As soon as he had seen
something of what I had in hand, he said to me, 'I would like to
show this to a young man of remarkable ability, at present engaged
in our works at Birkenhead.' Fleeming Jenkin was accordingly
telegraphed for, and appeared next morning in Glasgow. He remained
for a week, spending the whole day in my class-room and laboratory,
and thus pleasantly began our lifelong acquaintance. I was much
struck, not only with his brightness and ability, but with his
resolution to understand everything spoken of, to see if possible
thoroughly through every difficult question, and (no if about
this!) to slur over nothing. I soon found that thoroughness of
honesty was as strongly engrained in the scientific as in the moral
side of his character.
In the first week of our acquaintance, the electric telegraph and,
particularly, submarine cables, and the methods, machines, and
instruments for laying, testing, and using them, formed naturally
the chief subject of our conversations and discussions; as it was
in fact the practical object of Jenkin's visit to me in Glasgow;
but not much of the week had passed before I found him remarkably
interested in science generally, and full of intelligent eagerness
on many particular questions of dynamics and physics.
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