tained whether I may calculate upon adequate support. This, however, I cannot yet think it improbable that I shall obtain, when the plan and contents of the present volume shall have become better known; and with this view, I shall gladly receive the names of those who may be disposed to uphold the work by purchasing what has been published, and forming the list of my future subscribers.
I should hardly have been disposed to persevere further, had it not been for repeated expressions of strong interest in the success of the work, which have reached me from persons of the highest scientific eminence; among whom I may perhaps without impropriety mention the names of Ivory, of Babbage, Powell, Forbes, Lloyd, Challis, Owen, Wheatstone, Phillips, Talbot, Hamilton, Faraday, and others in this country, and of Hare, Henry, and Bache in the United States. To several of them I have been indebted for very important suggestions; and to Professor Wheatstone especially, for his valuable contributions.
From the kind assistance of men of science, and from an increased acquaintance with the sources whence the best materials are to be derived[1], I think I may fairly hold out to the public the prospect of some considerable improvements in the work: and I shall be thankful for any suggestion for this purpose. I may perhaps give the titles or early notices of such foreign scientific papers as shall not be adopted for immediate translation: and as our first volume may be said to have cleared off some arrears, we may now come nearer to the present time, and endeavour to supply what is of the latest date and of intrinsic value.
However, this, as I have already stated, must depend upon my prospect of future support, and the success of the present volume;—and, glad to have finished my humble but laborious task in completing it, I shall be able at my leisure to decide as to the future.
June 29, 1837.
- ↑ Arrangements have been made for obtaining such as may appear in the Swedish, Dutch, and Italian languages.
