Lacock Abbey
6th April 1841
Dear Sir
I have received the following information from an esteemed scientific friend Mr W. C. Trevelyan <1> of Wallington House, Northumberland, he says:
We expect soon that a clever young chemist Dr S. Brown will announce to the Royal Society here<2> some experiments on which he has long been engaged which tend to prove that those bodies which are at present accounted elements may really be isomeric forms of one common element. He has succeeded in proving this with regard to Carbon & Silex having from the former produced the latter; and had also been successful I believe with regard to some of the Metals, & thus proved that the imaginings of the Alchemists were not altogether such dreams as they have usually been considered.”
What do you think of the above intelligence?
I have long entertained similar opinions, but certainly I had very little hope that [illegible deletion] the transmutations could really be effected by the means of experiments we have at our disposal such as heat, galvanism &c
One reason for holding such an opinion, is the infinitesimally small proportion in which certain elements occur such as yttria thorina glucina & many others which appear to play no part of any importance in the material world. To be sure it may be said that these substances may exist abundantly in the interior of the globe, or in other planets, so that the argument is not a very strong one for supposing them accidental modifications of the common elements. Another reason exists I think, in the apparent transmutation of carbon into silex in the flints which are found disseminated in the chalk, & which are supposed to have been medusæ & other inhabitants of the primitive ocean.
Yours truly
H. F. Talbot
Notes:
1. This letter from Walter Calverley Trevelyan, 6th Baronet (1797–1879), naturalist & antiquary, before 6 April, has not been located. WHFT replied on the subject to Trevelyan in Doc. No: 04239.
2. The Royal Society of Edinburgh. Samuel Brown (1817–1856), chemist.