e in my
copy: and may my circumference never be more than 3-1/8 of my diameter if
the signature, name and writing both, were not that of my [circle square]
ing friend Mr. James Smith! And so I have come in contact with him on 666
as well as on [pi]! I should have nothing left to live for, had I not
happened to hear that he has a perpetual motion on hand. I returned thanks
and kind regards: and Miss Miggs's words--"Here's forgivenesses of
injuries! here's amicablenesses!"--rang in my ears. But I was made slightly
uncomfortable: how could the war go on after this armistice? Could I ever
make it understood that the truce only extended to the double Vahu and
things thereunto relating? It was once held by seafaring men that there was
no peace with Spaniards beyond the line: I was determined that there must
be no concord with J. S. inside the circle; that this must be a special
exception, like Father Huddleston {236} and old Grouse in the gun-room. I
was not long in anxiety; twenty-four hours after the book of sermons there
came a copy of the threatened exposure--_The British Association in
Jeopardy, and Professor De Morgan in the Pillory without hope of escape_.
By James Smith, Esq. London and Liverpool, 8vo., 1866 (pp. 94). This
exposure consists of reprints from the _Athenaeum_ and _Correspondent_: of
things new there is but one. In a short preface Mr. J. S. particularly
recommends to "_read to the end_." At the end is an appendix of two pages,
in type as large as the work; a very prominent peroration. It is an article
from the _Athenaeum_, left out of its place. In the last sentence Mr. J.
Smith, who had asked whether his character as an honest Geometer and
Mathematician was not at stake, is warned against the _fallacia plurium
interrogationum_.[377] He is told that there is not a more honest
what's-his-name in the world: but that as to the counter which he calls his
character as a mathematician, he is assured that it has been staked years
ago, and lost. And thus truth has the last word. There is no occasion to
say much about reprints. One of them is a letter [that given above] of
August 25, 1865, written by Mr. J. S. to the _Correspondent_. It is one of
his quadratures; and the joke is that I am made to be the writer: it
appears as what Mr. J. S. hopes I shall have the sense to write in the
_Athenaeum_ and forestall him. When I saw myself thus quoted--yes! quoted!
double commas, first person--I felt as I suppose did Wm. Wil