Dear Sir,
I write this hurried note to say that we get the Comptes Rendus <1> in for our Library. The articles you refer to must have been in Nos which came here in my absence.
I intend to be in Oxford in Queens College, on the 24th, and if you could give me then the information you refer to, it will be in time <2> – but just in time. I hope you will be able to give me some other information on the Talbotype <3>. I wish to review your Pencil of Nature, <4> but I have not a Copy, having only seen three Nos. <5>–
I think you shd send a copy to all the leading Reviews, which is the cheapest and most effective method of advertising. I do this with my own Works, and the Expense amounts to nothing more than the prime Cost of the Work. The advantage to be derived to the proprietor from this effective way of advertising, being proportional to the cost of the work, the principle is as applicable to an expensive as to a low priced work.
If I had the Pencil of Nature I could give an Analysis of its Contents, whereas without it I can only generally refer to it. If you send it to me I will return it to your Publisher, <6> as new as when it reached me.
Ever Most Truly yrs
D Brewster
St Leonards’ College
St Andrews
June 14th 1847
H. Fox Talbot Esqr
Notes:
1. Comptes Rendus hebdomadaires des séances de l’ de l’Académie des Sciences.
2. For the article Brewster was writing:. The North British Review was originally a journal of the Free Church of Scotland. Brewster’s "Article VIII - Photography" was published in v. 7 no. 14, August 1847, pp. 465-504, and was essentially a collected book review that he used to summarise the history and current state of photography. His sections were: 1. Researches on Light; An Examination of all the Phenomena connected with the Chemical and Molecular Changes produced by the influences of the Solar Rays, embracing all the known Photographic Processes, and new Discoveries in the Art. By Robert Hunt, Secretary to the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society. Pp. 304. London, 1844. / 2. A Treatise on the Forces which produce the Organization of Plants; with an Appendix containing several Memoirs on Capillary Attraction, Electricity, and the Chemical Action of Light. By John William Draper, M.D., Professor of Chemistry in the University of New York. royal 4to, pp. 324. New York, 1844. / 3. Nouvelles Instructions sur l’usage du Daguerreotype. Par Charles Chevalier. Paris, 1841. / 4. Mélanges Photographiques. Complement des nouvelles Instructions sur l’usage du Daguereotype. Pp. 128. Paris, 1844. /5. The Pencil of Nature. By Henry Fox Talbot, Esq., F.R.S., &c., &c. Nos. I., II., III., IV., V. London, 1844. / 6. Traité de Photographie, contenant tous les perfectionnements trouvée jusqu’à ce jour, appareil panoramique, différences des foyers, gravure Fizeau, &c. Par Lerebours et Secretans, Opticiens de l’Observatoire, et de lat Marine. 5me. Edit. Pp. 268. Paris, Octobre 1846. / 7. Des Papiers Photographiques, Procédés de M. Blanquart-Evrard et autres, avec Notes de N.P. Lerebours. P. 31. Paris, Mar. 1847. / 8. Excursions Daguerriennes. Collection de 114 Planches, représentant les vues et les monumens les plus remarquables du Globe. 2 Vols.
3. Although WHFT modestly used the term Calotype for his new process, Brewster and some other close friends preferred to honour the name of the inventor, in parallel with the Daguerreotype.
4. WHFT, The Pencil of Nature (London: Longman, Brown, Green, & Longmans, June 1844–April 1846 [issued in six fascicles]).
5. The first three were published in June 1844 and in January and May, 1845 respectively.
6. Longman, Brown, Green & Longmans.