CORRESPONDENCE. 83 



one for you, which has been lying waiting opportunities. I am 1836, 

 glad now of the delay, as I am enabled to send with it some 

 maps of the stars which I have been charged to present to you 

 in the name of the Committee of the Society for the Diffusion of 

 Useful Knowledge. They are the first maps, I believe, in which 

 Sir William's nebulae and your own are laid down from the 

 Catalogue. 



You will find a great deal of new speculation about an old 

 subject of yours in the Calculus of Functions, and in particular 

 a discussion which concerns you in 252, &c. 



The two books on Algebra and Number and Magnitude con- 

 tain various metaphysical points, which I heartily wish were 

 more attended to. I have not written your name in them be- 

 cause non constat that it is reasonable to expect you to bring 

 elementary books home again to England, where other copies 

 will be much at your service. Present them, therefore, to any 

 person or institution whom they will be of use to. 



We are getting up a picture of Mr. Baily by subscription, 

 and the same is limited to a guinea. It has struck me that I do 

 not remember that anybody has put your name down, and that 

 you would not be pleased to be left out in any association which 

 is to do honour to such a man. I shall therefore take care that 

 the omission is remedied. The picture is to be presented to 

 the Astronomical Society. 



Your sixth Catalogue has been printed, or will be struck off 

 shortly. The extra copies shall be forwarded to Mr. Stewart. 

 There is very little stirring in our world. You will have heard 

 that Captain Smyth had already asserted that the two stars 

 y Virgin-is were in peri-one-another, and was laughed at by some- 

 body for his assertion, which laughter your letter has turned on 

 his side. 



I should suppose you now can almost fix the time of your re- 

 turn. I take it for granted you have learned the extraordinary 

 discoveries you have made in the moon. It was a dull joke to 

 republish the book in England, and I suspect in America it 

 was done to raise the wind. I natter myself I did just as clever 

 a thing, which, however, has failed through Mr. Warren's want of 

 understanding ; at least, I have not seen it in print. I sent him 

 anonymously the following : 



4 Sir John Ilerschel.' This distinguished Astronomer writes 

 this to a friend from the Cape of Good Hope : ' The climate here 

 is so bad that my mirrors tarnish immediately. I do not know 



o 2 



