284 Proceedings of the Royal Society 
himself among the intricate channels and rocks of the West High- 
lands, when charts did not supply the requisite information. His 
most loved recreation from the labours of Lincoln’s Inn was always 
a cruise in the West Highlands. In the last summer of his life, after 
a naturally strong constitution had broken down under the stress of 
mathematical work on ships’ magnetism by night, following days 
of hard work in his legal profession, he regained something of his 
health and strength in sailing about with his hoys in his yacht, 
between the beautiful coasts of the Firth of Clyde, hut not enough, 
alas ! to carry him through unfavourable influences of the winter 
that followed. 
In 1826 he went to a school at Eedland, near Bristol, for two 
years; and in 1828 he entered the University of Glasgow, where 
he not only began to show his remarkable capacity for mathe- 
matical science in the classes of Mathematics and Natural Philo- 
sophy, but also distinguished himself highly in classics and logic. 
Among his fellow-students were Norman Macleod and Archibald 
Campbell Tait, with both of whom he retained a friendship 
throughout life. After completing his fourth session in Glasgow, 
he joined in the summer of 1832 a Cambridge reading party, under 
Hopkins, at Barmouth in North Wales, and in the October follow- 
ing commenced residence in Trinity College, Cambridge. 
While still an undergraduate he wrote and communicated to the 
Cambridge Philosophical Society a paper on Fresnel’s wave-surface. 
The mathematical tact and power for which he afterwards became 
celebrated were shown to a remarkable degree in this his first 
published work. 
In 1836 he took his degree as Senior Wrangler and first Smith’s 
Prizeman, and in the same year he was elected to a Fellowship in 
Trinity College. 
Shortly after taking his degree, he proposed to his friend Duncan 
Farquliarson Gregory, of the celebrated Edinburgh mathematical 
family, then an undergraduate of Trinity College, the establish- 
ment of an English periodical for the publication of short papers 
on mathematical subjects. Gregory answered in a letter of date 
December 4th, 1836, cordially entering into the scheme, and 
undertaking the office of editor. The result was the “ Cambridge 
Mathematical Journal,” of which the first number appeared in 
