British Museum
13^th February 1871

My dear Sir

It is with great regret I find you will not accept the office of President^<1> .

as you could have done more justice to it – than I possibly could – Any papers that you would contribute to it would be most acceptable as the difficulty of starting with good scientific papers and memoirs is as great as obtaining a large following. It is unfortunate that the machinery of Societies costs so much but we are endeavoring to start as moderately and yet respectably as possible. Like you I consider the Journal^<2> the one thing essential and as soon as the Inaugural meeting has been made, and the Council nominated I shall set about seeing what can be done. Perhaps a publisher might undertake a Journal of a certain extent provided the Society took a certain number of copies. At present our numbers are under 50 and it would not be possible to start a journal till the Society had one hundred enrolled. I am sorry to say that no money was to be had for excavations in Assyria and Babylonia – for it was my intention to have initiated some more diggings in those regions. The IV. Volume of Cuneiform inscriptions is in hand^<3>.

– and will commence with bilinguals. The North British Review in its final number has an Assyrian and Egyptian article but that vehicle will it is to be feared cease soon.^<4>.

The III Volume it appears is on the point of issuing and your wishes that your copy should be sent to your address at Edinburgh.^<5>

have been sent in by me to the proper authorities you will no doubt receive it in a few days M^r G. Smith has 32 more pages of his work which he will post to you in a day or two^<6>

Believe me yours very trly
S Birch

H. Fox Talbot Esq^e
&c &c &c

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Notes:

1. President of the Society of Biblical Archæology - see Birch's invitation: Doc. No: 09753 and WHFT's reasons for declining Doc. No: 09754. In the end, Birch became the inaugual President.

2. In 1872, the first volume of The Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archæology was published - WHFT was a regular contributor and they published an important obituary of him upon his death.

3. British Museum, Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, v. 4, 1875.

4. An important quarterly, The North British Review ceased publication with the January 1871 issue, v. 53 no. 106 (which contained the reviews Birch mentioned). The journal had started publication in 1844 as a Scottish counter-balance to the conservative Quarterly Review and secular Edinburgh Review, with early contributions from members of the newly-formed Free Church of Scotland. Its demise came as a surprise, especially since in 1869 it had announced plans to expand its coverage.

5. British Museum, Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities, The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, v. 3, 1870 - for WHFT's request, see Doc. No: 09754.

6. George Smith (1840-1876), bank-note engraver, Assyriologist. WHFT was helping to edit his text, which was published as History of Assurbanipal, translated from the cuneiform inscriptions (London: Williams & Norgate, 1871).