    Contact   Pressure    (Jour.    Soc.    Telegraph 

Engineers  and  Electricians). 

1885 

Lectures  on  Waves  [Juvenile  Lectures]  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
Apparatus  for  the  Automatic  Extinction  of  Fires  (Jour.  Soc.  of 
Arts). 

1886 

On  Maintaining  Tuning-forks  by  Electricity  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Law  of  the  Electromagnet  and  the  Dynamo  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Further  Notes  on  the  Formulae  of  the  Electromagnet  and  the 

Dynamo  (Phil.  Mag.). 
German  Translation  of  the  above  by  Exner  in  Repertorium  der 

Physik. 
Notes  on  some  New  Polarising  Prisms  (Jour,  of  Roy.  Micros. 

Soc.,  Phil.  Mag.). 

1887 
The  Present  Position  of  the  Technical  Instruction   Question 

(Conference  on  T.  L,  London,  Nov.  1887). 
Die  Neuesten  Fortschritte  in  Dynamo-elektrischen  Maschinen 

(Jahrbuch  f.  Elektrotechnik). 

Note  on  the  Electrodepofcition  of  Alloys  (Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 
On  an  Arc-lamp  suitable  for  use  with  the  Duboscq  Lantern 

(Phil.  Mag.). 
Twin  Prisms  for  Polarimeters  (Proc.  Mag.}. 

1888 

The  Development  of  the  Mercurial  Air-pump  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
On  the  Formulae  for  the  Lighting  Power  of  Magnets  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Note  on  the  Conditions  of  Self-excitation  in  a  Dynamo  Machine 

(Phil.  Mag.). 
Some   Experiments   on    Electro-magnetic  Action    (Electrician , 

Sept.). 


362  APPENDIX 

On  Electrical  Theory  (Electrician,  Nov.) 

The  Influence  Machine  from  1788-1888  (Jour.  Soc.  Telegraph 
Engineers  and  Electricians). 

On  a  Modified  Water-dropping  Influence  Machine  (Phil.  Mag.}. 

Note  on  Continuous  Current  Transformers  (Phil.  Mag.). 

On  the  Price  of  the  Factor  of  Safety  in  the  Materials  for  Light- 
ning-rods (Phil.  Mag.). 

1889 

Arc-lamps  and  their  Mechanism  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

On  the  Magnetic  Action  of  Displacement  Currents  in  a  Dielectrio 

(Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 
Note  on  Polarising  Apparatus  for  the  Microscope  (Jour.  Roy. 

Micros.  Soc.). 

Notes  on  Geometrical  Optics,  Part  I  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Optical  Torque  [Friday  Discourse]  (Royal  Institution). 

1890 

The  Organisation  of  Secondary  and  Technical  Education  in 

London  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

The  Electromagnet.    Cantor  Lectures  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
The  Physical  Foundation  of  Music.  Discourse  (Koyal  Institution). 
Electro-magnetic    Mechanisms.     Presidential    Address    (Junior 

Engineering  Soc.). 

1891 

The  Measurement  of  Lenses  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

Das  Neue  Gebiet  der  Alternierende  Strome.  Vortrag.  (Frankfurt- 

am-M. :  Bericht  des  Internationalen  Elektrotechniker-Kon- 

gresses). 

Electricity  in  Mining.    Lecture  to  Working  Men  (Brit.  Assoc.). 
On  the  Use  of  Fluor-spar  in  Optical  Instruments  (Phil.  Mag.). 
On  the  Focometry  of  Lenses  and  Lens-combinations  (Proc.  Roy. 

Soc.). 
On  Galvano-hysteresis.     Prelim.  Note  (Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 

1892 
On  the  Physics  of  the  Voltaic  Arc  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

1893 

Practical  Electrical  Problems  at  Chicago  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

Ocean  Telephony.    Pamphlet. 

Some  Notes  on  Photometry  (Phil.  Mag,  Proc.  Physical  Soc.) 


APPENDIX  363 

1894 

Notes  on  Rotatary  Field  Motors  (Electrician). 

On  the  Design  and  Winding  of  Alternate-current  Electromagnets 
(Phil.  Mag.). 

Electromagnets.    S.  P.  T.  and  Miles  Walker  (Phil.  Mag.). 

Transformations  of  Electric  Currents.  Discourse  (Royal  Institu- 
tion). 

1895 

The  Arc  Light.    Cantor  Lectures  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
Mirrors  of  Magnetism.     S.  P.  T.  and  Miles  Walker  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Note  on  a  Neglected  Experiment  of  Ampere  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Note  on  the  Cause  of  the  Differences  in  Lichtenberg's  Dust 
Figures.     Preliminary  Note  (Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 


1896 

The  Making  of  a  Great  University  for  London  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
Some  Experiments  with  Roentgen's  Rays  (Phil.  Mag.). 
Electric  Shadows  and  Luminescence.     Discourse  (Royal  Institu- 
tion). 

On  Hyperphosphorescence  (Phil.  Mag.,  Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 
Luminescence  (Oxford  University  Jun.  Sc.  Club). 
More  X-ray  Myths  (Electrician). 
Kathode,  X-,  and  Becquerel  Rays  (Brit.  Assoc.). 
Hyperphosphorescence  (Brit.  Assoc.). 


1897 

Reforms  in  the  Organisation  of  Technical  Education  (Jour.  Soc. 

of  Arts). 

Presidential  Address  to  the  Roentgen  Society. 
Cathode  Rays  and  Some  Analogous  Rays  (Proc.  Roy.  Soc.  Phil. 

Trans.  Roy.  Soc.,  1898). 
Peter  Short,  Printer,  and  his  Marks  (Bibliographical  Soc.). 

1898 

Telegraphy  Across  Space  [Silver  Medal]  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
Electric  Traction  by  Surface  Contacts.    S.  P.  T.  and  Miles  Walker 

(Brit.  Assoc.,  Section  G.). 
Rotatory  Converters  (Jour.  Inst.  Elec.  Engin.). 


364  APPENDIX 

1899 

Presidential  Address  to  the  Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers 
(Jour.  Inst.  Elec.  Engin.). 

1900 

Intorno  alle  Immagini  Magnetiche   (Atti  dell'  Assoc.  Elettro- 

technica  Italiana). 

Ueber  Magnetische  Bilder  (Physikalische  Zeitschrift). 
Report  on  Electromagnetic  Mechanisms  (Rapports  et  Proems 

verbaux,  Elec.  Congress,  Paris). 
On  Obliquely-crossed  Cylindrical  Lenses  (PhiL  Mag.). 

1901 

Faraday  und  die  Englische  Schule  der  Elektriker  (Vortrag  in  dem 

Urania  Theater,  Berlin). 

Presidential  Address  before  the  Physical  Society  of  London. 
Some  Experiments  on  the  Zonal  Aberration  of  Lenses  (Archives 

Neerlandaises  des  Sciences  exactes  et  naturelles). 

1902 

Opto-technics  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 

Second  Presidential  Address  to  the  Physical  Society  of  London. 

Illustrative  Teaching.    Presidential  Address  to  Friends'   Guild 

of  Teachers. 

Professor  Alfred  Marie  Cornu  (Obit.  Notice,  Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 
Magnetism  in  Growth.    The  eighth  Boyle  Lecture  (Oxford  Univ. 

Jun.  Science  Club). 
Magnetism  in  Transitu.    Discourse  (Royal  Institution). 

1903 

The  Optical  and  Physical  Properties  of  Mica  (Optical  Soc.). 
Zonal  Aberration  and  its  Consequences  (Brit.  Jour.  Photographic 

Almanac). 

The  Fourth  Traill  Taylor  Memorial  Lecture. 
The  Dynamo-Electric  Machine.    Wilde  v.  Thompson  (Electrician) 
William  Gilbert  and  Terrestrial  Magnetism  (Jour.  Roy.  Geog. 

Soc.). 

1904 

Note  on  a  Rapid  Approximate  Method  of  Harmonic  Analysis 

(Proc.  Physical  Soc.). 
Address  before  the  City  of  Bradford  Technical  College. 


APPENDIX  365 

1905 

On  the  Nicol  Prism  and  its  Modern  Varieties  [with  a  biblio- 
graphy] (Proc.  Optical  Convention). 
The  Early  Literature  of  Optics.    Presidential  Address  (Optical 

Soo.). 

Harmonic  Analysis  reduced  to  Simplicity  (Electrician). 
Translation  of  La  Qusestio  de  Aqua  et  Terra  di  Dante. 

1906 

Electric  Production  of  Nitrates  from  the  Atmosphere.    Discourse 

(Royal  Institution). 
High-speed  Electric  Machinery  with  Special  Reference  to  Steam 

Turbines.     Howard  Lectures  (Jour.  Soc.  of  Arts). 
Petrus  Peregrinus  de  Maricourt  and  his  Epistola  de  Magnete 

(Proc.  Brit.  Academy). 

1907 

Address  as  President  of  Section  G  [Engineering]  (Brit.  Assoc.). 

Presidential  Address  to  the  South-Eastern  Union -of  Scientific 

Societies  [(Trans,  of  the  South-Eastern  Union  of  Scientific 

Societies). 

1908 

The  Life  and  Work  of  Lord  Kelvin,    The  First  Kelvin  Lecture 
(Jour,  of  the  Inst.  of  Elec.  Engin.). 

1909 

On  the  Self -demagnetising  Factor  of  Bar  Magnets.     S.  P.  T. 

and  E.  W.  Moss  (Proc.  Physical.  Soc.). 
Presidential  Address  Illuminating  Engineering  Society. 

1910 

On  Hysteresis  Loops  and  Lissajous  Figures  (Proc.  Physical  Soc.). 
On   Physiological  Effects   of    an   Alternating  Magnetic  Field 
(Philf  Trans.  Roy.  Soc.    B.). 

1911 

A  New  Method  of  Approximate  Harmonic  Analysis  by  Selected 
Ordinates  (Proc.  Physical  Soc.). 

1912 

Physiological  Effects  of  an  Alternating  Magnetic  Field  (Jour. 
Roentgen  Soc.). 


366  APPENDIX 

A  New  Method  of  Harmonic  Analysis  (Archiv  for  Matematik, 
Upsala). 

The  Magnetism  of  Permanent  Magnets.  GlasgOAv  Lecture 
(Inst.  Elec.  Engineers). 

Presidential  Address  to  Second  Optical  Convention  (Proc.  Op- 
tical Convention). 

The  Trend  of  Geometrical  Optics  (Proc.  Optical  Convention). 

Design  and  Construction  of  Large  Polariscopes,  S.  P.  T.  and 
E.  G.  Coker  (Proc.  Optical  Convention). 

French  Translation  of  the  Kelvin  Lecture  (International  Elec- 
trotech.  Commission). 

1913 

The  Aims  and  Work  of  the  International  Electrotechnical  Com- 
mission (Jour.  Inst.  Elec.  Engin.). 

Le  But  et  L'CEuvre  de  La  Commission  Electrotechnique  Inter- 
nationale (La  Lumiere  ^lectrique). 

Permanent  Magnets.  Terrestrial  Magnetism  (Jour.  Inst.  Elec. 
Engin.). 

On  the  Origin  and  Development  of  the  Compass  Card,  Rosa 
Ventorum  (International  Congress  of  Historical  Studies, 
London). 

The  Rose  of  the  Winds  (Proc.  Brit.  Academy). 

Some  Considerations  on  the  Brightness  of  Lights  (Illuminating 
Engineer). 

The  Secret  of  the  Permanent  Magnet.  Friday  Discourse  (Royal 
Institution). 

1914 

Dispersion  (Institute  of  Ophthalmic  Opticians). 
Note  on  Mr.  Mallock's  Observations  on  Intermittent  Vision 
(Proc.  Roy.  Soc.). 

1915 

On  the  Criterion  of  Steel  suitable  for  Permanent  Magnets  (Proc. 
Physical  Soc.). 

1916 

Science  and  Industry  (The  Beama  Journal). 
Corona  and  other  Forms  of  Electric  Discharge.    Friday  Discourse 
(Royal  Institution). 


INDEX 


Abbe,  Professor  Dr.,  254,  258,  260 

Abel,  Sir  Frederick,  130 

Adams,    Professor,    of    Cambridge, 

19,  25,  43,  44 
Aggs,  Sylvia  M.  (Thompson),  338, 

349,  353 

Aggs,  William  Hanbury,  338 
Aire,  the  sources  of  the  river,  297 
Allen,  William,  3 
Alpine   Club,    exhibitions   at,    305, 

310 
Alverstone,  Richard  Webster,  Lord, 

251 
Apprenticeship  schools  in  France, 

50 

Arbitration,  331 
Ardennes,  visit  to  the,  308 
Armstrong,    Professor    Henry    E., 

127,  130,  137 
Arnold,    Matthew,    views    on    his 

poetry,  313,  317 
Associazione  elettrotecnica  italiana, 

205,  212,  213,  218,  285 
Astronomy,  lectures  on,  19,  24,  64 
—  study  of,  8,  19 
Athenaeum  Club,  election  to,  181, 

240 

Auerbach,  Professor,  258,  260 
Austen,  Sir  Wm.  Roberts,  214 
Avebury,  Lord,  177,  178 
Ayrton,  Mrs.  Hertha,  132,  206,  214, 

343 
Ayrton,  Professor  Willam  E.,  53, 

94,  121,  127,  130,  153,  204,  205, 

214,  256,  278 

Bachelor's  Papers,  16,  319 
Ball,  Wilfred,  165,  305 
Barlow,  Sir  Thomas,  182,  272 
Barrett,  Professor  Sir  William,  43, 

44,  64,  110,  129,  154,  331,  341 
Bayes,  Gilbert,  R.A.,  135 
Beale,  Miss  Dorothea,  57 
Beck,  Conrad,  266 
Beck,  R.  and  J.,  254 
Becquerel,    Henri,    184,    186,    191, 

283 


Becquerel  rays,  186,  191 

Bennett,  Alfred  W.,  19,  24 

Berlin,  lecture  in  Urania  Theatre,  1 70 

—  visits  to,  224,  345 

Bertelli,     Padre,     his     version     of 
Petrus  Peregrinus,  244 

Bibliographical  Society,  239,  242 

Binaural  audition,  39, 46,  60, 108, 109 

Boer  War,  214 

Thompson's  opinions  on,  179 

Boistel,  Emil,  93,  189,  219 

Bonney,  Canon,  327 

Bootham  School,  4,  7,   12,   17,  19, 
310,  319 

Botany,  6,  8,  216,  296,  298,  301,  316 

Bottomley,  Dr.  J.  T.,  285 

Boyle  Lecture,  Oxford,  84 

Boyle,  Robert,  243 

Bramwell,    Sir   Frederick,    76,    78, 
231 

Breslau,  visit  to  University  of,  340 

Bright,  John,  3,  11,  20,  209 

Bristol,  Friends'  Meeting,  34,  320 

Bristol  Naturalists'  Society,  46, 112, 
299 

Bristol  University  College,  27,  31, 
85,  124,  155 

Bristol  University,   Honorary  De- 
gree, 343 

British  Academy,  244,  245 

British  Association  meetings : 
1876,  Glasgow,  30,  278;  1877, 
Plymouth,  39;  1878,  Dublin, 
46;  1880,  Swansea,  58;  1881, 
York,  60;  1884,  Montreal,  116, 
119;  1889,  Newcastle,  254; 
1891,  Cardiff,  77,  161  ;  1894, 
Oxford,  163ff. ;  1895,  Ispwich, 
84  ;  1896,  Liverpool,  192  ;  1897, 
Toronto,  196,  309  ;  1900,  Brad- 
ford, 72,  73;  1906,  York,  195, 
273  ;  1907,  Leicester,  219,  285 

British  Science  Guild,  272 

Brockbank,  Ellwood,  58,  164,  304, 
322 

Brockbank,  Marie   Thompson,   58, 
164,  348,  350 


367 


368 


INDEX 


Brown,  Alfred  Kemp,  12,  28 
Brown,  Charles,  of  Baden,  165,  218 
Browne,  Sir  James  Crichton,  44,  214 
Browning,    Robert,    views    on    his 

poetry,  313,  320 
Brunswick,  Monsieur,  222 
Bryce,  James,  Lord,  251 
Budde,  Dr.,  222,  224,  225,  344 
Bunsen,  Professor,  29 


Calculus  made  Easy,  107,  138 
Cambridge,  visits  to,  234,  327 
Campbell  Swinton,  A.  A.,  199 
Cantor  Lectures,  85,  92,  96 
Central    Electric    Generating    Sta- 
tions, 72 

Chicago  Exhibition,  juror  at,  120 
Christmas  Lectures,  Bristol,  37,  41 

Royal  Institution,  192,  339 

City  Guilds  of  London,  50,  53 
City    Guilds    Institute,    127,    128, 

142 

Clark,  James  Edmund,  8,  9 
Clark,  Latimer,  221,  228,  235,  246 
Coales,  Dr.  Dennis,  136,  148 
Coker,  Professor  E.  G.,  140,  142, 

270 

Colchester,  Gilbert  Centenary,  232 
—  Oyster  Feast,  234,  281 
Colombo,  Commendatore  G.,  205, 

211,  213,  217 
Comets,  lecture  on,  24 
Como  Exhibition,  205,  212 
Congres  de  Paris,  1877,  108 
Conscription,  354 
Conservation  of  Electricity,  90 
Cooke,  Conrad  W.,  32,  41,  168,  227, 

230,  245,  352 

Comu,  Alfred  Marie,  187,  268 
Crompton,  Colonel,  93,  208,  224 
Crookes,  Sir  William,  23,  40,  97, 153, 
167,  160,  166,  167,  170,  183,  191, 
192,  196,  236,  252,  262,  284,  289, 
308,  331,  332,  339 
Curie,  Madame,  195,  341 
Curie,  Pierre,  195,  219 


Dalby,   Professor   William    Ernest, 

141 

Dante,  218,  315 
Darwin,  Sir  Francis,  300 
Darwin,  Sir  George  H.,  293 
Dewar,  Professor  Sir  James,   157, 

202,  339 

Dickson,  J.  D.  Hamilton,  286-8, 291 
Dictionary  of  National  Biography, 

The,  295 

Diploma  di  Benemerenza,  Como,213 
Duddell,  William,  198,  220 


Dudley  Gallery  Exhibition,  304 
Dyer,  Sir  W.  T.  Thistleton,  177,  181 
Dynamo  Electric  Machinery,  85,  92, 
95,96,100,119,165,205,223 

Edison,  Thomas  Alva,  68,  111,  115, 

121,  123,  222 
Education,  views  on,  40,  47  ff.,  57, 

58,  59,  69,  133,  175,  176,  264,  270 
Elder     of     Westminster     Friends' 

Meeting,  321 
Electric  light,  first  introduction  of, 

63,  64,  76 
Electric  Lighting  Act,  76 

—  Power  Bills,  73 

Electric  Traction  by  Surface  Con- 
tacts, 103 

Electrical  Congress,  Chicago,  118, 
121 

—  Congress,  Philadelphia,  120 
Electricity,  essay  on,  8 

—  first  research  on,  22 

—  lectures  at  Crystal  Palace,  67 
Electromagnet,  The,  85,  96 
Electrotechnical  Commission,  344 
Elementary   Lessons    on   Electricity 

and  Magnetism,  86,  88,  161 
Essex  Field  Club,  231,  300 

Faraday,  Life  of,  166,  260,  283,  286 
Faraday,  Michael,  44,  165,  170 
Ferraris,  Professor  Galileo,  121,  207 
Ferrier,  Professor,  196 
Finsbury  Memorial  Magazine,  143 

—  Old  Students'  Association,  141 

—  Technical  College,  127  ft,  175 
Fitzgerald,  Professor  G.  F.,  89,  154 
Fleming,  Professor  J.  A.,  118,  137, 

205,  273 

Flemwell,  George,  305,  306,  307 
Ford,  John,  7,  11,  14,  318 
Foster,  Professor  George  Carey,  25, 

43,  45,  88,  135,  178,  204,  208,  256 
Flounders  Institute,  10,  11 
Frankfort,  visits  to,  112,  161,  205, 

292 

—  Electrical  Exhibition,   161,  205, 
292 

Frankland,  Sir  Edward,  17,  24,  25 

27,  87,  319 

Freedom  of  City  of  London  con- 
ferred, 262 
Friends'  Portfolio  Society,  20,  243, 

310,  313 

Fry,  Albert,  128,  152 
Fry,  Sir  Edward,  20,  24,  27 
Fry,  Francis  James,  33,  37,  152 
Fry,  Lewis,  M.P.,  34,  35,  56,  152 
Fry,  Richard,  17 


INDEX 


369 


Garnett,  Dr.  William,  125,  182,  272 
Geikie,  Sir  Archibald,  300,  341 
Geissler,  Dr.,  of  Bonn,  28,  184 
Gems,  literature  of,  242,  243 

—  collection  of,  303 
Geology,  297,  301 
Gerard,  Professor  Eric,  222 
German    optical    works,    visit    to, 

257  ff. 

—  visit  of  Institution  of  Electrical 
Engineers,  215 

Gheury,  Maurice,  107 

Gilbert  Club,  the,  228 

Gilbert  family  and  arms  of,  231,  234 

Gilbert,    William,    author    of     De 

Magnete,  40,  226  ff. 
Gilchrist  lectures,  38,  63 
Gladstone,  John  Hall,  20,  21,  38, 

47,  53,  59,  128,  130,  153,  196,  255 
Glasgow,    visit    of     Institution    of 

Electrical  Engineers,  220 
Glazebrook,    Sir   Richard   T.,   263, 

264,  266,  268,  276 
Gorick,  Charles,  148 
Gould,  Sir  Francis  Carruthers,  251 
Govi,  Signer,  221 
Graham    Bell,    Professor    A.,    108, 

110,  111,  114,  120,  122 
Graham,  J.  W.,  Principal,  873,  321 
Graham,  Robert  P.  Howgrave,  143, 

149 
Gray,   Professor   Elisha,    120,    121, 

123 

Gray,  Robert  K.,  215,  217,  232 
Grubb,  Edward,  34,  322,  355 
Guthrie,  Professor,   18,  20,  22,  26, 

29,  41,  42,  43,  55 

Hampstead   Scientific   Society,    81, 

299 

Harmonic  analysis,  106 
Harness  Libel  Case,  70 
Harris,  Doctor  Rendel,  321 
Harvey,  T.  Edmund,  330,  335,  340 
Hassall,  John,  249,  252 
Heidelberg  University,  studies  at, 

28 

Hellmann,  Gustav,  237 
Helmholtz,  Professor  von,  121,  221, 

273,  281 

Henderson,  James,  24,  51,  56 
Henderson,  Jane  Smeal,  24,  46,  56, 

59,  110 

Hering,  Professor  Carl,  214 
Herkomer,    Sir   Hubert    von,    161, 

162,  163 

Hodgkin,  Dr.  Thomas,  300,  330 
Holmes,  Stratten,  148 
Hopkinson,  Dr.  John,  94,  205,  208, 

273 

24 


Howell,  Rev.  W.  C.  ,229 
Huggins,  Sir  William,  244 
Hughes,    Professor   David    E.,    93, 

101,  157,  168,214 
Hunt,  A.  Ackland,  232,  234 
Huxley,  Piofessor,  21,  51,  53,  319, 

331,  332 
Huygens,    Christian,   optical    work 

of,  270 
Hyperphosphorescence,  186 

Illuminating    Engineering    Society, 

first  President  of,  274 

work  for,  274  ff. 

Institution  of  Electrical  Engineers, 

204 
Presidential     Address    to, 

213 
International  Congress  of  Historical 

studies,  245 

—  Electrical  Congress,  1881,  1889, 
1900,    at    Paris,    66,    221,    222; 
at   Philadelphia,    120;     1891    at 
Frankfort,      206,      222  ;       1893, 
Chicago,  121,  222  ;    1899,  Como, 
205,  211  ;    1904,  St.  Louis,  222; 
1911,  Turin,  222 

—  Electrotechnical        Commission, 
222,  224,  344,  345 

—  good- will,  351 

—  Wireless  Congress,  Berlin,  83 
Italian  Visit  of  Institution  of  Elec- 
trical Engineers,  215 

Italy,  visits  to,  135,  205,  222,  304, 
345,  347 


Janet,  Professor  Paul,  224 

Jena,  visit  to,  258 

Johnson,  Dr.  G.  Lindsay,  263 

Jordans,  Old  Friends'  Meeting  House, 

355 

Jowett,  Benjamin,  126,  128 
Junior    Institution    of    Engineers, 

President  of,  102,  160 

Kapp,  Professor  Gisbert,  171,  205, 

224 
Kelvin,  William  Thomson,  Lord,  39, 

45,   61,    65,    71,    119,    137,    186; 

199,    201,    202,    214,    220-1-2, 

228,  262,  278  ff.,  290,  291  ;  arms 

of,  2 

"  Kelviniana,"  284 
Kelvin  Lecture,  the,  220 
Kennelly,  Professor,  107,  185,  289 
Kenyon,  Sir  F.  G.,  234 
Keogh,  Sir  Alfred,  267 
Kimmins,  Dr.,  178 
Koenig,  Dr.,  159,  169,  187,  188,  229 


-- 


370 


INDEX 


Konigsberg,    Honorary    Degree    of 

University  of,  39 
Kohlrausch,  Professor,  171 

Laver,  Henry,  228 
Lecture  subjects,  63,  78 
Lee,  Sir  Sidney,  295 
Library,  Royal  Society,  341 

—  Silvanus  P.  Thompson's,  227,  235, 
243  ft,  247 

—  University  of  London,  180 
Light    Visible    and    Invisible,    192, 

193,  255,  257,  273 
Lippmann,   Professor    G.,  of    Sor- 

bonne,  90,  106 
Lister,  Lord,  177,  197 
"  Little  blue  note-books,"  315 
Lockyer,  Sir  Norman,  18,  85 
Lodge,  Professor  Alfred,  140 
Lodge,  Sir  Oliver  J.,  25,  42,  45,  71, 

77,  81,  82,  84,  86,  88,  95,  120,  124, 

136,  140,  164,  163,  177,  199,  210, 

292,  294,  329,  330,  331,  332,  335, 

339,  343 

London  Institution,  lectures  at,  78 
London  Society  for   the    Study   of 

Religion,  the,  330 
London     University,     election     to 

Senate  of,  178 

examinership  in,  1 53 

reform  of,  172ff. 

Royal  Commission,  175 

Luminescence, lecture  on,  at  Oxford, 

190,  202 
Lummer,  Professor  Otto,  171,  194, 

257,  340 

McMillan,  W.  G.,  211 

Magick  Mirrour  of  Japan,  The,  256 

Magnetism,  lectures  on,  84 

—  researches  on,  54 
Magnus,  Sir  Philip,  128 
Manchester   Conference    (Friends'), 

321,  323 
Manufacture   of  light,   lecture   on, 

195,  273 

Marconi,  Guglielmo,  81  ff. 
Marriage      of      Silvanus      Phillips 

Thompson,  59 
Marshall,  Professor  Alfred,  45,  61, 

128 
Mascart,  Professor  E.,  121, 169, 187, 

188,  222 

Mathematics,  105-6-7,  138 
Maxwell,   Professor  Clerk,   64,    68, 

155 
Meldola,  Professor  Raphael,  18, 130, 

182,  229,  297,  300,  350,  351,  352 
Memorial     Lecture,     Silvanus     P. 

Thompson,  100,  200 


Memorial     Library,     Silvanus     P. 

Thompson,  247 
Militarism,  209 
Minister,  recognised  by  the  Society 

of  Friends,  323 
Monkhouse,  Cosmo,  168 
Monodies,  337 
Moore,  Edwin,  8,  12 
Mordey,  William  M.,  92,  213,  217 
Morgan,  Dr.  G.  T.,  353 
Morland,  1,  153,247,  310 
Moss,  Ernest  W.,  105,  365 
Mottelay,  Dr.  P.  Fleury,  230,  238, 

246 
Moulton,  Fletcher,  Lord  Justice,  98, 

160,  178,  196 

Murrav,  Sir  James,  98,  242,  243 
Music,  love  of,  13,  310  ff. 
Myths  of  the  Magnet,  The,  231 

Nature,  contributions  to,  85,  110 
Neesen,  Professor,  171 
Newcastle  College  of   Science,  ex- 
aminership in,  60 
New  English  Dictionary,  99,  242 
New  Telephone  Company,  116,  118 
Nicol,  William,  biography  of,  268 
Not  Impossible  Religion,  A,  326,  336 

Ocean  Telephony,  118,  121 

"Odd  Volumes,  Sette  of,"  230,  233, 

243,  245,  250,  251,  252 
Optical  Convention,  1905,  266 
1912,  269 

—  Society,  foundation  of,  263 

President  of,  266 

Opto-technics,  264 

O'Reilly,  M.  F.  (Brother  Pota- 
mian),  238,  246,  286 

Pacinotti,   Professor    Antonio,    94, 

223 

Page,  Dr.,  Ambassador,  U.S.A.,  251 
Palmer,  Sir  Walter,  38,  117 
Paris  Exhibition,  261 

—  visit  of  Institution  of   Electrical 
Engineers,  214 

Percival,  Dr.  John  (Bishop  of 
Hereford),  27,  35,  125,  128,  152 

Peregrinus,  Petrus,  243,  245,  288 

Permanent  Magnets,  105,  220 

Perrin,  Monsieur,  184,  188 

Perry,  Professor  John,  53,  92,  127, 
130,  131,  141,  153,  160,  214,  215, 
293 

Phillips,  Frances,  3 

Phillips,  Richard,  3,  166,  169 

Phillips,  William,  3 

Phonautograph,  109 

Photometry,  256,  273,  276 


INDEX 


371 


Photophone,  110 

Physical  Society  of  London,  the, 
20,  23,  25,  26,  38,  41,  42,  105, 
106,  111,  255,  283 

Plante,  Gaston,  65,  66 

Plateau's  Films,  research  on,  41 

Poetry,  251,  313,  317,  337 

Poggi,  Signer,  216 

Polyphase  Electric  Currents,  96,  165 

Poynting,  Professor  J.  H.,  110,  154, 
330 

Preece,  Sir  William  Henry,  41,  67, 
80,  121,  157,  205,  273,  293 

Presidency  of  Institution  of  Elec- 
trical Engineers,  207 

Presidential  Address  to  Engineering 
Section,  219 

Pseud  ophone,  109 

Psychical  research,  331 

Quakers,  persecution  of  the,  4 
Quaritch,  Bernard,  235,  244 
Quest  for  Truth,  The,  327,  328 
Quincke,  Professor  Geheimrath  von, 
30,  113 

Radiometers,  discourse  on,  26 

—  theory  of,  281,  282 
Rainbows,  lecture  on,  46 
Ramsay,    Professor    Sir    William, 

56,  61,  62,  124,  129,  153,  178,  188, 

278,  323,  353 
Rasi,  Signer  P.,  224 
Rayleigh,  Lord,  108,  111,  276,  281 
Reis,  Life  of  Philipp,  113,  114 
Reis,  Phillipp,  111,  114,  229 
Religion  and  Science  by  Seven  Men 

of  Science,  335 
Righi,  Professor  Augusto,  212,  268, 

345 

Riseley,  George,  311 
Rocky  Mountains,  sketches  of,  309 
Rontgen  Society,  foundation  of,  195 
Presidential  Address  to,  1 96, 

201 

Rontgen,  Professor,  184,  196 
Rosa  Ventorum,  245 
Roscoe,  Sir  Henry,  166,  168,   178, 

214 

Rosebery,  Lord,  175 
Rotatory  Converters,  104,  204 
Rowley,  Professor,  34,  152 
Royal  Astronomical  Society,  19 
Royal  Institution,  first  visits  to  the, 

19,  21,  94,  156 

lectures  at  the,  84,  85,   105, 

158,  159,  163,  165,  189,  192,  243, 

255,  276,  312,  339,  353 
membership  of,  1 55 

—  School  of  Mines,  17 


Royal  Society,  the,  62,  78,  91,  101, 

102,  103,  195,  199,  256,  268,  279, 

340,  341,  342 

elected  Fellow  of,  160 

Soirees,  exhibits  at,  79 

—  Water  Colour  Society,  Art  Club, 

305 
Riicker,  Professor  Sir  Arthur,  87, 

180,  182 

Ruskin,  John,  letters  from,  47,  49 
Russell,    Dr.  Alexander,   104,    106, 

118,  213 
Rutherford,  Sir  Ernest,  100,  200 


Safety  lamp,  miner's,  77,  93,  130 
Saunders,  Thomas  Bailey,  181,  239, 

240,  290,  332,  344 
Schott,  Dr.,  of  Jena,  254,  259 
Schuster,  Sir  Arthur,  160 
Science,  importance  of  in  industry, 

54 

Sedley  Taylor,  Dr.,  108 
"  Sette  of  Odd  Volumes,"  230,  233, 

245,  250,  251,  252 
Settle,  visits  to,  6,  59,  71,  296  ff. 
Short,  Peter,  printer,  239,  242 
Siemens,  Alexander,  93,  222 
Slaby,    Professor,    of    Charlotten- 

burg,  81 

Sleeman,  Rev.  Philip,  152,  158 
Social    Science    Congress,    Chelten- 
ham, 48 

Nottingham,  59 

Soci6t6  Franjaise  de  Physique,  186, 

187 

Society  of  Arts  medal,  80 
lectures  to  the,  51,  64,  85,  92, 

176,  256,  264 
Solari,  Lieutenant  Marquis  Luigi, 

82 

Sound,  Christmas  lectures  on,  339 
South-Eastern  Union  of  Scientific 

Societies,  President  of,  300,  333 
Spectacle    Makers'    Company,    70, 

262,269,271 

Spencer,  Herbert,  300,  333,  345 
Spottiswoode,  Dr.  William,  46,  91, 

159 

Standard  of  Illumination,  273 
Stephan,  Dr.  von,  206 
Stokes,  Professor  Sir  G.  G.,  91,  185, 

191,  192,  202 
Storage  of  Electricity,  64 
Stirling,  Professor,  44 
Strobic  circles,  44 
Sturgeon,  William,  102,  229 
Swan,  Sir  Joseph  Wilson,  66,  68,  87, 

169,  205,  207,  292 
Swarthmore  Lecture,  the,  327 


372 


INDEX 


Swiss  Excursion  of  Institution  of 
Electrical  Engineers,  210 

Switzerland,  visits  to,  14,  38  164 
287,  299,  303,  305,  346 


Tatham,  family  arms  of,  4,  6 
Tatham,  John,  4 
Tatham,  Marmaduke,  4 
Technical  College,  Finsbury,  127  ff 
Telephone  patents,  114,  116,  118 
Telephone  research  on,  108ff 
Temperance^  work  for,  13 
Tennyson,    Alfred,    views    on    his 

poetry,  313,  314,  320 
Tercentenary  of   Queen   Elizabeth, 

232 

Thompson,  Arms  of,  2,  6 
Thompson,  Bridget,  4,  5, 14,  38,  304 
Thompson,  J.  Dorothea,  165,  225, 

297,  299,  312,  327,  328,  352 
Thompson,  Helen  G.,  91,  296,  305, 

312,  338,  347,  349,  352 
Thompson,  Isaac  C.,  16,  64,  120,  192 
Thompson,    A.   Irene    (Mrs.    T.    E. 

Harvey),  300,  312,  340 
Thompson,  Dr.  John  Tatham,  36, 

96,  275,  338 
Thompson,  Rachel  Ford,  164,  296, 

305 
Thompson,  Silvanus,  of  York,  3,  5, 

38,  59 

Thompson,  Sylvia  M.,  214,  312,  338 
Thompson,  Thomas,  of  Liverpool,  3 
Thompson,  William  Phillips,  16 
Thomson,  Dr.  Elihu,  121,  123,  170, 

193,  222,  223,  224 
Thomson,  James,  280 
Thomson,  Professor  Sir  J.  J.,  192 
Thomson,  Sir  William.     See  Kelvin. 
Tidal  Power,  use  of,  65 
Tilden,  Sir  William,  35,  152 
Todhunter,  Dr.  John,  233,  252 
Trades  schools,  51 
Traill- Taylor  Memorial  Lecture,  268 
Trotter,  A.  P.,  221,  256 
Turin  Exhibition,  1911,  222 
Tyndall  Lectures,  84,  243 


Tyndall,  Professor  John,  21,  41,  94, 
157,  194,  319 

University  Colleges,  English,  1 55, 330 
University  of  Heidelberg    student 
at,  28 

—  of  Konigsberg,  Honorary  Degree 
of,  39 

—  of  London,  8,    17,   19,  45,   153, 

162,  172  ff.,  272 

—  the  making  of  a  great,  lecture  to 
Society  of  Arts,  1 76 

—  of  Paris,  visit  to,  181 

Varley,  Samuel  Alfred,  229,  292 
Volta,  centenary  of,  205,  215,  231 
Volta,  Professor  Alessandro,  216 
Volta,  tomb  of  212,  216,  217 

Wagner,    Richard,   music    of,    113 

311,  312 
Walker,   Professor  Miles,    91,    103, 

104,  136,  148,  165,  185,  363 
Walmsley,  Dr.  R.  Mullineux,   136, 

266,267 

Walton,  E.  A.,  R.S.A.,  289 
Watson,  Dr.  Robert  Spence,  321 
Watson,  William,  quotation  from, 

219 

Weaver,  W.  D.,  238 
Weimar,  visit  to,  257 
West,  Joseph  Walter,  R.  W.  S.,  13, 

163,  310 

Westminster  Friends'  Meeting,  19, 
23,  38,  179,  320,  321,  323,  334, 
354,  355 

Wheatley,  H.  B.,  229 

White,  Sir  William,  214,  326 

Wilde,  Dr.  Henry,  97 

Wilde  v.  Thompson,  97 

Wilson,  Lady,  166,  169 

Wimshurst,  James,  78,  161 

Winkworth,  Catherine,  33,  34 

Wireless  telegraphy,  80  ff. 

Women's  suffrage,  342 

X-rays,  184,  185,  196,  200 
Zeiss,  Carl,  258 


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