17 Drummond Place,
Edinr.
26/9/68
My dear Sir,
I have only now got your note, having staid longer in Ireland than I intended when I gave you the above address. I am too tired and sleepy to write much, perhaps even to write sense.
I don’t think the New College will in any way interfere with me. Your chief work will be looking over Ex[a]m papers once a fortnight — (and that can be done at any hour) — and showing the students where & how they have blundered.
As to the Physical Laboratory wh. I hope to open, I take it that you will consider attendance there rather as a means of making yourself known by original investigation, than as daily toil.
But I have no doubt we shall arrange matters easily, especially as you seek the post from a genuine love of the subject.
Let me know when you are coming to Edinr, for we can talk more in half an hour’s talk than in fifty letters. My mechanical assistant[2] won’t be here till the last ten days of October and there is no hurry whatever.
I shall propose you to the University Court at their early meeting next month.[3]
Yours truly,
P. G. Tait
[1] CUL ADD 7449 D706 MS
[2] This was “Old Lindsay”, celebrated by R.L. Stevenson in his essay “Some College Memories”, originally written for the Book of the Edinburgh University Union Fancy Fair, 1886. Today Lindsay’s post would be known as that of laboratory assistant, whereas WRS acted as assistant lecturer and tutor in the department. Indeed, the testimonial which Tait wrote on Smith’s behalf in 1870 describes WRS as “assistant professor”.
[3] The appointment was confirmed and WRS acted as Tait’s teaching assistant for the two university sessions, 1868/69 and 1869/70.