60 JAMES CLERK MAXWELL. [CHAP. III. 



13. [19th June 1844.] " Old Sir 



MY DEAR FATHER On Wednesday I went to the 

 Virginian minstrels, in which some of the songs were sung, 

 the first line accompanied with clappers, the second on a 

 tamborine, the third on a banjo, like this, . . . played like a 

 guitar very quickly, and the fourth on the fiddle, and the 

 chorus by all together. There were guesses, 1 in abundance ; 

 and there was an imitation of a steam onion, and other things 

 which you will find in the bill. On Saturday, having got 

 the play for verses on Laocoon, I went with Cha. H. John- 

 stone 2 so far, and then went to the murrain vile till Mrs. 

 M'Kenzie, Ninny, and Kwrj 3 went to visit Cramond, where 

 I played with the boies till high water ; and the minister's 

 young brother and the too boies and I doukit in C (big sea 

 as Kvvrj calls it), and then dried ourselves after the manner 

 of Auncient Greeks ; we had also the luxury of a pail of 

 . water to wash our feet in. 



How is a' aboot the house now our Gudeman's at home ? 

 How are herbs, shrubs, and trees doing ? cows, sheep, mares, 

 dogs, and folk ? and how did Nannie like bonny Carlisle ? 

 Mrs. Robt. Cay was at the church on Sunday. 4 I have 

 made a tetra hedron, a dodeca hedron, and 2 more hed- 

 rons that I don't know the wright names for. How do 

 doos and Geraniums come on. Your most obt. servt. 



JAS. ALEX. MMERKWELL. 



125 12 7 4 13 3 6 11 8 9 10 14 15 16 17 



1 i.e. riddles or conundrums, of which the boy was fond. 



2 A son of Admiral Hope Johnstone, then living at Cramond, a 

 scion of the Johnstones, who in 1 5 had a feud with the Maxwells, 

 but in later times claimed kinship with them. 



3 " i.e. Coonie," viz. Mr. Colin Mackenzie, then a child of three. 



4 This helps to fix the date of this letter. Mrs. E. Cay joined her 

 husband in China early in the spring of 1845. Her son Alexander was 

 born May 7, and christened on Wednesday, June 26, 1844. Mr. C. Max- 

 well had left Edinburgh for Glenlair on June 7, taking with him six 

 pigeons in a basket, and some cuttings of pelargonium. His first entry 

 in the Diary after this, at Glenlair, is as follows : " Saturday, June 8. 

 Got home to dinner, and find all well. After dinner plant cuttings 

 of pelargonium from Killearn, and sort the doves in the new dove-cot." 



