STUDENT AT EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY 7 



markedly excelled in comparison with the best of their fellow students. 

 Tait was third in the honours list of the five men who formed the first 

 division. The Gold Medal, which was awarded to the student who made 

 most marks in the special examinations in the highest division, was gained 

 by James Sime, one of the most brilliant students of his day, and well 

 known in Edinburgh educational circles throughout a long and active life. 

 In the examinations on Newton's Principia (first three sections) and 

 Airy's Tracts (probably that on the undulatory theory of light), Sime 

 gained twice as many marks as Tait. In the ordinary examinations on 

 the Class Lectures Tait had a slight advantage, although a wrong addition 

 in the class book makes him a mark or two behind Sime. The prize 

 was, however, gained by Maxwell. It is not a little curious that the 

 Gold Medal was not won by Balfour Stewart in 1846, nor by Tait in 

 1848, nor by Maxwell in 1849; and yet Edinburgh University can claim 

 no greater names in physical science than these three. 



An interesting fact which I learned from Tait himself is worth 

 recording. On one occasion when, in preparation for a lecture on statics, 

 I was arranging and admiring the models of catenaries of various forms 

 which belong to the Natural Philosophy Museum of Edinburgh University, 

 Tait remarked, " I helped Forbes to make these when I was a young 

 student here." The models were constructed of beautifully turned disks of 

 wood of suitable form, suitably strung together, and represented the common 

 catenary, the circular arc catenary and the catenaries of parabolic form and 

 of uniform strength. I pointed to the last word " strength " which was 

 misspelled, the penultimate letter being dropped probably from want of 

 room, and said in joke, "Is this an example of your accuracy?" "Ah," 

 he rejoined, " I was responsible only for the calculations of the sizes of 

 the disks, not for anything else." 



Clerk Maxwell spent three sessions in Edinburgh University before 

 he decided to go to Cambridge ; but Tait was content with one session, 

 and began his mathematical training in Cambridge before he was 

 eighteen. 



