Stamford. <1>
Jan. 22. 1823.
Dear Talbot,
I send you the Tripos of this year –
| Dr Airy Trin. <2> | Sen. Op. <3> | Jun. Op. |
| – Jeffreys, <4> Joh. | Cory Emm. <5> | Wilson Cath. <6> |
| – Mason. Joh. <7> | Munns Joh. | Hoddart, Chr. |
| Drinkwater. Trin <8> | Howarth Joh. <9> | Cane Joh <10> |
| Myers. Trin <11> | Lutwidge Joh. <12> | Blake, Pemb <13> |
| Foley Emm. <14> | Birkett. Joh. <15> | Backhouse, Clare <16> |
| Fisher Pet. <17> | Crick Joh. <18> | Daniel, Clare <19> |
| Hamilton Joh. <20> | Kerrick Chr. <21> | Rothman Trin <22> |
| Buckle Trin. <23> | Miller Chr. <24> | Menteath. Trin <25> |
| Field Trin. <26> | Cubit Chr. <27> | Milner. Joh. <28> |
| Hodgson, Pet. <29> | Childers Trin. <30> | Hine. Sidney <31> |
| Hevenson. Joh. | Ayre, Caius <32> | Birch, Joh. <33> |
| Punnet, Clare <34> | Hildyard. Cath <35> | Leapingwell! C. C. C. <36> |
| Sutcliff, Trin <37> | Russell. Cath. | Barber, Joh.. <38> |
| Clowes, Qu. <39> | Bainbridge, Joh. <40> | May Joh. <41> |
| Winning, Trin. <42> | Paynter Trin. <43> | Boultbee. Joh. <44> |
| Rusby, Cath. <45> | Wilson Joh. | Boileau!!!!!!!!!! Trin. <46> |
| Sandys. Qu <47> | Herring, Caius. <48> | |
| Carrie, Pem. | Green. Cath <49> | |
| Brett, C.C.C. <50> | Taylor Cath <51> | |
| Cooper, Joh. <52> | Carlyon, Pemb. <53> | |
| Kempson Trin. <54> | Place Trin. <55> | |
| Waring, Mag. <56> | Welsby Joh. <57> | |
| Beauclerk, Caius <58> | Bryan. Joh. <59> | |
| Marshall, Qu. <60> Wharton, Joh. <61> |
Pettit, Trin <62> Sergeant, Joh. <63> |
To this list the St James’s Chronicle adds, “It is thought that Dr Airy is the greatest Mathematician that Cambridge has had since the immortal Newton, <64> and he is expected to extend the boundaries of science. He has already published articles in the Phil. Trans. and improved the Telescope.<65> He is said to be 700 marks before Dr Jeffreys, and no discredit to the latter either”
Drinkwater has been playing the fool all the last year, and has now received his reward. Mason married a wife in the last term, and on his wedding-day took a tour round by Madingley and How-House.
You will probably have heard of poor William’s <66> death before this reaches you; he was carried off by a fever on the third of November, a few weeks after he had commenced his medical studies in London. I heard of his illness on a Monday, and continued to receive very favourable [sic] accounts till the next Sunday, when my mother’s letter said that he was not quite so well, but that his medical attendants attributed this to his agitation at parting with my father, who went down to Stamford on Thursday Evening thinking him almost out of danger. Though this account alarmed me a little, still I was far from apprehending that his disease would terminate fatally. However I went up to town, where I arrived at 11 o’clock on Monday night, hurried off to his lodgings in the Borough, and was told by the maid-servant (to whom I of course was a stranger) that he was dead. I attended his funeral on the Thursday, and on that day week returned again to Liverpool, to toil through 5 more weeks as I might. What a change to me since January last, when I was with him at Cambridge during the Senate-House week! To add to my misery I am obliged to return to Liverpool till Easter, as I have not been able to find a substitute – I am going off in a few hours.
After this accounts of my prospects and misfortunes you cannot expect me to answer your amusing letters as they deserve. I will extract some passages from two letters which I have just received from Key <67> and Matthews. <68> Key says “The Fellowship prospect is much the same; Bird <69> is every day deferring his marriage, <70> but Lambert <71> is very ill, so much so that his friends have been to Cambridge to remove his private papers. Amos <72> of course vacates his Fellowship, and most probably, or rather certainly, Hustler. <73> You are aware how the latter has this last term destroyed the little character he ever had” He has been trying to revive an old statute, by which he, as being a B.D, could claim a living before the Masters of Arts. The living in dispute was Enfield, which was given to Cresswell, who got the degree of D.D by royal mandamus. Hustler was sent to Coventry, and the Master will not a[llow] <74> any more men to be entered on his side. Matthews is still delighted with his situation, though his raptures have been rather lowered by a three weeks vacation spent at Cambridge. He has been beating Dr Wollaston <75> at Chess. Also he talks about sitting for a fellowship “that he may enjoy in his retirement the honos ET dulce lucellum; if he you see his fellowship reading by his quotations.<76> You do me injustice as to Botany; I took it up strenously [sic] after I saw you at Normanton, <77> and putting aside the Grasses & Crypts, <78> consider myself to shine among the natives. I have also taken up German & read Bürger’s <79> Ballads with tolerable ease. Worsley <80> passed through here a few weeks since. Cobbet <81> & Sir C Wolseley <82> are going to oppose Scarlett at Peterborough. <83> Copley <84> did not get a vote at Trin. Musgrave <85> said “Sir John Copley I am still a Whig.”
Field<86> & Crick Joh. will be the Medallists I suppose, unless Pettit can come it. Write to me at L’pool [5 Cornwallis Street].
I am etc Your very sincere Friend
T. K. Arnold
W. H. F. Talbot, Esq
Palazzo Ceva,
a Roma
Napoli <87>
Notes:
1. Stamford is 10 miles north of Peterborough.
2. Sir George Biddell Airy (1801–1892), Astronomer Royal from 1835-1881.
3. Senior Optime.
4. Charles Jeffreys (d. 1862), emigrated to New Zealand.
5. Robert Cory (1802–1885), clergy.
6. Edward Wilson (1802–1859), clergy.
7. Peter Mason (1794–1866).
8. John Elliot Drinkwater (1801–1851), public administrator in India.
9. Henry Howarth (1801–1876), chaplain to Queen Victoria.
10. Thomas Coats Cane (1801–1887), clergy.
11. Charles John Myers (1801–1870), mathematician.
12. Charles Henry Lutwidge (1800–1843), clergy.
13. Robert Philip Blake (1801–1841).
14. Richard Foley.
15. George William Birkett (1799–1877), clergy and poet.
16. Ralph Drake Backhouse (d. 1853), clergy.
17. Edmund Fisher (1802–1881), clergy. [See Doc. No: 01128].
18. Thomas Crick (1801–1870), St Johns College, clergy. Chancellor's Gold Medal, 1823, for Classical Studies.
19. Richard Daniel (d. 1864), clergy.
20. Edward Michael Hamilton (1802–1860), of Brown Hall, Ballinfra, Ireland.
21. Richard Edward Kerrick (1801–1872), clergy.
22. Richard Wellesley Rothman (1798–1856), foreign secretary from 1840 to 1842.
23. John Buckle (1800–1891), lawyer.
24. Stanley Miller (1801–1878), clergy.
25. Charles Granville Stuart Menteath (1800–1880), barrister.
26. Frederick Field (1801–1885), clergy. Chancellor's Gold Medal, 1823, for Classical Studies.
27. John Cubit (1800–1846).
28. Richard Milner, clergy.
29. William Hodgson (d. 1847), tutor.
30. Eardly Childers (1797–1831).
31. George Henry Hine (b. 1800).
32. John Ayre (1801–1869), general secretary and librarian of the Parker Society.
33. Edward Birch, clergy
34. John Punnet (1801–1863), clergy.
35. Robert Charles Hildyard (1800–1857), lawyer.
36. George Leapingwell (1801–1863), lawyer and deputy recorder of Cambridge.
37. William Sutcliff (1801–1852), high sheriff of Bedforshire.
38. John Barber (1801–1868), clergy at Gibraltar.
39. Thomas Clowes (1801–1862).
40. James Bainbridge, solicitor.
41. Charles May, went on to a career in the army.
42. William Balfour Winning (1801–1845), writer on philology.
43. Samuel Paynter (1801–1893), chaplain to the Marquees of Ailsa.
44. Francis Boultbee (d. 1823).
45. Samuel Stones Rusby (1799–1879), clergy.
46. Simeon John Boileau (1799–1863), lawyer in Madras.
47. John Sandys (1799–1879), clergy.
48. Charles Barnwell Herring (1801–1882), clergy.
49. Daniel Green.
50. William Brett (1798–1855), clergy.
51. Thomas Taylor (1800–1890), clergy.
52. Henry John Cooper (1801–1845).
53. Thomas Stackhouse Carlyon (1802–1877), clergy.
54. Edwin Kempson (1800–1878), clergy.
55. William Henry Place, lawyer.
56. William Waring (1801–1877), clergy.
57. William Newland Welsby (d. 1864), lawyer.
58. Charles Robert Beauclerk (1801–1872), lawyer.
59. George Bryan (1800–1889), clergy.
60. William Marshall.
61. John Louis Pettit (1801–1868), writer on architecture.
62. Robert Wharton (d. 1849), lawyer and judge.
63. Oswald Sergeant (d. 1854), chaplain to the Marquees of Stafford.
64. Isaac Newton (1642–1727), English physicist and mathematician.
65. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Airy's earliest known publication in there was in 1826, after which he was a prodigious contributor. Perhaps Arnold had personal knowledge of a work already accepted and pending publication?
66. William Langton Arnold (1801– 3 Nov 1822), the first chemical scholar elected on the Micklebrough Foundation.
67. Thomas Hewitt Key (1799–1875), philologist.
68. Probably Frederick Hoskyns Matthews (b. 1798), author of Fancies and fragments: including imitations of favourite passages from the Greek, Latin, and French, with special allusions to the locality of Hereford (London: 1878).
69. Charles Smith Bird (1795–1862), clergy, entomologist, and writer on theology.
70. See Doc. No: 01097.
71. James Lambert (1742–1823), professor on Greek from 1771 to 1780, although not very active in the 19th century, he managed to hold on to his fellowship until his death.
72. Probably Andrew Amos (d. 1860), first professor of English law at University College, London.
73. James Devereux Hustler (1784–1844), mathematician, married Elizabeth Mansel in 1823.
74. Text torn away under seal.
75. William Hyde Wollaston (1766–1828), chemist, manufacturer, physicist, optician and medical researcher.
76. Horace, Epistle I, 1.18, lines 102-103. The original Latin was slightly different: 'quid pure tranquillet, honos an dulce lucellum, an secretum iter et fallentis semita vitae' = What gives you unruffled calm - honour, or the sweets of dear gain, or a secluded journey along the pathwayof life unnoticed?
77. Normanton, Rutlandshire.
78. ‘Cryptogamia’, species with hidden seeds.
79. Gottfried August Bürger (1747–1794), one of the founders of German Romantic ballad literature.
80. Rev Thomas Worsley (1797–1885), theologian & Master of Downing College, Cambridge.
81. William Cobbett (1763–1835), writer, politician and agriculturalist.
82. Sir Charles Wolseley.
83. James Scarlett, first Baron of Abinger (1769–1844), whig MP for Peterborough from 1819 to 1830, with a break from 1822 to 1823.
84. Sir Richard Musgrave (1790–1859), MP.
85. Sir John Copley, Lord Lyndhurst (b. 1772), Chancellor of the Exchequer 1830.
86. Frederick Field (1801-1885), of Trinity College, theologian and biblical scholar.
87. Readdressed in another hand.