Letter 0399

Waller explains that his residing in the country keeps him from contributing to the Royal Society as he should. He speculates that his holding a prominent post in the Society is preventing another able person from advancing the its interests. Waller ‘would not, like ye Dog in ye Manger, keep a more usefull Member out’. He proposes Dr Aglionby as a suitable candidate and promises to be present for the ‘Election on St Andrews day in ye mean time’. Richard Waller was a natural philosopher and translator who worked as the Royal Society’s secretary. He also served on its council and edited the Philosophical Transactions (Lotte Mulligan, Waller, Richard (c.16601715), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/48707, accessed 19 June 2013]).