Chapter V: Part 5

He is a glaring instance of the truth of the observations quoted above. I will answer for it that, at the Mersey Dock Board, he never dreams of proving that the balance at the banker's is larger than that in the book by assuming that the larger sum is there, and then proving that the other supposition--the smaller balance--is upon that assumption, an absurdity. He never says to another director, How can you dare to refuse me a right to assume the larger balance, when you yourself, the other day, said,--Suppose, for argument's sake, we had 80,000l. at the banker's, though you knew the book only showed 30,000l.? This is the way in which he has supported his geometrical paradox by Euclid's example: and this is not the way he reasons at the board; I know it by the character of him as a man of business which has reached my ears from several quarters. But in geometry and rational arithmetic he is a smatterer, though expert at computation; at the board he is a trained man of business. The language of geometry is so new to him that he does not know what is meant by "two mean proportionals:" but all the phrases of commerce are rooted in his mind. He is most unerasably booked in the history of the squaring of the circle, as the speculator who took a right to assume a proposition for the destruction of other propositions, on the express ground that Euclid assumes a proposition to show that it destroys itself: which is as if the curate should demand permission to throttle the squire because St. Patrick drove the vermin to suicide to save themselves from slaughter. He is conspicuous as a speculator who, more visibly than almost any other known to history, reasoned in a circle by way of reasoning on a circle. But {123} what I have chiefly to do with is the force of instance which he has lent to my assertion that men who have not had real training in pure logic are unsafe reasoners in matter which is not familiar. It is hard to get first-rate examples of this, because there are few who find the way to the printer until practice and reflection have given security against the grossest slips. I cannot but think that his case will lead many to take what I have said into consideration, among those who are competent to think of the great mental disciplines. To this end I should desire him to continue his efforts, to amplify and develop his great principle, that of proving a proposition by assuming it and taking as confirmation every consequence that does not contradict the assumption.

Since my Budget commenced, Mr. Smith has written me notes: the portion which I have preserved--I suppose several have been mislaid--makes a hundred and seven pages of note-paper, closely written. To all this I have not answered one word: but I think I cannot have read fewer than forty pages. In the last letter the writer informs me that he will not write at greater length until I have given him an answer, according to the "rules of good society." Did I not know that for every inch I wrote back he would return an ell? Surely in vain the net is spread in the eyes of anything that hath a wing. There were several good excuses for not writing to Mr. J. Smith: I will mention five. First, I distinctly announced at the beginning of this Budget that I would not communicate with squarers of the circle. Secondly, any answer I might choose to give might with perfect propriety be reserved for this article; had the imputation of incivility been made after the first note, I should immediately have replied to this effect: but I presumed it was quite understood. Thirdly, Mr. Smith, by his publication of E. M.'s letters against the wish of the writer, had put himself out of the pale of correspondence. Fourthly, he had also gone beyond the rules of good society in sending {124} letter after letter to a person who had shown by his silence an intention to avoid correspondence. Fifthly, these same rules of good society are contrived to be flexible or frangible in extreme cases: otherwise there would be no living under them; and good society would be bad. Father Aldrovand has laid down the necessary distinction--"I tell thee, thou foolish Fleming, the text speaketh but of promises made unto Christians, and there is in the rubric a special exemption of such as are made to Welchmen." There is also a rubric to the rules of good society; and squarers of the circle are among those whom there is special permission not to answer: they are the wild Welchmen of geometry, who are always assailing, but never taking, the Garde Douloureuse[219] of the circle. "At this commentary," proceeds the story, "the Fleming grinned so broadly as to show his whole case of broad strong white teeth." I know not whether the Welchman would have done the like, but I hope Mr. James Smith will: and I hope he has as good a case to show as Wilkin Flammock. For I wish him long life and long health, and should be very glad to see so much energy employed in a productive way. I hope he wishes me the same: if not, I will give him what all his judicious friends will think a good reason for doing so. His pamphlets and letters are all tied up together, and will form a curious lot when death or cessation of power to forage among book-shelves shall bring my little library to the hammer. And this time may not be far off: for I was X years old in A.D. X^2; not 4 in A.D. 16, nor 5 in A.D. 25, but still in one case under that law. And now I have made my own age a problem of quadrature, and Mr. J. Smith may solve it. But I protest against his method of assuming a result, and making itself prove itself: he might in this way, as sure as eggs is eggs (a corruption of X is X), make me 1,864 years old, which is a great deal too much.

{125}

_April 5, 1864._--Mr. Smith continues to write me long letters, to which he hints that I am to answer. In his last, of 31 closely written sides of note-paper, he informs me, with reference to my obstinate silence, that though I think myself and am thought by others to be a mathematical Goliath, I have resolved to play the mathematical snail, and keep within my shell. A mathematical _snail_! This cannot be the thing so called which regulates the striking of a clock; for it would mean that I am to make Mr. Smith sound the true time of day, which I would by no means undertake upon a clock that gains 19 seconds odd in every hour by false quadrature. But he ventures to tell me that pebbles from the sling of simple truth and common sense will ultimately crack my shell, and put me _hors de combat_.[220] The confusion of images is amusing: Goliath turning himself into a snail to avoid [pi] = 3-1/8, and James Smith, Esq., of the Mersey Dock Board: and put _hors de combat_--which should have been _cache_[221]--by pebbles from a sling. If Goliath had crept into a snail-shell, David would have cracked the Philistine with his foot. There is something like modesty in the implication that the crack-shell pebble has not yet taken effect; it might have been thought that the slinger would by this time have been singing--

"And thrice [and one-eighth] I routed all my foes,
And thrice [and one-eighth] I slew the slain."

But he promises to give the public his nut-cracker if I do not, before the Budget is concluded, "unravel" the paradox, which is the mathematico-geometrical nut he has given me to crack. Mr. Smith is a crack man: he will crack his own nut; he will crack my shell; in the mean time he cracks himself up. Heaven send he do not crack himself into lateral contiguity with himself.

On June 27 I received a letter, in the handwriting of Mr. James Smith, signed Nauticus. I have ascertained {126} that one of the letters to the _Athenaeum_ signed Nauticus is in the same handwriting. I make a few extracts:

"... The important question at issue has been treated by a brace of mathematical birds with too much levity. It may be said, however, that sarcasm and ridicule sometimes succeed, where reason fails.... Such a course is not well suited to a discussion.... For this reason I shall for the future [this implies there has been a past, so that Nauticus is not before me for the first time] endeavor to confine myself to dry reasoning from incontrovertible premises.

... It appears to me that so far as his theory is concerned he comes off unscathed. You might have found "a hole in Smith's circle" (have you seen a pamphlet bearing this title? [I never heard of it until now]), but after all it is quite possible the hole may have been left by design, for the purpose of entrapping the unwary."

[On the publication of the above, the author of the pamphlet obligingly forwarded a copy to me of _A Hole in Smith's Circle_--by a Cantab: Longman and Co., 1859, (pp. 15). "It is pity to lose any fun we can get out of the affair," says my almamaternal brother: to which I add that in such a case warning without joke is worse than none at all, as giving a false idea of the nature of the danger. The Cantab takes some absurdities on which I have not dwelt: but there are enough to afford a Cantab from every college his own separate hunting ground.]

Does this hint that his mode of proof, namely, assuming the thing to be proved, was a design to entrap the unwary? if so, it bangs Banagher. Was his confounding two mean proportionals with one mean proportional found twice over a trick of the same intent? if so, it beats cockfighting. That Nauticus is Mr. Smith appears from other internal evidence. In 1819, Mr. J. C. Hobhouse[222] was sent to Newgate for a {127} libel on the House of Commons which was only intended for a libel on Lord Erskine.[223] The ex-Chancellor had taken Mr. Hobhouse to be thinking of him in a certain sentence; this Mr. Hobhouse denied, adding, "There is but one man in the country who is always thinking of Lord Erskine." I say that there is but one man of our day who would couple me and Mr. James Smith as a "brace of mathematical birds."

Mr. Smith's "theory" is unscathed by me. Not a doubt about it: but how does he himself come off? I should never think of refuting a theory proved by assumption of itself. I left Mr. Smith's [pi] untouched: or, if I put in my thumb and pulled out a plum, it was to give a notion of the cook, not of the dish. The "important question at issue" was not the circle: it was, wholly and solely, whether the abbreviation of _James_ might be spelled _Jimm_.[224] This is personal to the verge of scurrility: but in literary controversy the challenger names the weapons, and Mr. Smith begins with charge of ignorance, folly, and dishonesty, by conditional implication. So that the question is, not the personality of a word, but its applicability to the person designated: it is enough if, as the Latin grammar has it, _Verbum personale concordat cum nominativo_.[225]

I may plead precedent for taking a liberty with the orthography of _Jem_. An instructor of youth was scandalized at the abrupt and irregular--but very effective--opening of Wordsworth's little piece:

{128}

"A simple child
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?"

So he mended the matter by instructing his pupils to read the first line thus:

"A simple child, dear brother ----."

The brother, we infer from sound, was to be James, and the blank must therefore be filled up with _Jimb_.

I will notice one point of the letter, to make a little more distinction between the two birds. Nauticus lays down--quite correctly--that the sine of an angle is less than its circular measure. He then takes 3.1416 for 180 deg., and finds that 36' is .010472. But this is exactly what he finds for the sine of 36' in tables: he concludes that either 3.1416 or the tables must be wrong. He does not know that sines, as well as [pi], are interminable decimals, of which the tables, to save printing, only take in a finite number. He is a six-figure man: let us go thrice again to make up nine, and we have as follows:

Circular measure of 36' .010471975...
Sine of 36' .010471784...
Excess of measure over sine .000000191...

Mr. Smith invites me to say which is wrong, the quadrature, or the tables: I leave him to guess. He says his assertions "arise naturally and necessarily out of the arguments of a circle-squarer:" he might just as well lay down that all the pigs went to market because it is recorded that "_This_ pig went to market." I must say for circle-squarers that very few bring their pigs to so poor a market. I answer the above argument because it is, of all which Mr. James Smith has produced, the only one which rises to the level of a schoolboy: to meet him halfway I descend to that level.

Mr. Smith asks me to solve a problem in the _Athenaeum_: {129} and I will do it, because the question will illustrate what is _below_ schoolboy level.

"Let x represent the circular measure of an angle of 15 deg., and y half the sine of an angle of 30 deg. = area of the square on the radius of a circle of diameter unity = .25. If x - y = xy, firstly, what is the arithmetical value of xy? secondly, what is the angle of which xy represents the circular measure?"

If x represent 15 deg. and y be 1/4, xy represents 3 deg. 45', whether x - y be xy or no. But, y being 1/4, x - y is _not_ xy unless x be 1/3, that is, unless 12x or [pi] be 4, which Mr. Smith would not admit. How could a person who had just received such a lesson as I had given immediately pray for further exposure, furnishing the stuff so liberally as this? Is it possible that Mr. Smith, because he signs himself Nauticus, means to deny his own very regular, legible, and peculiar hand? It is enough to make the other members of the Liverpool Dock Board cry, Mersey on the man!

Mr. Smith says that for the future he will give up what he calls sarcasm, and confine himself, "as far as possible," to what he calls dry reasoning from incontrovertible premises. If I have fairly taught him that _his_ sarcasm will not succeed, I hope he will find that his wit's end is his logic's beginning.

I now reply to a question I have been asked again and again since my last Budget appeared: Why do you take so much trouble to expose such a reasoner as Mr. Smith? I answer as a deceased friend of mine used to answer on like occasions--A man's capacity is no measure of his power to do mischief. Mr. Smith has untiring energy, which does something; self-evident honesty of conviction, which does more; and a long purse, which does most of all. He has made at least ten publications, full of figures which few readers can criticize. A great many people are staggered to this extent, that they imagine there must be {130} the indefinite _something_ in the mysterious _all this_. They are brought to the point of suspicion that the mathematicians ought not to treat "all this" with such undisguised contempt, at least. Now I have no fear for [pi]: but I do think it possible that general opinion might in time demand that the crowd of circle-squarers, etc. should be admitted to the honors of opposition; and this would be a time-tax of five per cent., one man with another, upon those who are better employed. Mr. James Smith may be made useful, in hands which understand how to do it, towards preventing such opinion from growing. A speculator who expressly assumes what he wants to prove, and argues that all which contradicts it is absurd, _because_ it cannot stand side by side with his assumption, is a case which can be exposed to all. And the best person to expose it is one who has lived in the past as well as the present, who takes misthinking from points of view which none but a student of history can occupy, and who has something of a turn for the business.

Whether I have any motive but public good must be referred to those who can decide whether a missionary chooses his pursuit solely to convert the heathen. I shall certainly be thought to have a little of the spirit of Col. Quagg, who delighted in strapping the Grace-walking Brethren. I must quote this myself: if I do not, some one else will, and then where am I? The Colonel's principle is described as follows:

"I licks ye because I kin, and because I like, and because ye'se critters that licks is good for. Skins ye have on, and skins I'll have off; hard or soft, wet or dry, spring or fall. Walk in grace if ye like till pumpkins is peaches; but licked ye must be till your toe-nails drop off and your noses bleed blue ink. And--licked--they--were--accordingly."

I am reminded of this by the excessive confidence with which Mr. James Smith predicted that he would treat me as Zephaniah Stockdolloger (Sam Slick calls it _slockdollager_) treated Goliah Quagg. He has announced his {131} intention of bringing me, with a contrite heart, and clean shaved,--4159265... razored down to 25,--to a camp-meeting of circle-squarers. But there is this difference: Zephaniah only wanted to pass the Colonel's smithy in peace; Mr. James Smith sought a fight with me. As soon as this Budget began to appear, he oiled his own strap, and attempted to treat me as the terrible Colonel would have treated the inoffensive brother.

He is at liberty to try again.

THE MOON HOAX.

The Moon-hoax; or the discovery that the moon has a vast population of
human beings. By Richard Adams Locke.[226] New York, 1859, 8vo.

This is a reprint of the hoax already mentioned. I suppose R. A. Locke is the name assumed by M. Nicollet.[227] The publisher informs us that when the hoax first appeared day by day in a morning paper, the circulation increased fivefold, and the paper obtained a permanent footing. Besides this, an edition of 60,000 was sold off in less than one month.

The discovery was also published under the name of A. R. Grant.[228] Sohncke's[229] _Bibliotheca Mathematica_ confounds this Grant with Prof. R. Grant[230] of Glasgow, the author of the _History of Physical Astronomy_, who is accordingly made to guarantee the discoveries in the moon. I hope Adams Locke will not merge in J. C. Adams,[231] the co-discoverer of Neptune. Sohncke gives the titles of {132} three French translations of the Moon hoax at Paris, of one at Bordeaux, and of Italian translations at Parma, Palermo, and Milan.

A Correspondent, who is evidently fully master of details, which he has given at length, informs me that the Moon hoax appeared first in the _New York Sun_, of which R. A. Locke was editor. It so much resembled a story then recently published by Edgar A. Poe, in a Southern paper, "Adventures of Hans Pfaal," that some New York journals published the two side by side. Mr. Locke, when he left the _New York Sun_, started another paper, and discovered the manuscript of Mungo Park;[232] but this did not deceive. The _Sun_, however, continued its career, and had a great success in an account of a balloon voyage from England to America, in seventy-five hours, by Mr. Monck Mason,[233] Mr. Harrison Ainsworth,[234] and others. I have no doubt that M. Nicollet was the author of the Moon hoax,[235] written in a way which marks the practised observatory astronomer beyond all doubt, and by evidence seen in the most minute details. Nicollet had an eye to Europe. I suspect that he took Poe's story, and made it a basis for his own. Mr. Locke, it would seem, when he attempted a fabrication for himself, did not succeed.

The Earth we inhabit, its past, present, and future. By Capt.
Drayson.[236] London, 1859, 8vo.

The earth is growing; absolutely growing larger: its diameter increases three-quarters of an inch per mile every year. The foundations of our buildings will give way in {133} time: the telegraph cables break, and no cause ever assigned except ships' anchors, and such things. The book is for those whose common sense is unwarped, who can judge evidence as well as the ablest philosopher. The prospect is not a bad one, for population increases so fast that a larger earth will be wanted in time, unless emigration to the Moon can be managed, a proposal of which it much surprises me that Bishop Wilkins has a monopoly.

IMPALEMENT BY REQUEST.

_Athenaeum_, August, 19, 1865. _Notice to Correspondents._

"R. W.--If you will consult the opening chapter of the Budget of Paradoxes, you will see that the author presents only works in his own library at a given date; and this for a purpose explained. For ourselves we have carefully avoided allowing any writers to present themselves in our columns on the ground that the Budget has passed them over. We gather that Mr. De Morgan contemplates additions at a future time, perhaps in a separate and augmented work; if so, those who complain that others of no greater claims than themselves have been ridiculed may find themselves where they wish to be. We have done what we can for you by forwarding your letter to Mr. De Morgan."

The author of "An Essay on the Constitution of the Earth," published in 1844, demanded of the _Athenaeum_, as an _act of fairness_, that a letter from him should be published, proving that he had as much right to be "impaled" as Capt. Drayson. He holds, on speculative grounds, what the other claims to have proved by measurement, namely, that the earth is growing; and he believes that in time--a good long time, not _our_ time--the earth and other planets may grow into suns, with systems of their own.

This gentleman sent me a copy of his work, after the commencement of my Budget; but I have no recollection of having received it, and I cannot find it on the (nursery? {134} quarantine?) shelves on which I keep my unestablished discoveries. Had I known of this work in time, (see the Introduction) I should of course, have impaled it (heraldically) with the other work; but the two are very different. Capt. Drayson professes to prove his point by results of observation; and I think he does not succeed. The author before me only speculates; and a speculator can get any conclusion into his premises, if he will only build or hire them of shape and size to suit. It reminds me of a statement I heard years ago, that a score of persons, or near it, were to dine inside the skull of one of the aboriginal animals, dear little creatures! Whereat I wondered vastly, nothing doubting; facts being stubborn and not easy drove, as Mrs. Gamp said. But I soon learned that the skull was not a real one, but artificially constructed by the methods--methods which have had striking verifications, too--which enable zoologists to go the whole hog by help of a toe or a bit of tail. This took off the edge of the wonder: a hundred people can dine inside an inference, if you draw it large enough. The method might happen to fail for once: for instance, the toe-bone might have been abnormalized by therian or saurian malady; and the possibility of such failure, even when of small probability, is of great alleviation. The author before me is, apparently, the sole fabricator of his own premises. With vital force in the earth and continual creation on the part of the original Creator, he expands our bit of a residence as desired. But, as the Newtoness of Cookery observed, First catch your hare. When this is done, when you _have_ a growing earth, you shall dress it with all manner of proximate causes, and serve it up with a growing Moon for sauce, a growing Sun, if it please you, at the other end, and growing planets for side-dishes. Hoping this amount of impalement will be satisfactory, I go on to something else. {135}

THE HAILESEAN SYSTEM OF ASTRONOMY.

_The Hailesean System of Astronomy._ By John Davey Hailes[237] (two
pages duodecimo, 1860).

He offers to _take_ 100,000l. to 1,000l. that he shows the sun to be less than seven millions of miles from the earth. The earth in the center, revolving eastward, the sun revolving westward, so that they "meet at half the circle distance in the 24 hours." The diameter of the circle being 9839458303, the circumference is 30911569920.

The following written challenge was forwarded to the Council of the Astronomical Society: it will show the "general reader"--and help him towards earning his name--what sort of things come every now and then to our scientific bodies. I have added punctuation:

_Challenge._
1,000 to 30,000.
"Leverrier's[238] name stand placed first. Do the worthy Frenchman
justice.
By awarding him the medal in a trice.
Give Adams[239] an extra--of which neck and neck the race.
Now I challenge to meet them and the F.R.S.'s all,
For good will and _one_ thousand pounds to their _thirty_ thousand
withall,
That I produce a system, which shall measure the time,
When the Sun was vertical to Gibeon, afterward to Syene.
To meet any time in London--name your own period,
To be decided by a majority of twelve persons--a President, _odd_.
That mean, if the twelve equally divide, the President decide,
I should prefer the Bishop of London, over the meeting to preside.
JOHN DAVY HAILES."
Feb. 17, 1847."

Mr. Hailes still issues his flying sheets. The last I have met with (October 7, 1863) informs us that the latitude of {136} England is slowly increasing, which is the true cause of the alteration in the variation of the magnet.

[Mr. Hailes continues his researches. Witness his new Hailesean system of Astronomy, displaying Joshua's miracle-time, origin of time from science, with Bible and Egyptian history. Rewards offered for astronomical problems. With magnetism, etc. etc. Astronomical challenge to all the world. Published at Cambridge, in 1865. The author agrees with Newton in one marked point. _Errores quam minimi non sunt contemnendi_,[240] says Isaac: meaning in figures, not in orthography. Mr. Hailes enters into the spirit, both positive and negative, of this dictum, by giving the distance of _Sidius_ from the center of the earth at 163,162,008 miles 10 feet 8 inches 17-28ths of an inch. Of course, he is aware that the center of _figure_ of the earth is 17.1998 inches from the center of _gravity_. Which of the two is he speaking of?]

The Divine Mystery of Life. London [1861], 18mo. (pp.32).

The author has added one class to zoology, which is printed in capitals, as derived from _zoe_, life, not from _zoon_, animal. That class is of _Incorporealia_, order I., _Infinitum_, of one genus without plurality, _Deus_: order II., _Finita_, angels good and evil. The rest is all about a triune system, with a diagram. The author is not aware that [Greek: zoon] is not _animal_, but _living being_. Aristotle had classed gods under [Greek: zoa], and has been called to account for it by moderns who have taken the word to mean _animal_.

A CHANCE FOR INVENTORS.

Explication du Zodiaque de Denderah, des Pyramides, et de Genese. Par
le Capitaine au longcours Justin Roblin.[241] Caen, 1861. 8vo.

{137}

Capt. Roblin, having discovered the sites of gold and diamond mines by help of the zodiac of Denderah, offered half to the shareholders of a company which he proposed to form. One of our journals, by help of the zodiac of Esne, offered, at five francs a head, to tell the shareholders the exact amount of gold and diamonds which each would get, and to make up the amount predicted to those who got less. There are moods of the market in England in which this company could have been formed: so we must not laugh at our neighbors.

JOHANNES VON GUMPACH.

A million's worth of property, and five hundred lives annually lost at
sea by the Theory of Gravitation. A letter on the true figure of the
earth, addressed to the Astronomer Royal, by Johannes von Gumpach.[242]
London, 1861, 8vo. (pp. 54).

The true figure and dimensions of the earth, in a letter addressed to
the Astronomer Royal. By Joh. von Gumpach. 2nd ed. entirely recast.
London, 1862, 8vo. (pp. 266).

Two issues of a letter published with two different title-pages, one
addressed to the Secretary of the Royal Society, the other to the
Secretary of the Royal Astronomical Society. It would seem that the
same letter is also issued with two other titles, addressed to the
British Association and the Royal Geographical Society. By Joh. von
Gumpach. London, 1862, 8vo.

Baby-Worlds. An essay on the nascent members of our solar household. By
Joh. von Gumpach. London, 1863, 8vo.

The earth, it appears, instead of being flattened, is elongated at the poles: by ignorance of which the loss above mentioned occurs yearly. There is, or is to be, a substitute for attraction and an "application hitherto neglected, of a {138} recognized law of optics to the astronomical theory, showing the true orbits of the heavenly bodies to be perfectly circular, and their orbital motions to be perfectly uniform." all irregularities being, I suppose, optical delusions. Mr. Von Gumpach is a learned man; what else, time must show.

SLANDER PARADOXES.

Perpetuum Mobile: or Search for self-motive Power. By Henry
Dircks.[243] London, 1861, 8vo.

A useful collection on the history of the attempts at perpetual motion, that is, at obtaining the consequences of power without any power to produce them. September 7, 1863, a correspondent of the _Times_ gave an anecdote of George Stephenson,[244] which he obtained from Robert Stephenson.[245] A perpetual motionist wanted to explain his method; to which George replied--"Sir! I shall believe it when I see you take yourself up by the waistband, and carry yourself about the room." Never was the problem better stated.

There is a paradox of which I ought to give a specimen, I mean the _slander-paradox_; the case of a person who takes it into his head, upon evidence furnished entirely by the workings of his own thoughts, that some other person has committed a foul act of which the world at large would no more suppose him guilty than they would suppose that the earth is a flat bordered by ice. If I were to determine on giving cases in which the self-deluded person imagines {139} a conspiracy against _himself_, there would be no end of choices. Many of the grosser cases are found at last to be accompanied by mental disorder, and it is difficult to avoid referring the whole class to something different from simple misuse of the reasoning power. The first instance is one which puts in a strong light the state of things in which we live, brought about by our glorious freedom of thought, speech, and writing. The Government treated it with neglect, the press with silent contempt, and I will answer for it many of my readers now hear of it for the first time, when it comes to be enrolled among circle-squarers and earth-stoppers, where, as the old philosopher said, it will not gravitate, being _in proprio loco_.[246]

1862. On new year's day, 1862, when the nation was in the full tide of sympathy with the Queen, and regret for its own loss, a paper called the _Free Press_ published a number devoted to the consideration of the causes of the death of the Prince Consort. It is so rambling and inconsecutive that it takes more than one reading to understand it. It is against the _Times_ newspaper. First, the following insinuation:

"To the legal mind, the part of [the part taken by] the _Times_ will present a _prima facie_ case of the gravest nature, in the evident fore-knowledge of the event, and the preparation to turn it to account when it should have occurred. The article printed on Saturday must have been written on Friday. That article could not have appeared had the Prince been intended to live."

Next, it is affirmed that the _Times_ intended to convey the idea that the Prince had been poisoned.

"Up to this point we are merely dealing with words which the _Times_ publishes, and these can leave not a shadow of doubt that there is an intention to promulgate the idea that Prince Albert had been poisoned."

The article then goes on with a strange olio of {140} insinuations to the effect that the Prince was the obstacle to Russian intrigue, and that if he should have been poisoned,--which the writer strongly hints may have been the case,--some Minister under the influence of Russia must have done it. Enough for this record. _Un sot trouve toujours un plus sot qui l'admire_:[247] who can he be in this case?

THE NEPTUNE CONTROVERSY.

1846. At the end of this year arose the celebrated controversy relative to the discovery of Neptune. Those who know it are well aware that Mr. Adams's[248] now undoubted right to rank with Le Verrier[249] was made sure at the very outset by the manner in which Mr. Airy,[250] the Astronomer Royal, came forward to state what had taken place between himself and Mr. Adams. Those who know all the story about Mr. Airy being arrested in his progress by the neglect of Mr. Adams to answer a letter, with all the imputations which might have been thrown upon himself for laxity in the matter, know also that Mr. Airy's conduct exhibited moral courage, honest feeling, and willingness to sacrifice himself, if need were, to the attainment of the ends of private justice, and the establishment of a national claim. A writer in a magazine, in a long and elaborate article, argued the supposition--put in every way except downright assertion, after the fashion of such things--that Mr. Airy had communicated Mr. Adams's results to M. Le Verrier, with intention that they should be used. His presumption as to motive is that, had Mr. Adams been recognized, "then the discovery must have been indisputably an _Englishman's_, and that Englishman not the Astronomer Royal." Mr. Adams's conclusions were "retouched in France, and sent {141} over the year after." The proof given is that it cannot be "imagined" otherwise.

"Can it then be imagined that the Astronomer Royal received such results from Mr. Adams, supported as they were by Professor Challis's[251] valuable testimony as to their probable accuracy, and did not bring the French astronomer acquainted with them, especially as he was aware that his friend was engaged in matters bearing directly upon these results?"

The whole argument the author styles "evidence which I consider it difficult to refute." He ends by calling upon certain persons, of whom I am one, to "see ample justice done." This is the duty of every one, according to his opportunities. So when the reputed author--the article being anonymous--was, in 1849, proposed as a Fellow of the Astronomical Society, I joined--if I remember right, I originated--an opposition to his election, until either the authorship should be denied, or a proper retraction made. The friends of the author neither denied the first, nor produced the second: and they judged it prudent to withdraw the proposal. Had I heard of any subsequent repentance, I would have taken some other instance, instead of this: should I yet hear of such a thing, I will take care to notice it in the continuation of this list, which I confidently expect, life and health permitting, to be able to make in a few years. This much may be said, that the author, in a lecture on the subject, given in 1849, and published with his name, did _not_ repeat the charge.

[The libel was published in the _Mechanics' Magazine_,[252] (vol. for 1846, pp. 604-615): and the editor supported it as follows, (vol. for 1847, p. 476). In answer to Mr. Sheepshanks's charitable hope that he had been hoaxed, {142} he says: "Mr. Sheepshanks cannot certainly have read the article referred to.... Severe and inculpatory it is--unjust some may deem it (though we ourselves are out of the number.)... A 'hoax' forsooth! May we be often the dupes of such hoaxes!" He then goes on to describe the article as directed against the Astronomer Royal's alleged neglect to give Mr. Adams that "encouragement and protection" which was his due, and _does not hint one word_ about the article containing the charge of having secretly and fraudulently transmitted news of Mr. Adams's researches to France, that an Englishman might not have the honor of the discovery. Mr. Sheepshanks having called this a "deliberate calumny," without a particle of proof or probability to support it, the editor says "what the reverend gentleman means by this, we are at a loss to understand." He then proceeds _not_ to remember. I repeat here, what I have said elsewhere, that the management of the journal has changed hands; but from 1846 to 1856, it had the collar of S.S. (scientific slander). The prayer for more such things was answered (See p. 349).]

JAMES IVORY.[253]

I have said that those who are possessed with the idea of conspiracy against themselves are apt to imagine both conspirators and their bad motives and actions. A person who should take up the idea of combination against himself without feeling ill-will and originating accusations would be indeed a paradox. But such a paradox has existed. It is very well known, both in and beyond the scientific world, that the late James Ivory was subject to the {143} impression of which I am speaking; and the diaries and other sources of anecdote of our day will certainly, sooner or later, make it a part of his biography. The consequence will be that to his memory will be attached the unfavorable impression which the usual conduct of such persons creates; unless it should happen that some one who knows the real state of the case puts the two sides of it properly together. Ivory was of that note in the scientific world which may be guessed from Laplace's description of him as the first geometer in Britain and one of the first in Europe. Being in possession of accurate knowledge of his peculiarity in more cases than one; and in one case under his own hand: and having been able to make full inquiry about him, especially from my friend the late Thomas Galloway[254]--who came after him at Sandhurst--one of the few persons with whom he was intimate:--I have decided, after full deliberation, to forestall the future biographies.

That Ivory was haunted by the fear of which I have spoken, to the fullest extent, came to my own public and official knowledge, as Secretary of the Astronomical Society. It was the duty of Mr. Epps,[255] the Assistant Secretary, at the time when Francis Baily[256] first announced his discovery of the Flamsteed Papers, to report to me that Mr. Ivory had called at the Society's apartments to inquire into the contents of those papers, and to express his hope that Mr. Baily was not attacking living persons under the names of Newton and Flamsteed.[257] Mr. Galloway, to whom I communicated this, immediately went to Mr. Ivory, and succeeded, after some explanation, in setting him right. This is but one of many instances in which a man of thoroughly sound judgment in every other respect seemed to be under a complete chain of delusions about the conduct of {144} others to himself. But the paradox is this:--I never could learn that Ivory, passing his life under the impression that secret and unprovoked enemies were at work upon his character, ever originated a charge, imputed a bad motive, or allowed himself an uncourteous expression. Some letters of his, now in my possession, referring to a private matter, are, except in the main impression on which they proceed, unobjectionable in every point: they might have been written by a cautious friend, whose object was, if possible, to prevent a difference from becoming a duel without compromising his principal's rights or character. Knowing that in some quarters the knowledge of Ivory's peculiarity is more or less connected with a notion that the usual consequences followed, I think the preceding statement due to his memory.

THREE CLASSES OF JOURNALS.

In such a record as the present, which mixes up the grossest speculative absurdities with every degree of what is better, an instance of another kind may find an appropriate place. The faults of journalism, when merely exposed by other journalism pass by and are no more regarded. A distinct account of an undeniable meanness, recorded in a work of amusement and reference both, may have its use: such a thing may act as a warning. An editor who is going to indulge his private grudge may be prevented from counting upon oblivion as a matter of certainty.

There are three kinds of journals, with reference to the mode of entrance of contributors. First, as a thing which has been, but which now hardly exists, there is the journal in which the editor receives a fixed sum to _find the matter_. In such a journal, every article which the editor can get a friend to give him is so much in his own pocket, which has a great tendency to lower the character of the articles; but I am not concerned with this point. Secondly, there is the journal which is supported by voluntary contributions of {145} matter, the editor selecting. Thirdly, there is the journal in which the contributor is paid by the proprietors in a manner with which the literary editor has nothing to do.

The third class is the safe class, as its editors know: and, as a usual rule, they refuse unpaid contributions of the editorial cast. It is said that when Canning[258] declined a cheque forwarded for an article in the _Quarterly_, John Murray[259] sent it back with a blunt threat that if he did not take his money he could never be admitted again. The great publisher told him that if men like himself in position worked for nothing, all the men like himself in talent who could not afford it would not work for the _Quarterly_. If the above did not happen between Canning and Murray, it _must have happened_ between some other two. Now journals of the second class--and of the first, if such there be--have a fault to which they alone are very liable, to say nothing of the editorial function (see the paper at the beginning, p. 11 et seq.), being very much cramped, a sort of gratitude towards effective contributors leads the journal to help their personal likes and dislikes, and to sympathize with them. Moreover, this sort of journal is more accessible than others to articles conveying personal imputation: and when these provoke discussion, the journal is apt to take the part of the assailant to whom it lent itself in the first instance.

THE MECHANICS' MAGAZINE.

Among the journals which went all lengths with contributors whom they valued, was the _Mechanics' Magazine_[260] in the period 1846-56. I cannot say that matters have not mended in the last ten years: and I draw some {146} presumption that they have mended from my not having heard, since 1856, of anything resembling former proceedings. And on actual inquiry, made since the last sentence was written, I find that the property has changed hands, the editor is no longer the same, and the management is of a different stamp. This journal is chiefly supported by voluntary articles: and it is the journal in which, as above noted, the ridiculous charge against the Astronomer Royal was made in 1849. The following instance of attempt at revenge is so amusing that I select it as the instance of the defect which I intend to illustrate; for its puerility brings out in better relief the points which are not so easily seen in more adult attempts.

The _Mechanics' Magazine_, which by its connection with engineering, etc., had always taken somewhat of a mathematical character, began, a little before 1846, to have more to do with abstract science. Observing this, I began to send short communications, which were always thankfully received, inserted, and well spoken of. Any one who looks for my name in that journal in 1846-49, will see nothing but the most respectful and even laudatory mention. In May 1849 occurred the affair at the Astronomical Society, and my share in forcing the withdrawal of the name of the alleged contributor to the journal. In February 1850 occurred the opportunity of payment. The _Companion to the Almanac_[261] had to be noticed, in which, as then usual, was an article signed with my name. I shall give the review of this article entire, as a sample of a certain style, as well as an illustration of my point. The reader will observe that my name is not mentioned. This would not have done; the readers of the Magazine would have stared to see a name of not infrequent occurrence in previous years all of a sudden fallen from the heaven of respect into the pit of contempt, like Lucifer, son of the morning. But before {147} giving the review, I shall observe that Mr. Adams, in whose _favor_ the attack on the Astronomer Royal was made, did not appreciate the favor; and of course did not come forward to shield his champion. This gave deadly offence, as appear from the following passage, (February 16, 1850):

"It was our intention to enter into a comparison of the contents of our Nautical Almanack with those of its rival, the _Connaissance des Temps_; but we shall defer it for the present. The Nautical Almanack for 1851 will contain Mr. Adams's paper 'On the Perturbation of Uranus'; and when it comes, in due course, before the public, we are quite sure that that gentleman will expect that we shall again enter upon the subject with peculiar delight. Whilst we have a thorough loathing for mean, cowardly, crawlers--we have an especial pleasure in maintaining the claims of men who are truly grateful as well as highly talented: Mr. Adams, therefore, will find that he cannot be disappointed--and the occasion will afford us an opportunity for making the comparison to which we have adverted."

This passage illustrates what I have said on the editorial function (Vol. I, p. 15). What precedes and follows has some criticism on the Government, the Astronomer Royal, etc., but reserved in allusion, oblique in sarcasm, and not fiercely uncourteous. The coarseness of the passage I have quoted shows editorial insertion, which is also shown by its blunder. The inserter is waiting for the Almanac of 1851 that he may review Mr. Adams's paper, which is to be contained in it. His own contributor, only two sentences before the insertion, had said, "The Nautical Almanac, we believe, is published three or four years in advance." In fact, the Almanac for 1851--with Mr. Adams's paper at the end--was published at the end of 1847 or very beginning of 1848; it had therefore been more than two years before the public when the passage quoted was written. And probably every person in the country who was fit to review Mr. Adams's {148} paper--and most of those who were fit to read it--knew that it had been widely circulated, in revise, at the end of 1846: my copy has written on it, "2d revise, December 27, 1846, at noon," in the handwriting of the Superintendent of the Almanac; and I know that there was an extensive issue of these revises, brought out by the Le-Verrier-and-Adams discussion. I now give the review of myself, (February 23, 1850):

"_The British Almanack and Companion._

"The Companion to this Almanack, for some years after its first publication, annually contained scientific articles by Sir J. Lubbock[262] and others of a high order and great interest; we have now, however, closed the publication as a scientific one in remembrance of what it was, and not in consequence of what it is. Its list of contributors on science, has grown 'small by degrees and beautifully less,' until it has dwindled down to one--'a last rose of summer left withering alone.' The one contributor has contributed one paper 'On Ancient and Modern Usage in Reckoning.'

"The learned critic's _chef d'oeuvre_, is considered, by competent judges, to be an Essay on _Old Almanacks_ printed a few years ago in this annual, and supposed to be written with the view of surpassing a profound memoir on the same subject by James O. Halliwell,[263] Esq., F.R. and A.S.S., but the tremendous effort which the learned writer then made to excel many titled competitors for honors in the antique line appears to have had a sad effect upon his mental powers--at any rate, his efforts have since yearly become duller and duller; happily, at last, we should suppose, 'the ancient {149} and modern usage in reckoning' indicates the lowest point to which the _vis inertia_ of the learned writer's peculiar genius can force him.

"We will give a few extracts from the article.

"The learned author says, 'Those who are accustomed to settle the meaning of ancient phrases by self-examination will find some _strange_ conclusions arrived at by us.' The writer never wrote a more correct sentence--it admits of no kind of dispute.

"'Language and counting,' says the learned author, 'both came before the logical discussion of either. It is not allowable to argue that something is or was, because it ought to be or ought to have been. That two negatives make an affirmative, ought to be; if _no_ man have done _nothing_, the man who has done nothing does not exist, and _every_ man has done _something_. But in Greek, and in uneducated English, it is unquestionable that 'no man has done nothing' is only an emphatic way of saying that no man has done _anything_; and it would be absurd to reason that it could not have been so, because it should not.'--p. 5.

"'But there _is_ another difference between old and new times, yet more remarkable, for we have _nothing_ of it now: whereas in things indivisible we count with our fathers, and should say in buying an acre of land, that the result has no parts, and that the purchaser, till he owns all the ground, owns none, the change of possession being instantaneous. This second difference lies in the habit of considering nothing, nought, zero, cipher, or whatever it may be called, to be at the beginning of the scale of numbers. Count four days from Monday: we should now say Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday; formerly, it would have been Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Had we asked, what at that rate is the first day from Monday, all would have stared at a phrase they had never heard. Those who were capable of extending language would have said, Why it must be Monday itself: the rest would have said, there can {150} be no first day from Monday, for the day after is Tuesday, which must be the second day: Monday, one; Tuesday, two,'--p. 10.

"We assure our readers that the whole article is equally lucid, and its logic alike formal.

"There are some exceedingly valuable footnotes; we give one of the most interesting, taken from the learned Mr. Halliwell's profound book on Nursery Rhymes[264]--a celebrated production, for which it is supposed the author was made F.R.S.

"'_One's nine_,
Two's some,
Three's a many,
Four's a penny,
Five's a little hundred.'

'The last line refers to five score, the so-called hundred being more usually six score. The first line, looked at etymologically, is _one is not one_, and the change of thought by which _nine_, the decimal of _one_, aims to be associated with the decimal of _plurality_ is curious:'--Very.

"This valuable and profound essay will very probably be transferred to the next edition of the learned Mr. Halliwell's rare work, of kindred worth, entitled 'RARA MATHEMATICA,' it will then be deservedly handed down to posterity as a covering for cheap trunks--a most appropriate archive for such a treasure."

In December, 1846, the _Mechanics' Magazine_ published a libel on Airy in the matter of the discovery of Neptune. In May, 1849, one * * * was to have been brought forward for election at the Astronomical Society, and was opposed by me and others, on the ground that he was the probable author of this libel, and that he would not, perhaps could {151} not, deny it. [N.B. I no more doubt that he was the author then I doubt that I am the author of this sentence.][265]