ATOMIC THEORY. 



or twelve stanzas, addressed to an ^Eolian lyre ; and written 

 in 1796, at a time when his feelings seem to have been some- 

 what excited by the beauty and talents of a young Quaker 

 lady, whose family he occasionally visited at Lancaster. In 

 letters to his brother he describes these qualities with more 

 warmth and in greater detail than we should have expected ; 

 yet still with a certain philosophical method and a strong- 

 leaning to the ' tabular form] which delineate the man 

 almost as well as the lady whom he admires. With regard to 

 the verses, they surprise us from being very much in the Delia 

 Crusca style ; and as poetry we can hardly commend them. 

 Yet we give a stanza below, which will not be thought defi- 

 cient either in harmony or feeling. In reading it we have 

 a difficulty in recognising either the Quaker or the hard dry 

 mathematician of the Kendal school.* 



Whatever might be the state of Dalton s feelings at this 

 time, result there was none. The same condition of life con- 

 tinued ; one which probably made marriage impossible, even 

 had he not been already wedded to those very different 

 pursuits which gave happiness as well as honour to his life. 

 It was about this year, 1796, that Chemistry first engaged 

 his attention ; and as a Member of the Manchester Literary 

 and Philosophical Institution (of which he afterwards became 

 President) he placed before them in successive years a series 

 of papers of great value in connection with this and other 

 branches of Natural Philosophy ; evincing both the extent of 

 his objects and the energetic and successful labour he bestowed 

 upon them. Without enumerating these different Memoirs, 

 we may say generally that the most important of them relate 

 to the weight, temperature, and moisture of the atmosphere ; 



* Again the slowly rising notes assail 



As if some tender maid, unseen, unknown, 

 Sigh'd for neglect yet tuneful swell' d the gale, 



To nielt th' unfeeling heart with sorrow's plaintive moan. 



