1836.] 



On the Position of Frames in a Sloping Gallery. 387 



XIII. — On the Position of Frames in a Sloping Gallery. 



TO THE EDITOR OF THE MADRAS LITERARY JOURNAL. 

 SIR, 



I am much obliged to you for sending my former letter to your 

 correspondent A Miner, and to him for correcting the errors I com- 

 plained of. I wish though he would again refer to my letter and see if 

 I did assert that P is greatest when B C is greatest : no, I only quoted 

 his own proportionals, and endeavoured (with what success you and 

 your readers will judge) to prove that he made a wrong deduction from 

 them. He asks me what I think of No. 2 ? I must say it is not so 

 satisfactory to me as it is to him. He divides the force of gravity into 

 two parts, one parallel, the other perpendicular, to the plane ; the latter, 

 he lays hold of to prove his argument upon, and the former is totally 

 set aside. Now suppose Sir Isaac Newton, or some other Mathemati- 

 cian, were going down a steep hill in his palankeen, and were to divide 

 the force of gravity on A Miner's theory, and to tell his bearers to 

 place themselves in a position perpendicular to the slope ; his bearers 

 would look anxiously for the sturdy bough of a tree, or some other 

 friend in need, to relieve them of the responsibility of the parallel por- 

 tion of Sahib's sub-divided gravity, confident enough, perhaps, without 

 the aid of Mathematics, that they could take upon themselves the 

 perpendicular portion, but until they get to the tree or meet with some 

 other friendly aid, they would have to keep the erect position-— And is it 

 not so in driving a sloping gallery ? My next objection to No. 2, is 

 this. A Miner says " then by proposition of the lever AG; c w = F. 

 sc. A E, or b c w — a F x." 



What the lever has to do with the question, I cannot make out, so I 

 leave it to the more learned, but take his equation . . . .c w = F. x. A E; 

 and as he assumes AE = a, substitute a for AE and we have cw = aF x — 

 how then can he make b c w — a F x ? 



I have been talking the question over with my friend " A Borer," 

 and I have persuaded him to write to you on the subject, which perhaps 

 may serve to keep the matter alive, if you will be so kind as to give his 

 letter a place in your Journal. 



I am quite sure you do not look upon my humble efforts to draw 

 truth out of a mist, as bearing sweeping censure in their train ; 

 " A Miner" does himself great injustice, and will, I hope, excuse the 

 free, but unlearned, remarks of 



A would-be Mathematician. 



