Volume 1
The life of William Thomson, Baron Kelvin of Largs / by Silvanus P. Thompson.
- Silvanus P. Thompson
- Date:
- 1910
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The life of William Thomson, Baron Kelvin of Largs / by Silvanus P. Thompson. Source: Wellcome Collection.
615/626 page 577
![with more ease to themselves, more speed, and more accuracy than the mirror. So the days of signalling by the “spot of light” are numbered, and a luminous electrified pen will succeed the mirror. I enclose a small but very clear specimen of its work. . .. This evening we expect extra clerks from London to learn it, or take the place of some of those here and allow them to learn it. As soon as we see them fairly in train I shall leave, but that cannot be before Monday, as there is a great block on the line owing to this wicked war, stopping European telegraphs, and causing numerous commercial messages to “cancel orders,” which will likely last till Saturday night. Sunday may possibly bea quiet day, and if so must be used for trials which cannot be done when messages are passing. I am afraid it will be a week from now before I can be with you at the Rouken, as I must be two days in London. I am very glad poor Fairy is better—Your affectionate brother, W. T. A kindly letter from Helmholtz elicited the following reply :— PORTHCURNO, PENZANCE, /uly 29, 1870. My DEAR HELMHOLTZ—I thank you most warmly for your kind letter. It is indeed, as you say, an un- speakable great loss which I have suffered. My sense of it goes on increasing every day and through all my occupations, after the first shock. That the end was certainly a happy relief for my dear wife from incessant suffering has done nothing yet to diminish the desolation in which it has left me. I am very sorry to think that there is now no prospect of meeting you soon as I had hoped. I could have spoken to you of these things but I feel it impossible to write. Meantime what I suppose is the best medicine for me has been forced on me— sheer hard work. The completion of the cables between England and India two months ago has led to an urgent demand for my recording instrument [an electrified pen (a very fine capillary siphon) shooting ink at the paper] VOL. I 2 FP](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b31360403_0001_0615.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
