180 THE LIFE OF JAMES D. FORBES. [CHAP. 



will form the best record of his life for most of its future 

 years. 



To E. BATTEN, ESQ. 



'EDINBURGH, December 6th, 1846. 



' . . . The old Dean is now a green grass-plot. I 

 looked in the other day the gateway-bell and all is as 

 it was. How that bell reminded me of you ! how often 

 at its sound have I started up to see you walking up the 

 avenue ! The avenue and the holly -hedges are there ; 

 but, instead of terminating in the tall pile of masonry, it 

 opens on a flat turf soon to be full of graves. Nothing 

 more surely was wanted to point a moral. . . . 



* My class, together with the Royal Society, affords me 

 nearly as much work as I can overtake, and sometimes 

 I am very tired ; but my class is so attentive and ear- 

 nest that I cannot but do my best, and I am thankful 

 to feel more vigorous than I have done for some wim 

 A week ago I had eighty-five papers given in, containing 

 answers to thirteen questions ; the week before I had 

 eighty-three : so you see I have some evenings' work 

 with such a class. Viva voce examinations on Saturdays 

 make little way. I think of trying six or seven minutes' 

 examination at the beginning of each lecture/ 



To the Same. 



'EDINBURGH, Jan. IQth, 1847. 



' . . . You must allow me some voice in deciding 

 whether the glacier question may safely be abandoned 

 to itself. Your repeated assurances that everyone is 

 satisfied are very pleasing, as expressing a sort of public 

 opinion ; but I have the very best reasons for knowing 

 that only a small portion of strict men of science, whose 

 opinion must ultimately decide the matter, are convinced, 

 or at least, if convinced, have the candour to allow it. Dr. 

 Whewell has spoken out manfully in the new edition of 

 his " Inductive History," and I hope Lyell will do as 

 much, and then we may expect others to follow. But 

 the result of my reading in the history of science is that 

 in questions of mixed evidence like this a man must 



