1844.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



427 



gained by the omission," and fiirtlipr as to priority of discovery, " Mr. 

 Nicliolson had the means in his hand, but did not then tliink of ap- 

 plying them. Did lie do so aftcrmarch f His own words previonsly 

 quoted, show that the " non-tigiirate method" was first revealed to 

 him by Jlr. Horner's paper," and finally dismisses the claim of Mr. 

 Nicholson as nnintelligible, and nothing more than a total mistake." 

 But before the paper is concluded, and in reference not to priority of 

 discovery, but to Mr. Nicholson's statement of the introduction of an 

 improvement, as stated at p. 120 of his " Increments," the writer of 

 tile paper in thi? " British Almanac slates," Mr. Nicholson has ob- 

 tained what he stated to have been his object, viz. "the placing of 

 corresponding processes in the same horizontal line ; but further ob- 

 serves, " by sacrificing a much more important element of arithme- 

 tical accuracy. Numbers which are to be added together should 

 always be written under one another ; whereas in Mr. Nicholson's 

 form, this is very frequently not the case. We think that the brevity 

 of his method can profit no one but a very expert arithmetician in- 

 deed ; that its facility is considerably below that of the fo^m given by 

 Mr. Horner; and that in point of perspicuity it is hardly as good. 

 The introduction of the ciphers is a decided improvement;" and, 

 further, in reference to parties claiming the merit of new discoveries 

 regrets that they do not make themselves better acquainted with the 

 previous history of the science to the improvement of which they lay 

 claim, and says in reference to Mr. Horner, that had he done so, " it 

 is more than probable that his lionours would not have been claimed 

 by others." The writer claims, therefore, the discovery in question 

 for Mr. Horner. This subject of priority of discovery between Mr. 

 Nicholson and Mr. Horner, is noticed in " The Monthly Review," vol. 

 93, 1820, "after explaining Mr. Horner's method of solving equa- 

 tions, we observed that Mr. Nicholson had also succeeded in attaining 

 a method of approximation, which though in some degree less general, 

 was still fundamentally the same;" and "that these two gentlemen by 

 following writers altogether diftVrent, have arrived very nearly at the 

 same time, at the same point of destination; and it is remarkable that 

 it should be one which lias been sought in vain for by all the most emi- 

 nent algebraists of the last two centuries," and further, " that Mr. 

 Nicholson did not claim the exclusive merit of the discovery, but only 

 an improvement on the method communicated to him by Mr. Theo- 

 philus Holdred or Holdroid, and that they afterwards disagreed, which 

 was the means of leaving Mr. Holdred fir behind Mr. Horner in his 

 claim to the discovery ; but that from the works of Mr. Nicholson it 

 is clear that Mr. Holdred was in possession of the method long before 

 Mr. Horner; and that certainly Mr. Nicholson published his account 

 of Mr. Holdred's method of approximation before Mr. Horner's paper 

 appeared, although the paper was read before Mr.Nicholson's book had 

 issued from the press. It also appears that Mr. Holdred was in pos- 

 session of his approximation ten years before his acquaintance with 

 Mr. Nicholson, and, until then, was unaware of the great task which 

 he had accomplished." 



Mr. Nicholson gave me a rule in 1835, which I think has never been 

 published, for " A New Method of Extracting the Cube Root ;" it is 

 given in the Appendix. 



When the writer of this memoir first made the acquaintance of Mr. 

 Nicholson, his wife was then alive, and he lived in the back part of 

 what had been the old prison of Morpeth, and which had been con- 

 verted into dwellings under his superintendence, and there is an 

 arched passage which is the covering of a frustrura of a cone, so 

 that even in this humble dwelling he has left evidence of his handy- 

 work. The writer was then very young, and had been just bound 

 apprentice to a carpenter, and was fivouied by a loan from Mr. 

 Nicholson of his work on " Perspective," and TurnbuU's " Treatise 

 on the Strength of Cast Iron." When Mr. Nicholson came to New- 

 castle, the writer became one of his pupils, and continued so as long 

 as he kept his school in the Arcade. On going to London in search 

 of employment, Mr. Nicholson furnished him with recommendations, 

 and during his stay in London he received many kind letters from 

 liim. After returning to the North, which was a year before Mr. 

 Nicholson left Newcastle, he had 0|iporturiities of returning the kind- 

 ness of his venerable preceptor, and when Mr. Nicholson resided in 

 Carlisle visited him a few months before he died, viz., on Feb. 18, 

 1844, when he found him bedridden by infirmity, with difficulty being 

 able to breathe, and scarcely able to articulate, yet he knew the coun- 

 tenance and pronounced the name. At that time he was seldom out 

 of bed and unable to write, and had no subsistence but from the libe- 

 rality of bis relative, Thos. Jamieson, Esq. Being at a distance from 

 his relatives, they were precluded from attending him in his last 

 moments, which were passed amidst strangers, who, however, gave 

 him every attention. As to the want of pecuniary success of Mr. 

 Nicholson's works, at the meeting held in Newcastle to get up a sub- 

 scription, it was stated, lie made engagements with designing men 



which tended much to his disadvantage, and that the profits were ap- 

 propriated by the publishers, and that some of his works were of a de- 

 scription that did not sell readily; yet among this description of works 

 the sale of them had exceeded the sale of all others, and became 

 as it were, a test of the repute in which his talents were held. I 

 have heard that forty thousand pounds were realized by the sale of his 

 " Architectural Dictionary," and that he was engaged on account of it 

 in Chancery for 31 years, and finally obtained a judgment in his be- 

 half, which was, however, of no money advantage. This is his 

 greatest work. 



O. T. 

 NemcaUU-on-Tyne. 



APPENDIX. 

 List of Mr. Nicholson's Works. 



1. The Carpenter's Guide, 1792, 1 vol. quarto. The Carpenter's New 

 Guide, 7tU edition, 1792, 84 plates, quarto, 21s. bound. 



2. The Carpenter and Joiner's Assistant, 1 vol. quarto, 79 plates, 21s. 

 boards, 4th edition, 1793. 



3. The Principles of Architecture, 3 vols. 8vo., 1794 to 1797 and 1809. 



4. The Student's Instructor, 8vo., 1 vol., 41 plates, 10s. 6rf. 5tli edition, 

 1823 ; Taylor, London, pp. 39. 



5. Mechanical Exercises, 8vo., 1 vol., 18s., 1812, 39 plates ; Taylor, 

 London. 



6. The Architectural Dictionary, 2 vols, large quarto, 1812 to 1819, Sept. 

 1st, 5/. 5s. 



7. The Workman and Budder's Director, 1 vol. quarto. 



8. Method of Increments, 1 vol. 8vo., 1817. 



9. Essays on the Combinatorial Analysis, 1818 ; Longman & Co., pp. 200. 



10. The Rudiments of Algebra, 1 vol. 12mo., July, 1819; 2nd 1824; 3rd 

 1837 ; 4th, 1839. 



11. Essay on Involution and Evolution, 8vo., May, 1820; London, Davis 

 and Di.\on, pp. 92. 



12. Treatise on Handrailing, 39 plates, 18s. 1820. 



13. The Practical Builder, 1 vol. quarto. 



14. The Carpenter and Joiner's Companion, 1 vol. 8vo. 



1.5. A Treatise on the Rudiments of Perspective, 1 vol. 8to., 38 plates, 

 14s. boards; J. Taylor, High Ilolborn. 



IG. The School of Architecture and Engineering, 1827, 5 Nos. ; J. and C. 

 Adlard, London, at Is. dd. each. 



17. Treatise on Stone Cutting, 1 vol. 8vo., 1828. 



18. Treatise on Dialling, 1 vol. 8vo., 9 plates, 4s., 1833 ; Blackwell and 

 Co., Newcastle, pp. 58. 



19. Treatise on Projection, 62 plates, 1 vol. 8vo., ICs., 1837; T. and J. 

 Hodgson, Newcastle, pp. 136, 44 plates by CoUard, engraver. 



20. A Practical Treatise on the Oblique Arch, 1 vol. 8vo., 1839 ; Patten, 

 son and Ross, Newcastle, pp. 50, 39 plates. 



21. The Mechanics' Companion. 



22. Course of Mathematics, published at the expense of Sir Richard 

 PhiUips, 1825. 



23. The Builder and Workman's New Director, 1827 ; Lewis, Poultry, 

 edition 1836. 



24. The New Carpenter's Guide; Jones and Co., 1835. 



25. Popular Course of Mathematics, 1822. 



26. Mechanics' Companion, 8vo., 40 plates, 1824 ; Bartlett and Hinton. 



27. Analytical and Arithmetical Essay, 1820. 



Address to the King, 1835. 

 Ta the King's Most Excellent Majesty's, 



We, the undersigned, your Majesty's loyal and dutiful subjects, being Fel- 

 lows of the Royal Society, Civil Engineers, Architects, Builders, Mechanics 

 and others, interested in the arts and sciences, beg leave to approach your 

 Royal person with every expression of our attachment and respect. Em- 

 boldened by former instances of your Majesty's royal munificence in reward- 

 ing persons who have conferred benefits upon their country by their valuable 

 literary productions and discoveries in science, and their inventions in the 

 useful arts, we would humbly beg leave to recommend to your Majesty's no- 

 tice an individual %vlio in every of these respects has deserved the gratitude 

 of his fellow-subjects, and we trust the approbation of your Majesty. The 

 works of Peter Nicholson, while they have contributed to the advancement 

 of knowledge, have tended to raise the English mechanic to that pre-emi- 

 nence he has attained over the other artificers of Europe, and nhile they 

 have been honoured with the proudest marks of distinction by the various 

 learned societies of this kingdom, have yet failed to produce to their author 

 those benefits which are necessary for his existence, and it must ever be a 

 source of regret that an individual who, having devoted his best energies to 

 the advancement of science, should he left, at the close of a long and labo- 

 rious life, and in his 73rd year, to struggle in penury and want. Presuming 

 that an individual who has conferred a national benefit might be entitled to 



