Abstract
MESSRS. H. SOTHERAN of 2 Sackville Street, Piccadilly, W.1, have just issued an annotated catalogue of works on physics comprising the library of John Tyndall (1820–93), professor of natural philosophy at the Royal Institution, and including also other items. Of special interest are such unique items as a manuscript catalogue of the library with nearly two thousand entries, together with numerous scientific notes of Prof. Tyndall and short autobiographical details of his boyhood. Another notebook of seventy pages contains notes of his original drafts of papers and reviews with suggestions of experiments to be made. A great deal consists of personal notes, not without their humorous aspect. Of Forbes he writes, "The late Principal J. D. Forbes was a man not slow to anger. He was so sensitive as to his fame, and so eager to secure it that honest criticism was regarded by him in the light of personal attack"—typical English understatement remembering the Forbes–Rendu–Tyndall glacier controversy. Other notes connected with Ruskin and Prof. Tait include "I have heard Prof. Tait described as a rude overgrown schoolboy". The same note-book contains the first draft of his sensational presidential address at the Belfast meeting of the British Association. The catalogue of more than a thousand items includes many volumes with Tyndall's pencilled notes. Such rare works as a first edition of Huygens "Traité de la Lumière" with the full name on the title-page also appear.
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Tyndall's Library. Nature 155, 199 (1945). https://doi.org/10.1038/155199a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/155199a0