But the severest lesson was the loss of Barrett's Method,[[327]] now the universal instrument of the actuary in his highest calculations. It was presented to the Royal Society, and refused admission into the Transactions: Francis Baily[[328]] printed it. The Society is now better informed: "live and learn," meaning "must live, so better learn," ought to be the especial motto of a corporation, and is generally acted on, more or less.
Horner's method begins to be introduced at Cambridge: it was published in 1820. I remember that when I first went to Cambridge (in 1823) I heard my tutor say, in conversation, there is no doubt that the true method of solving equations is the one which was published a few years ago in the Philosophical Transactions. I wondered it was not taught, but presumed that it belonged to the higher mathematics. This Horner himself had in his head: and in a sense it is true; for all lower branches belong to the higher: but he would have stared to have been told that he, Horner,
was without a European predecessor, and in the distinctive part of his discovery was heir-at-law to the nameless Brahmin—Tartar—Antenoachian—what you please—who concocted the extraction of the square root.
It was somewhat more than twenty years after I had thus heard a Cambridge tutor show sense of the true place of Horner's method, that a pupil of mine who had passed on to Cambridge was desired by his college tutor to solve a certain cubic equation—one of an integer root of two figures. In a minute the work and answer were presented, by Horner's method. "How!" said the tutor, "this can't be, you know." "There is the answer, Sir!" said my pupil, greatly amused, for my pupils learnt, not only Horner's method, but the estimation it held at Cambridge. "Yes!" said the tutor, "there is the answer certainly; but it stands to reason that a cubic equation cannot be solved in this space." He then sat down, went through a process about ten times as long, and then said with triumph: "There! that is the way to solve a cubic equation!"
I think the tutor in this case was never matched, except by the country organist. A master of the instrument went into the organ-loft during service, and asked the organist to let him play the congregation out; consent was given. The stranger, when the time came, began a voluntary which made the people open their ears, and wonder who had got into the loft: they kept their places to enjoy the treat. When the organist saw this, he pushed the interloper off the stool, with "You'll never play 'em out this side Christmas." He then began his own drone, and the congregation began to move quietly away. "There," said he, "that's the way to play 'em out!"
I have not scrupled to bear hard on my own university, on the Royal Society, and on other respectable existences: being very much the friend of all. I will now clear the Royal Society from a very small and obscure slander, simply because I know how. This dissertation began with
the work of Mr. Oliver Byrne, the dual arithmetician, etc. This writer published, in 1849, a method of calculating logarithms.[[329]] First, a long list of instances in which, as he alleges, foreign discoverers have been pillaged by Englishmen, or turned into Englishmen: for example, O'Neill,[[330]] so called by Mr. Byrne, the rectifier of the semi-cubical parabola claimed by the Saxons under the name of Neal: the grandfather of this mathematician was conspicuous enough as Neal; he was archbishop of York. This list, says the writer, might be continued without end; but he has mercy, and finishes with his own case, as follows:—"About twenty years ago, I discovered this method of directly calculating logarithms. I could generally find the logarithm of any number in a minute or two without the use of books or tables. The importance of the discovery subjected me to all sorts of prying. Some asserted that I committed a table of logarithms to memory; others attributed it to a peculiar mental property; and when Societies and individuals failed to extract my secret, they never failed to traduce the inventor and the invention. Among the learned Societies, the Royal Society of London played a very base part. When I have more space and time at my disposal, I will revert to this subject again."
Such a trumpery story as this remains unnoticed at the time; but when all are gone, a stray copy from a stall falls into hands which, not knowing what to make of it, make history of it. It is a very curious distortion. The reader may take it on my authority, that the Royal Society played no part, good or bad, nor had the option of playing a part.
But I myself pars magna fui:[[331]] and when the author has "space and time" at his disposal, he must not take all of them; I shall want a little of both.
ARE ATOMS WORLDS?