hilosophers of the Royal
Society.

These men, from similarity of employment and inevitable contiguity of
position, were brought into intercourse almost of necessity, and the
formation of a little society (such as the "Oldham") the natural
result--the older and more experienced men taking the lead in it. At the
same time, there can be little doubt that the Spitalfields Society was the
pattern after which it was formed; and there can be as little doubt that
one or more of its founders had resided in London, and "wrought" in the
metropolitan workshops. Could the records of the "Mathematical Society of
London" (now in the archives of the Royal Astronomical Society) be
carefully examined, some light might be thrown upon this question. A list
of members attending every weekly meeting, as well as of visitors, was
always kept; and these lists (I have been informed) have been carefully
preserved. No doubt any one interested in the question would, upon
application to the secretary (Professor De Morgan), obtain ready access to
these documents.

The preceding remarks will, in some degree, furnish the elements of an
answer to the inquiry, "_Why_ did geometrical speculation take so much
deeper root amongst the Lancashire weavers, than amongst any other classes
of artisans?" The subject was better adapted to the weaver's mechanical
life than any other that could be named; for even the other favourite
subjects, botany and entomology, required the suspension of their proper
employment at the loom. The formation of the Oldham Society was calculated
to keep alive the aspiration for distinction, as well as to introduce
novices into the arcanium of geometry. There was generous co-operation, and
there was keen competition,--the sure stimulants to eminent success. The
unadulterated love of any intellectual pursuit, apart from the love of fame
or the hope of emolument, is a rare quality in all stages of society. Few
men, however, seem to have realised Basil Montagu's idea of being governed
by "a love of _excellence_ rather than the pride of _excelling_," so
closely as the Lancashire geometers of that period--uncultivated as was the
age in which they lived, rude as was the society in which their lives were
passed, and selfish as the brutal treatment received in those days by
mechanics from their employers, was calculated to render them. They were
surrounded, enveloped, by the worst social and moral influences; yet, so
far as can now be gathere