Passages from the Life of a Philosopher. Charles Babbage

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СКАЧАТЬ chapel; arriving at about nine, and remaining to between twelve and one o’clock. We discussed all knowable and many unknowable things.

      〈GHOST CLUB—EXTRACTORS.〉

      At one time we resolved ourselves into a Ghost Club, and proceeded to collect evidence, and entered into a considerable correspondence upon the subject. Some of this was both interesting and instructive.

      At another time we resolved ourselves into a Club which we called The Extractors. Its rules were as follows—

       1st. Every member shall communicate his address to the Secretary once in six months.

       2nd. If this communication is delayed beyond twelve months, it shall be taken for granted that his relatives had shut him up as insane.

       3rd. Every effort legal and illegal shall be made to get him out of the madhouse. Hence the name of the club—The Extractors. {35}

       4th. Every candidate for admission as a member shall produce six certificates. Three that he is sane and three others that he is insane.

      It has often occurred to me to inquire of my legal friends whether, if the sanity of any member of the club had been questioned in after-life, he would have adduced the fact of membership of the Club of Extractors as an indication of sanity or of insanity.

      〈SHYNESS—CHESS.〉

      During the first part of my residence at Cambridge, I played at chess very frequently, often with D’Arblay and with several other good players. There was at that period a fellow-commoner at Trinity named Brande, who devoted almost his whole time to the study of chess. I was invited to meet him one evening at the rooms of a common friend for the purpose of trying our strength.

      On arriving at my friend’s rooms, I found a note informing me that he had gone to Newmarket, and had left coffee and the chessmen for us. I was myself tormented by great shyness, and my yet unseen adversary was, I understood, equally diffident. I was sitting before the chess-board when Brande entered. I rose, he advanced, sat down, and took a white and a black pawn from the board, which he held, one in either hand. I pointed with my finger to the left hand and won the move.

      The game then commenced; it was rather a long one, and I won it: but not a word was exchanged until the end: when Brande uttered the first word. “Another?” To this I nodded assent.

      How that game was decided I do not now remember; but the first sentence pronounced by either of us, was a remark by Brande, that he had lost the first game by a certain move of his white bishop. To this I replied, that I thought he was {36} mistaken, and that the real cause of his losing the game arose from the use I had made of my knight two moves previously to his white bishop’s move.

      We then immediately began to replace the men on the board in the positions they occupied at that particular point of the game when the white bishop’s move was made. Each took up any piece indiscriminately, and placed it without hesitation on the exact square on which it had stood. It then became apparent that the effective move to which I had referred was that of my knight.

      Brande, during his residence at Cambridge, studied chess regularly several hours each day, and read almost every treatise on the subject. After he left college he travelled abroad, took lessons from every celebrated teacher, and played with all the most eminent players on the Continent.

      At intervals of three or four years I oc­ca­sion­al­ly met him in London. After the usual greeting he always proposed that we should play a game of chess.

      I found on these occasions, that if I played any of the ordinary openings, such as are found in the books, I was sure to be beaten. The only way in which I had a chance of winning, was by making early in the game a move so bad that it had not been mentioned in any treatise. Brande possessed, and had read, almost every book upon the subject.

      〈SIXPENNY WHIST.〉

      Another set which I frequently joined were addicted to sixpenny whist. It consisted of Higman, afterwards Tutor of Trinity; Follet, afterwards Attorney-General; of a learned and accomplished Dean still living, and I have no doubt still playing an excellent rubber, and myself. We not unfrequently sat from chapel-time in the evening until the sound {37} of the morning chapel bell again called us to our religious duties.

      I mixed oc­ca­sion­al­ly with a different set of whist players at Jesus College. They played high: guinea points, and five guineas on the rubber. I was always a most welcome visitor, not from my skill at the game; but because I never played more than shilling points and five shillings on the rubber. Consequently my partner had what they considered an advantage: namely, that of playing guinea points with one of our adversaries and pound points with the other.

      〈EXPEDITIONS TO THE FENS.〉

      Totally different in character was another set in which I mixed. I was very fond of boating, not of the manual labour of rowing, but the more in­tel­lec­tual art of sailing. I kept a beautiful light, London-built boat, and oc­ca­sion­al­ly took long voyages down the river, beyond Ely into the fens. To accomplish these trips, it was necessary to have two or three strong fellows to row when the wind failed or was contrary. These were useful friends upon my aquatic expeditions, but not being of exactly the same calibre as my friends of the Ghost Club, were very cruelly and disrespectfully called by them “my Tom fools.”

      The plan of our voyage was thus:—I sent my servant to the apothecary for a thing called an ægrotat, which I understood, for I never saw one, meant a certificate that I was indisposed, and that it would be injurious to my health to attend chapel, or hall, or lectures. This was forwarded to the college authorities.

      I also directed my servant to order the cook to send me a large well-seasoned meat pie, a couple of fowls, &c. These were packed in a hamper with three or four bottles of wine and one of noyeau. We sailed when the wind was fair, and rowed when there was none. Whittlesea Mere was a very {38} favourite resort for sailing, fishing, and shooting. Sometimes we reached Lynn. After various adventures and five or six days of hard exercise in the open air, we returned with our health more renovated than if the best physician had prescribed for us.

      〈CHEMISTRY.〉

      During my residence at Cambridge, Smithson Tennant was the Professor of Chemistry, and I attended his lectures. Having a spare room, I turned it into a kind of laboratory, in which Herschel worked with me, until he set up a rival one of his own. We both oc­ca­sion­al­ly assisted the Professor in preparing his experiments. The science of chemistry had not then assumed the vast development it has now attained. I gave up its practical pursuit soon after I resided in London, but I have never regretted the time I bestowed upon it at the commencement of my career. I had hoped to have long continued to enjoy the friendship of my entertaining and valued instructor, and to have profited by his introducing me to the science of the metropolis, but his tragical fate deprived me of that advantage. Whilst riding with General Bulow across a drawbridge at Boulogne, the bolt having been displaced, Smithson Tennant was precipitated to the bottom, and killed on the spot. The General, having an earlier warning, set spurs to his horse, and just escaped a similar fate.

      〈TRANSLATION OF LACROIX.〉

      My views respecting the notation of Leibnitz now (1812) received confirmation from an extensive course of reading. I became convinced that the notation of fluxions must ultimately prove a strong impediment to the progress of English science. But I knew, also, that it was hopeless for any young and unknown author to attempt to introduce the notation of Leibnitz into an elementary work. This opinion naturally {39} suggested to me the idea of translating the smaller work of СКАЧАТЬ