Lelirjahre and Wauderjahre 163 



might liave been for after reading them through carefully 5 times I abandoned all hope of 

 making out the meaning of any one single line in utter despair. The words appear all 

 bewitched for I can't make out which is substantive and which is nominative case etc. etc. 

 As a specimen " Debtor to balance agreed £. ." — Should you have spare time, would 

 you be so kind as to write two or three lines in account book style with their interpreta- 

 tion in popular English and then I have no doubt but that I shall make out the rest of 

 the paper, which you so kindly sent me. 



My box arrived safely and the books inside in good preservation, with the exception 

 of one book right through which, like Sisera's temples, a hobnail was driven — however it 

 was only some temperance tracts bound up and therefore it is quite immaterial. Emma 

 was not sure whether my D'Israeli's Curiosities of Literature was packed up — it is. 



I like Hopkins more and more every day, and I never enjoyed Cambridge so 

 thoroughly. Love to all. 



Goodbye, Your affectionate Son, Fras. Galton. 



The following letter gives a vivid picture of a famous mathematical 

 coach and enables us still better to realise the Cambridge life of those 



days : 



Trinity, 



Thursday Eveiting, 



My dear Father, Nov. [11] 1841. 



Thanks for the second edition of my accounts which I received this morning, 

 and still greater thanks for the explanatory notes by Bessy thereunto attached'. 



Hopkins progresses capitally. I had forgotten to tell you that I find that his 

 charges are only £72 per annum instead of £100 as currently reported : this will make 

 a jolly difference to my finances. Hopkins to use a Cantab expression is a regular 

 brick ; tells funny stories connected with diflFerent problems and is no way Donnish ; he 

 rattles us on at a splendid pace and makes mathematics anything but a dry subject by 

 entering thoroughly into its metaphysics. I never enjoyed anything so much before. 

 I made my first acquaintance with Laplace today, in one of his theorems, greatly to my 

 satisfaction. 



H has not returned to Cambridge. He is an utter Puseyite, he dances much 



and instructs his partners in the "Fathers" and in their controversies. Eddis and 

 Mathison both bloom. I wined with the former last night, who decidedly has not 

 recovered from tender impressions received at Keswick. He spoke on walking in the 

 cloisters by moonlight, and quoted Byron. He is therefore hopeless. 



I am going to become a member of the Camden Antiquarian Society as being 

 a gentlemanly thing and really very amusing. The subscription is 7 shillings a term 

 until £.3 has been paid when the subscriber becomes an honorary member, and is released 

 from further subscription retaining the same privileges. Whewell is expected next week 

 in Cambridge. He is not Vice-Chancellor this year as Dr Archdall of Emmanuel has 

 been elected to that office. 



' " Lord Torment and Tease," as he had been called at an earlier date, neither 

 deserved that second edition nor the commentary ; the accounts were beautifully simple 

 and clear, and we may shrewdly suspect he understood them. 



21—2 



