AQ NOTES AND QUERIES. 
(24S. Nog, Jaw. 19. °5¢. 
critic as exclaiming, in a burst of indignation, the 
one of Charles, the other of William, “ The Lord’s 
Anointed, truly !!_ No! A rade, barbarous ruler, 
a mere Russian Bear!” 5 
The last line should be printed with a note of 
admiration after the words, “ Lord’s Anointed!” 
We now rate Quarles above Blackmore, but that 
Pope held them equally in contempt, we have 
sullicient proof, 8. G. R. 
ANECDOTE OF LAPLACE. 
Under this title, in the Journal des Savans for 
1850, M. Biot, then seventy-five years of age, gave 
an account of the benevolent encouragement of La- 
place towards a young aspirant to scientific fame. 
As this journal is but little read in England, the 
substance of the anecdote may be worthy of inser- 
tion in your columns. M. Biot gave his account 
in the character of a person about to make a long 
voyage, and anxious to pay his debts before setting 
out. It may be added that he has not yet taken 
-his departure, and if we may judge from the 
activity of mind shown in a recent account of 
Brewster’s Life of Newton, in the same journal, he 
may remain in his place at the French Institute 
for many years yet. 
The aspirant, of course, was M. Biot himself. 
The first introduction to Laplace took place in 
what he calls an VIII. de la République Frangaise, 
premiere édition. He was then what he terms a 
tout petit Professor of Mathematics at Beauvais, 
forgetting that he was on the point of being nomi- 
nated an associate of the Institute. Fascinated 
with the Mécanique Céleste, so far as then pub- 
lished, he wrote to Laplace, without any introduc- 
tion, begging to have the sheets as fast as they were 
printed. Laplace politely answered that he would 
rather the public judged of the whole volume at 
once. M. Biot replied that he was not of the 
public which judged, but of the public which 
studied; and that he might hope, by working 
through the whole, to correct a few misprints. 
Laplace wielded to this’ inducement, and M. Biot, 
at each of his journeys to Paris, used to return 
the sheets with his corrections, and to receive 
help in his difficulties. These last generally oc- 
curred at places where the author had abbreviated 
a train of thought into “It is easy to see;” and 
M. Biot remembers an occasion on which Laplace 
himself was nearly an hour in trying to recover 
what he had hidden under the mysterious symbol, 
“Ii est aisé de voir.” The Mécanique Céleste may 
be presumed to be a difficult book: the reader 
will find it so, if he try. When a student at Cam- 
bridge, I asked a teacher of mine, who will per- 
haps not remember it (if he should see this), what 
swere the existing helps to reading Laplace: he 
answered, ‘‘ A few reams of paper and five hun- 
dred of the best quills.” d 
A short time after personal acquaintance had 
thus commenced, M. Biot had the good fortune 
to find a method of applying what mathematicians 
now ¢all equations of mixed differences to the direct 
and general solution of some problems which 
Euler had treated only indirectly. He took his 
solution to Laplace, who heard of it with some 
apparent surprise, examined the manuscript at- 
tentively, and pronounced that M. Biot had in- 
vented the true method. “ But,” said he, “ the 
apercus of further progress which you give at the 
end are seen from too great a distance. Do not 
go beyond the results you have obtained, You 
will probably find the subsequent analysis more 
difficult than you reckon on.” After some re- 
sistance, M. Biot agreed to omit this portion, and 
Laplace desired him to present the memoir to the 
Institute the next day, and to dine with him after- 
wards. Accordingly, the next day, M. Biot read 
and explained his method at a meeting at which, 
among others, General Bonaparte was present. 
The paper gave satisfaction to all present, and La- 
place, Bonaparte (who took especial interest in 
every thing which came from a pupil of the Poly- 
technic School), and Lacroix, were appointed a 
committee of examination. M. Biot walked home 
with Laplace. When they arrived, Laplace took 
M. Biot into his cabinet, and producing sheets of 
paper yellow with age, showed him the very method 
which he thought he had been the first to invent. 
Laplace’ had been stopped at the point at which 
M. Biot left off, and had put the papers by, hoping 
at some future time to conquer the ulterior dif- 
ficulties which he had hinted to M. Biot might 
perhaps exist. He then required absolute silence 
on the subject, avoided, in the report, all allusion 
to what he had done, and would not allow M. Biot 
to give any hint of his own previous researches 
in the published memoir. In 1850, twenty-three 
years after Laplace’s death, M. Biot felt himself at 
liberty to pay the debt of gratitude to his benefac- 
tor, in amanner which does honour to both. M. 
SCOTCH CHURCH, SWALLOW STREET, PICCADILLY. 
The Scotch Church in Swallow Street, Picca-° 
dilly, I do not find to be mentioned either by 
Cunningham or Timbs, and I therefore take the 
opportunity cf communicating the following docu- 
ment, extracted from the Treasury Crown Lease . 
Book (No. 1. p.471.), which affords a compicte 
history of the foundation of this church. The 
French Protestant Chapel, which Mr. Anderson, 
the petitioner, purchased, and converted into a 
Presbyterian meeting-house, was founded in the 
year 1692; it is mentioned in Weiss’s History of 
the French Protestant Refugees, and referred to 
by Timbs in a note at p. 658., under the title 
Savoy. 
