Queen of Science by Mary Somerville

Author:Mary Somerville [Dorothy McMillan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847674654
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2009-03-12T16:00:00+00:00

On going to Rome I required a good many books for continuing my work on Physical Geography, and had got Transactions of the Geographical Society and other works sent from London. The Hon. Mountstuart Elphinstone° who was then at Rome, was an old acquaintance of ours. He was one of the most amiable men I ever met with, and quite won my heart one day at table when they were talking of the number of singing-birds that were eaten in Italy – nightingales, goldfinches, and robins – he called out, ‘What! robins! our household birds! I would as soon eat a child!’ He was so kind as to write to the Directors of the East India Company requesting that I might have the use of the library and papers that were in the India House. This was readily granted me; and I had a letter in consequence from Mr Wilson°, the Orientalist, giving me a list of the works they had on the geography of Eastern Asia and the most recent travels in the Himalayas, Tibet, and China, with much useful information from himself. I was indebted to Sir Henry Pottinger°, then at Rome, for information relating to Sind, for he had been for some years British Envoy at Beluchistan. Thus provided, I went on with my work. We lived several winters in an apartment on the second floor of Palazzo Lepri, Via dei Condotti, where we passed many happy days. When we first lived in Via Condotti, the waste-pipes to carry off the rain-water from the roofs projected far into the street, and when there was a violent thunderstorm, one might have thought a waterspout had broken over Rome, the water poured in such cascades from the houses on each side of the street. On one occasion the rain continued in torrents for thirty-six hours, and the Tiber came down in heavy flood, inundating the Ghetto and all the low parts of the city; the water was six feet deep in the Pantheon.84 The people were driven out of their houses in the middle of the night and took refuge in the churches, and boats plied in the streets supplying the inhabitants with food, which they hauled up in baskets let down from the windows. The Campagna for miles was under water; it covered the Ponte Molle so that the courier could not pass; and seen from the Pincio it looked like an extensive lake. Much anxiety was felt for the people who lived in the farm houses now surrounded with water. Boats were sent to rescue them, and few lives were lost; but many animals perished. The flood did not subside till after three days, when it left everything covered with yellow mud; the loss of property was very great, and there was much misery for a long time.

Our house was in a very central position, and when not engaged I gladly received anyone who liked to come to us in the evening, and we had a most

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