The Life of James Clerk Maxwell

From the PREFACE. In a work which has more than one author, it is right to distinguish as far as possible what has been contributed by each. The first part of this book, then, has been mainly composed by the present writer (who has acted as editor), and the second by Mr. Garnett; but it is due to Mr. Garnett to add that, while he had the chief share of the labour of collecting materials for the whole biography, and the entire burden of the account here given of Maxwell's...
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From the PREFACE.
In a work which has more than one author, it is right to distinguish as far as possible what has been contributed by each.
The first part of this book, then, has been mainly composed by the present writer (who has acted as editor), and the second by Mr. Garnett; but it is due to Mr. Garnett to add that, while he had the chief share of the labour of collecting materials for the whole biography, and the entire burden of the account here given of Maxwell's contributions to science, the substance of Chapters XL XII. XIII. is also largely drawn from information obtained through him. The matter of whole pages remains almost in his very words, although for the sake of uniformity and simplicity the first person has still been used in speaking of my own reminiscences.
The narrative of Maxwell's early life has been facilitated-(1) by a diary kept by Maxwell's father from 1841 to 1847, and often referred to in these pages as "the Diary;" (2) by two albums containing a series of water-colour drawings by Maxwell's first cousin, Mrs. Hugh Blackburn (née Isabella Wedderburn), the value of which may be inferred from the outlined reproductions of a few of them prepared by Mrs. Blackburn herself as illustrations for this book. They are literally bits out of the past, each containing an exact representation, by a most accurate observer and clever draughtswoman, of some incident which had just happened when the sketch was made. The figures, even as outlined, bring back the persons with singular vividness to the memory of those who knew them.
For these and many other advantages the thanks of the authors are due to Maxwell's relatives, but above all to his widow, not only for the free access she has given them to various documents, such as those mentioned above, but for the generous confidence she has reposed in them throughout, and for many important suggestions made by her during the progress of the work....
....The juvenile verses and translations have been included for the same reason which has led to the prominence given to the early life in Part I. If we are right in our estimate of Maxwell, it must be interesting to watch the unfolding of such a mind and character from the first, and this not only for the psychological student, but for all those who share Wordsworth's fondness for "days" that are "linked each to each with natural piety."
While the last sheets were being revised for the press the sad news arrived that Maxwell's first cousin, Mr. Colin Mackenzie, had died on board the Bosnia, on his way home from America. There was no one whose kind encouragement had more stimulated the preparation of this volume, or whose pleasure in it would have been a more welcome reward. But he, too, is gone before his time, and this book will be sent into the world with fewer good wishes. He deserves to be remembered with affection wherever the name of James Clerk Maxwell is honoured or beloved.