1838-39- LABORATORY DUTIES. 67 



doubts whether I ought to send them. The mill for grinding 

 corn, for instance, is a great block of stone with a hollow 

 worn in it of about three inches in depth, and the mortar, 

 exactly like the Egyptian, is about the size of a man's body. 

 A web in process of weaving, is an uncouth affair, as indeed 

 everything here is. They have not improved a bit since 

 Tubal Cain, and those old fogies, drove a little into their 

 heads. Such as they are, however, you shall see them 

 some day." 



Further details of Laboratory duties are given in writing 

 home. " I go to the Laboratory at nine o'clock, and do 

 not finally leave it till five o'clock. Long as these hours 

 are, they are agreeably broken up : thus, at eleven o'clock, 

 I go in to hear Mr. Graham's lecture ; at two I go home to 

 dinner, and at five I leave finally. Three days a week there 

 will be a practical class, where I shall have to assist, so 

 that there will be no room for wearying. You will observe 

 I am never more than two hours continuously at work : at 

 Dr. Christison's Laboratory I was often four or five, and as 

 many at Richmond Court always. My lodgings are at a 

 mile's distance from the University, so that I shall have 

 a comfortably long walk, to and from my working place, 

 twice each day." 



In another letter, he writes, U I shall not send any 

 papers to the journals, so do not look for such things; 

 my Thesis must be my first labour, and till that is done, 

 every other subject must be laid by. Nor is it likely I 

 should write if I had the time, though I have many things 

 in hand ; I am more anxious at present to be a learner than 

 a teacher, and still look to more profitably extending science 

 hereafter, by storing myself with all the truths it has already 

 gathered. 



F 2 



