elements of his education in the public schools of that town. His
father was a watchmaker and intended that his son should become a
clergyman of the church of Scotland, for which purpose he sent him,
when fourteen years old, to the University of St. Andrews. Here Ivory
remained for six years, and had for his fellow student, Mr. (afterwards
Sir John) Leslie, with whom, at the end of the above period he removed
to the University of Edinburgh, where he remained one year to complete
the course of study required as a qualification for admission into the
church of Scotland. Circumstances, however, seem to have prevented
Ivory from carrying out the intentions of his father, for, on leaving
the university in 1786, he became an assistant teacher in an academy
at that time recently established in Dundee. After remaining at this
academy for three years, Ivory, in company with several others,
established a factory for spinning flax at Douglastown, in Forfarshire.
In this apparently uncongenial occupation he remained for fifteen
years (from 1789 to 1804), but the undertaking proved unsuccessful
and in 1804 the company ceased to exist. Mr. Ivory then obtained
the appointment to a professorship of mathematics in the Royal
Military College at Marlow, in Buckinghamshire (afterwards removed to
Sandhurst), with which establishment he remained until his retirement
from public service. This was the most active period of his life,
for while fulfilling assiduously the duties of his professorship he
continued unremittingly his scientific studies. His earliest writings
were three memoirs, which he communicated in the years 1796, 1799,
and 1802, to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. The first of these was
entitled, 'A New Series for the Rectification of the Ellipse;' the
second, 'A New Method of Resolving Cubic Equations;' and the third, 'A
New and Universal Solution of Kepler's Problem;' all of them evincing
great analytical skill, as well as originality of thought. Mr. Ivory
contributed fifteen papers to 'The Transactions of the Royal Society of
London,' nearly all of them relating to physical astronomy, and every
one containing mathematical investigations of the most refined nature.
The first, published in the 'Transactions of 1809,' and entitled, 'On
the Attractions of Homogeneous Ellipsoids,' is his most celebrated
paper, in which he completely and definitely resolved the problem of
attraction for every class of ellipsoidal bodies. Many of Ivory's
remaining contributions, ranging through a period of nearly thirty
years, related to the subject of the attraction of spheroids and the
theory of the figure of the Earth, and some of them are considered
masterpieces of analytical skill. One of the last subjects which
occupied his attention was the possible equilibrium of a spheroid with
three unequal axes when revolving about one of the axes, a fact which
Jacobi had discovered. This Ivory demonstrates in the volume for 1838
of the 'Philosophical Transactions.' The volumes in 1823 and 1838,
contain Ivory's two papers on the 'Theory of Atmospheric Refraction,'
a subject which, next to the Theory of Attractions, engaged most
seriously his attention on account of its great importance in astronomy
and the curious mathematical difficulties which its investigation
presents. For each of these papers he was awarded the Royal medal by
the Society. Of all his contributions to the 'Transactions,' only one
is purely mathematical; this is contained in the volume for 1831,
and is entitled, 'On the Theory of Elliptic Transcendants.' Besides
these contributions to the Royal Society, Ivory wrote several papers
in the Philosophical Magazine of 1821-27; in Maseres's 'Scriptores
Logarithmici;' in Leybourne's 'Mathematical Repository;' and in the
Supplement to the sixth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica.
In the beginning of 1819 Ivory, finding that his health began to
decline under the great exertions which he made in carrying on his
scientific researches, and performing his duties as professor, resigned
his professorship at Sandhurst and retired into private life. In
consideration, however, of his great merit, the pension due for the
full period of service required by the regulations was granted to him,
although that period had not been completed. After his retirement,
Ivory devoted himself entirely to his scientific researches, living
in or near London until his death. In 1814 he had received the Copley
medal for his communications to the Royal Society; in 1815 he became a
Fellow of the same society. He was also an honorary fellow of the Royal
Society of Edinburgh; an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy and
of the Cambridge Philosophical Society; a corresponding member of the
Institute of France, of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Berlin, and of
the Royal Society of Göttingen.
In the year 1831, in consideration of the great talent displayed in his
investigations, Ivory was recommended by Lord Brougham, whom he had
known in early life, to the notice of the King (Wm. IV.), who, with the
Hanoverian Guelphic Order of Knighthood, gave him an annual pension
of 300_l._, which he enjoyed during the rest of his life; and in 1839
he received the degree of Doctor in Laws from the University of St.
Andrews.
Mr. Ivory attained the age of seventy-seven before his death; he was
essentially a self-taught mathematician, and spent most of his leisure
in retirement. He fathomed in private the profoundest writings of the
most learned continental mathematicians, and at a period when few
Englishmen were able to understand those difficult works; he even
added to their value by many original contributions, and must always
be remembered with special interest when the singular destitution of
higher mathematical talent, which had reigned in this country for so
long a period before his time, is considered.--_English Cyclopædia._
London, 1856.--_Encyclopædia Britannica._ Eighth Edition.
JOSEPH PRIESTLY, LL.D.
Born March 24, 1773. Died February 26, 1804.
Joseph Priestly was the son of a cloth-dresser at Burstal-Fieldhead,
near Leeds. His family appear to have been in humble circumstances,
and he was taken off their hands after the death of his mother by
his paternal aunt, who sent him to a free school at Batley. There
he learnt something of Greek, Latin, and a little Hebrew. To this
he added some knowledge of other Eastern languages connected with
Biblical literature; he made a considerable progress in Syriac and
Chaldean, and began to learn Arabic; he also had a little instruction
in mathematics, but in this science he did not make much proficiency.
Indeed his whole education was exceedingly imperfect, and, excepting in
Hebrew and Greek, he never afterwards improved it by any systematic
course of study. Even in chemistry, the science which he best knew,
and in which he made so important a figure, he was only half-taught,
so that he presents one of the memorable examples of knowledge
pursued, science cultivated, and even its bounds extended, by those
whose circumstances made their exertions a continued struggle against
difficulties which only genius like theirs could have overcome.
After studying for some years at the Dissenting Academy founded by
Mr. Coward at Daventry (afterwards transferred to London), Priestly
quitted Daventry and became minister of a congregation at Needham
Market, in Suffolk, where his salary never exceeded thirty pounds.
He had been brought up in the strictest Calvinistic principles, but
he very soon abandoned these, and his tenets continued in after life
to be those of the moderate Unitarians, whose leading doctrine is
the proper humanity of Christ, and who confine all adoration to one
Supreme Being. Priestly's religious opinions proving distasteful to
his congregation at Needham Market, caused him to remove in 1758 to
Nantwich, in Cheshire, where he obtained a considerable number of
pupils, which greatly increased his income and enabled him by strict
frugality to purchase a scanty scientific apparatus, and commence a
study of natural philosophy. In 1761, Priestly removed to Warrington,
where he was chosen to succeed Dr. Aitken as tutor in the _belles
lettres_ at that academy. On settling at Warrington he married the
daughter of Mr. Wilkinson, an ironmaster in Wales, by whom he had
several children. His literary career may be said to have commenced
here, and having once begun to publish, his appeals to the press
were incessant and on almost every subject. The universality and
originality of his pursuits may be judged from his delivering at
Warrington a course of lectures on anatomy, while his published works
during the next seven or eight years comprise:--'The Theory of Language
and Universal Grammar,' 1762; 'On Oratory and Criticism,' 1777; 'On
History and General Policy,' 1788; 'On the Laws and Constitution of
England,' 1772; 'On Education,' 1765; 'Chart of Biography,' 1765;
'Chart of History,' 1769. During the same period appeared, in 1767,
his work entitled, 'A History of Electricity,' &c., which was so well
received that it went through five editions. This was followed in
1772 by a 'History of Vision.' In 1767, on account of a dispute with
the Warrington trustees, Priestly removed to Leeds, where he became
minister of the Mill-Hill Chapel, and wrote many controversial books
and pamphlets. In after times he wrote--'Letters to a Philosophical
Institution;' 'An Answer to Gibbon;' 'Disquisitions on Matter and
Spirit;' 'Corruptions of Christianity;' 'Early Opinions on Christ;'
'Familiar Letters to the Inhabitants of Birmingham;' 'Two different
Histories of the Christian Church;' 'On Education;' 'Comparison of
Heathen and Christian Philosophy;' 'Doctrine of Necessity;' 'On the
Roman Catholic Claims;' 'On the French Revolution;' 'On the American
War;' besides twenty volumes of tracts in favour of Dissenters and
their Rights. His general works fill twenty-five volumes, of which
only five or six are on scientific subjects; his publications being
in all 141, of which only seventeen are scientific. When residing at
Leeds Priestly's house immediately adjoined a brewery, which led him
to make experiments upon the fixed air copiously produced during the
process of fermentation. These experiments resulted in his discovering
the important fact that atmospheric air, after having been corrupted by
the respiration of animals, and by the burning of inflammable bodies,
is restored to salubrity by the vegetation of plants; and that, if
the air is exposed to a mixture of sulphur and iron-filings, its bulk
is diminished between a fourth and a fifth, and the residue is both
lighter than common air and unfit to support life; this residue he
termed 'phlogistic air,' afterwards called azotic or nitrogen gas.[53]
For these experiments the Copley medal was awarded to him in 1773 by
the Royal Society. The following year to this, from experiments with
nimium or red lead, Priestly made his great and important discovery
of oxygen gas. This was followed by his discovering the gases of
muriatic, sulphuric, and fluoric acids, ammonial gas and nitrous
oxide gas. He also discovered the combination which nitrous gas forms
suddenly with oxygen; diminishing the volume of both in proportion to
that combination; and he thus invented the method of eudiometry or the
ascertainment of the relative purity of different kinds of atmospheric
air.
In considering the great merits of Priestly as an experimentalist, it
must not be forgotten that he had almost to create the apparatus by
which his processes were to be performed. He for the most part had to
construct his instruments with his own hands, or to make unskilful
workmen form them under his own immediate direction. His apparatus,
however, and his contrivances for collecting, keeping, transferring
gaseous bodies, and for exposing substances to their action, were
simple and effectual, and they continue to be still used by chemical
philosophers without any material improvement. Although Priestly
was the first to discover oxygen, and thus give the basis of the
true theory of combustion, he clung all his life with a wonderful
pertinacity to the Phlogistic Theory,[54] and nothing in after life
would make him give it up. In 1773 Priestly accepted an invitation
from Lord Shelbourne (afterwards first Marquis of Lansdowne), to fill
the place of librarian and philosophic companion, with a salary of
250_l._, reducible to 150_l._ for life should he quit the employment;
40_l._ a-year was also allowed him for the expense of apparatus
and experiments, and homes were provided for his family in the
neighbourhood both of Lord Shelbourne's town and country residence.
Priestly remained with the Earl of Shelbourne for six or seven
years, at the end of which period, in 1780, he settled at Birmingham
and became minister of a dissenting body there. While residing at
Birmingham he engaged fiercely in polemical writings and discussions,
particularly with Gibbon and Bishop Horseley. He also displayed a warm
interest in the cause of America at the time of the quarrel with the
mother-country, and likewise took an active and not very temperate
part in the controversy to which the French Revolution gave rise;
and, having published a 'Reply' to Burke's famous pamphlet, he was in
1791 made a citizen of the French Republic. This gave considerable
offence to the inhabitants of Birmingham, an ironical and somewhat
bitter pamphlet against the high church party still further excited
their feelings against him; and a dinner which was given on the 14th
of July, to celebrate the anniversary of the attack upon the Bastile,
became the signal for a general riot. The tavern where the party were
assembled was attacked, and, although Dr. Priestly was not present,
his house and chapel were immediately afterwards assailed, he and his
family escaped, but his house, library, and manuscripts were burnt.
Although his losses were made up to him partially by an action at
law and partially by a subscription among his friends, Priestly felt
that he could no longer live at Birmingham, he therefore removed to
London and succeeded his friend Dr. Price as principal of the Hackney
Academy. He, however, still found himself highly unpopular and shunned
even by his former associates in silence. This determined Priestly
to leave England, and in the spring of 1794 he withdrew with his
family to America and settled at Northumberland, in Pennsylvania,
where he purchased 300 acres of land. Here he remained the rest of
his life, occupied in cultivating his land, in occasional preaching,
and in scientific studies. He continued writing and publishing until
his death, in February 1804, in the 72nd year of his age. He expired
very quietly, and so easily that having put his hand to his face
those who were sitting close to him did not immediately perceive
his death.--_Brougham's Lives of Philosophers._ London and Glasgow,
1855.--_Encyclopædia Britannica._ Eighth Edition.
MEMOIRS OF
THE DISTINGUISHED MEN OF SCIENCE OF GREAT BRITAIN,
LIVING A.D., 1807-8.
OPINIONS OF THE PRESS ON THE FIRST EDITION.
ONCE A WEEK.
Accompanying the picture, &c., there is a volume by Mr. W. Walker,
junior, giving a brief memoir of the salient points of each individual
history. This is well executed, and forms a useful book of reference
for those who would know more than the picture can tell.
ENGINEER.
Messrs. Walker's great historical engraving of the "Distinguished Men
of Science," noticed some weeks ago in these columns, is accompanied
by a well written and handsomely printed octavo volume of 228 pages,
containing condensed biographical sketches of the fifty-one subjects of
the picture itself. The book appears to have been first undertaken with
the view of furnishing a mere outline of the life and achievements of
these eminent men, but the inevitable delay attending the production
of a large engraving, and the gradual accumulation of personal and
historical details, at last led Mr. Walker, Jun., to revise and
considerably extend the scope of his work, which now forms a very
complete and desirable compendium of long-neglected, and, popularly
speaking, almost inaccessible biography, of interest and value as
well to those who cannot possess themselves of the picture as to the
subscribers to that work. The whole is preceded by an introduction,
not wanting in suggestive matter, from the pen of Mr. Robert Hunt,
F.R.S.... There is probably no work, certainly none so well within
the reach of the general public, which gives anything like as full
and yet concise an account of the great men of science who lived and
flourished half a century ago. The arrangement of the book is such as
to facilitate the readiest reference to any part, and, while the matter
is abundant, the style is clear and pleasing. We believe the book will
be in large request.
MECHANICS' MAGAZINE.
In our notice last week of Mr. Walker's engraving of the distinguished
men of science, we were only able to make a passing mention of the
book of memoirs which accompanies it. As, however, this book is to
be obtained separately, and has evidently been written with care, we
will now speak further as to its deserts. In the preface the writer
claims the merit only of a compiler, with one or two exceptions, and
he expresses a hope that he may have performed his task with clearness
and brevity, not neglecting, at the same time, to present his facts in
a readable form. The combination of these three qualities is not often
to be met with in a series of short biographies, and we are, therefore,
glad to be able to say that Mr. W. Walker has, in a great measure,
succeeded in accomplishing this. We would particularly call attention
to the notices of Cavendish, Samuel Crompton, Dr. Jenner, Count
Rumford, and Dr. Thomas Young, as instances of the successful manner
in which good sketches of character have been interwoven with plain
records of the facts occurring in the lives of these eminent men. The
memoir of James Watt is also well put together, and it must have cost
the writer considerable labour to compress into the space of six pages
so clear an account of the numerous works of this great philosopher and
engineer.
The biographies which claim particular notice, from containing original
information, are those of Tennant, Maudslay, and Trevithick. The life
of Charles Tennant, the founder of the celebrated chemical works at St.
Rollox, Glasgow, gives to the public for the first time a sketch of
the career of one whose inborn energy of character and clear intellect
(to use the author's words), placed him among the foremost of those
men who, by uniting science to manufactures, have entitled their
occupations to be classed among the ranks of the liberal professions.
But the memoir the perusal of which will afford the greatest interest
to engineers is that of Trevithick. Without pretending to anything
like a life worthy of the genius of this extraordinary man, it is,
notwithstanding, the most complete biographical notice which has yet
been published of him. We trust the book may be extensively read, as it
affords interesting information, in an easily accessible shape, of men,
the memory of whose deeds is too liable to pass away.
ENGRAVING OF
THE DISTINGUISHED MEN OF SCIENCE OF GREAT BRITAIN,
LIVING A.D., 1807-8.
This Great Historical Engraving represents, assembled at the Royal
Institution, authentic Portraits of the following illustrious
men:--WATT, RENNIE, TELFORD, MYLNE, JESSOP, CHAPMAN, MURDOCK, the
first to introduce gas into practical use; RUMFORD, HUDDART, BOULTON,
BRUNEL, WATSON, BENTHAM, MAUDSLAY, DALTON, CAVENDISH, SIR HUMPHRY DAVY,
WOLLASTON, HATCHET, HENRY, ALLEN, HOWARD, SMITH, the father of English
Geology; CROMPTON, inventor of the Spinning Mule: CARTWRIGHT, TENNANT,
RONALDS, the first to successfully pass an electric telegraph message
through a long distance; CHARLES EARL STANHOPE, TREVITHICK, NASMYTH,
MILLER of Dalswinton, and SYMINGTON, the inventors and constructors
of the first practical Steam Boat; PROFESSOR THOMSON, of Glasgow;
TROUGHTON, DONKIN, CONGREVE, HERSCHEL, MASKELYNE, BAILY, FRODSHAM,
LESLIE, PLAYFAIR, RUTHERFORD, DOLLOND, BROWN, the botanist; GILBERT
and BANKS, the Presidents of the Royal Society at that epoch of time;
CAPTAIN KATER, celebrated for his pendulum experiments; DR. THOMAS
YOUNG, and JENNER the benefactor of mankind.
Engraved in the best style of Stipple and Mezzotinto by WM. WALKER and
GEORGE ZOBEL. From an original drawing in Chiaroscuro. Designed by
GILBERT; drawn by J. F. SKILL and W. WALKER.
PUBLISHED BY W. WALKER & SON, 64, MARGARET STREET, CAVENDISH SQUARE,
LONDON, W.
_Size of the Engraving, without Margin, Forty-one by Twenty and a half
Inches._
Plain Impressions, £5 : 5.
Proofs, with Title and Autographs, £8 : 8.
Artist Proof, with or without Autographs, £10 : 10.
OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.
TIMES.
An Engraving before us comprises the portraits of 50 distinguished Men
of Science of Great Britain who were living in 1807-8, and who are here
represented as assembled in the Upper Library of the Royal Institution
... we can easily conceive, as the preface to an accompanying volume
of biographies informs us, that the collection and combination of these
portraits occupied five years,--for some of them, at this distance of
time, must have been discoverable with very great difficulty. Thus we
have among them portraits of some of the inventors of whom we know very
little in proportion to their acknowledged capacities, such for example
as Trevithick the friend of Robert Stephenson, and Murdock the Achates
of James Watt and introducer of gas ... there can be little doubt that
the 50 physiognomies are derived from authentic originals in every
case, great diligence having been employed in searching for such in the
hands of their representatives ... as we said, this engraving must not
be regarded only as a work of art, but as a collection of portraits of
special interest, some of which are not attainable in any other form;
while, as a whole, they are an appropriate monument of _our greatest
scientific epoch_.
DAILY TELEGRAPH.
We may fairly commence the following remarks with unqualified praise
of a work of art, which is intended to honour the distinguished men
of science who were living in Great Britain early in the present
century, and who, with one surviving exception, having passed into a
deathless fame, are yet remembered by philosophers equally great, who
were their contemporaries. Mr. Wm. Walker, with the assistance of Mr.
Zobel, has produced a really great historical engraving from a design
by Mr. Gilbert, representing an assemblage of fifty eminent chemists,
engineers, astronomers, naturalists, electricians and mechanical
inventors, grouped in the library of the Royal Institution. The scene
is thoroughly appropriate, for these men were living in the years
1807-8, while the Royal Institution itself dates from 1800, having
been founded to promote the application of science to practical uses.
The period marked by the pictorial gathering in question, belonged
to an era as complete and brilliant as any that British science has
yet passed through. A glance round the circle of intensely thoughtful
faces composing this great portrait group will revive many a page of
instructive and ennobling history. We see in the centre, seated round
a table, James Watt, Sir Isambard Brunel, John Dalton, &c.... Such
men were our fathers--patient, indomitable, calmly and wisely bold,
modestly self-reliant; ever watching, ever toiling, ever adding to the
store of knowledge that was to benefit not them alone but the great
human race. Such men are their sons who carry on the appointed work
of improvement and civilization. To such men do we point as examples
for our children. Their sterling qualities may be best summed up in
the words of Lord Jeffrey, written of that same John Playfair to whom
we have already referred. Their's was the understanding "at once
penetrating and vigilant, but more distinguished, perhaps, for the
caution and sureness of its march than for the brilliancy or rapidity
of its movements: and guided and adorned through all its progress by
the most genuine enthusiasm for all that is grand, and the justest
taste for all that is beautiful."
ATHENÆUM.
Messrs. Walker and Son have published a large engraving of fifty-one
distinguished men of science, alive in 1807-8, grouped together in
the library of the Royal Institution. This engraving, which is a
beautiful production, is described as designed by Gilbert, &c.... It is
accompanied by a book, the frontispiece of which is a reduced copy of
the engraving, for reference, &c.
ONCE A WEEK.