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Cover Quote: July 1983

Mr. Croker to Mr. Peel

March 21, 1823

My dear Peel,

Mr. Babbage’s invention is at first sight incredible, but if you will recollect those little numeral locks which one has seen in France, in which a series of numbers are written on a succession of wheels, you will have some idea of the first principles of this machine, which is very curious and ingenious, and which not only will calculate all regular series, but also arranges the types for printing all the figures. At present indeed it is a matter more of curiosity than use, and I believe some good judges doubt whether it ever can be of any. But when I consider what has been already done by what were called Napier’s bones and Gunter’s scale, and the infinite and undiscovered variety of what may be called the mechanical powers of numbers, I cannot but admit the possibility, nay the probability, that important consequences may be ultimately derived from Mr. Babbage’s principle.



- John Wilson Croker
The Croker Papers, 1885
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