‘Birmingham: Dec. 12, 1781.
‘Dear Sir,—If I had any remarks or hints respecting the subject of your experiments, I should certainly with much pleasure have communicated them long ago. I meant, indeed, to have made a few more experiments on the growth of plants in the course of the last summer, but the weather was so bad, and the sun shone so little, that I dropped the scheme. All I can do, therefore, in return for your facts, is to mention one that I have lately observed. I readily convert pure water into permanent air, by first combining it with quicklime, and then exposing it to a strong heat. The weight of the air is equal to the weight of water, and no part of the water is turned into steam in the process. During the whole of it, a glass velum, interposed between the retort and the recipient for the air, remains quite cool and dry. The air I procure in this manner is in part fixed air, but the bulk of it is such as a candle would hardly burn in it, but is such as I should imagine would be the best for plants, which would purify it and render it fit for respiration. And as this kind of air would be yielded in great abundance by volcanoes, from calcareous matter in the earth; such was perhaps the original atmosphere of this earth, which according to the Mosaick account (which you must allow me to respect) had plants before there were any land animals.
‘This letter I fear is hardly worth sending you; your objects and mine are so very different, though now and then coinciding; but mine have seldom any practical uses, at least no immediate ones, whereas yours are highly and immediately beneficial. Wishing you the greatest success, and wishing you and all philosophers joy of the near prospect of peace,
‘I am, yours sincerely,
‘J. Priestley.’
This year’s memoranda: ‘Wrote “Emigration,” an ode.’
In the autumn of this year I spent a month at Lowestoft, where the sea air and bathing agreed so well with me that I do not recollect in my life ever having spent a month with so continued a flow of high spirits, which received no slight addition by the society of a very handsome and most agreeable girl, whose name I have forgotten.[[74]]
In a letter from Dr. Burney (of this year) he rallied me with much wit on my culture of the earth instead of the Muses. This friend of mine had a happy talent of rendering his letters lively and agreeable, indeed they were a picture of the man, for I never met with any person who had more decided talents for conversation, eminently seasoned with wit and humour, and these talents were so at command that he could exert them at will. He was remarkable for some sprightly story or witty bon mot just when he quitted a company, which seemed as much as to say, ‘There now, I have given you a dose which you may work upon in my absence.’ His society was greatly sought after by all classes, from the first nobility to the mere homme de lettres. He dressed expensively, always kept his carriage, and yet died worth about 15,000l., leaving a most capital library of curious books. His second wife was my wife’s sister, the handsome widow of a Mr. Allen, of Lynn, who in a short life in commerce made above 40,000l., leaving her a handsome fortune and her two daughters equally provided for.
This year I had a controversy in the ‘Bury St. Edmunds News’ with Capel Lofft, Esq.,[[75]] on the proposal which originated with the Earl of Bristol,[[76]] for building a 74-gun ship and presenting it to the public. I wrote a paper in favour of this scheme, which so pleased Lord Bristol that he complimented me on my eloquent, spirited language, and he caused a numerous edition of it to be printed and given away. Lofft attacked the scheme as unconstitutional, I retorted, and a paper war ensued which lasted for some time, and was afterwards published. The Earl of Shelburne, at that time Minister, wrote several letters to Lord Bristol in which he appeared highly gratified by this plan. Capel Lofft at the conclusion of our controversy wrote to me a very polite letter, expressing his satisfaction that our names should be united in the same publication. These papers were read with much avidity, and established the Bury paper in which they were written, to the great emolument of the proprietor.
Prince Potemkin, the Russian Prime Minister, sent this year to England three young men consigned to the care of M. Smirnove, chaplain to the Russian Embassy, who requested that I would fix them in my immediate vicinity, in order that I might pay some attention to their progress and acquisitions. This I readily did, and took every means to have them well instructed in the English mode of cultivating land.[[77]]