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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley
+Volume 2, by Leonard Huxley
+#2 in our series by Leonard Huxley
+
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+Title: The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2
+
+Author: Leonard Huxley
+
+Release Date: March, 2004 [EBook #5226]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on June 8, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK T.H. HUXLEY VOLUME 2 ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sue Asscher asschers@bigpond.com
+
+
+
+
+LIFE AND LETTERS OF THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY
+
+BY HIS SON
+
+LEONARD HUXLEY.
+
+
+
+IN THREE VOLUMES.
+
+
+VOLUME 2.
+
+
+(PLATE: T.H. HUXLEY, PHOTOGRAPH BY WALKER AND COCKERILL, PH. SC.
+SIGNED T.H. HUXLEY, 1857.)
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.1. 1870.
+
+CHAPTER 2.2. 1871.
+
+CHAPTER 2.3. 1872.
+
+CHAPTER 2.4. 1873.
+
+CHAPTER 2.5. 1874.
+
+CHAPTER 2.6. 1875-1876.
+
+CHAPTER 2.7. 1875-1876.
+
+CHAPTER 2.8. 1876.
+
+CHAPTER 2.9. 1877.
+
+CHAPTER 2.10. 1878.
+
+CHAPTER 2.11. 1879.
+
+CHAPTER 2.12. 1881.
+
+CHAPTER 2.13. 1882.
+
+CHAPTER 2.14. 1883.
+
+CHAPTER 2.15. 1884.
+
+CHAPTER 2.16. 1884-1885.
+
+CHAPTER 2.17. 1885.
+
+CHAPTER 2.18. 1886.
+
+CHAPTER 2.19. 1886.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.1. 1870.
+
+[With the year 1870 comes another turning-point in Huxley's career.
+From his return to England in 1850 till 1854 he had endured four years
+of hard struggle, of hope deferred; his reputation as a zoologist had
+been established before his arrival, and was more than confirmed by
+his personal energy and power. When at length settled in the
+professorship at Jermyn Street, he was so far from thinking himself
+more than a beginner who had learned to work in one corner of the
+field of knowledge, still needing deep research into all kindred
+subjects in order to know the true bearings of his own little portion,
+that he treated the next six years simply as years of further
+apprenticeship. Under the suggestive power of the "Origin of Species"
+all these scattered studies fell suddenly into due rank and order; the
+philosophic unity he had so long been seeking inspired his thought
+with tenfold vigour, and the battle at Oxford in defence of the new
+hypothesis first brought him before the public eye as one who not only
+had the courage of his convictions when attacked, but could, and more,
+would, carry the war effectively into the enemy's country. And for the
+next ten years he was commonly identified with the championship of the
+most unpopular view of the time; a fighter, an assailant of
+long-established fallacies, he was too often considered a mere
+iconoclast, a subverter of every other well-rooted institution,
+theological, educational, or moral.
+
+It is difficult now to realise with what feelings he was regarded in
+the average respectable household in the sixties and early seventies.
+His name was anathema; he was a terrible example of intellectual
+gravity beyond redemption, a man with opinions such as cannot be held
+"without grave personal sin on his part" (as was once said of Mill by
+W.G. Ward), the representative in his single person of rationalism,
+materialism, atheism, or if there be any more abhorrent "ism"--in
+token of which as late as 1892 an absurd zealot at the headquarters of
+the Salvation Army crowned an abusive letter to him at Eastbourne by
+the statement, "I hear you have a local reputation as a Bradlaughite."
+
+But now official life began to lay closer hold upon him. He came
+forward also as a leader in the struggle for educational reform,
+seeking not only to perfect his own biological teaching, but to show,
+in theory and practice, how scientific training might be introduced
+into the general system of education. He was more than once asked to
+stand for Parliament, but refused, thinking he could do more useful
+work for his country outside.
+
+The publication in 1870 of "Lay Sermons," the first of a series of
+similar volumes, served, by concentrating his moral and intellectual
+philosophy, to make his influence as a teacher of men more widely
+felt. The "active scepticism," whose conclusions many feared, was yet
+acknowledged as the quality of mind which had made him one of the
+clearest thinkers and safest scientific guides of his time, while his
+keen sense of right and wrong made the more reflective of those who
+opposed his conclusions hesitate long before expressing a doubt as to
+the good influence of his writings. This view is very clearly
+expressed in a review of the book in the "Nation" (New York 1870 11
+407).
+
+And as another review of the "Lay Sermons" puts it ("Nature" 3 22), he
+began to be made a kind of popular oracle, yet refused to prophesy
+smooth things.
+
+During the earlier period, with more public demands made upon him than
+upon most men of science of his age and standing, with the burden of
+four Royal Commissions and increasing work in learned societies in
+addition to his regular lecturing and official paleontological work,
+and the many addresses and discourses in which he spread abroad in the
+popular mind the leaven of new ideas upon nature and education and the
+progress of thought, he was still constantly at work on biological
+researches of his own, many of which took shape in the Hunterian
+lectures at the College of Surgeons from 1863-1870. But from 1870
+onward, the time he could spare to such research grew less and less.
+For eight years he was continuously on one Royal Commission after
+another. His administrative work on learned societies continued to
+increase; in 1869-70 he held the presidency of the Ethnological
+Society, with a view to effecting the amalgamation with the
+Anthropological,] "the plan," [as he calls it,] "for uniting the
+Societies which occupy themselves with man (that excludes 'Society'
+which occupies itself chiefly with woman)." [He became President of
+the Geological Society in 1872, and for nearly ten years, from 1871 to
+1880, he was secretary of the Royal Society, an office which occupied
+no small portion of his time and thought, "for he had formed a very
+high ideal of the duties of the Society as the head of science in this
+country, and was determined that it should not at least fall short
+through any lack of exertion on his part" (Sir M. Foster, Royal
+Society Obituary Notice). (See Appendix 2.)
+
+The year 1870 itself was one of the busiest he had ever known. He
+published one biological and four paleontological memoirs, and sat on
+two Royal Commissions, one on the Contagious Diseases Acts, the other
+on Scientific Instruction, which continued until 1875.
+
+The three addresses which he gave in the autumn, and his election to
+the School Board will be spoken of later; in the first part of the
+year he read two papers at the Ethnological Society, of which he was
+President, on "The Geographical Distribution of the Chief
+Modifications of Mankind," March 9--and on "The Ethnology of Britain,"
+May 10--the substance of which appeared in the "Contemporary Review"
+for July under the title of "Some Fixed Points in British Ethnology"
+("Collected Essays" 7 253). As President also of the Geological
+Society and of the British Association, he had two important addresses
+to deliver. In addition to this, he delivered an address before the
+Y.M.C.A. at Cambridge on "Descartes' Discourse."
+
+How busy he was may be gathered from his refusal of an invitation to
+Down:--]
+
+26 Abbey Place, January 21, 1870.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+It is hard to resist an invitation of yours--but I dine out on
+Saturday; and next week three evenings are abolished by Societies of
+one kind or another. And there is that horrid Geological address
+looming in the future!
+
+I am afraid I must deny myself at present.
+
+I am glad you liked the sermon. Did you see the "Devonshire man's"
+attack in the "Pall Mall?"
+
+I have been wasting my time in polishing that worthy off. I would not
+have troubled myself about him, if it were not for the political
+bearing of the Celt question just now.
+
+My wife sends her love to all you.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The reference to the "Devonshire Man" is as follows:--Huxley had been
+speaking of the strong similarity between Gaul and German, Celt and
+Teuton, before the change of character brought about by the Latin
+conquest; and of the similar commixture, a dash of Anglo-Saxon in the
+mass of Celtic, which prevailed in our western borders and many parts
+of Ireland, e.g. Tipperary.
+
+The "Devonshire Man" wrote on January 18 to the "Pall Mall Gazette,"
+objecting to the statement that "Devonshire men are as little
+Anglo-Saxons as Northumbrians are Welsh." Huxley replied on the 21st,
+meeting his historical arguments with citations from Freeman, and
+especially by completing his opponent's quotation from Caesar, to show
+that under certain conditions, the Gaul was indistinguishable from the
+German. The assertion that the Anglo-Saxon character is midway between
+the pure French or Irish and the Teutonic, he met with the previous
+question, Who is the pure Frenchman? Picard, Provencal, or Breton? or
+the pure Irish? Milesian, Firbolg, or Cruithneach?
+
+But the "Devonshire Man" did not confine himself to science. He
+indulged in various personalities, to the smartest of which, a parody
+of Sydney Smith's dictum on Dr. Whewell, Huxley replied:--]
+
+"A Devonshire Man" is good enough to say of me that "cutting up
+monkeys is his forte, and cutting up men is his foible." With your
+permission, I propose to cut up "A Devonshire Man"; but I leave it to
+the public to judge whether, when so employed, my occupation is to be
+referred to the former or to the latter category.
+
+[For this he was roundly lectured by the "Spectator" on January 29, in
+an article under the heading "Pope Huxley." Regardless of the rights
+or wrongs of the controversy, he was chidden for the abusive language
+of the above paragraph, and told that he was a very good anatomist,
+but had better not enter into discussions on other subjects.
+
+The same question is developed in the address to the Ethnological
+Society later in the year and in "Some Fixed Points in British
+Ethnology" (see above), and reiterated in an address from the chair in
+Section D at the British Association in 1878 at Dublin, and in a
+letter to the "Times" for October 12, 1887, apropos of a leading
+article upon "British Race-types of To-day."
+
+Letter-writing was difficult under such pressure of work, but the
+claims of absent friends were not wholly forgotten, though left on one
+side for a time, and the warm-hearted Dohrn, could not bear to think
+himself forgotten, managed to get a letter out of him--not on
+scientific business.]
+
+26 Abbey Place, January 30, 1870.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+In one sense I deserve all the hard things you may have said and
+thought about me, for it is really scandalous and indefensible that I
+have not written to you. But in another sense, I do not, for I have
+very often thought about you and your doings, and as I have told you
+once before, your memory always remains green in the "happy family."
+
+But what between the incessant pressure of work and an inborn aversion
+to letter-writing, I become a worse and worse correspondent the longer
+I live, and unless I can find one or two friends who will [be] content
+to bear with my infirmities and believe that however long before we
+meet, I shall be ready to take them up again exactly where I left off,
+I shall be a friendless old man.
+
+As for your old Goethe, you are mistaken. The Scripture says that "a
+living dog is better than a dead lion," and I am a living dog. By the
+way, I bought Cotta's edition of him the other day, and there he
+stands on my bookcase in all the glory of gilt, black, and marble
+edges. Do you know I did a version of his "Aphorisms on Nature" into
+English the other day. [For the first number of "Nature," November
+1869.] It astonishes the British Philistines not a little. When they
+began to read it they thought it was mine, and that I had suddenly
+gone mad!
+
+But to return to your affairs instead of my own. I received your
+volume on the "Arthropods" the other day, but I shall not be able to
+look at it for the next three weeks, as I am in the midst of my
+lectures, and have an annual address to deliver to the Geological
+Society on the 18th February, when, I am happy to say, my tenure of
+office as President expires.
+
+After that I shall be only too glad to plunge into your doings and, as
+always, I shall follow your work with the heartiest interest. But I
+wish you would not take it into your head that Darwin or I, or any one
+else thinks otherwise than highly of you, or that you need
+"re-establishing" in any one's eyes. But I hope you will not have
+finished your work before the autumn, as they have made me President
+of the British Association this year, and I shall be very busy with my
+address in the summer. The meeting is to take place in Liverpool on
+the 14th September, and I live in hope that you will be able to come
+over. Let me know if you can, that I may secure you good quarters.
+
+I shall ask the wife to fill up the next half-sheet. But for Heaven's
+sake don't be angry with me in English again. It's far worse than a
+scolding in Deutsch, and I have as little forgotten my German as I
+have my German friends.
+
+[On February 18 he delivered his farewell address to the Geological
+Society, on laying down the office of President. ("Palaeontology and
+the Doctrine of Evolution" "Collected Essays" 8.) He took the
+opportunity to revise his address to the Society in 1862, and pointed
+out the growth of evidence in favour of evolution theory, and in
+particular traced the paleontological history of the horse, through a
+series of fossil types approaching more and more to a generalised
+ungulate type and reaching back to a three-toed ancestor, or
+collateral of such an ancestor, itself possessing rudiments of the two
+other toes which appertain to the average quadruped.]
+
+If [he said] the expectation raised by the splints of horses that, in
+some ancestor of the horses, these splints would be found to be
+complete digits, has been verified, we are furnished with very strong
+reasons for looking for a no less complete verification of the
+expectation that the three-toed Plagiolophus-like "avus" of the horse
+must have been a five-toed "atavus" at some early period.
+
+[Six years afterwards, this forecast of paleontological research was
+to be fulfilled, but at the expense of the European ancestry of the
+horse. A series of ancestors, similar to these European fossils, but
+still more equine, and extending in unbroken order much farther back
+in geological time, was discovered in America. His use of this in his
+New York lectures as demonstrative evidence of evolution, and the
+immediate fulfilment of a further prophecy of his will be told in due
+course.
+
+His address to the Cambridge Y.M.C.A, "A Commentary on Descartes'
+'Discourse touching the method of using reason rightly, and of seeking
+scientific truth,'" was delivered on March 24. This was an attempt to
+give this distinctively Christian audience some vision of the world of
+science and philosophy, which is neither Christian nor Unchristian,
+but Extra-christian, and to show] "by what methods the dwellers
+therein try to distinguish truth from falsehood, in regard to some of
+the deepest and most difficult problems that beset humanity, "in order
+to be clear about their actions, and to walk sure-footedly in this
+life," as Descartes says. For Descartes had laid the foundation of his
+own guiding principle of "active scepticism, which strives to conquer
+itself."
+
+[Here again, as in the "Physical Basis of Life," but with more detail,
+he explains how far materialism is legitimate, is, in fact, a sort of
+shorthand idealism. This essay, too, contains the often-quoted
+passage, apropos of the] "introduction of Calvinism into science."
+
+I protest that if some great Power would agree to make me always think
+what is true and do what is right, on condition of being turned into a
+sort of clock and wound up every morning before I got out of bed, I
+should instantly close with the offer. The only freedom I care about
+is the freedom to do right; the freedom to do wrong I am ready to part
+with on the cheapest terms to any one who will take it of me.
+
+[This was the latest of the essays included in "Lay Sermons, Addresses
+and Reviews," which came out, with a dedicatory letter to Tyndall, in
+the summer of 1870, and, whether on account of its subject matter or
+its title, always remained his most popular volume of essays.
+
+To the same period belongs a letter to Matthew Arnold about his book
+"St. Paul and Protestantism."]
+
+My dear Arnold,
+
+Many thanks for your book which I have been diving into at odd times
+as leisure served, and picking up many good things.
+
+One of the best is what you say near the end about science gradually
+conquering the materialism of popular religion.
+
+It will startle the Puritans who always coolly put the matter the
+other way; but it is profoundly true.
+
+These people are for the most part mere idolaters with a Bible-fetish,
+who urgently stand in need of conversion by Extra-christian
+Missionaries.
+
+It takes all one's practical experience of the importance of Puritan
+ways of thinking to overcome one's feeling of the unreality of their
+beliefs. I had pretty well forgotten how real to them "the man in the
+next street" is, till your citation of their horribly absurd dogmas
+reminded me of it. If you can persuade them that Paul is fairly
+interpretable in your sense, it may be the beginning of better things,
+but I have my doubts if Paul would own you, if he could return to
+expound his own epistles.
+
+I am glad you like my Descartes article. My business with my
+scientific friends is something like yours with the Puritans, nature
+being OUR Paul.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+26 Abbey Place, May 10, 1870.
+
+[From the 14th to the 24th of April Huxley, accompanied by his friend
+Hooker, made a trip to the Eifel country. His sketch-book is full of
+rapid sketches of the country, many of them geological; one day indeed
+there are eight, another nine such.
+
+Tyndall was invited to join the party, and at first accepted, but then
+recollected the preliminaries which had to be carried out before his
+lectures on electricity at the end of the month. So he writes on April
+6:--
+
+Royal Institution, 6 April.
+
+My dear Huxley,
+
+I was rendered drunk by the excess of prospective pleasure when you
+mentioned the Eifel yesterday, and took no account of my lectures.
+They begin on the 28th, and I have studiously to this hour excluded
+them from my thought. I have made arrangements to see various
+experiments involving the practical application of electricity before
+the lectures begin; I find myself, in short, cut off from the
+expedition. My regret on this score is commensurable with the
+pleasures I promised myself. Confound the lectures!
+
+And yours on Friday is creating a pretty hubbub already. (On the
+Pedigree of the Horse" April 8, 1870, which was never brought out in
+book form.) I am torn to pieces by women in search of tickets.
+Anything that touches progenitorship interests them. You will have a
+crammed house, I doubt not.
+
+Yours ever,
+
+John Tyndall.
+
+Huxley replied:--]
+
+Geological Survey of England and Wales, April 6, 1870.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+DAMN
+  the
+      L
+       e
+        c
+         t
+          u
+           r
+            e
+             s.
+
+T.H.H.
+
+That's a practical application of electricity for you.
+
+[In June he writes to his wife, who has taken a sick child to the
+seaside:--]
+
+I hear a curious rumour (which is not for circulation), that Froude
+and I have been proposed for D.C.L.'s at Commemoration, and that the
+proposition has been bitterly and strongly opposed by Pusey. [Huxley
+ultimately received his D.C.L. in 1885.] They say there has been a
+regular row in Oxford about it. I suppose this is at the bottom of
+Jowett's not writing to me. But I hope that he won't fancy that I
+should be disgusted at the opposition and object to come [i.e. to pay
+his regular visit to Balliol]. On the contrary, the more complete
+Pusey's success, the more desirable it is that I should show my face
+there. Altogether it is an awkward position, as I am supposed to know
+nothing of what is going on.
+
+[The situation is further developed in a letter to Darwin:--]
+
+Jermyn Street, June 22, 1870.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I sent the books to Queen Anne St. this morning. Pray keep them as
+long as you like, as I am not using them.
+
+I am greatly disgusted that you are coming up to London this week, as
+we shall be out of town next Sunday. It is the rarest thing in the
+world for us to be away, and you have pitched upon the one day. Cannot
+we arrange some other day?
+
+I wish you could have gone to Oxford, not for your sake, but for
+theirs. There seems to have been a tremendous shindy in the Hebdomadal
+board about certain persons who were proposed; and I am told that
+Pusey came to London to ascertain from a trustworthy friend who were
+the blackest heretics out of the list proposed, and that he was glad
+to assent to your being doctored, when he got back, in order to keep
+out seven devils worse than that first!
+
+Ever, oh Coryphaeus diabolicus, your faithful follower,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The choice of a subject for his Presidential Address at the British
+Association for 1870, a subject which, as he put it,] "has lain
+chiefly in a land flowing with the abominable, and peopled with mere
+grubs and mouldiness," [was suggested by a recent controversy upon the
+origin of life, in which the experiments of Dr. Bastian, then
+Professor of Pathological Anatomy at University College, London, which
+seemed to prove spontaneous generation, were shown by Professor
+Tyndall to contain a flaw. Huxley had naturally been deeply interested
+from the first; he had been consulted by Dr. Bastian, and, I believe,
+had advised him not to publish until he had made quite sure of his
+ground. This question and the preparation of the course of Elementary
+Biology [See below.] led him to carry on a series of investigations
+lasting over two years, which took shape in a paper upon "Penicillium,
+Torula, and Bacterium", first read in Section D at the British
+Association, 1870 ("Quarterly Journal of Micr. Science" 1870 10 pages
+355-362.); and in his article on "Yeast" in the "Contemporary Review"
+for December 1871. He laboriously repeated Pasteur's experiments, and
+for years a quantity of flasks and cultures used in this work remained
+at South Kensington, until they were destroyed in the eighties. Of
+this work Sir J. Hooker writes to him:--
+
+You have made an immense leap in the association of forms, and I
+cannot but suppose you approach the final solution...
+
+I have always fancied that it was rather brains and boldness, than
+eyes or microscopes that the mycologists wanted, and that there was
+more brains in Berkeley's [Reverend M.J. Berkeley.] crude discoveries
+than in the very best of the French and German microscopic
+verifications of them, who filch away the credit of them from under
+Berkeley's nose, and pooh-pooh his reasoning, but for which we should
+be, as we were.
+
+In his Presidential Address, "Biogenesis and Abiogenesis" ("Collected
+Essays" 8 page 229), he discussed the rival theories of spontaneous
+generation and the universal derivation of life from precedent life,
+and professed his belief, as an act of philosophic faith, that at some
+remote period, life had arisen out of inanimate matter, though there
+was no evidence that anything of the sort had occurred recently, the
+germ theory explaining many supposed cases of spontaneous generation.
+The history of the subject, indeed, showed] "the great tragedy of
+Science--the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact--which
+is so constantly being enacted under the eyes of philosophers," and
+recalled the warning "that it is one thing to refute a proposition,
+and another to prove the truth of a doctrine which, implicitly or
+explicitly, contradicts that proposition."
+
+[Two letters to Dr. Dohrn refer to this address and to the meeting of
+the Association.]
+
+Jermyn Street, April 30, 1870.
+
+My dear Whirlwind,
+
+I have received your two letters; and I was just revolving in my mind
+how best to meet your wishes in regard to the very important project
+mentioned in the first, when the second arrived and put me at rest.
+
+I hope I need not say how heartily I enter into all your views, and
+how glad I shall be to see your plan for "Stations" carried into
+effect. [Dr. Dohrn succeeded in establishing such a zoological
+"station" at Naples.] Nothing could have a greater influence upon the
+progress of zoology.
+
+A plan was set afoot here some time ago to establish a great marine
+Aquarium at Brighton by means of a company. They asked me to be their
+President, but I declined, on the ground that I did not desire to
+become connected with any commercial undertaking. What has become of
+the scheme I do not know, but I doubt whether it would be of any use
+to you, even if any connection could be established.
+
+As soon as you have any statement of your project ready, send it to me
+and I will take care that it is brought prominently before the British
+public so as to stir up their minds. And then we will have a regular
+field-day about it in Section D at Liverpool.
+
+Let me know your new ideas about insects and vertebrata as soon as
+possible, and I promise to do my best to pull them to pieces. What
+between Kowalesky and his Ascidians, Miklucho-Maclay [A Russian
+naturalist, and close friend of Haeckel's, who later adventured
+himself alone among the cannibals of New Guinea.] and his Fish-brains,
+and you and your Arthropods, I am becoming schwindelsuchtig, and spend
+my time mainly in that pious ejaculation "Donner and Blitz," in which,
+as you know, I seek relief. Then there is our Bastian who is making
+living things by the following combination:--
+
+Prescription: Ammoniae Carbonatis
+              Sodae Phosphatis
+              Aquae destillatae
+                 quantum sufficit
+              Caloris 150 degrees Centigrade
+              Vacui perfectissimi
+              Patientiae.
+
+Transubstantiation will be nothing to this if it turns out to be true,
+and you may go and tell your neighbour Januarius to shut up his shop
+as the heretics mean to outbid him.
+
+Now I think that the best service I can render to all you enterprising
+young men is to turn devil's advocate, and do my best to pick holes in
+your work.
+
+By the way, Miklucho-Maclay has been here; I have seen a good deal of
+him, and he strikes me as a man of very considerable capacity and
+energy. He was to return to Jena to-day.
+
+My friend Herbert Spencer will be glad to learn that you appreciate
+his book. I have been HIS devil's advocate for a number of years, and
+there is no telling how many brilliant speculations I have been the
+means of choking in an embryonic state.
+
+My wife does not know that I am writing to you, or she would say
+apropos of your last paragraph that you are an entirely unreasonable
+creature in your notions of how friendship should be manifested, and
+that you make no allowances for the oppression and exhaustion of the
+work entailed by what Jean Paul calls a "Tochtervolles Haus." I hope I
+may live to see you with at least ten children, and then my wife and I
+will be avenged. Our children will be married and settled by that
+time, and we shall have time to write every day and get very wroth
+when you do not reply immediately.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+All are well, the children so grown you will not know them.
+
+July 18, 1870.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+Notwithstanding the severe symptoms of "Tochterkrankheit" under which
+I labour, I find myself equal to reply to your letter.
+
+The British Association meets in September on the 14th day of that
+month, which falls on a Wednesday. Of course, if you come you shall be
+provided for by the best specimen of Liverpool hospitality. We have
+ample provision for the entertainment of the "distinguished
+foreigner."
+
+Will you be so good as to be my special ambassador with Haeckel and
+Gegenbauer, and tell them the same thing? It would give me and all of
+us particular pleasure to see them and to take care of them.
+
+But I am afraid that this wretched war will play the very deuce with
+our foreign friends. If you Germans do not give that crowned swindler,
+whose fall I have been looking for ever since the coup d'etat, such a
+blow as he will never recover from, I will never forgive you. Public
+opinion in England is not worth much, but at present, it is entirely
+against France. Even the "Times," which generally contrives to be on
+the baser side of a controversy, is at present on the German side. And
+my daughters announced to me yesterday that they had converted a young
+friend of theirs from the French to the German side, which is one
+gained for you. All look forward with great pleasure to seeing you in
+the autumn.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[In addition to this address on September 14, he read his paper on
+"Penicillium," etc., in Section D on the 20th. Speaking on the 17th,
+after a lecture of Sir J. Lubbock's on the "Social and Religious
+Condition of the Lower Races of Mankind," he brought forward his own
+experiences as to the practical results of the beliefs held by the
+Australian savages, and from this passed to the increasing savagery of
+the lower classes in great towns such as Liverpool, which was the
+great political question of the future, and for which the only cure
+lay in a proper system of education.
+
+The savagery underlying modern civilisation was all the more vividly
+before him, because one evening he, together with Sir J. Lubbock, Dr.
+Bastian, and Mr. Samuelson, were taken by the chief of the detective
+department round some of the worst slums in Liverpool. In thieves'
+dens, doss houses, dancing saloons, enough of suffering and
+criminality was seen to leave a very deep and painful impression. In
+one of these places, a thieves' lodging-house, a drunken man with a
+cut face accosted him and asked him whether he was a doctor. He said
+"yes," whereupon the man asked him to doctor his face. He had been
+fighting, and was terribly excited. Huxley tried to pacify him, but if
+it had not been for the intervention of the detective, the man would
+have assaulted him. Afterwards he asked the detective if he were not
+afraid to go alone in these places, and got the significant answer,
+"Lord bless you, sir, drink and disease take all the strength out of
+them."
+
+On the 21st, after the general meeting of the Association, which wound
+up the proceedings, the Historical Society of Lancashire and Cheshire
+presented a diploma of honorary membership and a gift of books to
+Huxley, Sir G. Stokes, and Sir J. Hooker, the last three Presidents of
+the British Association, and to Professors Tyndall and Rankine and Sir
+J. Lubbock, the lecturers at Liverpool. Then Huxley was presented with
+a mazer bowl lined with silver, made from part of one of the roof
+timbers of the cottage occupied as his headquarters by Prince Rupert
+during the siege of Liverpool. He was rather taken aback when he found
+the bowl was filled with champagne, after a moment, however, he drank]
+"success to the good old town of Liverpool," [and with a wave of his
+hand, threw the rest on the floor, saying,] "I pour this as a libation
+to the tutelary deities of the town."
+
+[The same evening he was the guest of the Sphinx Club at dinner at the
+Royal Hotel, his friend Mr. P.H. Rathbone being in the chair, and in
+proposing the toast of the town and trade of Liverpool, declared that
+commerce was a greater civiliser than all the religion and all the
+science ever put together in the world, for it taught men to be
+truthful and punctual and precise in the execution of their
+engagements, and men who were truthful and punctual and precise in the
+execution of their engagements had put their feet upon the first rung
+of the ladder which led to moral and intellectual elevation.
+
+There were the usual clerical attacks on the address, among the rest a
+particularly violent one from a Unitarian pulpit. Writing to Mr.
+Samuelson on October 5 he says:--]
+
+Be not vexed on account of the godly. They will have their way. I
+found Mr. --'s sermon awaiting me on my return home. It is an able
+paper, but like the rest of his cloth he will not take the trouble to
+make himself acquainted with the ideas of the man whom he opposes. At
+least that is the case if he imagines he brings me under the range of
+his guns.
+
+[On October 2 he writes to Tyndall:--]
+
+I have not yet thanked you properly for your great contribution to the
+success of our meeting [i.e. his lecture "On the Scientific Uses of
+the Imagination"]. I was nervous over the passage about the clergy,
+but those confounded parsons seem to me to let you say anything, while
+they bully me for a word or a phrase. It's the old story, "one man may
+steal a horse while the other may not look over the wall."
+
+[Tyndall was not to be outdone, and replied:--
+
+The parsons know very well that I mean kindness; if I correct them I
+do it in love and not in wrath.
+
+One more extract from a letter to Dr. Dohrn, under date of November
+17. The first part is taken up with a long and detailed description of
+the best English microscopes and their price, for Dr. Dohrn wished to
+get one; and my father volunteered to procure it for him. The rest of
+the letter has a more general interest as giving his views on the
+great struggle between France and Germany then in progress, his
+distrust of militarism, and above all, his hatred of lying, political
+as much as any other:--]
+
+This wretched war is doing infinite mischief; but I do not see what
+Germany can do now but carry it out to the end.
+
+I began to have some sympathy with the French after Sedan, but the
+Republic lies harder than the Empire did, and the whole country seems
+to me to be rotten to the core. The only figure which stands out with
+anything like nobility or dignity, on the French side, is that of the
+Empress, and she is only a second-rate Marie-Antoinette. There is no
+Roland, no Corday, and apparently no MAN of any description.
+
+The Russian row is beginning, and the rottenness of English
+administration will soon, I suppose, have an opportunity of displaying
+itself. Bad days are, I am afraid, in store for all of us, and the
+worst for Germany if it once becomes thoroughly bitten by the military
+mad dog.
+
+The "happy family" is flourishing and was afflicted, even over its
+breakfast, when I gave out the news that you had been ill.
+
+The wife desires her best remembrances, and we all hope you are
+better.
+
+[The high pressure under which Huxley worked, and his abundant output,
+continued undiminished through the autumn and winter. Indeed, he was
+so busy that he postponed his Lectures to Working Men in London from
+October to February 1871. On October 3 he lectured in Leicester on
+"What is to be Learned from a Piece of Coal," a parallel lecture to
+that of 1868 on "A Piece of Chalk." On the 17th and 24th he lectured
+at Birmingham on "Extinct Animals intermediate between Reptiles and
+Birds"--a subject which he had made peculiarly his own by long study;
+and on December 29 he was at Bradford, and lectured at the
+Philosophical Institute upon "The Formation of Coal" ("Collected
+Essays" 8.).
+
+He was also busy with two Royal Commissions; still, at whatever cost
+of the energy and time due to his own investigations and those
+additional labours by which he increased his none too abundant income,
+he felt it his duty, in the interests of his ideal of education, to
+come forward as a candidate for the newly-instituted School Board for
+London. This was the practical outcome of the rising interest in
+education all over the country; on its working, he felt, depended
+momentous issues--the fostering of the moral and physical well-being
+of the nation; the quickening of its intelligence and the maintenance
+of its commercial supremacy. Withal, he desired to temper
+"book-learning" with something of the direct knowledge of nature: on
+the one hand, as an admirable instrument of education, if properly
+applied; on the other, as preparing the way for an attitude of mind
+which could appreciate the reasons for the immense changes already
+beginning to operate in human thought.
+
+Moreover, he possessed a considerable knowledge of the working of
+elementary education throughout the country, owing to his experience
+as examiner under the Science and Art Department, the establishment of
+which he describes as "a measure which came into existence unnoticed,
+but which will, I believe, turn out to be of more importance to the
+welfare of the people than many political changes over which the noise
+of battle has rent the air" ("Scientific Education" 1869; "Collected
+Essays" 3 page 131.)
+
+Accordingly, though with health uncertain, and in the midst of
+exacting occupations, he felt that he ought not to stand aside at so
+critical a moment, and offered himself for election in the Marylebone
+division with a secret sense that rejection would in many ways be a
+great relief.
+
+The election took place on November 29, and Huxley came out second on
+the poll. He had had neither the means nor the time for a regular
+canvass of the electors. He was content to address several public
+meetings, and leave the result to the interest he could awaken amongst
+his hearers. His views were further brought before the public by the
+action of the editor of the "Contemporary Review," who, before the
+election, "took upon himself, in what seemed to him to be the public
+interest," to send to the newspapers an extract from Huxley's article,
+"The School Boards: what they can do, and what they may do," which was
+to appear in the December number.
+
+In this article will be found ("Collected Essays" 3 page 374) a full
+account of the programme which he laid down for himself, and which to
+a great extent he saw carried into effect, in its fourfold
+division--of physical drill and discipline, not only to improve the
+physique of the children, but as an introduction to all other sorts of
+training--of domestic training, especially for girls--of education in
+the knowledge of moral and social laws and the engagement of the
+affections for what is good and against what is evil--and finally, of
+intellectual training. And it should be noted that he did not only
+regard intellectual training from the utilitarian point of view; he
+insisted, e.g. on the value of reading for amusement as] "one of its
+most valuable uses to hard-worked people."
+
+[Much as he desired that this intellectual training should be
+efficient, the most cursory perusal of this article will show how far
+he placed the moral training above the intellectual, which, by itself,
+would only turn the gutter-child into] "the subtlest of all the beasts
+of the field," [and how wide of the mark is the cartoon at this period
+representing him as the Professor whose panacea for the ragged
+children was to] "cram them full of nonsense."
+
+[In the third section are also to be found his arguments for the
+retention of Bible-reading in the elementary schools. He reproached
+extremists of either party for confounding the science, theology, with
+the affection, religion, and either crying for more theology under the
+name of religion, or demanding the abolition of] "religious" [teaching
+in order to get rid of theology, a step which he likens to] "burning
+your ship to get rid of the cockroaches."
+
+[As regards his actual work on the Board, I must express my thanks to
+Dr. J.H. Gladstone for his kindness in supplementing my information
+with an account based partly on his own long experience of the Board,
+partly on the reminiscences of members contemporary with my father.
+
+The Board met first on December 15, for the purpose of electing a
+Chairman. As a preliminary, Huxley proposed and carried a motion that
+no salary be attached to the post. He was himself one of the four
+members proposed for the Chairmanship; but the choice of the Board
+fell upon Lord Lawrence. In the words of Dr. Gladstone:--
+
+Huxley at once took a prominent part in the proceedings, and continued
+to do so till the beginning of the year 1872, when ill-health
+compelled him to retire.
+
+At first there was much curiosity both inside and outside the Board as
+to how Huxley would work with the old educationists, the clergy,
+dissenting ministers, and the miscellaneous body of eminent men that
+comprised the first Board. His antagonism to many of the methods
+employed in elementary schools was well known from his various
+discourses, which had been recently published together under the title
+of "Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews." I watched his course with
+interest at the time; but for the purpose of this sketch I have lately
+sought information from such of the old members of the Board as are
+still living, especially the earl of Harrowby, Bishop Barry, the
+Reverend Dr. Angus, and Mr. Edward North Buxton, together with Mr.
+Croad, the Clerk of the Board. They soon found proof of his great
+energy, and his power of expressing his views in clear and forcible
+language; but they also found that with all his strong convictions and
+lofty ideals he was able and willing to enter into the views of
+others, and to look at a practical question from its several sides. He
+could construct as well as criticise. Having entered a public arena
+somewhat late in life, and being of a sensitive nature, he had
+scarcely acquired that calmness and pachydermatous quality which is
+needful for one's personal comfort; but his colleagues soon came to
+respect him as a perfectly honest antagonist or supporter, and one who
+did not allow differences of conviction to interfere with friendly
+intercourse.
+
+The various sections of the clerical party indeed looked forward with
+great apprehension to his presence on the Board, but the more liberal
+amongst them ventured to find ground for hoping that they and he would
+not be utterly opposed so far as the work of practical organisation
+was concerned, in the declaration of his belief that true education
+was impossible without "religion," of which he declared that all that
+has an unchangeable reality in it is constituted by the love of some
+ethical ideal to govern and guide conduct,] "together with the awe and
+reverence, which have no kinship with base fear, but rise whenever one
+tries to pierce below the surface of things, whether they be material
+or spiritual." [And in fact a cleavage took place between him and the
+seven extreme "secularists" on the Board (the seven champions of
+unchristendom, as their opponents dubbed them) on the question of the
+reading of the Bible in schools (see below (Bishop Barry calls
+particular attention to his attitude on this point, "because," he
+says, "it is (I think) often misunderstood. In the "Life of the Right
+Honourable W.H. Smith" (for instance), published not long ago, Huxley
+is supposed, as a matter of course to have been the leader of the
+Secularist party.")
+
+One of the earliest proposals laid before the Board was a resolution
+to open the meetings with prayer. To this considerable opposition was
+offered; but a bitter debate was averted by Huxley pointing out that
+the proposal was ultra vires, inasmuch as under the Act constituting
+the Board the business for which they were empowered to meet did not
+include prayer. Hereupon a requisition--in which he himself
+joined--was made to allow the use of a committee-room to those who
+wished to unite in a short service before the weekly meetings, an
+arrangement which has continued to the present time.
+
+At the second meeting, on December 21, he gave notice of a motion to
+appoint a committee to consider and report upon the scheme of
+education to be adopted in the Board Schools.
+
+This motion came up for consideration on February 15, 1871. In
+introducing it, he said that such a committee ought to consider:--]
+
+First, the general nature and relations of the schools which may come
+under the Board. Secondly, the amount of time to be devoted to
+educational purposes in such schools; and Thirdly, the subject-matter
+of the instruction or education, or teaching, or training, which is to
+be given in these schools.
+
+[But this, by itself, he continued, would be incomplete. At one end of
+the scale he advocated Infant schools, and urged a connection with the
+excellent work of the Ragged schools. At the other end he desired to
+see continuation schools, and ultimately some scheme of technical
+education. A comprehensive scheme, indeed, would involve an
+educational ladder from the gutter to the university, whereby children
+of exceptional ability might reach the place for which nature had
+fitted them.
+
+The subject matter of elementary instruction must be limited by what
+was practicable and desirable. The revised code had done too little;
+it had taught the use of the tools of learning, while denying all
+sorts of knowledge on which to exercise them afterwards. And here
+incidentally he repudiated the notion that the English child was
+stupid; on the contrary, he thought the two finest intellects in
+Europe at this time were the English and the Italian.
+
+In particular he advocated the teaching of] "the first elements of
+physical science"; "by which I do not mean teaching astronomy and the
+use of the globes, and the rest of the abominable trash--but a little
+instruction of the child in what is the nature of common things about
+him; what their properties are, and in what relation this actual body
+of man stands to the universe outside of it." "There is no form of
+knowledge or instruction in which children take greater interest."
+
+[Drawing and music, too, he considered, should be taught in every
+elementary school, not to produce painters or musicians, but as
+civilising arts. History, except the most elementary notions, he put
+out of court, as too advanced for children.
+
+Finally, he proposed a list of members to serve on the Education
+Committee in a couple of sentences with a humorous twist in them which
+disarmed criticism.] "On a former occasion I was accused of having a
+proclivity in favour of the clergy, and recollecting this, I have only
+given them in this instance a fair proportion of the representation.
+If, however, I have omitted any gentleman who thinks he ought to be on
+the committee, I can only assure him that above all others I should
+have been glad to put him on."
+
+[That day week the committee was elected, about a third of the members
+of the Board being chosen to serve on it. At the same meeting, Dr.
+Gladstone continues:--
+
+Mr. W.H. Smith, the well-known member of Parliament, proposed, and Mr.
+Samuel Morley, M.P., seconded, a resolution in favour of religious
+teaching--"That, in the schools provided by the Board, the Bible shall
+be read, and there shall be given therefrom such explanations and such
+instruction in the principles of religion and morality as are suited
+to the capacities of children," with certain provisos. Several
+antagonistic amendments were proposed; but Professor Huxley gave his
+support to Mr. Smith's resolutions, which, however, he thought might
+be trimmed and amended in a way that the Reverend Dr. Angus had
+suggested. His speech, defining his own position, was a very
+remarkable one. He said] "it was assumed in the public mind that this
+question of religious instruction was a little family quarrel between
+the different sects of Protestantism on the one hand, and the old
+Catholic Church on the other. Side by side with this much shivered and
+splintered Protestantism of theirs, and with the united fabric of the
+Catholic Church (not so strong temporally as she used to be, otherwise
+he might not have been addressing them at that moment), there was a
+third party growing up into very considerable and daily increasing
+significance, which had nothing to do with either of those great
+parties, and which was pushing its own way independent of them, having
+its own religion and its own morality, which rested in no way whatever
+on the foundations of the other two." [He thought that] "the action of
+the Board should be guided and influenced very much by the
+consideration of this third great aspect of things," [which he called
+the scientific aspect, for want of a better name.]
+
+"It had been very justly said that they had a great mass of low
+half-instructed population which owed what little redemption from
+ignorance and barbarism it possessed mainly to the efforts of the
+clergy of the different denominations. Any system of gaining the
+attention of these people to these matters must be a system connected
+with, or not too rudely divorced from their own system of belief. He
+wanted regulations, not in accordance with what he himself thought was
+right, but in the direction in which thought was moving." [He wanted
+an elastic system, that did not oppose any obstacle to the free play
+of the public mind.
+
+Huxley voted against all the proposed amendments, and in favour of Mr.
+Smith's motion. There were only three who voted against it; while the
+three Roman Catholic members refrained from voting. This basis of
+religious instruction, practically unaltered, has remained the law of
+the Board ever since.
+
+There was a controversy in the papers, between Professor Huxley and
+the Reverend W.H. Fremantle, as to the nature of the explanations of
+the Bible lessons. Huxley maintained that it should be purely
+grammatical, geographical, and historical in its nature; Fremantle
+that it should include some species of distinct religious teaching,
+but not of a denominational character. (Cp. extract from Lord
+Shaftesbury's journal about this correspondence ("Life and Work of
+Lord Shaftesbury" 3 282). "Professor Huxley has this definition of
+morality and religion:] 'Teach a child what is wise, that is morality.
+Teach him what is wise and beautiful, that is RELIGION!' Let no one
+henceforth despair of making things clear and of giving
+explanations!")
+
+[In taking up this position, Huxley expressly disclaimed any desire
+for a mere compromise to smooth over a difficulty. He supported what
+appeared to be the only workable plan under the circumstances, though
+it was not his ideal; for he would not have used the Bible as the
+agency for introducing the religious and ethical idea into education
+if he had been dealing with a fresh and untouched population.
+
+His appreciation of the literary and historical value of the Bible,
+and the effect it was likely to produce upon the school children,
+circumstanced as they were, is sometimes misunderstood to be an
+endorsement of the vulgar idea of it. But it always remained his
+belief] "that the principle of strict secularity in State education is
+sound, and must eventually prevail." [(As a result of some remarks of
+Mr. Clodd's on the matter in "Pioneers of Evolution," a correspondent,
+some time after, wrote to him as follows:--
+
+"In the report upon State Education in New Zealand, 1895, drawn up by
+R. Laishly, the following occurs, page 13:--'Professor Huxley gives me
+leave to state his opinion to be that the principle of strict
+secularity in State education is sound, and must eventually prevail.'"
+
+His views on dogmatic teaching in State schools, may be gathered
+further from two letters at the period when an attempt was being made
+to upset the so-called compromise.
+
+The first appeared in the "Times" of April 29, 1893:--]
+
+Sir,
+
+In a leading article of your issue of to-day you state, with perfect
+accuracy, that I supported the arrangement respecting religious
+instruction agreed to by the London School Board in 1871, and hitherto
+undisturbed. But you go on to say that "the persons who framed the
+rule" intended it to include definite teaching of such theological
+dogmas as the Incarnation.
+
+I cannot say what may have been in the minds of the framers of the
+rule; but, assuredly, if I had dreamed that any such interpretation
+could fairly be put upon it, I should have opposed the arrangement to
+the best of my ability.
+
+In fact, a year before the rule was framed I wrote an article in the
+"Contemporary Review," entitled "The School Boards--what they can do
+and what they may do," in which I argued that the terms of the
+Education Act excluded such teaching as it is now proposed to include.
+And I support my contention by the following citation from the speech
+delivered by Mr. Forster at the Birkbeck Institution in 1870:--
+
+["I have the fullest confidence that in the reading and explaining of
+the Bible what the children will be taught will be the great truths of
+Christian life and conduct, which all of us desire they should know,
+and that no efforts will be made to cram into their poor little minds
+theological dogmas which their tender age prevents them from
+understanding."
+
+I am, sir, your obedient servant,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hodeslea, Eastbourne, April 28.
+
+[The second is to a correspondent who wrote to ask him whether
+adhesion to the compromise had not rendered nonsensical the teaching
+given in a certain lesson upon the finding of the youthful Jesus in
+the temple, when, after they had read the verse, "How is it that ye
+sought me? Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" the
+teacher asked the children the name of Jesus' father and mother, and
+accepted the simple answer, Joseph and Mary. Thus the point of the
+story, whether regarded as reality or myth, is slurred over, the
+result is perplexity, the teaching, in short, is bad, apart from all
+theory as to the value of the Bible.
+
+In a letter to the "Chronicle," which he forwarded, this correspondent
+suggested a continuation of the "incriminated lesson":--
+
+Suppose, then, that an intelligent child of seven, who has just heard
+it read out that Jesus excused Himself to his parents for disappearing
+for three days, on the ground that He was about His father's business,
+and has then learned that His father's name was Joseph, had said,
+"Please, teacher, was this the Jesus that gave us the Lord's Prayer?"
+The teacher answers, "Yes." and suppose the child rejoins, "And is it
+to His father Joseph that he bids us pray when we say Our Father?" But
+there are boys of nine, ten, eleven years in Board Schools, and many
+such boys are intelligent enough to take up the subject of the lesson
+where the instructor left it. "Please, teacher," asks one of these,
+"what business was it that Jesus had to do for His father Joseph? Had
+He stopped behind to get a few orders? Was it true that He had been
+about Joseph's business? And, if it was not, did He not deserve to be
+punished?"
+
+Huxley replied on October 16, 1894:--]
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+I am one with you in hating "hush up" as I do all other forms of
+lying; but I venture to submit that the compromise of 1871 was not a
+"hush-up." If I had taken it to be such I should have refused to have
+anything to do with it. And more specifically, I said in a letter to
+the "Times" (see "Times," 29th April 1893) at the beginning of the
+present controversy, that if I had thought the compromise involved the
+obligatory teaching of such dogmas as the Incarnation I should have
+opposed it.
+
+There has never been the slightest ambiguity about my position in this
+matter; in fact, if you will turn to one paper on the School Board
+written by me before my election in 1870, I think you will find that I
+anticipated the pith of the present discussion.
+
+The persons who agreed to the compromise, did exactly what all sincere
+men who agree to compromise, do. For the sake of the enormous
+advantage of giving the rudiments of a decent education to several
+generations of the people, they accepted what was practically an
+armistice in respect of certain matters about which the contending
+parties were absolutely irreconcilable.
+
+The clericals have now "denounced" the treaty, doubtless thinking they
+can get a new one more favourable to themselves.
+
+From my point of view, I am not sure that it might not be well for
+them to succeed, so that the sweep into space which would befall them
+in the course of the next twenty-three years might be complete and
+final.
+
+As to the case you put to me--permit me to continue the dialogue in
+another shape.
+
+Boy.--Please, teacher, if Joseph was not Jesus' father and God was,
+why did Mary say, "Thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing"? How
+could God not know where Jesus was? How could He be sorry?
+
+Teacher.--When Jesus says Father, he means God; but when Mary says
+father, she means Joseph.
+
+Boy.--Then Mary didn't know God was Jesus' father?
+
+Teacher.--Oh, yes, she did (reads the story of the Annunciation).
+
+Boy.--It seems to me very odd that Mary used language which she knew
+was not true, and taught her son to call Joseph father. But there's
+another odd thing about her. If she knew her child was God's son, why
+was she alarmed about his safety? Surely she might have trusted God to
+look after his own son in a crowd.
+
+I know of children of six and seven who are quite capable of following
+out such a line of inquiry with all the severe logic of a moral sense
+which has not been sophisticated by pious scrubbing.
+
+I could tell you of stranger inquiries than these which have been made
+by children in endeavouring to understand the account of the
+miraculous conception.
+
+Whence I conclude that even in the interests of what people are
+pleased to call Christianity (though it is my firm conviction that
+Jesus would have repudiated the doctrine of the Incarnation as warmly
+as that of the Trinity), it may be well to leave things as they are.
+
+All this is for your own eye. There is nothing in substance that I
+have not said publicly, but I do not feel called upon to say it over
+again, or get mixed up in an utterly wearisome controversy.
+
+I am, yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[However, he was unsuccessful in his proposal that a selection be made
+of passages for reading from the Bible; the Board refused to become
+censors. On May 10 he raised the question of the diversion from the
+education of poor children of charitable bequests, which ought to be
+applied to the augmentation of the school fund. In speaking to this
+motion he said that the long account of errors and crimes of the
+Catholic Church was greatly redeemed by the fact that that Church had
+always borne in mind the education of the poor, and had carried out
+the great democratic idea that the soul of every man was of the same
+value in the eyes of his Maker.
+
+The next matter of importance in which he took part was on June 14,
+when the Committee on the Scheme of Education presented its first
+report. Dr. Gladstone writes:--
+
+It was a very voluminous document. The Committee had met every week,
+and, in the words of Huxley,] "what it had endeavoured to do, was to
+obtain some order and system and uniformity in important matters,
+whilst in comparatively unimportant matters they thought some play
+should be given for the activity of the bodies of men into whose hands
+the management of the various schools should be placed." [The
+recommendations were considered on June 21 and July 12, and passed
+without any material alterations or additions. They were very much the
+same as existed in the best elementary schools of the period. Huxley's
+chief interest, it may be surmised, was in the subjects of
+instruction. It was passed that, in infants' schools there should be
+the Bible, reading, writing, arithmetic, object lessons of a simple
+character, with some such exercise of the hands and eyes as is given
+in the Kindergarten system, music, and drill. In junior and senior
+schools the subjects of instruction were divided into two classes,
+essential and discretionary, the essentials being the Bible, and the
+principles of religion and morality, reading, writing, and arithmetic,
+English grammar and composition, elementary geography, and elementary
+social economy, history of England, the principles of book-keeping in
+senior schools, with mensuration in senior boys' schools. All through
+the six years there were to be systematised object lessons, embracing
+a course of elementary instruction in physical science, and serving as
+an introduction to the science examinations conducted by the Science
+and Art department. An analogous course of instruction was adopted for
+elementary evening schools. In moving] "that the formation of science
+and art classes in connection with public elementary schools be
+encouraged and facilitated," [Huxley contended strongly for it,
+saying,] "The country could not possibly commit a greater error than
+in establishing schools in which the direct applications of science
+and art were taught before those who entered the classes were grounded
+in the principles of physical science." [In advocating object lessons
+he said,] "The position that science was now assuming, not only in
+relation to practical life, but to thought, was such that those who
+remained entirely ignorant of even its elementary facts were in a
+wholly unfair position as regarded the world of thought and the world
+of practical life." [It was, moreover,] "the only real foundation for
+technical education."
+
+[Other points in which he was specially concerned were, that the
+universal teaching of drawing was accepted, against an amendment
+excluding girls; that domestic economy was made a discretionary
+substitute for needlework and cutting-out; while he spoke in defence
+of Latin as a discretionary subject, alternatively with a modern
+language. It was true that he would not have proposed it in the first
+instance, not because a little Latin is a bad thing, but for fear of]
+"overloading the boat." [But, on the other hand, there was great
+danger if education were not thrown open to all without restriction.
+If it be urged that a man should be content with the state of life to
+which he is called, the obvious retort is, How do you know what is
+your state of life, unless you try what you are called to? There is no
+more frightful] "sitting on the safety valve" [than in preventing men
+of ability from having the means of rising to the positions for which
+they, by their talents and industry, could qualify themselves.
+
+Further, although the committee as a whole recommended that
+discretionary subjects should be extras, he wished them to be covered
+by the general payment, in which sense the report was amended.
+
+This Education Committee (proceeds Dr. Gladstone) continued to sit,
+and on November 30 brought up a report in favour of the Prussian
+system of separate classrooms, to be tried in one school as an
+experiment. This reads curiously now that it has become the system
+almost universally adopted in the London Board Schools.
+
+In regard to examinations Huxley strongly supported the view that the
+teaching in all subjects, secular or sacred, should be periodically
+tested.
+
+On December 13, Huxley raised the question whether the selection of
+books and apparatus should be referred to his Committee or to the
+School Management Committee, and on January 10 following, a small
+sub-committee for that object was formed. Almost immediately after
+this he retired from the Board.
+
+One more speech of his, which created a great stir at the time, must
+be referred to, namely his expression of undisguised hostility to the
+system of education maintained by the Ultramontane section of the
+Roman Catholics. (Cp. "Scientific Education" "Collected Essays" 3 page
+111.) In October the bye-laws came up for consideration. One of them
+provided that the Board should pay over direct to denominational
+schools the fees for poor children. This he opposed on the ground that
+it would lead to repeated contests on the Board, and further, might be
+used as a tool by the Ultramontanes for their own purposes. Believing
+that their system as set forth in the syllabus, of securing complete
+possession of the minds of those whom they taught or controlled, was
+destructive to all that was highest in the nature of mankind, and
+inconsistent with intellectual and political liberty, he considered it
+his earnest duty to oppose all measures which would lead to assisting
+the Ultramontanes in their purpose.
+
+Hereupon he was vehemently attacked, for example, in the "Times" for
+his "injudicious and even reprehensible tone" which "aggravated the
+difficulties his opponents might have in giving way to him." Was this,
+it was asked, the way to get Roman Catholic children to the Board
+schools? Was it not an abandonment of the ideal of compulsory
+education?
+
+It is hardly necessary to point out that the question was not between
+the compulsory inclusion or exclusion of poor children, but between
+their admission at the cost of the Board to schools under the Board's
+own control or outside it. In any case the children of Roman Catholics
+were not likely to get their own doctrines taught in Board Schools,
+and without this they declared they would rather go without education
+at all.
+
+Early in 1872 Huxley retired. For a year he had continued at this
+task; then his health broke down, and feeling that he had done his
+part, from no personal motives of ambition, but rather at some cost to
+himself, for what he held to be national ends, he determined not to
+resume the work after the rest which was to restore him to health, and
+made his resignation definite.
+
+Dr. Gladstone writes:--
+
+On February 7 a letter of resignation was received from him, stating
+that he was] "reluctantly compelled, both on account of his health and
+his private affairs, to insist on giving up his seat at the Board."
+[The Reverend Dr. Rigg, Canon Miller, Mr. Charles Reed, and Lord
+Lawrence expressed their deep regret. In the words of Dr. Rigg, "they
+were losing one of the most valuable members of the Board, not only
+because of his intellect and trained acuteness, but because of his
+knowledge of every subject connected with culture and education, and
+because of his great fairness and impartiality with regard to all
+subjects that came under his observation."
+
+Though Huxley quitted the Board after only fourteen months' service,
+the memory of his words and acts combined to influence it long
+afterwards. In various ways he expressed his opinion on educational
+matters, publicly and privately. He frequently talked with me on the
+subject at the Athenaeum Club, and shortly after my election to the
+Board in 1873, I find it recorded in my diary that he insisted
+strongly on the necessity of our building infants' schools,--] "People
+may talk about intellectual teaching, but what we principally want is
+the moral teaching."
+
+As to the sub-committee on books and apparatus, it did little at
+first, but at the beginning of the second Board, 1873, it became
+better organised under the presidency of the Reverend Benjamin Waugh.
+At the commencement of the next triennial term I became the chairman,
+and continued to be such for eighteen years. It was our duty to put
+into practice the scheme of instruction which Huxley was mainly
+instrumental in settling. We were thus able indirectly to improve both
+the means and methods of teaching. The subjects of instruction have
+all been retained in the Curriculum of the London School Board,
+except, perhaps, "mensuration" and "social economy." The most
+important developments and additions have been in the direction of
+educating the hand and eye. Kindergarten methods have been promoted.
+Drawing, on which Huxley laid more stress than his colleagues
+generally did, has been enormously extended and greatly revolutionised
+in its methods. Object lessons and elementary science have been
+introduced everywhere, while shorthand, the use of tools for boys,
+cookery and domestic economy for girls are becoming essentials in our
+schools. Evening continuation schools have lately been widely
+extended. Thus the impulse given by Huxley in the first months of the
+Board's existence has been carried forward by others, and is now
+affecting the minds of the half million of boys and girls in the Board
+Schools of London, and indirectly the still greater number in other
+schools throughout the land.
+
+I must further express my thanks to Bishop Barry for permission to
+make use of the following passages from the notes contributed by him
+to Dr. Gladstone:--
+
+I had the privilege of being a member of his committee for defining
+the curriculum of study, and here also--the religious question being
+disposed of--I was able to follow much the same line as his, and I
+remember being struck not only with his clear-headed ability, but with
+his strong commonsense, as to what was useful and practicable, and the
+utter absence in him of doctrinaire aspiration after ideal
+impossibilities. There was (I think) very little under his
+chairmanship of strongly-accentuated difference of opinion.
+
+In his action on the Board generally I was struck with these three
+characteristics:--First, his remarkable power of speaking--I may say,
+of oratory--not only on his own scientific subjects, but on all the
+matters, many of which were of great practical interest and touched
+the deepest feelings, which came before the Board at that critical
+time. Had he chosen--and we heard at that time that he was considering
+whether he should choose--to enter political life, it would certainly
+have made him a great power, possibly a leader, in that sphere. Next,
+what constantly appears in his writings, even those of the most
+polemical kind--a singular candour in recognising truths which might
+seen to militate against his own position, and a power of
+understanding and respecting his adversaries' opinions, if only they
+were strongly and conscientiously held. I remember his saying on one
+occasion that in his earlier experience of sickness and suffering, he
+had found that the most effective helpers of the higher humanity were
+not the scientist or the philosopher, but] "the parson, and the
+sister, and the Bible woman." [Lastly, the strong commonsense, which
+enabled him to see what was] "within the range of practical politics,"
+[and to choose for the cause which he had at heart the line of least
+resistance, and to check, sometimes to rebuke, intolerant obstinacy
+even on the side which he was himself inclined to favour. These
+qualities over and above his high intellectual ability made him, for
+the comparatively short time that he remained on the Board, one of its
+leading members.
+
+No less vivid is the impression left, after many years, upon another
+member of the first School Board, the Reverend Benjamin Waugh, whose
+life-long work for the children is so well known. From his
+recollections, written for the use of Professor Gladstone, it is my
+privilege to quote the following paragraphs:--
+
+I was drawn to him most, and was influenced by him most, because of
+his attitude to a child. He was on the Board to establish schools for
+children. His motive in every argument, in all the fun and ridicule he
+indulged in, and in his occasional anger, was the child. He resented
+the idea that schools were to train either congregations for churches
+or hands for factories. He was on the Board as a friend of children.
+What he sought to do for the child was for the child's sake, that it
+might live a fuller, truer, worthier life. If ever his great tolerance
+with men with whom he differed on general principles seemed to fail
+him for a moment, it was because they seemed to him to seek other ends
+than the child for its own sake...
+
+His contempt for the idea of the world into which we were born being
+either a sort of clergyhouse or a market-place, was too complete to be
+marked by any eagerness. But in view of the market-place idea he was
+the less calm.
+
+Like many others who had not yet come to know in what high esteem he
+held the moral and spiritual nature of children, I had thought he was
+the advocate of mere secular studies, alike in the nation's schools,
+and in its families. But by contact with him, this soon became an
+impossible idea. In very early days on the Board a remark I had made
+to a mutual friend which implied this unjust idea was repeated to
+him.] "Tell Waugh that he talks too fast," [was his message to me. I
+was not long in finding out that this was a very just reproof...
+
+The two things in his character of which I became most conscious by
+contact with him, were his childlikeness and his consideration for
+intellectual inferiors. His arguments were as transparently honest as
+the arguments of a child. They might or might not seem wrong to
+others, but they were never untrue to himself. Whether you agreed with
+them or not, they always added greatly to the charm of his
+personality. Whether his face was lighted by his careless and playful
+humour or his great brows were shadowed by anger, he was alike
+expressing himself with the honesty of a child. What he counted
+iniquity he hated, and what he counted righteous he loved with the
+candour of a child...
+
+Of his consideration for intellectual inferiors I, of course, needed a
+large share, and it was never wanting. Towering as was his
+intellectual strength and keenness above me, indeed above the whole of
+the rest of the members of the Board, he did not condescend to me. The
+result was never humiliating. It had no pain of any sort in it. He was
+too spontaneous and liberal with his consideration to seem conscious
+that he was showing any. There were many men of religious note upon
+the Board, of some of whom I could not say the same.
+
+In his most trenchant attacks on what he deemed wrong in principles,
+he never descended to attack either the sects which held them or the
+individuals who supported them, even though occasionally much
+provocation was given him. He might not care for peace with some of
+the theories represented on the Board, but he had certainly and at all
+times great good-will to men.
+
+As a speaker he was delightful. Few, clear, definite, and calm as
+stars were the words he spoke. Nobody talked whilst he was speaking.
+There were no tricks in his talk. He did not seem to be trying to
+persuade you of something. What convinced him, that he transferred to
+others. He made no attempt to misrepresent those opposed to him. He
+sought only to let them know himself...Even the sparkle of his humour,
+like the sparkle of a diamond, was of the inevitable in him, and was
+as fair as it was enjoyable.
+
+As one who has tried to serve children, I look back upon having fallen
+in with Mr. Huxley as one of the many fortunate circumstances of my
+life. It taught me the importance of making acquaintance with facts,
+and of studying the laws of them. Under his influence it was that I
+most of all came to see the practical value of a single eye to those
+in any pursuit of life. I saw what effect they had on emotions of
+charity and sentiments of justice, and what simplicity and grandeur
+they gave to appeals.
+
+My last conversation with him was at Eastbourne some time in 1887 or
+1888. I was there on my society's business.] "Well, Waugh, you're
+still busy about your babies," [was his greeting. "Yes," I responded
+"and you are still busy about your pigs." One of the last discussions
+at which he was present at the School Board for London had been on the
+proximity of a piggery to a site for a school, and his attack on Mr.
+Gladstone on the Gadarene swine had just been made in the "Nineteenth
+Century."] "Do you still believe in Gladstone?" [he continued.] "That
+man has the greatest intellect in Europe. He was born to be a leader
+of men, and he has debased himself to be a follower of the masses. If
+working men were to-day to vote by a majority that two and two made
+five, to-morrow Gladstone would believe it, and find them reasons for
+it which they had never dreamed of." [He said it slowly and with
+sorrow.
+
+Two more incidents are connected with his service on the School Board.
+A wealthy friend wrote to him in the most honourable and delicate
+terms, begging him, on public grounds, to accept 400 pounds sterling a
+year to enable him to continue his work on the Board. He refused the
+offer as simply and straightforwardly as it was made; his means,
+though not large, were sufficient for his present needs.
+
+Further, a good many people seemed to think that he meant to use the
+School Board as a stalking horse for a political career. To one of
+those who urged him to stand for Parliament, he replied thus:--]
+
+November 18, 1871.
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+It has often been suggested to me that I should seek for a seat in the
+House of Commons; indeed I have reason to think that many persons
+suppose that I entered the London School Board simply as a road to
+Parliament.
+
+But I assure you that this supposition is entirely without foundation,
+and that I have never seriously entertained any notion of the kind.
+
+The work of the School Board involves me in no small sacrifices of
+various kinds, but I went into it with my eyes open, and with the
+clear conviction that it was worth while to make those sacrifices for
+the sake of helping the Education Act into practical operation. A
+year's experience has not altered that conviction; but now that the
+most difficult, if not the most important, part of our work is done, I
+begin to look forward with some anxiety to the time when I shall be
+relieved of duties which so seriously interfere with what I regard as
+my proper occupation.
+
+No one can say what the future has in store for him, but at present I
+know of no inducement, not even the offer of a seat in the House of
+Commons, which would lead me, even temporarily and partially, to
+forsake that work again.
+
+I am, dear sir, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[I give here a letter to me from Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff, who also
+at one period was anxious to induce him to enter Parliament:--
+
+Lexden Park, Colchester, 4th November, 1898.
+
+Dear Mr. Huxley,
+
+I have met men who seemed to me to possess powers of mind even greater
+than those of your father--his friend Henry Smith for example; but I
+never met any one who gave me the impression so much as he did, that
+he would have gone to the front in any pursuit in which he had seen
+fit to engage. Henry Smith had, in addition to his astonishing
+mathematical genius, and his great talents as a scholar, a rare
+faculty of persuasiveness. Your father used to speak with much
+admiration and some amusement of the way in which he managed to get
+people to take his view by appearing to take theirs; but he never
+could have been a power in a popular assembly, nor have carried with
+him by the force of his eloquence, great masses of men. I do not think
+that your father, if he had entered the House of Commons and thrown
+himself entirely into political life, would have been much behind
+Gladstone as a debater, or Bright as an orator. Whether he had the
+stamina which are required not only to reach but to retain a foremost
+place in politics, is another question. The admirers of Prince
+Bismarck would say that the daily prayer of the statesman should be
+there "une bonne digestion et un mauvais coeur." "Le mauvais coeur"
+does not appear to be "de toute necessite," but, assuredly, the "bonne
+digestion" is. Given an adequate and equal amount of ability in two
+men who enter the House of Commons together, it is the man of strong
+digestion, drawing with it, as it usually does, good temper and power
+of continuous application, who will go furthest. Gladstone, who was
+inferior to your father in intellect, might have "given points" to the
+Dragon of Wantley who devoured church steeples. Your father could
+certainly not have done so, and in that respect was less well equipped
+for a lifelong parliamentary struggle.
+
+I should like to have seen these two pitted against each other with
+that "substantial piece of furniture" between them behind which Mr.
+Disraeli was glad to shelter himself. I should like to have heard them
+discussing some subject which they both thoroughly understood. When
+they did cross swords the contest was like nothing that has happened
+in our times save the struggle at Omdurman. It was not so much a
+battle as a massacre, for Gladstone had nothing but a bundle of
+antiquated prejudices wherewith to encounter your father's luminous
+thought and exact knowledge.
+
+You know, I daresay, that Mr. William Rathbone, then M.P. for
+Liverpool, once proposed to your father to be the companion of my
+first Indian journey in 1874-5, he, William Rathbone, paying all your
+father's expenses. (Of this, Dr. Tyndall wrote to Mrs. Huxley:--"I
+want to tell you a pleasant conversation I had last night with
+Jodrell. He and a couple more want to send Hal with Grant Duff to
+India, taking charge of his duties here and of all necessities ghostly
+and bodily there!") Mr. Rathbone made this proposal when he found that
+Lubbock, with whom I travelled a great deal at that period of my life,
+was unable to go with me to India. How I wish your father had said
+"Yes." My journey, as it was, turned out most instructive and
+delightful; but to have lived five months with a man of his
+extraordinary gifts would have been indeed a rare piece of good
+fortune, and I should have been able also to have contributed to the
+work upon which you are engaged a great many facts which would have
+been of interest to your readers. You will, however, I am sure, take
+the will for the deed, and believe me, very sincerely yours,
+
+M.E. Grant Duff.]
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.2.
+
+1871.
+
+["In 1871" (to quote Sir M. Foster), "the post of Secretary to the
+Royal Society became vacant through the resignation of William
+Sharpey, and the Fellows learned with glad surprise that Huxley, whom
+they looked to rather as a not distant President, was willing to
+undertake the duties of the office." This office, which he held until
+1880, involved him for the next ten years in a quantity of anxious
+work, not only in the way of correspondence and administration, but
+the seeing through the press and often revising every biological paper
+that the Society received, as well as reading those it rejected. Then,
+too, he had to attend every general, council, and committee meeting,
+amongst which latter the "Challenger" Committee was a load in itself.
+Under pressure of all this work, he was compelled to give up active
+connection with other learned societies. (See Appendix 2.)
+
+Other work this year, in addition to the School Board, included
+courses of lectures at the London Institution in January and February,
+on "First Principles of Biology," and from October to December on
+"Elementary Physiology"; lectures to Working Men in London from
+February to April, as well as one at Liverpool, March 25, on "The
+Geographical Distribution of Animals"; two lectures at the Royal
+Institution, May 12 and 19, on "Berkeley on Vision," and the
+"Metaphysics of Sensation" ("Collected Essays" 6). He published one
+paleontological paper, "Fossil Vertebrates from the Yarrow Colliery"
+(Huxley and Wright, "Irish Academy Transactions"). In June and July he
+gave 36 lectures to schoolmasters--that important business of teaching
+the teachers that they might set about scientific instruction in the
+right way. (See below.) He attended the British Association at
+Edinburgh, and laid down his Presidency; he brought out his "Manual of
+Vertebrate Anatomy," and wrote a review of "Mr. Darwin's Critics" (see
+below), while on October 9 he delivered an address at the Midland
+Institute, Birmingham, on "Administrative Nihilism" ("Collected
+Essays" 1). This address, written between September 21 and 28, and
+remodelled later, was a pendant to his educational campaign on the
+School Board; a restatement and justification of what he had said and
+done there. His text was the various objections raised to State
+interference with education; he dealt first with the upholders of a
+kind of caste system, men who were willing enough to raise themselves
+and their sons to a higher social plane, but objected on
+semi-theological grounds to any one from below doing likewise--neatly
+satirising them and their notions of gentility, and quoting Plato in
+support of his contention that what is wanted even more than means to
+help capacity to rise is "machinery by which to facilitate the descent
+of incapacity from the higher strata to the lower." He repeats in new
+phrase his warning] "that every man of high natural ability, who is
+both ignorant and miserable, is as great a danger to society as a
+rocket without a stick is to people who fire it. Misery is a match
+that never goes out; genius, as an explosive power, beats gunpowder
+hollow: and if knowledge, which should give that power guidance, is
+wanting, the chances are not small that the rocket will simply run
+amuck among friends and foes."
+
+[Another class of objectors will have it that government should be
+restricted to police functions, both domestic and foreign, that any
+further interference must do harm.]
+
+Suppose, however, for the sake of argument, that we accept the
+proposition that the functions of the State may be properly summed up
+in the one great negative commandment--"Thou shalt not allow any man
+to interfere with the liberty of any other man,"--I am unable to see
+that the logical consequence is any such restriction of the power of
+Government, as its supporters imply. If my next-door neighbour chooses
+to have his drains in such a state as to create a poisonous
+atmosphere, which I breathe at the risk of typhoid and diphtheria, he
+restricts my just freedom to just as much as if he went about with a
+pistol threatening my life; if he is to be allowed to let his children
+go unvaccinated, he might as well be allowed to leave strychnine
+lozenges about in the way of mine; and if he brings them up untaught
+and untrained to earn their living, he is doing his best to restrict
+my freedom, by increasing the burden of taxation for the support of
+gaols and workhouses, which I have to pay.
+
+The higher the state of civilisation, the more completely do the
+actions of one member of the social body influence all the rest, and
+the less possible is it for any one man to do a wrong thing without
+interfering, more or less, with the freedom of all his
+fellow-citizens. So that, even upon the narrowest view of the
+functions of the State, it must be admitted to have wider powers than
+the advocates of the police theory are disposed to admit.
+
+[This leads to a criticism of Mr. Spencer's elaborate comparison of
+the body politic to the body physical, a comparison vitiated by the
+fact that "among the higher physiological organisms there is none
+which is developed by the conjunction of a number of primitively
+independent existences into a complete whole."]
+
+The process of social organisation appears to be comparable, not so
+much to the process of organic development, as to the synthesis of the
+chemist, by which independent elements are gradually built up into
+complex aggregations--in which each element retains an independent
+individuality, though held in subordination to the whole.
+
+[It is permissible to quote a few more sentences from this address for
+the sake of their freshness, or as illustrating the writer's ideas.
+
+Discussing toleration,] "I cannot discover that Locke fathers the pet
+doctrine of modern Liberalism, that the toleration of error is a good
+thing in itself, and to be reckoned among the cardinal virtues."
+[(This bears on his speech against Ultramontanism.)
+
+Of Mr. Spencer's comparison of the State to a living body in the
+interests of individualism:--]
+
+I suppose it is universally agreed that it would be useless and absurd
+for the State to attempt to promote friendship and sympathy between
+man and man directly. But I see no reason why, if it be otherwise
+expedient, the State may not do something towards that end indirectly.
+For example, I can conceive the existence of an Established Church
+which should be a blessing to the community. A Church in which, week
+by week, services should be devoted, not to the iteration of abstract
+propositions in theology, but to the setting before men's minds of an
+ideal of true, just, and pure living; a place in which those who are
+weary of the burden of daily cares should find a moment's rest in the
+contemplation of the higher life which is possible for all, though
+attained by so few; a place in which the man of strife and of business
+should have time to think how small, after all, are the rewards he
+covets compared with peace and charity. Depend upon it, if such a
+Church existed, no one would seek to disestablish it.
+
+The sole order of nobility which, in my judgment, becomes a
+philosopher, is the rank which he holds in the estimation of his
+fellow-workers, who are the only competent judges in such matters.
+Newton and Cuvier lowered themselves when the one accepted an idle
+knighthood, and the other became a baron of the empire. The great men
+who went to their graves as Michael Faraday and George Grote seem to
+me to have understood the dignity of knowledge better when they
+declined all such meretricious trappings. [(On the other hand, he
+thought it right and proper for officials, in scientific as in other
+departments, to accept such honours, as giving them official power and
+status. In his own case, while refusing all simple titular honours, he
+accepted the Privy Councillorship, because, though incidentally
+carrying a title, it was an office; and an office in virtue of which a
+man of science might, in theory at least, be called upon to act as
+responsible adviser to the Government, should special occasion arise.)
+
+The usual note of high pressure recurs in the following letter,
+written to thank Darwin for his new work, "The Descent of Man, and
+Selection in relation to Sex."]
+
+Jermyn Street, February 20, 1871.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+Best thanks for your new book, a copy of which I find awaiting me this
+morning. But I wish you would not bring your books out when I am so
+busy with all sorts of things. You know I can't show my face anywhere
+in society without having read them--and I consider it too bad.
+
+No doubt, too, it is full of suggestions just like that I have hit
+upon by chance at page 212 of volume 1, which connects the periodicity
+of vital phenomena with antecedent conditions.
+
+Fancy lunacy, etc., coming out of the primary fact that one's nth
+ancestor lived between tide-marks! I declare it's the grandest
+suggestion I have heard of for an age.
+
+I have been working like a horse for the last fortnight, with the fag
+end of influenza hanging about me--and I am improving under the
+process, which shows what a good tonic work is.
+
+I shall try if I can't pick out from "Sexual Selection" some practical
+hint for the improvement of gutter-babies, and bring in a resolution
+thereupon at the School Board.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This year also saw the inception of a scheme for a series of science
+primers, under the joint editorship of Professors Huxley, Roscoe, and
+Balfour Stewart. Huxley undertook the Introductory Primer, but it
+progressed slowly owing to pressure of other work, and was not
+actually finished till 1880.]
+
+26 Abbey Place, June 29, 1871.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+If you could see the minutes of the Proceedings of the Aid to Science
+Commission, the Contagious Diseases Commission and the School Board
+(to say nothing of a lecture to Schoolmasters every morning), you
+would forgive me for not having written to you before.
+
+But now that I have had a little time to look at it, I hasten to say
+that your chemical primer appears to me to be admirable--just what is
+wanted.
+
+I enclose the sketch for my Primer primus. You will see the bearing of
+it, rough as it is. When it touches upon chemical matters, it would
+deal with them in a more rudimentary fashion than yours does, and only
+prepare the minds of the fledglings for you.
+
+I send you a copy of the Report of the Education Committee, the
+resolutions based on which I am now slowly getting passed by our
+Board. The adoption of (c) among the essential subjects has, I hope,
+secured the future of Elementary Science in London. Cannot you get as
+much done in Manchester?
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Sir Charles Lyell was now nearly 74 years old, and though he lived
+four years longer, age was beginning to tell even upon his vigorous
+powers. A chance meeting with him elicited the following letter:--]
+
+26 Abbey Place, July 30, 1871.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I met Lyell in Waterloo Place to-day walking with Carrick Moore--and
+although what you said the other day had prepared me, I was greatly
+shocked at his appearance, and still more at his speech. There is no
+doubt it is affected in the way you describe, and the fact gives me
+very sad forebodings about him. The Fates send me a swift and speedy
+end whenever my time comes. I think there is nothing so lamentable as
+the spectacle of the wreck of a once clear and vigorous mind!
+
+I am glad Frank enjoyed his visit to us. He is a great favourite here,
+and I hope he will understand that he is free of the house. It was the
+greatest fun to see Jess and Mady [aged 13 and 12 respectively] on
+their dignity with him. No more kissing, I can tell you. Miss Mady was
+especially sublime.
+
+Six out of our seven children have the whooping-cough. Need I say
+therefore that the wife is enjoying herself?
+
+With best regards to Mrs. Darwin and your daughter (and affectionate
+love to Polly) believe me,
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The purchase of the microscope, already referred to, was the subject
+of another letter to Dr. Dohrn, of which only the concluding paragraph
+about the School Board, is of general interest. Unfortunately the
+English microscope did not turn out a success, as compared to the work
+of the Jena opticians: this is the "optical Sadowa" of the second
+letter.]
+
+I fancy from what you wrote to my wife that there has been some report
+of my doings about the School Board in Germany. So I send you the
+number of the "Contemporary Review" [Containing his article on "The
+School Boards," etc.] for December that you may see what line I have
+really taken. Fanatics on both sides abuse me, so I think I must be
+right.
+
+When is this infernal war to come to an end? I hold for Germany as
+always, but I wish she would make peace.
+
+With best wishes for the New Year,
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+26 Abbey Place, July 7, 1871.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+I have received your packet, and I will take care that your Report is
+duly presented to the Association. But the "Happy Family" in general,
+and myself in particular, are very sorry you cannot come to Scotland.
+We had begun to count upon it, and the children are immeasurably
+disgusted with the Insects which will not lay their eggs at the right
+time.
+
+You have become acclimatised to my bad behaviour in the matter of
+correspondence, so I shall not apologise for being in arrear. I have
+been frightfully hard-worked with two Royal Commissions and the School
+Board all sitting at once, but I am none the worse, and things are
+getting into shape--which is a satisfaction for one's trouble. I look
+forward hopefully towards getting back to my ordinary work next year.
+
+Your penultimate letter was very interesting to me, but the glimpses
+into your new views which it affords are very tantalising--and I want
+more. What you say about the development of the Amnion in your last
+letter still more nearly brought "Donner und Blitz!" to my lips--and I
+shall look out anxiously for your new facts. Lankester tells me you
+have been giving lectures on your views. I wish I had been there to
+hear.
+
+He is helping me as Demonstrator in a course of instruction in Biology
+which I am giving to Schoolmasters--with the view of converting them
+into scientific missionaries to convert the Christian Heathen of these
+islands to the true faith.
+
+I am afraid that the English microscope turned out to be by no means
+worth the money and trouble you bestowed upon it. But the glory of
+such an optical Sadowa should count for something! I wish that you
+would get your Jena man to supply me with one of his best objectives
+if the price is not ruinous--I should like to compare it with my 1/12
+inch of Ross. [In this connection it may be noted that he himself
+invented a combination microscope for laboratory use, still made by
+Crouch the optician. (See "Journal of Queckett Micr. Club" volume 5
+page 144.)]
+
+All our children but Jessie have the whooping-cough--Pertussis--I
+don't know your German name for it. It is distressing enough for them,
+but, I think, still worse for their mother. However, there are no
+serious symptoms, and I hope the change of air will set them right.
+
+They all join with me in best wishes and regrets that you are not
+coming. Won't you change your mind? We start on July 31st.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The summer holiday of 1871 was spent at St. Andrews, a place rather
+laborious of approach at that time, with all the impedimenta of a
+large and young family, but chosen on account of its nearness to
+Edinburgh, where the British Association met that year. I well
+remember the night journey of some ten or eleven hours, the freshness
+of the early morning at Edinburgh, the hasty excursion with my father
+up the hill from the station as far as the old High Street. The return
+journey, however, was made easier by the kindness of Dr. Matthews
+Duncan, who put up the whole family for a night, so as to break the
+journey.
+
+We stayed at Castlemount, now belonging to Miss Paton, just opposite
+the ruined castle. Among other visitors to St. Andrews known to my
+father were Professors Tait and Crum Brown, who inveigled him into
+making trial of the "Royal and Ancient" game, which then, as now, was
+the staple resource of the famous little city. I have a vivid
+recollection of his being hopelessly bunkered three or four holes from
+home, and can testify that he bore the moral strain with more than
+usual calm as compared with the generality of golfers. Indeed, despite
+his naturally quick temper and his four years of naval service at a
+time when, perhaps, the traditions of a former generation had not
+wholly died out, he had a special aversion to the use of expletives;
+and the occasional appearance of a strong word in his letters must be
+put down to a simply literary use which he would have studiously
+avoided in conversation. A curious physical result followed the vigour
+with which he threw himself into the unwonted recreation. For the last
+twenty years his only physical exercise had been walking, and now his
+arms went black and blue under the muscular strain, as if they had
+been bruised.
+
+But the holiday was by no means spent entirely in recreation. One week
+was devoted to the British Association; another to the examination of
+some interesting fossils at Elgin; while the last three weeks were
+occupied in writing two long articles, "Mr. Darwin's Critics," and the
+address entitled "Administrative Nihilism" referred to above, as well
+as a review of Dana's "Crinoids." The former, which appeared in the
+"Contemporary Review" for November ("Collected Essays" 2 120-187) was
+a review of (1) "Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection," by
+A.R. Wallace, (2) "The Genesis of Species," by St. George Mivart,
+F.R.S., and (3) an article in the "Quarterly" for July 1871, on
+Darwin's "Descent of Man."]
+
+"I am Darwin's bull-dog," [he once said, and the "Quarterly
+Reviewer's" treatment of Darwin,] "alike unjust and unbecoming,"
+[provoked him into immediate action.] "I am about sending you," [he
+writes to Haeckel on November 2,] "a little review of some of Darwin's
+critics. The dogs have been barking at his heels too much of late."
+[Apart from this stricture, however, he notes the] "happy change"
+[which] "has come over Mr. Darwin's critics. The mixture of ignorance
+and insolence which at first characterised a large proportion of the
+attacks with which he was assailed, is no longer the sad distinction
+of anti-Darwinian criticism." [Notes too] "that, in a dozen years, the
+'Origin of Species' has worked as complete a revolution in biological
+science as the 'Principia' did in astronomy--and it has done so,
+because, in the words of Helmholtz, it contains 'an essentially new
+creative thought.'"
+
+[The essay is particularly interesting as giving evidence of his skill
+and knowledge in dealing with psychology, as against the "Quarterly
+Reviewer," and even with such an unlikely subject as scholastic
+metaphysics, so that, by an odd turn of events, he appeared in the
+novel character of a defender of Catholic orthodoxy against an attempt
+from within that Church to prove that its teachings have in reality
+always been in harmony with the requirements of modern science. For
+Mr. Mivart, while twitting the generality of men of science with their
+ignorance of the real doctrines of his church, gave a reference to the
+Jesuit theologian Suarez, the latest great representative of
+scholasticism, as following St. Augustine in asserting, not direct,
+but derivative creation, that is to say, evolution from primordial
+matter endued with certain powers. Startled by this statement, Huxley
+investigated the works of the learned Jesuit, and found not only that
+Mr. Mivart's reference to the Metaphysical Disputations was not to the
+point, but that in the "Tractatus de opere sex Dierum," Suarez
+expressly and emphatically rejects this doctrine and reprehends
+Augustine for asserting it.]
+
+By great good luck [he writes to Darwin from St. Andrews] there is an
+excellent library here, with a good copy of Suarez, in a dozen big
+folios. Among these I dived, to the great astonishment of the
+librarian, and looking into them as "the careful robin eyes the
+delver's toil" (vide "Idylls"), I carried off the two venerable
+clasped volumes which were most promising.
+
+So I have come out in the new character of a defender of Catholic
+orthodoxy, and upset Mivart out of the mouth of his own prophet.
+
+[Darwin himself was more than pleased with the article, and wrote
+enthusiastically (see "Life and Letters" 3 148-150). A few of his
+generous words may be quoted to show the rate at which he valued his
+friend's championship.
+
+What a wonderful man you are to grapple with those old
+metaphysical-divinity books...The pendulum is now swinging against our
+side, but I feel positive it will soon swing the other way; and no
+mortal man will do half as much as you in giving it a start in the
+right direction, as you did at the first commencement.
+
+And again, after "mounting climax on climax," he continues:--"I must
+tell you what Hooker said to me a few years ago. 'When I read Huxley,
+I feel quite infantile in intellect.'"
+
+This sketch of what constituted his holiday--and it was not very much
+busier than many another holiday--may possibly suggest what his busy
+time must have been like.
+
+Till the end of the year the immense amount of work did not apparently
+tell upon him. He rejoiced in it. In December he remarked to his wife
+that with all his different irons in the fire, he had never felt his
+mind clearer or his vigour greater. Within a week he broke down quite
+suddenly, and could neither work nor think. He refers to this in the
+following letter:--]
+
+Jermyn Street, December 22, 1871.
+
+My dear Johnny,
+
+You are certainly improving. As a practitioner in the use of cold
+steel myself, I have read your letter in to-day's "Nature," "mit
+Ehrfurcht und Bewunderung." And the best evidence of the greatness of
+your achievement is that it extracts this expression of admiration
+from a poor devil whose brains and body are in a colloid state, and
+who is off to Brighton for a day or two this afternoon.
+
+God be with thee, my son, and strengthen the contents of thy
+gall-bladder!
+
+Ever thine,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+PS.--Seriously, I am glad that at last a protest has been raised
+against the process of anonymous self-praise to which our friend is
+given. I spoke to Smith the other day about that dose of it in the
+"Quarterly" article on Spirit-rapping.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.3.
+
+1872.
+
+[Dyspepsia, that most distressing of maladies, had laid firm hold upon
+him. He was compelled to take entire rest for a time. But his first
+holiday produced no lasting effect, and in the summer he was again
+very ill. Then the worry of a troublesome lawsuit in connection with
+the building of his new house intensified both bodily illness and
+mental depression. He had great fears of being saddled with heavy
+costs at the moment when he was least capable of meeting any new
+expense--hardly able even to afford another much-needed spell of rest.
+But in his case, as in others, at this critical moment the circle of
+fellow-workers in science to whom he was bound by ties of friendship,
+resolved that he should at least not lack the means of recovery. In
+their name Charles Darwin wrote him the following letter, of which it
+is difficult to say whether it does more honour to him who sent it or
+to him who received it:--
+
+Down, Beckenham, Kent, April 23, 1873.
+
+My dear Huxley,
+
+I have been asked by some of your friends (eighteen in number) to
+inform you that they have placed through Robarts, Lubbock & Company,
+the sum of 2100 pounds sterling to your account at your bankers. We
+have done this to enable you to get such complete rest as you may
+require for the re-establishment of your health; and in doing this we
+are convinced that we act for the public interest, as well as in
+accordance with our most earnest desires. Let me assure you that we
+are all your warm personal friends, and that there is not a stranger
+or mere acquaintance amongst us. If you could have heard what was
+said, or could have read what was, as I believe, our inmost thoughts,
+you would know that we all feel towards you, as we should to an
+honoured and much loved brother. I am sure that you will return this
+feeling, and will therefore be glad to give us the opportunity of
+aiding you in some degree, as this will be a happiness to us to the
+last day of our lives. Let me add that our plan occurred to several of
+your friends at nearly the same time and quite independently of one
+another.
+
+My dear Huxley, your affectionate friend,
+
+Charles Darwin.
+
+It was a poignant moment.] "What have I done to deserve this?" [he
+exclaimed. The relief from anxiety, so generously proffered, entirely
+overcame him; and for the first time, he allowed himself to confess
+that in the long struggle against ill-health, he had been beaten; but,
+as he said, only enough to teach him humility.
+
+His first trip in search of health was in 1872, when he obtained two
+months' leave of absence, and prepared to go to the Mediterranean. His
+lectures to women on Physiology at South Kensington were taken over by
+Dr. Michael Foster, who had already acted as his substitute in the
+Fullerian course of 1868. But even on this cruise after health he was
+not altogether free from business. The stores of biscuit at Gibraltar
+and Malta were infested with a small grub and its cocoons. Complaints
+to the home authorities were met by the answer that the stores were
+prepared from the purest materials and sent out perfectly free from
+the pest. Discontent among the men was growing serious, when he was
+requested by the Admiralty to investigate the nature of the grub and
+the best means of preventing its ravages. In the end he found that the
+biscuits were packed within range of stocks of newly arrived,
+unpurified cocoa, from which the eggs were blown into the stores while
+being packed, and there hatched out. Thereafter the packing was done
+in another place and the complaints ceased.]
+
+January 3, 1872.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+It is true enough that I am somewhat "erkrankt," though beyond general
+weariness, incapacity and disgust with things in general, I do not
+precisely know what is the matter with me.
+
+Unwillingly, I begin to suspect that I overworked myself last year.
+Doctors talk seriously to me, and declare that all sorts of wonderful
+things will happen if I do not take some more efficient rest than I
+have had for a long time. My wife adds her quota of persuasion and
+admonition, until I really begin to think I must do something, if only
+to have peace.
+
+What if I were to come and look you up in Naples, somewhere in
+February, as soon as my lectures are over?
+
+The "one-plate system" might cure me of my incessant dyspeptic nausea.
+A detestable grub--larva of Ephestia elatella--has been devouring Her
+Majesty's stores of biscuits at Gibraltar. I have had to look into his
+origin, history, and best way of circumventing him--and maybe I shall
+visit Gibraltar and perhaps Malta. In that case, you will see me turn
+up some of these days at the Palazzo Torlonia.
+
+Herbert Spencer has written a friendly attack on "Administrative
+Nihilism," which I will send you; in the same number of the
+"Fortnightly" there is an absurd epicene splutter on the same subject
+by Mill's step-daughter, Miss Helen Taylor. I intended to publish the
+paper separately, with a note about Spencer's criticism, but I have
+had no energy nor faculty to do anything lately.
+
+Tell Lankester, with best regards, that I believe the teaching of
+teachers in 1872 is arranged, and that I shall look for his help in
+due course.
+
+The "Happy family" have had the measles since you saw them, but they
+are well again.
+
+I write in Jermyn Street, so they cannot send messages; otherwise
+there would be a chorus from them and the wife of good wishes and kind
+remembrances.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He left Southampton on January 11, in the "Malta." On the 16th, he
+notes in his diary,] "I was up just in time see the great portal of
+the Mediterranean well. It was a lovely morning, and nothing could be
+grander than Ape Hill on one side and the Rock on the other, looking
+like great lions or sphinxes on each side of a gateway."
+
+[The morning after his arrival he breakfasted with Admiral Hornby, who
+sent him over to Tangier in the "Helicon," giving the Bishop of
+Gibraltar a passage at the same time. This led him to note down,] "How
+the naval men love Baxter and all his works." [A letter from Dr.
+Hooker to Sir John Hay ensured him a most hospitable welcome, though
+continual rain spoiled his excursions. On the 21st he returned to
+Gibraltar, leaving three days later in the "Nyanza" for Alexandria,
+which was reached on February 1. At that "muddy hole" he landed in
+pouring rain, and it was not till he reached Cairo the following day
+that he at last got into his longed-for sunshine.
+
+Seeing that three of his eight weeks had been spent in merely getting
+to sunshine, his wife and doctor conspired to apply for a third month
+of leave, which was immediately granted, so that he was able to accept
+the invitation of two friends to go with them up the Nile as far as
+Assouan in that most restful of conveyances, a dahabieh.
+
+Cairo more than answered his expectations. He stayed here till the
+13th, making several excursions in company with Sir W. Gregory,
+notably to Boulak Museum, where he particularly notes the "man with
+ape" from Memphis; and, of course, the pyramids, of which he remarks
+that Cephren's is cased at the top with limestone, not granite. His
+notebook and sketch-book show that he was equally interested in
+archeology, in the landscape and scenes of everyday life, and in the
+peculiar geographical and geological features of the country. His
+first impression of the Delta was its resemblance to Belgium and
+Lincolnshire. He has sections and descriptions of the Mokatta hill,
+and the windmill mound, with a general panorama of the surrounding
+country and an explanation of it. He remarks at Memphis how the
+unburnt brick of which the mounds are made up had in many places
+become remanie into a stratified deposit--distinguishable from Nile
+mud chiefly by the pottery fragments--and notes the bearing of this
+fact on the Cairo mounds. It is the same on his trip up the Nile; he
+jots down the geology whenever opportunity offered; remarks, as
+indication of the former height of the river, a high mud-bank beyond
+Edfou, and near Assouan a pot-hole in the granite fifty feet above the
+present level. Here is a detailed description of the tomb of Aahmes;
+there a river-scene beside the pyramid of Meidum; or vivid sketches of
+vulture and jackal at a meal in the desert, the jackal in possession
+of the carcass, the vulture impatiently waiting his good pleasure for
+the last scraps; of the natives working at the endless shadoofs; of a
+group of listeners around a professional story-teller--unfinished, for
+he was observed sketching them.
+
+Egypt left a profound impression upon him. His artistic delight in it
+apart, the antiquities and geology of the country were a vivid
+illustration to his trained eye of the history of man and the
+influence upon him of the surrounding country, the link between
+geography and history.
+
+He left behind him for a while a most unexpected memorial of his
+visit. A friend not long after going to the pyramids, was delighted to
+find himself thus adjured by a donkey-boy, who tried to cut out his
+rival with "Not him donkey, sah; him donkey bad, sah; my donkey good;
+my donkey 'Fessor-uxley donkey, sah." It appears that the Cairo
+donkey-boys have a way of naming their animals after celebrities whom
+they have borne on their backs.
+
+While at Thebes, on his way down the river again, he received news of
+the death of the second son of Matthew Arnold, to whom he wrote the
+following letter:--]
+
+Thebes, March 10, 1872.
+
+My dear Arnold,
+
+I cannot tell you how shocked I was to see in the papers we received
+yesterday the announcement of the terrible blow which has fallen upon
+Mrs. Arnold and yourself.
+
+Your poor boy looked such a fine manly fellow the last time I saw him,
+when we dined at your house, that I had to read the paragraph over and
+over again before I could bring myself to believe what I read. And it
+is such a grievous opening of a wound hardly yet healed that I hardly
+dare to think of the grief which must have bowed down Mrs. Arnold and
+yourself.
+
+I hardly know whether I do well in writing to you. If such trouble
+befell me there are very few people in the world from whom I could
+bear even sympathy--but you would be one of them, and therefore I hope
+that you will forgive a condolence which will reach you so late as to
+disturb rather than soothe, for the sake of the hearty affection which
+dictates it.
+
+My wife has told me of the very kind letter you wrote her. I was
+thoroughly broken down when I left England, and did not get much
+better until I fell into the utter and absolute laziness of dahabieh
+life. A month of that has completely set me up. I am as well as ever;
+and though very grateful to Old Nile for all that he has done for
+me--not least for a whole universe of new thoughts and pictures of
+life--I begin to feel strongly
+
+    'the need of a world of men for me.'
+
+But I am not going to overwork myself again. Pray make my kindest
+remembrances to Mrs. Arnold, and believe me, always yours very
+faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Leaving Assouan on March 3, and Cairo on the 18th, he returned by way
+of Messina to Naples, taking a day at Catania to look at Etna. At
+Naples he found his friend Dohrn was absent, and his place as host was
+filled by his father. Vesuvius was ascended, Pozzuoli and Pompeii
+visited, and two days spent in Rome.]
+
+Hotel de Grande Bretagne, Naples, March 31, 1872.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+Your very welcome letter did not reach me until the 18th of March,
+when I returned to Cairo from my expedition to Assouan. Like Johnny
+Gilpin, I "little thought when I set out, of running such a rig"; but
+while at Cairo I fell in with Ossory of the Athenaeum, and a very
+pleasant fellow, Charles Ellis, who had taken a dahabieh, and were
+about to start up the Nile. They invited me to take possession of a
+vacant third cabin, and I accepted their hospitality, with the
+intention of going as far as Thebes and returning on my own hook. But
+when we got to Thebes I found there was no getting away again without
+much more exposure and fatigue than I felt justified in facing just
+then, and as my friends showed no disposition to be rid of me, I stuck
+to the boat, and only left them on the return voyage at Rodu, which is
+the terminus of the railway, about 150 miles from Cairo.
+
+We had an unusually quick journey, as I was little more than a month
+away from Cairo, and as my companions made themselves very agreeable,
+it was very pleasant. I was not particularly well at first, but by
+degrees the utter rest of this "always afternoon" sort of life did its
+work, and I am as well and vigorous now as ever I was in my life.
+
+I should have been home within a fortnight of the time I had
+originally fixed. This would have been ample time to have enabled me
+to fulfil all the engagements I had made before starting; and Donnelly
+had given me to understand that "My Lords" would not trouble their
+heads about my stretching my official leave. Nevertheless I was very
+glad to find the official extension (which was the effect of my wife's
+and your and Bence Jones's friendly conspiracy) awaiting me at Cairo.
+A rapid journey home via Brindisi might have rattled my brains back
+into the colloid state in which they were when I left England. Looking
+back through the past six months I begin to see that I have had a
+narrow escape from a bad breakdown, and I am full of good resolutions.
+
+As the first-fruit of these you see that I have given up the School
+Board, and I mean to keep clear of all that semi-political work
+hereafter. I see that Sandon (whom I met at Alexandria) and Miller
+have followed my example, and that Lord Lawrence is likely to go. What
+a skedaddle!
+
+It seems very hard to escape, however. Since my arrival here, on
+taking up the "Times" I saw a paragraph about the Lord Rectorship of
+St. Andrews. After enumerating a lot of candidates for that honour,
+the paragraph concluded, "But we understand that at present Professor
+Huxley has the best chance." It is really too bad if any one has been
+making use of my name without my permission. But I don't know what to
+do about it. I had half a mind to write to Tulloch to tell him that I
+can't and won't take any such office, but I should look rather foolish
+if he replied that it was a mere newspaper report, and that nobody
+intended to put me up.
+
+Egypt interested me profoundly, but I must reserve the tale of all I
+did and saw there for word of mouth. From Alexandria I went to
+Messina, and thence made an excursion along the lovely Sicilian coast
+to Catania and Etna. The old giant was half covered with snow, and
+this fact, which would have tempted you to go to the top, stopped me.
+But I went to the Val del Bove, whence all the great lava streams have
+flowed for the last two centuries, and feasted my eyes with its rugged
+grandeur. From Messina I came on here, and had the great good fortune
+to find Vesuvius in eruption. Before this fact the vision of good
+Bence Jones forbidding much exertion vanished into thin air, and on
+Thursday up I went in company with Ray Lankester and my friend Dohrn's
+father, Dohrn himself being unluckily away. We had a glorious day, and
+did not descend till late at night. The great crater was not very
+active, and contented itself with throwing out great clouds of steam
+and volleys of red-hot stones now and then. These were thrown towards
+the south-west side of the cone, so that it was practicable to walk
+all round the northern and eastern lip, and look down into the Hell
+Gate. I wished you were there to enjoy the sight as much as I did. No
+lava was issuing from the great crater, but on the north side of this,
+a little way below the top, an independent cone had established itself
+as the most charming little pocket-volcano imaginable. It could not
+have been more than 100 feet high, and at the top was a crater not
+more than six or seven feet across. Out of this, with a noise exactly
+resembling a blast furnace and a slowly-working high pressure steam
+engine combined, issued a violent torrent of steam and fragments of
+semi-fluid lava as big as one's fist, and sometimes bigger. These shot
+up sometimes as much as 100 feet, and then fell down on the sides of
+the little crater, which could be approached within fifty feet without
+any danger. As darkness set in, the spectacle was most strange. The
+fiery stream found a lurid reflection in the slowly-drifting steam
+cloud, which overhung it, while the red-hot stones which shot through
+the cloud shone strangely beside the quiet stars in a moonless sky.
+
+Not from the top of this cinder cone, but from its side, a couple of
+hundred feet down, a stream of lava issued. At first it was not more
+than a couple of feet wide, but whether from receiving accessions or
+merely from the different form of slope, it got wider on its journey
+down to the Atrio del Cavallo, a thousand feet below. The slope
+immediately below the exit must have been near fifty, but the lava did
+not flow quicker than very thick treacle would do under like
+circumstances. And there were plenty of freshly cooled lava streams
+about, inclined at angles far greater than those which that learned
+Academician, Elie de Beaumont, declared to be possible. Naturally I
+was ashamed of these impertinent lava currents, and felt inclined to
+call them "Laves mousseuses." [Elie de Beaumont "is said to have
+'damned himself to everlasting fame' by inventing the nickname of 'la
+science moussante' for Evolutionism." See "Life of Darwin" 2 185.]
+
+Courage, my friend, behold land! I know you love my handwriting. I am
+off to Rome to-day, and this day-week, if all goes well, I shall be
+under my own roof-tree again. In fact I hope to reach London on
+Saturday evening. It will be jolly to see your face again.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+My best remembrances to Hirst if you see him before I do.
+
+[My father reached home on April 6, sunburnt and bearded almost beyond
+recognition, but not really well, for as soon as he began work again
+in London, his old enemy returned. Early hours, the avoidance of
+society and societies, an hour's riding before starting at nine for
+South Kensington, were all useless; the whole year was poisoned until
+a special diet prescribed by Dr. (afterwards sir) Andrew Clark,
+followed by another trip abroad, effected a cure. I remember his
+saying once that he learned by sad experience that such a holiday as
+that in Egypt was no good for him. What he really required was
+mountain air and plenty of exercise. The following letters fill up the
+outline of this period:--]
+
+26 Abbey Place, May 20, 1872.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+I suppose that you are now back in Naples, perambulating the Chiaja,
+and looking ruefully on the accumulation of ashes on the foundations
+of the aquarium! The papers, at any rate, tell us that the ashes of
+Vesuvius have fallen abundantly at Naples. Moreover, that abominable
+municipality is sure to have made the eruption an excuse for all sorts
+of delays. May the gods give you an extra share of temper and
+patience!
+
+What an unlucky dog our poor Ray is, to go and get fever when of all
+times in the world's history he should not have had it. However, I
+hear he is better and on his way home. I hope he will be well enough
+when he returns not only to get his Fellowship, but to help me in my
+schoolmaster work in June and July.
+
+I was greatly disgusted to miss you in Naples, but it was something to
+find your father instead. What a vigorous, genial YOUNGSTER of three
+score and ten he is. I declare I felt quite aged beside him. We had a
+glorious day on Vesuvius, and behaved very badly by leaving him at the
+inn for I do not know how many hours, while we wandered about the
+cone. But he had a very charming young lady for companion, and
+possibly had the best of it. I am very sorry that at the last I went
+off in a hurry without saying "Good-bye" to him, but I desired
+Lankester to explain, and I am sure he will have sympathised with my
+anxiety to see Rome.
+
+I returned, thinking myself very well, but a bad fit of dyspepsia
+seized me, and I found myself obliged to be very idle and very careful
+of myself--neither of which things are to my taste. But I am right
+again now, and hope to have no more backslidings. However, I am afraid
+I may not be able to attend the Brighton meeting. In which case you
+will have to pay us a visit, wherever we may be--where, we have not
+yet made up our minds, but it will not be so far as St. Andrews.
+
+Now for a piece of business. The new Governor of Ceylon is a friend of
+mine, and is proposing to set up a Natural History Museum in Ceylon.
+He wants a curator--some vigorous fellow with plenty of knowledge and
+power of organisation who will make use of his great opportunities. He
+tells me he thinks he can start him with 350 pounds sterling a year
+(and a house) with possible increase to 400 pounds sterling. I do not
+know any one here who would answer the purpose. Can you recommend me
+any one? If you can, let me know at once, and don't take so long in
+writing to me as I have been in writing to you.
+
+I await the "Prophecies of the Holy Antonius" anxiously. [His work on
+the development of the Arthropoda or Spider family.] Like the Jews of
+old, I come of an unbelieving generation, and need a sign. The bread
+and the oil, also the chamber in the wall shall not fail the prophet
+when he comes in August: nor Donner and Blitzes either.
+
+I leave the rest of the space for the wife.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following is in reply to a jest of Dr. Dohrn's--who was still a
+bachelor--upon a friend's unusual sort of offering to a young lady.]
+
+I suspected the love affair you speak of, and thought the young damsel
+very attractive. I suppose it will come to nothing, even if he be
+disposed to add his hand to the iron and quinine, in the next present
+he offers...and, oh my Diogenes, happy in a tub of arthropodous
+Entwickelungsgeschichte [History of Development.], despise not
+beefsteaks, nor wives either. They also are good.
+
+Jermyn Street, June 5, 1872.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+I have written to the Governor of Ceylon, and enclosed the first half
+of your letter to me to him as he understands High Dutch. I have told
+him that the best thing he can do is to write to you at Naples and
+tell you he will be very happy to see you as soon as you can come. And
+that if you do come you will give him the best possible advice about
+his museum, and let him have no rest until he has given you a site for
+a zoological station.
+
+I have no doubt you will get a letter from him in three weeks or so.
+His name is Gregory, and you will find him a good-humoured acute man
+of the world, with a very great general interest in scientific and
+artistic matters. Indeed in art I believe he is a considerable
+connoisseur.
+
+I am very grieved to hear of your father's serious illness. At his age
+cerebral attacks are serious, and when we spent so many pleasant hours
+together at Naples, he seemed to have an endless store of vigour--very
+much like his son Anton.
+
+What put it into your head that I had any doubt of your power of work?
+I am ready to believe that you are Hydra in the matter of heads and
+Briareus in the matter of hands.
+
+...If you go to Ceylon I shall expect you to come back by way of
+England. It's the shortest route anywhere from India, though it may
+not look so on the map.
+
+How am I? Oh, getting along and just keeping the devil of dyspepsia at
+arm's length. The wife and other members of the H.F. are well, and
+would send you greetings if they knew I was writing to you.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A little later Von Willemoes Suhm] ("why the deuce does he have such
+a long name, instead of a handy monosyllable are dissyllable like
+Dohrn or Huxley?") [was recommended for the post. He afterwards was
+one of the scientific staff of the "Challenger," and died during the
+voyage.]
+
+Morthoe, near Barnstaple, North Devon, August 5, 1872.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+I trust you have not been very wroth with me for my long delay in
+answering your last letter. For the last six weeks I have been very
+busy lecturing daily to a batch of schoolmasters, and looking after
+their practical instruction in the laboratory which the Government
+has, at last, given me. In the "intervals of business" I have been
+taking my share in a battle which has been raging between my friend
+Hooker of Kew and his official chief...and moreover I have just had
+strength enough to get my daily work done and no more, and everything
+that could be put off has gone to the wall. Three days ago, the "Happy
+Family," bag and baggage, came to this remote corner, where I propose
+to take a couple of months' entire rest--and put myself in order for
+next winter's campaign. It is a little village five miles from the
+nearest town (which is Ilfracombe), and our house is at the head of a
+ravine running down to the sea. Our backs are turned to England and
+our faces to America with no land that I know of between. The country
+about is beautiful, and if you will come we will put you up at the
+little inn, and show you something better than even Swanage. There are
+slight difficulties about the commissariat, but that is the Hausfrau's
+business, and not mine. At the worst, bread, eggs, milk, and rabbits
+are certain, and the post from London takes two days!
+
+Morthoe, Ilfracombe, North Devon, August 23, 1872.
+
+My dear Whirlwind,
+
+I promise you all my books, past, present, and to come for the
+Aquarium. The best part about them is that they will not take up much
+room. Ask for Owen's by all means; "Fas est etiam ab hoste doceri." I
+am very glad you have got the British Association publications, as it
+will be a good precedent for the Royal Society.
+
+Have you talked to Hooker about marine botany? He may be able to help
+you as soon as X. the accursed (may jackasses sit upon his
+grandmother's grave, as we say in the East) leaves him alone.
+
+It is hateful that you should be in England without seeing us, and for
+the first time I lament coming here. The children howled in chorus
+when they heard that you could not come. At this moment the whole
+tribe and their mother have gone to the sea, and I must answer your
+letter before the post goes out, which it does here about half an hour
+after it comes in.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[In 1872 Huxley was at length enabled to establish in his regular
+classes a system of science teaching based upon laboratory work by the
+students, which he had long felt to be the only true method. It
+involved the verification of every fact by each student, and was a
+training in scientific method even more than in scientific fact. Had
+circumstances only permitted, the new epoch in biological teaching
+might have been antedated by many years. But, as he says in the
+preface to the "Practical Biology," 1875:--]
+
+Practical work was forbidden by the limitations of space in the
+building in Jermyn Street, which possessed no room applicable to the
+purpose of a laboratory, and I was obliged to content myself, for many
+years, with what seemed the next best thing, namely, as full an
+exposition as I could give of the characters of certain plants and
+animals, selected as types of vegetable and animal organisation, by
+way of introduction to systematic zoology and paleontology.
+
+[There was no laboratory work, but he would show an experiment or a
+dissection during the lecture or perhaps for a few minutes after, when
+the audience crowded round the lecture table.
+
+The opportunity came in 1871. As he afterwards impressed upon the
+great city companies in regard to technical education, the teaching of
+science throughout the country turned upon the supply of trained
+teachers. The part to be played by elementary science under the
+Education Act of 1870, added urgency to the question of proper
+teaching. With this in view, he organised a course of instruction for
+those who had been preparing pupils for the examinations of the
+Science and Art Department, "scientific missionaries," as he described
+them to Dr. Dohrn.
+
+In the promotion of the practical teaching of biology (writes the late
+Jeffery Parker, "Natural Science" 8 49), Huxley's services can hardly
+be overestimated. Botanists had always been in the habit of
+distributing flowers to their students, which they could dissect or
+not as they chose; animal histology was taught in many colleges under
+the name of practical physiology; and at Oxford an excellent system of
+zoological work had been established by the late Professor Rolleston.
+("Rolleston (Professor Lankester writes to me) was the first to
+systematically conduct the study of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in
+this country by making use of a carefully selected series of animals.
+His 'types' were the Rat, the Common Pigeon, the Frog, the Perch, the
+Crayfish, Blackbeetle, Anodon, Snail, Earthworm, Leech, Tapeworm. He
+had a series of dissections of these mounted, also loose dissections
+and elaborate manuscript descriptions. The student went through this
+series, dissecting fresh specimens for himself. After some ten years'
+experience Rolleston printed his manuscript directions and notes as a
+book, called 'Forms of Animal Life.'
+
+"This all preceded the practical class at South Kensington in 1871. I
+have no doubt that Rolleston was influenced in his plan by your
+father's advice. But Rolleston had the earlier opportunity of putting
+the method into practice.
+
+"Your father's series of types were chosen so as to include plants,
+and he gave more attention to microscopic forms and to microscopic
+structure than did Rolleston."
+
+It was distinctive of the lectures that they were on biology, on
+plants as well as animals, to illustrate all the fundamental features
+of living things.)
+
+But the biological laboratory, as it is now understood, may be said to
+date from about 1870, when Huxley, with the cooperation of Professors
+Foster, Rutherford, Lankester, Martin, and others (T.J. Parker, G.B.
+Howes, and the present Sir W. Thiselton Dyer, K.C.M.G., C.I.E.,), held
+short summer classes for science teachers at South Kensington, the
+daily work consisting of an hour's lecture followed by four hours'
+laboratory work, in which the students verified for themselves facts
+which they had hitherto heard about and taught to their unfortunate
+pupils from books alone. The naive astonishment and delight of the
+more intelligent among them was sometimes almost pathetic. One
+clergyman, who had for years conducted classes in physiology under the
+Science and Art Department, was shown a drop of his own blood under
+the microscope. "Dear me!" he exclaimed, "it's just like the picture
+in Huxley's 'Physiology.'"
+
+Later, in 1872, when the biological department of the Royal School of
+Mines was transferred to South Kensington, this method was adopted as
+part of the regular curriculum of the school, and from that time the
+teaching "of zoology by lectures alone became an anachronism."
+
+The first of these courses to schoolmasters took place, as has been
+said, in 1871. Some large rooms on the ground floor of the South
+Kensington Museum were used for the purpose. There was no proper
+laboratory, but professor and demonstrators rigged up everything as
+wanted. Huxley was in the full tide of that more than natural energy
+which preceded his breakdown in health, and gave what Professor Ray
+Lankester describes as "a wonderful course of lectures," one every day
+from ten to eleven for six weeks, in June and half July. The three
+demonstrators (those named first on the list above) each took a third
+of the class, about thirty-five apiece. "Great enthusiasm prevailed.
+We went over a number of plants and of animals--including microscopic
+work and some physiological experiment. The 'types' were more numerous
+than in later courses."
+
+In 1872 the new laboratory--the present one--was ready.] "I have a
+laboratory," [writes Huxley to Dohrn,] "which it shall do your eyes
+good to behold when you come back from Ceylon, the short way." [(i.e.
+via England.) here a similar course, under the same demonstrators,
+assisted by H.N. Martin, was given in the summer, Huxley, though very
+shaky in health, making a point of carrying them out himself.]
+
+26 Abbey Place, June 4, 1872.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I MUST be at work on examination papers all day to-day, but to-morrow
+I am good to lunch with you (and abscond from the Royal Commission,
+which will get on very well without me) or to go with you and call on
+your friends, whichever may be most convenient.
+
+Many thanks for all your kind and good advice about the lectures, but
+I really think they will not be too much for me, and it is of the
+utmost importance I should carry them on.
+
+They are the commencement of a new system of teaching which, if I
+mistake not, will grow into a big thing and bear great fruit, and just
+at this present moment (nobody is necessary very long) I am the
+necessary man to carry it on. I could not get a suppleant if I would,
+and you are no more the man than I am to let a pet scheme fall through
+for the fear of a little risk of self. And really and truly I find
+that by taking care I pull along very well. Moreover, it isn't my
+brains that get wrong, but only my confounded stomach.
+
+I have read your memorial [In the affair of Dr. Hooker already
+referred to.] which is very strong and striking, but a difficulty
+occurs to me about a good deal of it, and that is that it won't do to
+quote Hooker's official letters before they have been called for in
+Parliament, or otherwise made public. We should find ourselves in the
+wrong officially, I am afraid, by doing so. However we can discuss
+this when we meet. I will be at the Athenaeum at 4 o'clock.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[As for the teaching by "types," which was the most salient feature of
+his method, and therefore the most easily applied and misapplied,
+Professor Parker continues:--
+
+Huxley's method of teaching was based upon the personal examination by
+the student of certain "types" of animals and plants selected with a
+view of illustrating the various groups. But, in his lectures, these
+types were not treated as the isolated things they necessarily appear
+in a laboratory manual or an examination syllabus; each, on the
+contrary, took its proper place as an example of a particular grade of
+structure, and no student of ordinary intelligence could fail to see
+that the types were valuable, not for themselves, but simply as
+marking, so to speak, the chapters of a connected narrative. Moreover,
+in addition to the types, a good deal of work of a more general
+character was done. Thus, while we owe to Huxley more than to any one
+else the modern system of teaching biology, he is by no means
+responsible for the somewhat arid and mechanical aspect it has assumed
+in certain quarters.
+
+The application of the same system to botanical teaching was
+inaugurated in 1873, when, being compelled to go abroad for his
+health, he arranged that Mr. (now Sir W.) Thiselton Dyer should take
+his place and lecture on Botany.
+
+The "Elementary Instruction in Biology," published in 1875, was a
+text-book based upon this system. This book, in writing which Huxley
+was assisted by his demonstrator, H.N. Martin, was reprinted thirteen
+times before 1888, when it was "Revised and Extended by Howes and
+Scott," his later assistants. The revised edition is marked by one
+radical change, due to the insistence of his demonstrator, the late
+Professor Jeffery Parker. In the first edition, the lower forms of
+life were first dealt with; from simple cells--amoeba, yeast-plant,
+blood-corpuscle--the student was taken through an ascending series of
+plants and of animals, ending with the frog or rabbit. But] "the
+experience of the Lecture-room and the Laboratory taught me," [writes
+Huxley in the new preface,] "that philosophical as it might be in
+theory, it had defects in practice." [The process might be regarded as
+not following the scientific rule of proceeding from the known to the
+unknown; while the small and simple organisms required a skill in
+handling high-power microscopes which was difficult for beginners to
+acquire. Hence the course was reversed, and began with the more
+familiar type of the rabbit or frog. This was Rolleston's practice;
+but it may be noted that Professor Ray Lankester has always maintained
+and further developed "the original Huxleian plan of beginning with
+the same microscopic forms" as being a most important philosophic
+improvement on Rolleston's plan, and giving, he considers, "the truer
+'twist,' as it were, to a student's mind."
+
+When the book was sent to Darwin, he wrote back (November 12, 1875):--
+
+My dear Huxley,
+
+Many thanks for your biology, which I have read. It was a real stroke
+of genius to think of such a plan. Lord, how I wish that I had gone
+through such a course.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+Charles Darwin.
+
+A large portion of his time and energy was occupied in the
+organisation of this course of teaching for teachers, and its
+elaboration before being launched on a larger scale in October, when
+the Biological Department of the Jermyn Street school was transferred
+to the new buildings at South Kensington, fitted with laboratories
+which were to excite his friend Dr. Dohrn's envy. But he was also at
+work upon his share of the "Science Primers," so far as his still
+uncertain health allowed. This and the affairs of the British
+Association are the subject of several letters to Sir Henry Roscoe and
+Dr. Tyndall.]
+
+26 Abbey Place, April 8, 1872.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+Many thanks for your kind letter of welcome. My long rest has
+completely restored me. As my doctor told me, I was sound, wind and
+limb, and had merely worn myself out. I am not going to do that again,
+and you see that I have got rid of the School Board. It was an awful
+incubus!
+
+Oddly enough I met the Ashtons in the Vatican, and heard about your
+perplexities touching Oxford. I should have advised you to do as you
+have done. I think that you have a great piece of work to do at Owens
+College, and that you will do it. If you had gone to Oxford you would
+have sacrificed all the momentum you have gained in Manchester; and
+would have had to begin de novo, among conditions which, I imagine, it
+is very hard for a non-University man to appreciate and adjust himself
+to.
+
+I like the look of the "Primers" (of which Macmillan has sent me
+copies to-day) very much, and shall buckle to at mine as soon as
+possible. I am very glad you did not wait for me. I remained in a very
+shaky condition up to the middle of March, and could do nothing.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+The wife unites with me in kind regards to Mrs. Roscoe and yourself.
+
+Morthoe, Ilfracombe, North Devon, September 9, 1872.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I was very glad to have news of you, and to hear that you are
+vigorous.
+
+My outing hitherto has not been very successful, so far as the inward
+man is concerned at least, for the weather has been good enough. But I
+have been worried to death with dyspepsia and the hyperchondriacal
+bedevilments that follow in its train, until I am seriously thinking
+of returning to town to see if the fine air of St. John's Wood (as the
+man says in "Punch") won't enable me to recover from the effects of
+the country.
+
+I wish I were going with you to Yankee Land, not to do any lecturing,
+God forbid! but to be a quiet spectator in a corner of the
+enthusiastic audiences. I am as lazy as a dog, and the role of
+looker-on would just suit me. However, I have a good piece of work to
+do in organising my new work at South Kensington.
+
+I have just asked my children what message they have to send to you,
+and they send their love; very sorry they won't see you before you go,
+and hope you won't come back speaking through your nose!
+
+I shall be in town this week or next, and therefore shall see you.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+26 Abbey Place, September 17, 1872.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+Your letter has followed me from Morthoe here. We had good enough
+weather in Devon--but my stay there was marred by the continuous
+dyspepsia and concurrent hyperchondriacal incapacity. At last, I could
+not stand it any longer, and came home for "change of air," leaving
+the wife and chicks to follow next week. By dint of living on cocoa
+and Revalenta, and giving up drink, tobacco, and all other things that
+make existence pleasant, I am getting better.
+
+What was your motive in getting kicked by a horse? I stopped away from
+the Association without that; and am not sorry to have been out of the
+way of the X. business. What is to become of the association if -- is
+to monopolise it? And then there was that scoundrel, Louis
+Napoleon--to whom no honest man ought to speak--gracing the scene. I
+am right glad I was out of it.
+
+I am at my wits' end to suggest a lecturer for you. I wish I could
+offer myself, but I have refused everything of that sort on the score
+of health; and moreover, I am afraid of my wife!
+
+What do you say to Ramsay? He lectures very well. I have done nothing
+whatever to the Primer. Stewart sent me Geikie's letter this morning,
+and I have asked Macmillan to send Geikie the proofs of my Primer so
+far as they go. We must not overlap more than can be helped.
+
+I have not seen Hooker yet since my return. While all this row has
+been going on, I could not ask him to do anything for us. And until X.
+is dead and d--d (officially at any rate), I am afraid there will be
+little peace for him.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Please remember me very kindly to Mrs. Roscoe.
+
+[In a letter of September 25 is a reference to the way in which his
+increasing family had outgrown his house in Abbey Place. Early in the
+preceding year, he had come to the decision to buy a small house in
+the same neighbourhood, and add to it so as to give elbow-room to each
+and all of the family. This was against the advice of his friend and
+legal adviser, to whom he wrote announcing his decision, as follows.
+The letter was adorned with a sketch of an absurd cottage, "Ye House!"
+perched like a windmill on a kind of pedestal, and with members of the
+family painfully ascending a ladder to the upper story, above the
+ominous legend, "Staircase forgotten."]
+
+March 20, 1871.
+
+My dear Burton,
+
+There is something delightfully refreshing in rushing into a piece of
+practical work in the teeth of one's legal adviser.
+
+If the lease of a piece of ground whereon I am going to build mine
+house come to you, will you see if it's all right.
+
+Yours wilfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This house, Number 4 Marlborough Place, stands on the north side of
+that quiet street, close to its junction with Abbey Road. It is next
+door to the Presbyterian Church, on the other side of which again is a
+Jewish synagogue. The irregular front of the house, with the original
+cottage, white-painted and deep eaved, joined by a big porch to the
+new uncompromising square face of yellow brick, distinguished only by
+its extremely large windows, was screened from the road by a high oak
+paling, and a well-grown row of young lime-trees. Taken as a whole, it
+was not without character, and certainly was unlike most London
+houses. It was built for comfort, not beauty; designed, within
+stringent limits as to cost, to give each member of the family room to
+get away by himself or herself if so disposed. Moreover, the gain in
+space made it more possible to see something of friends or put up a
+guest, than in the small and crowded house in Abbey Place.
+
+A small garden lay in front of the house; a considerably larger garden
+behind, wherein the chief ornament was then a large apple-tree, that
+never failed to spread a cloud of blossom for my father's birthday,
+the 4th of May.
+
+Over the way, too, for many years we were faced by a long garden full
+of blossoming pear-trees in which thrushes and blackbirds sang and
+nested, belonging to a desolate house in the Abbey Road, which was
+tenanted by a solitary old man, supposed to be a male prototype of
+Miss Havisham in "Great Expectations."
+
+The move was accompanied by a unique and unpleasant experience. A
+knavish fellow, living in a cottage close to the foot of the garden,
+sought to blackmail the new comer, under threat of legal proceedings,
+alleging that a catchment well for surface drainage had made his
+basement damp. Unfortunately for his case, it could be shown that the
+pipes had not yet been connected with the well, and when he carried
+out his threat, he gained nothing from his suit in Chancery and his
+subsequent appeal, except some stinging remarks from Vice-Chancellor
+Malins.]
+
+I am afraid the brute is impecunious [wrote my father after the first
+suit failed], and that I shall get nothing out of him. So I shall have
+had three months' worry, and be fined 100 pounds sterling or so for
+being wholly and absolutely in the right.
+
+[Happily the man turned out to have enough means to pay the bulk of
+the costs; but that was no compensation for the mental worry and
+consequent ill-health entailed from November to June.
+
+The only amusing point in the whole affair was when the plaintiff's
+solicitors had the face to file an affidavit before the
+Vice-Chancellor himself in answer to his strictures upon the case,
+"about as regular a proceeding," reports Mr. Burton, "as for a middy
+to reply upon the Post Captain on his own quarter-deck."
+
+The move was made in the third week of December (1872) amid endless
+rain and mud and with workmen still in the house. It was attended by
+one inconvenience. He writes to Darwin on December 20, 1872:--]
+
+I am utterly disgusted at having only just received your note of
+Tuesday. But the fact is, there is a certain inconvenience about
+having FOUR addresses as has been my case for the most part of this
+week, in consequence of our moving--and as I have not been to Jermyn
+Street before to-day, I have missed your note. I should run round to
+Queen Anne Street now on the chance of catching you, but I am bound
+here by an appointment.
+
+[One incident of the move, however, was more agreeable. Mr. Herbert
+Spencer took the opportunity of sending a New Year's gift for the new
+house, in the shape of a handsome clock, wishing, as he said, "to
+express in some way more empathic than by words, my sense of the many
+kindnesses I have received at your hands during the twenty years of
+our friendship. Remembrance of the things you have done in furtherance
+of my aims, and of the invaluable critical aid you have given me, with
+so much patience and at so much cost of time, has often made me feel
+how much I owe you."
+
+After a generous reference to occasions when the warmth of debate
+might have betrayed him into more vigorous expressions than he
+intended, he concludes:--
+
+But inadequately as I may ordinarily show it, you will (knowing that I
+am tolerably candid) believe me when I say that there is no one whose
+judgment on all subjects I so much respect, or whose friendship I so
+highly value.
+
+It may be remembered that the 1872 address on "Administrative
+Nihilism" led to a reply from the pen of Mr. Spencer, as the champion
+of Individualism. When my father sent him the volume in which this
+address was printed, he wrote back a letter (September 29, 1873) which
+is characterised by the same feeling. It expresses his thanks for the
+book, "and many more for the kind expression of feeling in the
+preface. If you had intended to set an example to the Philistines of
+the way in which controversial differences may be maintained without
+any decrease of sympathy, you could not have done it more perfectly."
+
+In connection with the building of the house, Tyndall had advanced a
+sum of money to his friend, and with his usual generosity, not only
+received interest with the greatest reluctance, but would have liked
+to make a gift of the principal. He writes, "If I remain a bachelor I
+will circumvent you--if not--not. It cleaves to me like dirt--and that
+is why you wish to get rid of it." To this he received answer:--
+
+February 26, 1873.
+
+I am not to be deterred by any amount of bribery and corruption, from
+bringing you under the yoke of a "rare and radiant,"--whenever I
+discover one competent to undertake the ticklish business of governing
+you. I hope she will be "radiant,"--uncommonly "rare" she certainly
+will be!
+
+Two years later this loan was paid off, with the following letter:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 11, 1875.
+
+My dear old Shylock,
+
+My argosies have come in, and here is all that was written in the
+bond! If you want the pound of flesh too, you know it is at your
+service, and my Portia won't raise that pettifogging objection to
+shedding a little blood into the bargain, which that other one did.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On October 24 Miss Jex Blake wrote to him to ask his help for herself
+and the other women medical students at Edinburgh. For two years they
+had only been able to get anatomical teaching in a mixed class; but
+wishing to have a separate class, at least for the present, they had
+tried to arrange for one that session. The late demonstrator at the
+Surgeons' Hall, who had given them most of their teaching before, had
+undertaken to teach this separate class, but was refused recognition
+by the University Court, on the ground that they had no evidence of
+his qualifications, while refusing to let him prove his qualification
+by examination. This the women students understood to be an indirect
+means of suppressing their aspirations; they therefore begged Huxley
+to examine their instructor with a view to giving him a certificate
+which should carry weight with the University Court.
+
+He replied:--]
+
+To Miss Jex Blake.
+
+October 28, 1872.
+
+Dear Madam,
+
+While I fully sympathise with the efforts made by yourself and others,
+to obtain for women the education requisite to qualify them for
+medical practice, and while I think that women who have the
+inclination and the capacity to follow the profession of medicine are
+most unjustly dealt with if any obstacles beyond those which are
+natural and inevitable are placed in their way, I must nevertheless
+add, that I as completely sympathise with those Professors of Anatomy,
+Physiology, and Obstetrics, who object to teach such subjects to mixed
+classes of young men and women brought together without any further
+evidence of moral and mental fitness for such association than the
+payment of their fees.
+
+In fact, with rare exceptions, I have refused to admit women to my own
+Lectures on Comparative Anatomy for many years past. But I should not
+hesitate to teach anything I know to a class composed of women; and I
+find it hard to believe that any one should really wish to prevent
+women from obtaining efficient separate instruction, and from being
+admitted to Examination for degrees upon the same terms as men.
+
+You will therefore understand that I should be most glad to help you
+if I could--and it is with great regret that I feel myself compelled
+to refuse your request to examine Mr. H--.
+
+In the first place I am in the midst of my own teaching, and with
+health not yet completely re-established I am obliged to keep clear of
+all unnecessary work. Secondly, such an examination must be practical,
+and I have neither dissecting-room available nor the anatomical
+license required for human dissection; and thirdly, it is not likely
+that the University authorities would attach much weight to my report
+on one or two days' work--if the fact that Mr. H-- has already filled
+the office of anatomical Demonstrator (as I understand from you) does
+not satisfy them as to his competency.
+
+I am, dear Madam, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The last event of the year was that he was elected by the students
+Lord Rector of Aberdeen University--a position, the duties of which
+consist partly in attending certain meetings of the University Court,
+but more especially in delivering an address. This, however, was not
+required for another twelvemonth, and the address on "Universities,
+Actual and Ideal," was delivered in fulfilment of this duty in
+February 1874.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.4.
+
+1873.
+
+[The year opens with a letter to Tyndall, then on a lecturing tour in
+America:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, Abbey Road, N.W., January 1, 1872 [1873].
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I cannot let this day go by without wishing you a happy New Year, and
+lamenting your absence from our customary dinner. But Hirst and
+Spencer and Michael Foster are coming, and they shall drink your
+health in champagne while I do the like in cold water, making up by
+the strength of my good wishes for the weakness of the beverage.
+
+You see I write from the new house. Getting into it was an awful job,
+made worse than needful by the infamous weather we have had for weeks
+and months, and by the stupid delays of the workmen, whom we had
+fairly to shove out at last as we came in. We are settling down by
+degrees, and shall be very comfortable by and by, though I do not
+suppose that we shall be able to use the drawing-room for two or three
+months to come. I am very glad to have made the change, but there is a
+drawback to everything in "this here wale," as Mrs. Gamp says and my
+present thorn in the flesh is a neighbour, who says I have injured him
+by certain operations in my garden, and is trying to get something out
+of me by Chancery proceedings. Fancy finding myself a defendant in
+Chancery!
+
+It is particularly hard on me, as I have been especially careful to
+have nothing done without Burton's sanction and assurance that I was
+quite safe in law; and I would have given up anything [rather] than
+have got into bother of this kind. But "sich is life."
+
+You seem to have been making a Royal Progress in Yankee-land. We have
+been uncommonly tickled with some of the reports of your lectures
+which reached us, especially with that which spoke of your having "a
+strong English accent."
+
+The loss of your assistant seems to have been the only deduction to be
+made from your success. I am afraid you must have felt it much in all
+ways.
+
+"My Lord" received your telegram only after the business of "securing
+Hirst" was done. That is one of the bright spots in a bad year for me.
+Goschen consulted Spottiswood and me independently about the headship
+of the new Naval College, and was naturally considerably surprised by
+the fact that we coincided in recommending Hirst...The upshot was that
+Goschen asked me to communicate with Hirst and see if he would be
+disposed to accept the offer. So I did, and found to my great
+satisfaction that Hirst took to the notion very kindly. I am sure he
+is the very best man for the post to be met with in the three
+kingdoms, having that rare combination of qualities by which he gets
+on with all manner of men, and singularly attracts young fellows. He
+will not only do his duty, but be beloved for doing it, which is what
+few people can compass.
+
+I have little news to give you. The tail of the X.-Hooker storm is
+drifting over the scientific sky in the shape of fresh attacks by Owen
+on Hooker. Hooker answered the last angelically, and I hope they are
+at an end.
+
+The wife has just come in and sends her love (but is careful to add
+"second-best"). The chicks grow visibly and audibly, and Jess looks
+quite a woman. All are well except myself, and I am getting better
+from a fresh breakdown of dyspepsia. I find that if I am to exist at
+all it must be on strictly ascetic principles, so there is hope of my
+dying in the odour of sanctity yet. If you recollect, Lancelot did not
+know that he should "die a holy man" till rather late in life. I have
+forgotten to tell you about the Rectorship of Aberdeen. I refused to
+stand at first, on the score of health, and only consented on
+condition that I should not be called upon to do any public work until
+after the long vacation. It was a very hard fight, and although I had
+an absolute majority of over fifty, the mode of election is such that
+one vote, in one of the four nations, would have turned the scale by
+giving my opponent the majority in that nation. We should then have
+been ties, and as the chancellor, who has under such circumstances a
+casting vote, would have (I believe) given it against me, I should
+have been beaten.
+
+As it is, the fact of any one, who stinketh in the nostrils of
+orthodoxy, beating a Scotch peer at his own gates in the most orthodox
+of Scotch cities, is a curious sign of the times. The reason why they
+made such a tremendous fight for me, is I believe, that I may carry on
+the reforms commenced by Grant Duff, my predecessor. Unlike other Lord
+Rectors, he of Aberdeen is a power and can practically govern the
+action of the University during his tenure of office.
+
+I saw Pollock yesterday, and he says that they want you back again.
+Curiously the same desire is epidemically prevalent among your
+friends, not least here.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[In spite of his anxieties, his health was slowly improving under
+careful regimen. He published no scientific memoirs this year, but in
+addition to his regular lectures, he was working to finish his "Manual
+of Invertebrate Anatomy" and his "Introductory Primer," and to write
+his Aberdeen address; he was also at work upon the "Pedigree of the
+Horse" and on "Bodily Motion and Consciousness." He delivered a course
+to teachers on Psychology and Physiology, and was much occupied by the
+Royal Commission on Science. As a governor of Owens College he had
+various meetings to attend, though his duties did not extend, as some
+of his friends seem to have thought, to the appointment of a Professor
+of Physiology there.]
+
+My life (he writes to Sir Henry Roscoe) is becoming a burden to me
+because of --. Why I do not know, but for some reason people have
+taken it into their heads that I have something to do with
+appointments in Owens College, and no fewer than three men of whose
+opinion I think highly have spoken or written to me urging --'s merits
+very strongly.
+
+[This summer he again took a long holiday, thanks to the generosity of
+his friends, and with better results. He went with his old friend
+Hooker to the Auvergne, walking, geologising, sketching, and gradually
+discarding doctor's orders. Sir Joseph Hooker has very kindly written
+me a letter from which I give an account of this trip:--
+
+It was during the many excursions we took together, either by
+ourselves or with one of my boys, that I knew him best at his best:
+and especially during one of several weeks' duration in the summer of
+1873, which we spent in central France and Germany. He had been
+seriously ill, and was suffering from severe mental depression. For
+this he was ordered abroad by his physician, Sir A. Clark, to which
+step he offered a stubborn resistance. With Mrs. Huxley's approval,
+and being myself quite in the mood for a holiday, I volunteered to
+wrestle with him, and succeeded, holding out as an inducement a visit
+to the volcanic region of the Auvergne with Scrope's classical volume,
+which we both knew and admired, as a guide book.
+
+We started on July 2nd, I loaded with injunctions from his physician
+as to what his patient was to eat, drink, and avoid, how much he was
+to sleep and rest, how little to talk and walk, etc., that would have
+made the expedition a perpetual burthen to me had I not believed that
+I knew enough of my friend's disposition and ailments to be convinced
+that not only health but happiness would be our companions throughout.
+Sure enough, for the first few days, including a short stay in Paris,
+his spirits were low indeed, but this gave me the opportunity of
+appreciating his remarkable command over himself and his ever-present
+consideration for his companion. Not a word or gesture of irritation
+ever escaped him; he exerted himself to obey the instructions laid
+down; nay, more, he was instant in his endeavour to save me trouble at
+hotels, railway stations, and ticket offices. Still, some mental
+recreation was required to expedite recovery, and he found it first by
+picking up at a bookstall, a "History of the Miracles of Lourdes,"
+which were then exciting the religious fervour of France, and the
+interest of her scientific public. He entered with enthusiasm into the
+subject, getting together all the treatises upon it, favourable or the
+reverse, that were accessible, and I need hardly add, soon arrived at
+the conclusion, that the so-called miracles were in part illusions and
+for the rest delusions. As it may interest some of your readers to
+know what his opinion was in this early stage of the manifestations, I
+will give it as he gave it to me. It was a case of two peasant
+children sent in the hottest month of the year into a hot valley to
+collect sticks for firewood washed up by a stream, when one of them
+after stooping down opposite a heat-reverberating rock, was, in
+rising, attacked with a transient vertigo, under which she saw a
+figure in white against the rock. This bare fact being reported to the
+cure of the village, all the rest followed.
+
+Soon after our arrival at Clermont Ferrand, your father had so far
+recovered his wonted elasticity of spirits that he took a keen
+interest in everything around, the museums, the cathedral, where he
+enjoyed the conclusion of the service by a military band which gave
+selections from the Figlia del Regimento, but above all he appreciated
+the walks and drives to the geological features of the environs. He
+reluctantly refrained from ascending the Puy de Dome, but managed the
+Pic Parion, Gergovia, Royat, and other points of interest without
+fatigue...
+
+After Clermont they visited the other four great volcanic areas
+explored by Scrope, Mont Dore, the Cantal, Le Puy, and the valley of
+the Ardeche. Under the care of his friend, and relieved from the
+strain of work, my father's health rapidly improved. He felt no bad
+effects from a night at Mont Dore, when, owing to the crowd of
+invalids in the little town, no better accommodation could be found
+than a couple of planks in a cupboard. Next day they took up their
+quarters in an unpretentious cabaret at La Tour d'Auvergne, one of the
+villages on the slopes of the mountain, a few miles away.
+
+Here (writes Sir J. Hooker), and for some time afterwards, on our
+further travels, we had many interesting and amusing experiences of
+rural life in the wilder parts of central France, its poverty, penury,
+and too often its inconceivable impositions and overcharges to
+foreigners, quite consistently with good feeling, politeness, and
+readiness to assist in many ways.
+
+By the 10th of July, nine days after setting out, I felt satisfied (he
+continues) that your father was equal to an excursion upon which he
+had set his heart, to the top of the Pic de Sancy, 4000 feet above La
+Tour and 7 miles distant.
+
+It was on this occasion that the friends made what they thought a new
+discovery, namely evidence of glacial action in central France.
+Besides striated stones in the fields or built into the walls, they
+noticed the glaciated appearance of one of the valleys descending from
+the peak, and especially some isolated gigantic masses of rock on an
+open part of the valley, several miles away, as to which they debated
+whether they were low buildings or transported blocks. Sir Joseph
+visited them next day, and found they were the latter, brought down
+from the upper part of the peak. (He published an account of these
+blocks in "Nature" 8 31, 166, but subsequently found that glaciation
+had been observed by von Lassaul in 1872 and by Sir William Guise in
+1870.)
+
+Lepuy offered a special attraction apart from scenery and geology. In
+the museum was the skeleton of a prehistoric man that had been found
+in the breccia of the neighbourhood, associated with the remains of
+the rhinoceros, elephant, and other extinct mammals. My father's
+sketch-book contains drawings of these bones and of the ravine where
+they were discovered, although in spite of directions from M. Aymard,
+the curator, he could not find the exact spot. Under the sketch is a
+description of the remains, in which he notes,] "The bones do not look
+fresher than some of those of Elephas and Rhinoceros in the same or
+adjacent cases."
+
+[As for the final stage of the excursion:--
+
+After leaving the Ardeche (continues Sir J. Hooker), with no Scrope to
+lead or follow, our scientific ardours collapsed. We had vague views
+as to future travel. Whatever one proposed was unhesitatingly acceded
+to by the other. A more happy-go-lucky pair of idlers never joined
+company.
+
+As will be seen from the following letters, they made their way to the
+Black Forest, where they stayed till Sir Joseph's duties called him
+back to England, and my mother came out to join my father for the rest
+of his holiday. (You ask me (Sir Joseph adds) whether your father
+smoked on the occasion of this tour. Yes, he did, cigars in
+moderation. But the history of his addiction to tobacco that grew upon
+him later in life, dates from an earlier excursion that we took
+together, and I was the initiator of the practice. It happened in this
+wise; he had been suffering from what was supposed to be gastric
+irritation, and, being otherwise "run down," we agreed to go, in
+company with Sir John Lubbock, on a tour to visit the great monoliths
+of Brittany. This was in 1867. On arriving at Dinan he suffered so
+much, that I recommended his trying a few cigarettes which I had with
+me. They acted as a charm, and this led to cigars, and finally, about
+1875 I think, to the pipe. That he subsequently carried the use of
+tobacco to excess is, I think, unquestionable. I repeatedly
+remonstrated with him, at last I think (by backing his medical
+adviser) with effect.
+
+I have never blamed myself for the "teaching him" to smoke, for the
+practice habitually palliated his distressing symptoms when nothing
+else did, nor can his chronic illness be attributed to the abuse of
+tobacco.)
+
+The following letters to Sir H. Roscoe and Dr. Tyndall were written
+during this tour:--]
+
+Le Puy, Haute Loire, France, July 17, 1873.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+Your very kind letter reached me just as I was in the hurry of getting
+away from England, and I have been carrying it about in my pocket ever
+since.
+
+Hooker and I have been having a charming time of it among the
+volcanoes of the Auvergne, and we are now on our way to those of the
+Velay and Vivarrais. The weather has been almost perfect. Perhaps a
+few degrees of temperature could have been spared now and then,
+especially at Clermont, of which somebody once said that having stayed
+there the climate of hell would have no terrors for him.
+
+It has been warm in the Mont Dore country and in the Cantal, as it is
+here, but we are very high up, and there is a charming freshness and
+purity about the air.
+
+I do not expect to be back before the end of September, and my
+lectures begin somewhere in the second week of October. After they
+commence I shall not be able to leave London even for a day, but I
+shall be very glad to come to the inauguration of your new buildings
+if the ceremony falls within my possible time. And you know I am
+always glad to be your guest.
+
+I am thriving wonderfully. Indeed all that plagues me now is my
+conscience, for idling about when I feel full of vigour. But I
+promised to be obedient, and I am behaving better than Auld Clootie
+did when he fell sick.
+
+I hope you are routing out the gout. This would be the place for
+you--any quantity of mineral waters.
+
+Pray remember me very kindly to Mrs. Roscoe, and believe me, ever
+yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hotel de France, Baden-Baden, July 30, 1873.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+We find ourselves here after a very successful cruise in the Auvergne
+and Ardeche, successful at least so far as beauty and geological
+interest go. The heat was killing, and obliged us to give up all
+notion of going to Ursines, as we had at first intended to do. So we
+turned our faces north and made for Grenoble, hoping for a breath of
+cool air from the mountains of Dauphiny. But Grenoble was hotter even
+than Clermont (which, by the way, quite deserves its reputation as a
+competitor with hell), a neighbour's drains were adrift close to the
+hotel, and we got poisoned before we could escape. Luckily we got off
+with nothing worse than a day or two's diarrhoea. After this the best
+thing seemed to be to rush northward to Gernsbach, which had been
+described to me as a sort of earthly paradise. We reached the place
+last Saturday night, and found ourselves in a big rambling hotel,
+crammed full of people, and planted in the bottom of a narrow valley,
+all hot and steaming. A large pigstye "convenient" to the house
+mingled its vapours with those of the seventy or eighty people who ate
+and drank without any other earthly occupation that we could discern
+during the three days we were bound, by stress of letters and dirty
+linen, to stop. On Monday we made an excursion over here, prospecting,
+and the air was so fresh and good, and things in general looked so
+promising that I made up my mind to put up in Baden-Baden until the
+wife joins me. She writes me that you talk of leaving England on
+Friday, and I may remark that Baden is on the high road to
+Switzerland. Verbum sap.
+
+I am wonderfully better, and really feel ashamed of loafing about when
+I might very well be at work. But I have promised to make holiday, and
+make holiday I will.
+
+No proof of your answer to Forbes' biographer reached me before I
+left, so I suppose you had not received one in time. I am dying to see
+it out.
+
+Hooker is down below, but I take upon myself to send his love. He is
+in great force now that he has got rid of his Grenoble mulligrubs.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[After parting company with Hooker, he paid a flying visit to
+Professor Bonnet at Geneva; then he was joined by his wife and son for
+the last three weeks of the holiday, which were spent at Baden and in
+the Bernese Oberland. Before this, he writes home:--]
+
+I feel quite a different man from what I was two months ago, and you
+will say that you have a much more creditable husband than the
+broken-down old fellow who has been a heart-ache to you so long, when
+you see me. The sooner you can get away the better. If the rest only
+does you as much good as it does me, I shall be very happy.
+
+Axenstein, Luzerne, August 24, 1873.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+The copies of your booklet ["Principal Forbes and his Biographers."]
+intended for Hooker and me reached me just as I left Baden last
+Tuesday. Hooker had left me for home a fortnight before, and I hardly
+know whether to send his to Kew or keep them for him till I return. I
+have read mine twice, and I think that nothing could be better than
+the tone you have adopted. I did not suspect that you had such a shot
+in your locker as the answer to Forbes about the direction of the
+"crevasses" referred to by Rendu. It is a deadly thrust; and I shall
+be curious to see what sort of parry the other side will attempt. For
+of course they will attempt something. Scotland is, I believe, the
+only country in the world in which you can bring in action for
+"putting to silence" an adversary who will go on with an obviously
+hopeless suit. The lawgivers knew the genius of the people; and it is
+to be regretted that they could not establish a process of the same
+sort in scientific matters.
+
+I wrote to you a month ago to tell you how we had been getting on in
+France. Hooker and I were very jolly, notwithstanding the heat, and I
+think that the Vivarrais is the most instructive country in the world
+for seeing what water can do in cutting down the hardest rocks.
+Scrope's book is very good on the whole, though the pictures are a
+little overdone.
+
+My wife and Leonard met me at Cologne on the 11th. Then we went on to
+Baden and rested till last Tuesday, when we journeyed to Luzerne and,
+getting out of that hot and unsavoury hole as fast as we could, came
+here last Thursday.
+
+We find ourselves very well off. The hotel is perched up 1800 feet
+above the lake, with a beautiful view of Pilatus on the west and of
+the Urner See on the south. On the north we have the Schwyz valley, so
+that we are not shut in, and the air is very good and fresh. There are
+plenty of long walks to be had without much fatigue, which suits the
+wife. Leonard promises to have very good legs of his own with plenty
+of staying power. I have given him one or two sharp walks, and I find
+he has plenty of vigour and endurance. But he is not thirteen yet and
+I do not mean to let him do overmuch, though we are bent on a visit to
+a glacier. I began to tell him something about the glaciers the other
+day, but I was promptly shut up with, "Oh, yes! I know all about that.
+It's in Dr. Tyndall's book."--which said book he seems to me to have
+got by heart. He is the sweetest little fellow imaginable; and either
+he has developed immensely in the course of the last year, or I have
+never been so much thrown together with him alone, and have not had
+the opportunity of making him out.
+
+You are a fatherly old bachelor, and will not think me a particularly
+great donkey for prattling on in this way about my swan, who probably
+to unprejudiced eyes has a power of goose about him.
+
+I suppose you know that in company with yourself and Hooker, the
+paternal gander (T.H.H.) has been honoured by the King of Sweden and
+made into a Polar Goose by the order of the North Star. Hooker has
+explained to the Swedish Ambassador that English officials are
+prohibited by order in Council from accepting foreign orders, and I
+believe keeps the cross and ribbon on these conditions. If it were an
+ordinary decoration I should decline with thanks, but I am told it is
+a purely scientific and literary affair like the Prussian "pour le
+merite"; so when I get back I shall follow Hooker's line.
+
+I met Laugel on board the Luzerne steamboat the other day, and he told
+me that you were at the Belalp--gallivanting as usual, and likely to
+remain there for some time. So I send this on the chance of finding
+you.
+
+With best love from us all, ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I am as well as I ever was in my life--regularly set up--in token
+whereof I have shaved off my beard.
+
+[In another letter to his wife, dated August 8, from Baden, there is a
+very interesting passage about himself and his aims. He has just been
+speaking about his son's doings at school:--]
+
+I have been having a great deal of talk with myself about my future
+career too, and I have often thought over what you say in the letter
+you wrote to the Puy. I don't quite understand what -- meant about the
+disputed reputation, unless it is a reputation for getting into
+disputes. But to say truth I am not greatly concerned about any
+reputation except that of being entirely honest and straightforward,
+and that reputation I think and hope I have.
+
+For the rest...the part I have to play is not to found a new school of
+thought or to reconcile the antagonisms of the old schools. We are in
+the midst of a gigantic movement greater than that which preceded and
+produced the Reformation, and really only the continuation of that
+movement. But there is nothing new in the ideas which lie at the
+bottom of the movement, nor is any reconcilement possible between free
+thought and traditional authority. One or other will have to succumb
+after a struggle of unknown duration, which will have as side issues
+vast political and social troubles. I have no more doubt that free
+thought will win in the long run than I have that I sit here writing
+to you, or that this free thought will organise itself into a coherent
+system, embracing human life and the world as one harmonious whole.
+But this organisation will be the work of generations of men, and
+those who further it most will be those who teach men to rest in no
+lie, and to rest in no verbal delusions. I may be able to help a
+little in this direction--perhaps I may have helped already. For the
+present, however, I am disposed to draw myself back entirely into my
+own branch of physical science. There is enough and to spare for me to
+do in that line, and, for years to come, I do not mean to be tempted
+out of it.
+
+[Strangely enough, this was the one thing he was destined not to do.
+Official work multiplied about him. From 1870 to 1884 only two years
+passed without his serving on one or two Royal Commissions. He was
+Secretary of the Royal Society from 1871 to 1880, and President from
+1883 to his retirement, owing to ill-health, in 1885. He became Dean
+as well as Professor of Biology in the College of Science, and
+Inspector of Fisheries. Though he still managed to find some time for
+anatomical investigations, and would steal a precious hour or
+half-hour by driving back from the Home Office to his laboratory at
+South Kensington before returning home to St. John's Wood, the amount
+of such work as he was able to publish could not be very great.
+
+His most important contributions during this decennium (writes Sir M.
+Foster) were in part continuations of his former labours, such as the
+paper and subsequent full memoir on Stagonolepis, which appeared in
+1875 and 1877, and papers on the Skull. The facts that he called a
+communication to the Royal Society, in 1875 (written 1874.), on
+Amphioxus, a preliminary note, and that a paper read to the Zoological
+Society in 1876, on Ceratodus Forsteri, was marked Number 1 of the
+series of Contributions to Morphology, showed that he still had before
+him the prospect of much anatomical work, to be accomplished when
+opportunity offered; but, alas! the opportunity which came was small,
+the preliminary note had no full successor, and Number 1 was only
+followed, and that after an interval of seven years, by a brief Number
+2. A paper "On the Characters of the Pelvis," in the "Proceedings of
+the Royal Society," in 1879, is full of suggestive thought, but its
+concluding passages seem to suggest that others, and not he himself,
+were to carry out the ideas. Most of the papers of this decennium deal
+with vertebrate morphology, and are more or less connected with his
+former researches, but in one respect, at least, he broke quite fresh
+ground. He had chosen the crayfish as one of the lessons for the class
+in general biology spoken of above, and was thus drawn into an
+interesting study of crayfishes, by which he was led to a novel and
+important analysis of the gill plumes as evidence of affinity and
+separation. He embodied the main results of his studies in a paper to
+the Zoological Society, and treated the whole subject in a more
+popular style in a book on the Crayfish. In a somewhat similar way,
+having taken the dog as an object lesson in mammalian anatomy for his
+students, he was led to a closer study of that common animal,
+resulting in papers on that subject to the Zoological Society in 1880,
+and in two lectures at the Royal Institution in 1880. He had intended
+so to develop this study of the dog as to make it tell the tale of
+mammalian morphology; but this purpose, too, remained unaccomplished.
+
+Moreover, though he sent one paper (on Hyperodapedon Gordoni) to the
+Geological Society as late as 1887, yet the complete breakdown of his
+health in 1885, which released him from nearly all his official
+duties, at the same time dulled his ardour for anatomical pursuits.
+Stooping over his work became an impossibility.
+
+Though he carried about him, as does every man of like calibre and
+experience, a heavy load of fragments of inquiry begun but never
+finished, and as heavy a load of ideas for promising investigations
+never so much as even touched, though his love of science and belief
+in it might never have wavered, though he never doubted the value of
+the results which further research would surely bring him, there was
+something working within him which made his hand, when turned to
+anatomical science, so heavy that he could not lift it. Not even that
+which was so strong within him, the duty of fulfilling a promise,
+could bring him to the work. In his room at South Kensington, where
+for a quarter of a century he had laboured with such brilliant effect,
+there lay on his working table for months, indeed for years, partly
+dissected specimens of the rare and little studied marine animal,
+Spirula, of which he had promised to contribute an account to the
+Reports of the "Challenger" Expedition, and hard by lay the already
+engraven plates; there was still wanted nothing more than some further
+investigation and the working out of the results. But it seemed as if
+some hidden hands were always being stretched out to keep him from the
+task; and eventually another labourer had to complete it. (Ibid.)
+
+The remaining letters of this year include several to Dr. Dohrn, which
+show the continued interest my father took in the great project of the
+Biological Station at Naples, which was carried through in spite of
+many difficulties. He had various books and proceedings of learned
+societies sent out at Dr. Dohrn's request (I omit the details), and
+proposed a scheme for raising funds towards completing the building
+when the contractor failed. The scheme, however, was not put into
+execution.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, February 24, 1873.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+I was very glad to receive the fine sealed letter, and to get some
+news of you--though to be sure there is not much of you in the letter,
+but all is "Station, Station."
+
+I congratulate you heartily on your success with your undertaking, and
+I only wish I could see England represented among the applicants for
+tables. But you see England is so poor, and the present price of coals
+obliges her to economise.
+
+I envy you your visit from "Pater Anchises" Baer, and rejoice to hear
+that the grand old man is well and strong enough to entertain such a
+project. I wish I could see my way to doing the like. I have had a
+long bout of illness--ever since August--but I am now very much
+better, indeed, I hope I may say quite well. The weariness of all this
+has been complicated by the trouble of getting into a new house, and
+in addition a lawsuit brought by a knavish neighbour, in the hope of
+extracting money out of me.
+
+I am happy to say, however, that he has just been thoroughly and
+effectually defeated. It has been a new experience for me, and I hope
+it may be my last as well as my first acquaintance with English law,
+which is a luxury of the most expensive character.
+
+If Dr. Kleinenberg is with you, please to tell him, with my
+compliments and thanks for the copy of his Memoir, that I went over
+his Hydra paper pretty carefully in the summer, and satisfied myself
+as to the correctness of his statements about the structure of the
+ectoderm and about the longitudinal fibres. About the Endoderm I am
+not so clear, and I often found indications of delicate circular
+fibres in close apposition with the longitudinal ones. However, I had
+not time to work all this out, and perhaps might as well say nothing
+about it.
+
+Pray make my very kind remembrances to Mr. Grant. I trust that his
+dramas may have a brilliant reception.
+
+The Happy Family flourishes. But we shall look to your coming to see
+us. The house is big enough now to give you a bedroom, and you know
+you will have no lack of welcome.
+
+I have said nothing about my wife (who has been in a state not only of
+superhuman, but of superfeminine, activity for the last three months)
+meaning to leave her the last page to speak for herself.
+
+With best compliments to the "ladies downstairs," ever yours very
+faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 17, 1873.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+Your letter reached me nearly a week ago, and I have been turning over
+its contents in my mind as well as I could, but have been able to come
+to no clear conclusion until now. I have been incessantly occupied
+with other things.
+
+I will do for you, and gladly, anything I would do for myself, but I
+could not apply on my own behalf to any of those rich countrymen of
+mine, unless they were personally well known to me, and I had the
+opportunity of feeling my way with them. But if you are disposed to
+apply to any of the people you mention, I shall be only too glad to
+back your application with all the force I am master of. You may make
+use of my name to any extent as guarantor of the scientific value and
+importance of your undertaking and refer any one to whom you may apply
+to me. It may be, in fact, that this is all you want, but as you have
+taken to the caprice of writing in my tongue instead of in that
+vernacular, idiomatic and characteristically Dohrnian German in which
+I delight, I am not so sure about your meaning. There is a rub for
+you. If you write to me in English again I will send the letter back
+without paying the postage.
+
+In any case let me have a precise statement of your financial
+position. I may have a chance of talking to some Croesus, and the
+first question he is sure to ask me is--How am I to know that this is
+a stable affair, and that I am not throwing my money into the sea?...
+
+[Referring to an unpleasant step it seemed necessary to take]...you
+must make up your mind to act decidedly and take the consequences. No
+good is ever done in this world by hesitation...
+
+I hope you are physically better. Look sharply after your diet, take
+exercise and defy the blue-devils, and you will weather the storm.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Tyndall, who had not attended the 1873 meeting of the British
+Association, had heard that some local opposition had been offered to
+his election as President for the Belfast meeting in 1874, and had
+written:--
+
+I wish to have an you had not persuaded me to accept that Belfast
+duty. They do not want me...but Spottiswoode assures me that no
+individual offered the slightest support to the two unscientific
+persons who showed opposition.
+
+The following was written in reply:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 25, 1873.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I am sure you are mistaken about the Belfast people. That blundering
+idiot of -- wanted to make himself important and get up a sort of
+"Home Rule" agitation in the Association, but nobody backed him and he
+collapsed. I am at your disposition for whatever you want me to do, as
+you know, and I am sure Hooker is of the same mind. We shall not be
+ashamed when we meet our enemies in the gate.
+
+The grace of god cannot entirely have deserted you since you are aware
+of the temperature of that ferocious epistle. Reeks [The late Trenham
+Reeks, Registrar of the School of Mines, and Curator of the Museum of
+Practical Geology.], whom I saw yesterday, was luxuriating in it, and
+said (confound his impudence) that it was quite my style. I forgot to
+tell him, by the bye, that I had resigned in your favour ever since
+the famous letter to Carpenter. Well, so long as you are better after
+it there is no great harm done.
+
+Somebody has sent me the two numbers of Scribner with Blauvelt's
+articles on "Modern Skepticism." They seem to be very well done, and
+he has a better appreciation of the toughness of the job before him
+than any of the writers of his school with whom I have met. But it is
+rather cool of you to talk of his pitching into Spencer when you are
+chief target yourself. I come in only par parenthese, and I am glad to
+see that people are beginning to understand my real position, and to
+separate me from such raging infidels as you and Spencer.
+
+Ever thine,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He was unable to attend the opening of Owens College this autumn, and
+having received but a scanty account of the proceedings, wrote as
+follows:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., October 16, 1873.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+I consider myself badly used. Nobody has sent me a Manchester paper
+with the proceedings of the day of inauguration, when, I hear, great
+speeches were made.
+
+I DID get TWO papers containing your opening lecture, and the
+"Fragment of a Morality," for which I am duly grateful, but two copies
+of one days' proceedings are not the same thing as one copy of two
+days' proceedings, and I consider it is very disrespectful to a
+Governor (large G) not to let him know what went on.
+
+By all accounts which have reached me it was a great success, and I
+congratulate you heartily. I only wish that I could have been there to
+see.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The autumn brought a slow improvement in health--]
+
+I am travelling [he writes] between the two stations of dyspepsia and
+health thus [illustrated by a zigzag with "mean line ascending".
+
+[The sympathy of the convalescent appears in various letters to
+friends who were ill. Thus, in reply to Mr. Hyde Clarke, the
+philologist and, like himself, a member of the Ethnological Society,
+he writes:--]
+
+November 18, 1873.
+
+I am glad to learn two things from your note--first, that you are
+getting better; second, that there is hope of some good coming out of
+that Ashantee row, if only in the shape of rare vocables.
+
+My attention is quite turned away from Anthropological matters at
+present, but I will bear your question in mind if opportunity offers.
+
+[A letter to Professor Rolleston at Oxford gives a lively account of
+his own ailments, which could only have been written by one now
+recovering from them, while the illness of another friend raised a
+delicate point of honour, which he laid before the judgment of Mr.
+Darwin, more especially as the latter had been primarily concerned in
+the case.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 16, 1873.
+
+My dear Rolleston,
+
+A note which came from Mrs. Rolleston to my wife the other day, kindly
+answering some inquiries of ours about the Oxford Middle Class
+Examination, gave us but a poor account of your health.
+
+This kind of thing won't do, you know. Here is -- ill, and I doing all
+I can to persuade him to go away and take care of himself, and now
+comes ill news of you.
+
+Is it dyspeps again? If so follow in my steps. I mean to go about the
+country, with somebody who can lecture, as the "horrid
+example"--cured. Nothing but gross and disgusting intemperance, Sir,
+was the cause of all my evil. And now that I have been a teetotaller
+for nine months, and have cut down my food supply to about half of
+what I used to eat, the enemy is beaten.
+
+I have carried my own permissive bill, and no canteen (except for my
+friends who still sit in darkness) is allowed on the premises. And as
+this is the third letter I have written before breakfast (a thing I
+never could achieve in the days when I wallowed in the stye of
+Epicurus), you perceive that I am as vigorous as ever I was in my
+life.
+
+Let me have news of you, and believe me,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Athenaeum Club, November 3, 1873.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+You will have heard (in fact I think I mentioned the matter when I
+paid you my pleasant visit the other day) that -- is ill and obliged
+to go away for six months to a warm climate. It is a great grief to
+me, as he is a man for whom I have great esteem and affection, apart
+from his high scientific merits, and his symptoms are such as cause
+very grave anxiety. I shall be happily disappointed if that accursed
+consumption has not got hold of him.
+
+The college authorities have behaved as well as they possibly could to
+him, and I do not suppose that his enforced retirement for a while
+gives him the least pecuniary anxiety, as his people are all well off,
+and he himself has an income apart from his college pay. Nevertheless,
+under such circumstances, a man with half a dozen children always
+wants all the money he can lay hands on; and whether he does or no, he
+ought not to be allowed to deprive himself of any, which leads me to
+the gist of my letter. His name was on your list as one of those
+hearty friends who came to my rescue last year, and it was the only
+name which made me a little uneasy, for I doubted whether it was right
+for a man with his responsibilities to make sacrifices of this sort.
+However, I stifled that feeling, not seeing what else I could do
+without wounding him. But now my conscience won't let me be, and I do
+not think that any consideration ought to deter me from getting his
+contribution back to him somehow or other. There is no one to whose
+judgment on a point of honour I would defer more readily than yours,
+and I am quite sure you will agree with me. I really am quite unhappy
+and ashamed to think of myself as vigorous and well at the expense of
+his denying himself any rich man's caprice he might take a fancy to.
+
+So, my dear, good friend, let me know what his contribution was, that
+I may get it back to him somehow or other, even if I go like Nicodemus
+privily and by night to his bankers.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.5.
+
+1874.
+
+[My father's health continued fairly good in 1874, and while careful
+to avoid excessive strain he was able to undertake nearly as much as
+before his illness outside his regular work at South Kensington, the
+Royal Society, and on the Royal Commission. To this year belong three
+important essays, educational and philosophical. From February 25 to
+March 3 he was at Aberdeen, staying first with Professor Bain,
+afterwards with Mr. Webster, in fulfilment of his first duty as Lord
+Rector to deliver an address to the students. (It may be noted that
+between 1860 and 1890 he and Professor Bain were the only Lord Rectors
+of Aberdeen University elected on non-political grounds.) Taking as
+his subject "Universities, Actual and Ideal," he then proceeded to
+vindicate, historically and philosophically, the claims of natural
+science to take the place from which it had so long been ousted in the
+universal culture which a University professes to give. More
+especially he demanded an improved system of education in the medical
+school, a point to which he gave practical effect in the Council of
+the University.]
+
+In an ideal University, as I conceive it, a man should be able to
+obtain instruction in all forms of knowledge, and discipline in the
+use of all the methods by which knowledge is obtained. In such a
+University the force of living example should fire the student with a
+noble ambition to emulate the learning of learned men, and to follow
+in the footsteps of the explorers of new fields of knowledge. And the
+very air he breathes should be charged with that enthusiasm for truth,
+that fanaticism of veracity, which is a greater possession than much
+learning; a nobler gift than the power of increasing knowledge; by so
+much greater and nobler than these, as the moral nature of man is
+greater than the intellectual; for veracity is the heart of morality.
+[("Collected Essays" 3 189 sqq.)
+
+As for the "so-called 'conflict of studies,'" he exclaims:--]
+
+One might as well inquire which of the terms of a Rule of Three sum
+one ought to know in order to get a trustworthy result. Practical life
+is such a sum, in which your duty multiplied into your capacity and
+divided by your circumstances gives you the fourth term in the
+proportion, which is your deserts, with great accuracy.
+
+[The knowledge on which medical practice should be based is] "the sort
+of practical, familiar, finger-end knowledge which a watchmaker has of
+a watch," [the knowledge gained in the dissecting-room and
+laboratory.]
+
+Until each of the greater truths of anatomy and physiology has become
+an organic part of your minds--until you would know them if you were
+roused and questioned in the middle of the night, as a man knows the
+geography of his native place and the daily life of his home. That is
+the sort of knowledge which, once obtained, is a lifelong possession.
+Other occupations may fill your minds--it may grow dim and seem to be
+forgotten--but there it is, like the inscription on a battered and
+defaced coin, which comes out when you warm it.
+
+[Hence the necessity to concentrate the attention on these cardinal
+truths, and to discard a number of extraneous subjects commonly
+supposed to be requisite whether for general culture of the medical
+student or to enable him to correct the possible mistakes of
+druggists. Against this "Latin fetish" in medical education, as he
+used to call it, he carried on a lifelong campaign, as may be gathered
+from his published essays on medical education, and from letters given
+in later chapters of this book. But there is another side to such
+limitation in professional training. Though literature is an essential
+in the preliminary, general education, culture is not solely dependent
+upon classics.]
+
+Moreover, I would urge that a thorough study of Human Physiology is in
+itself an education broader and more comprehensive than much that
+passes under that name. There is no side of the intellect which it
+does not call into play, no region of human knowledge into which
+either its roots or its branches do not extend; like the Atlantic
+between the Old and New Worlds, its waves wash the shores of the two
+worlds of matter and of mind; its tributary streams flow from both;
+through its waters, as yet unfurrowed by the keel of any Columbus,
+lies the road, if such there be, from the one to the other; far away
+from that North-west Passage of mere speculation, in which so many
+brave souls have been hopelessly frozen up.
+
+[Of the address he writes to his wife, February 27:--]
+
+I have just come back from the hall in which the address was
+delivered, somewhat tired. The hall was very large, and contained, I
+suppose, a couple of thousand people, and the students made a terrific
+row at intervals, though they were quiet enough at times. As the
+address took me an hour and a half to deliver, and my voice has been
+very shaky ever since I have been here, I did not dare to put too much
+strain upon it, and I suspect that the people at the end of the hall
+could have heard very little. However, on the whole, it went off
+better than I expected.
+
+[And to Professor Baynes:--]
+
+I am very glad you liked my address. The students were abnormally
+quiet for the first half-hour, and then made up for their reticence by
+a regular charivari for the rest of the time. However, I was consoled
+by hearing that they were much quieter than usual.
+
+Dr. John Muir's appreciation is worth having. It did not occur to me
+that what I had to say would interest people out of Britain, but to my
+surprise I had an application from a German for permission to
+translate the address the other day.
+
+[Again to his wife, March 1:--]
+
+...I was considerably tired after my screed on Friday, but Bain and I
+took a long walk, and I was fresh again by dinner-time. I dined with
+the Senators at a hotel in the town, and of course had to make a
+speech or two. However I cut all that as fast as I could. They were
+all very apologetic for the row the students made. After the dinner
+one of the Professors came to ask me if I would have any objection to
+attend service in the College Chapel on Sunday, as the students would
+like it. I said I was quite ready to do anything it was customary for
+the Rector to do, and so this morning in half an hour's time I shall
+be enduring the pains and penalties of a Presbyterian service.
+
+There was to have been another meeting of the University Court
+yesterday, but the Principal was suffering so much from an affection
+of the lungs that I adjourned the meeting till to-morrow. Did I tell
+you that I carried all my resolutions about improving the medical
+curriculum? Fact, though greatly to my astonishment. To-morrow we go
+in for some reforms in the arts curriculum, and I expect that the job
+will be tougher.
+
+I send you a couple of papers--"Scotsman," with a very good leading
+article, and the "Aberdeen Herald" also with a leading article, which
+is as much favourable as was to be expected...The Websters are making
+me promise to bring you and one of the children here next autumn. They
+are wonderfully kind people.
+
+March 2.
+
+My work here finishes to-day. There is a meeting of the Council at one
+o'clock, and before that I am to go and look over laboratories and
+collections with sundry Professors. Then there is the supper at
+half-past eight and the inevitable speeches, for which I am not in the
+least inclined at present. I went officially to the College Chapel
+yesterday, and went through a Presbyterian service for the first time
+in my life. May it be the last!
+
+Then to lunch at Professor Struthers' and back here for a small
+dinner-party. I am standing it all well, for the weather is villainous
+and there is no getting any exercise. I shall leave here by the twelve
+o'clock train to-morrow.
+
+[On August 2 he delivered an address on "Joseph Priestley" ("Collected
+Essays" 3 1) at Birmingham, on the occasion of the presentation of a
+statue of Priestley to that town. The biography of this pioneer of
+science and of political reform, who was persecuted for opinions that
+have in less than a century become commonplaces of orthodox thought,
+suggested a comparison between those times and this, and evoked a
+sincere if not very enthusiastic tribute to one who had laboured to
+better the world, not for the sake of worldly honour, but for the sake
+of truth and right.
+
+As the way to Birmingham lay through Oxford, he was asked by Professor
+Ray Lankester, then a Fellow of Exeter College, if he could not break
+his journey there, and inspect the results of his investigations on
+Lymnaeus. The answer was as follows:--]
+
+We go to Birmingham on Friday by the three o'clock train, but there is
+no chance of stopping at Oxford either going or coming, so that unless
+you bring a Lymnaeus or two (under guise of periwinkles for
+refreshment) to the carriage door I shall not be able to see them.
+
+[The following letters refer both to this address on Priestley, and to
+the third of the important addresses of this year, that "On the
+Hypothesis that Animals are Automata, and its History" ("Collected
+Essays" 1 199, see also below). The latter was delivered at Belfast
+before the British Association under Tyndall's presidency. It appears
+that only a month before, he had not so much as decided upon his
+subject--indeed, was thinking of something quite different.
+
+The first allusion in these letters is to a concluding phase of
+Tyndall's controversy upon the claims of the late Principal Forbes in
+the matter of Glacier theory:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., June 24, 1874.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I quite agree with your Scotch friend in his estimate of Forbes, and
+if he were alive and the controversy beginning, I should say draw your
+picture in your best sepia or lampblack. But I have been thinking over
+this matter a good deal since I received your letter, and my verdict
+is, leave that tempting piece of portraiture alone.
+
+The world is neither was nor just, but it makes up for all its folly
+and injustice by being damnably sentimental, and the more severely
+true your portrait might be the more loud would be the outcry against
+it. I should say publish a new edition of your "Glaciers of the Alps,"
+make a clear historical statement of all the facts showing Forbes'
+relations to Rendu and Agassiz, and leave the matter to the judgment
+of your contemporaries. That will sink in and remain when all the
+hurly-burly is over.
+
+I wonder if that address is begun, and if you are going to be as wise
+and prudent as I was at Liverpool. When I think of the temptation I
+resisted on that occasion, like Clive when he was charged with
+peculation, "I marvel at my own forbearance!" Let my example be a
+burning and a shining light to you. I declare I have horrid misgivings
+of your kicking over the traces.
+
+The "x" comes off on Saturday next, so let your ears burn, for we
+shall be talking about you. I have just begun my lectures to
+Schoolmasters, and I wish they were over, though I am very well on the
+whole.
+
+Griffith [for many years secretary to the British Association.] wrote
+to ask for the title of my lecture at Belfast, and I had to tell him I
+did not know yet. I shall not begin to think of it till the middle of
+July when these lectures are over.
+
+The wife would send her love, but she has gone to Kew to one of
+Hooker's receptions, taking Miss Jewsbury, who is staying with us.
+[Miss Geraldine Jewsbury (1812-1880) the novelist, and friend of the
+Carlyles. After 1866 she lived at Sevenoaks.] I was to have gone to
+the College of Physicians' dinner to-night, but I was so weary when I
+got home that I made up my mind to send an excuse. And then came the
+thought that I had not written to you.
+
+Ever yours sincerely,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The next letter is in reply to Tyndall, who had written as follows
+from Switzerland on July 15:--
+
+I confess to you that I am far more anxious about your condition than
+about my own; for I fear that after your London labour the labour of
+this lecture will press heavily upon you. I wish to Heaven it could be
+transferred to other shoulders.
+
+I wish I could get rid of the uncomfortable idea that I have drawn
+upon you at a time when your friend and brother ought to be anxious to
+spare you every labour...
+
+PS.--Have just seen the Swiss "Times"; am intensely disgusted to find
+that while I was brooding over the calamities possibly consequent on
+your lending me a hand, that you have been at the Derby Statue, and
+are to make an oration apropos of the Priestley Statue in Birmingham
+on the 1st August!!!]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., July 22, 1874.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I hope you have been taking more care of your instep than you did of
+your leg in old times. Don't try mortifying the flesh again.
+
+I was uncommonly amused at your disgustful wind-up after writing me
+such a compassionate letter. I am as jolly as a sandboy so long as I
+live on a minimum and drink no alcohol, and as vigorous as ever I was
+in my life. But a late dinner wakes up my demoniac colon and gives me
+a fit of blue devils with physical precision.
+
+Don't believe that I am at all the places in which the newspapers put
+me. For example, I was not at the Lord Mayor's dinner last night. As
+for Lord Derby's statue, I wanted to get a lesson in the art of statue
+unveiling. I help to pay Dizzie's salary, so I don't see why I should
+not get a wrinkle from that artful dodger.
+
+I plead guilty to having accepted the Birmingham invitation [to unveil
+the statue of Joseph Priestley]. I thought they deserved to be
+encouraged for having asked a man of science to do the job instead of
+some noble swell, and, moreover, Satan whispered that it would be a
+good opportunity for a little ventilation of wickedness. I cannot say,
+however, that I can work myself up into much enthusiasm for the dry
+old Unitarian who did not go very deep into anything. But I think I
+may make him a good peg whereon to hang a discourse on the tendencies
+of modern thought.
+
+I was not at the Cambridge pow-wow--not out of prudence, but because I
+was not asked. I suppose that decent respect towards a Secretary of
+the Royal Society was not strong enough to outweigh University
+objections to the incumbent of that office. It is well for me that I
+expect nothing from Oxford or Cambridge, having burned my ships so far
+as they were concerned long ago.
+
+I sent your note on to Knowles as soon as it arrived, but I have heard
+nothing from him. I wrote to him again to-night to say he had better
+let me see it in proof if he is going to print it. I am right glad you
+find anything worth reading again in my old papers. I stand by the
+view I took of the origin of species now as much as ever.
+
+Shall I not see the address? It is tantalising to hear of your
+progress, and not to know what is in it.
+
+I am thinking of taking Development for the subject of my evening
+lecture, the concrete facts made out in the last thirty years without
+reference to Evolution. [I.e. at the British Association; he actually
+took "Animals as Automata."] If people see that it is Evolution, that
+is Nature's fault, and not mine.
+
+We are all flourishing, and send our love.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The paper on Animal Automatism is in effect an enlargement of a short
+paper read before the Metaphysical Society in 1871, under the title of
+"Has a Frog a Soul?" It begins with a vindication of Descartes as a
+great physiologist, doing for the physiology of motion and sensation
+that which Harvey had done for the circulation of the blood. A series
+of propositions which constitute the foundation and essence of the
+modern physiology of the nervous system are fully expressed and
+illustrated in the writings of Descartes. Modern physiological
+research, which has shown that many apparently purposive acts are
+performed by animals, and even by men, deprived of consciousness, and
+therefore of volition, is at least compatible with the theory of
+automatism in animals, although the doctrine of continuity forbids the
+belief that] "such complex phenomena as those of consciousness first
+make their appearance in man." [And if the volitions of animals do not
+enter into the chain of causation of their actions at all, the fact
+lays at rest the question] "How is it possible to imagine that
+volition, which is a state of consciousness, and, as such, has not the
+slightest community of nature with matter in motion, can act upon the
+moving matter of which the body is composed, as it is assumed to do in
+voluntary acts?"
+
+[As for man, the argumentation, if sound, holds equally good. States
+of consciousness are immediately caused by molecular changes of the
+brain-substance, and our mental conditions are simply the symbols in
+consciousness of the changes which take place automatically in the
+organism.
+
+As for the bugbear of the] "logical consequences" [of this
+conviction,] "I may be permitted to remark [he says] that logical
+consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the beacons of wise men."
+[And if St. Augustine, Calvin, and Jonathan Edwards have held in
+substance the view that men are conscious automata, to hold this view
+does not constitute a man a fatalist, a materialist, nor an atheist.
+And he takes occasion once more to declare that he ranks among none of
+these philosophers.]
+
+Not among fatalists, for I take the conception of necessity to have a
+logical, and not a physical foundation; not among materialists, for I
+am utterly incapable of conceiving the existence of matter if there is
+no mind in which to picture that existence; not among atheists, for
+the problem of the ultimate cause of existence is one which seems to
+me to be hopelessly out of reach of my poor powers. Of all the
+senseless babble I have ever had occasion to read, the demonstrations
+of these philosophers who undertake to tell us all about the nature of
+God would be the worst, if they were not surpassed by the still
+greater absurdities of the philosophers who try to prove that there is
+no God.
+
+[This essay was delivered as an evening address on August 24, the
+Monday of the Association week. A vast stir had been created by the
+treatment of deep-reaching problems in Professor Tyndall's
+presidential address; interest was still further excited by this
+unexpected excursion into metaphysics. "I remember," writes Sir M.
+Foster, "having a talk with him about the lecture before he gave it. I
+think I went to his lodgings--and he sketched out what he was going to
+say. The question was whether, in view of the Tyndall row, it was wise
+in him to take the line he had marked out. In the end I remember his
+saying,] 'Grasp your nettle, that is what I have got to do.'" [But
+apart from the subject, the manner of the address struck the audience
+as a wonderful tour de force. The man who at first disliked public
+speaking, and always expected to break down on the platform, now,
+without note or reference of any kind, discoursed for an hour and a
+half upon a complex and difficult subject, in the very words which he
+had thought out and afterwards published.
+
+This would have been a remarkable achievement if he had planned to do
+so and had learned up his speech; but the fact was that he was
+compelled to speak offhand on the spur of the moment. He describes the
+situation in a letter of February 6, 1894, to Professor Ray
+Lankester:--]
+
+I knew that I was treading on very dangerous ground, so I wrote out
+uncommonly full and careful notes, and had them in my hand when I
+stepped on to the platform.
+
+Then I suddenly became aware of the bigness of the audience, and the
+conviction came upon me that, if I looked at my notes, not one half
+would hear me. It was a bad ten seconds, but I made my election and
+turned the notes face downwards on the desk.
+
+To this day, I do not exactly know how the thing managed to roll
+itself out; but it did, as you say, for the best part of an hour and a
+half.
+
+There's a story pour vous encourager if you are ever in a like fix.
+
+[He writes home on August 20:--]
+
+Johnny's address went off exceedingly well last night. There was a
+mighty gathering in the Ulster Hall, and he delivered his speech very
+well. The meeting promises to be a good one, as there are over 1800
+members already, and I daresay they will mount up to 2000 before the
+end. The Hookers' arrangements [i.e. for the members of the x club and
+their wives to club together at Belfast] all went to smash as I rather
+expected they would, but I have a very good clean lodging well outside
+the town where I can be quiet if I like, and on the whole I think that
+is better, as I shall be able to work up my lectures in peace...
+
+August 21.
+
+Everything is going on very well here. The weather is delightful, and
+under these circumstances my lodgings here with John Ball for a
+companion turns out to be a most excellent arrangement. Ca va sans
+dire, though, by the way, that is a bull induced by the locality. I am
+not going on any of the excursions on Sunday. I am going to have a
+quiet day here when everybody will suppose that I have accepted
+everybody else's invitation to be somewhere else. The Ulster Hall, in
+which the addresses are delivered, seems to me to be a terrible room
+to speak in, and I mean to nurse my energies all Monday. I sent you a
+cutting from one of the papers containing an account of me that will
+amuse you. The writer is evidently disappointed that I am not a
+turbulent savage.
+
+August 25.
+
+...My work is over and I start for Kingstown, where I mean to sleep
+to-night, in an hour. I have just sent you a full and excellent report
+of my lecture. ["On Animals as Automata": see above.] I am glad to say
+it was a complete success. I never was in better voice in my life, and
+I spoke for an hour and a half without notes, the people listening as
+still as mice. There has been a great row about Tyndall's address, and
+I had some reason to expect that I should have to meet a frantically
+warlike audience. But it was quite otherwise, and though I spoke my
+mind with very great plainness, I never had a warmer reception. And I
+am not without hope that I have done something to allay the storm,
+though, as you may be sure, I did not sacrifice plain speaking to that
+end...I have been most creditably quiet here, and have gone to no
+dinners or breakfasts or other such fandangoes except those I accepted
+before leaving home. Sunday I spent quietly here, thinking over my
+lecture and putting my peroration, which required a good deal of care,
+into shape. I wandered out into the fields in the afternoon, and sat a
+long time thinking of all that had happened since I was here a young
+beginner, two and twenty, and...you were largely in my thoughts, which
+were full of blessings and tender memories.
+
+I had a good night's work last night. I dined with the President of
+the College, and then gave my lecture. After that I smoked a bit with
+Foster till eleven o'clock, and then I went to the "Northern Whig"
+office to see that the report of my lecture was all right. It is the
+best paper here, and the Editor had begged me to see to the report,
+and I was anxious myself that I should be rightly represented. So I
+sat there till a quarter past one having the report read and
+correcting it when necessary. Then I came home and got to bed about
+two. I have just been to the section and read my paper there to a
+large audience who cannot have understood ten words of it, but who
+looked highly edified, and now I have done. Our lodging has turned out
+admirably, and Ball's company has been very pleasant. So that the
+fiasco of our arrangements was all for the best.
+
+[I take the account of this last-mentioned paper in Section D from the
+report in "Nature":--
+
+Professor Huxley opened the last day of the session with an account of
+his recent observations on the development of the Columella auris in
+Amphibia. (He described it as an outgrowth of the periotic capsule,
+and therefore unconnected with any visceral arch.)...
+
+In the absence of Mr. Parker there was no one competent to criticise
+the paper from personal knowledge; but a word dropped as to the many
+changes in the accepted homologies of the ossicula auditus, elicited a
+masterly and characteristic exposition of the series of new facts, and
+the modifications of the theory they have led to, from Reichert's
+first observations down to the present time. The embryonic structures
+grew and shaped themselves on the board, and shifted their relations
+in accordance with the views of successive observers, until a graphic
+epitome of the progress of knowledge on the subject was completed.
+
+He and Parker indeed (to whom he signs himself, "Ever yours
+amphibially") had been busy, not only throughout 1874, but for several
+years earlier, examining the development of the Amphibia, with a
+particular view to the whole theory of the vertebrate skull, for which
+he had done similar work in 1857 and 1858. Thus on May 4, 1870, he
+writes to Parker:--]
+
+I read all the most important part of your Frog-paper last night, and
+a grand piece of work it is--more important, I think, in all its
+bearings than anything you have done yet.
+
+From which premisses I am going to draw a conclusion which you do not
+expect, namely, that the paper must by no manner of means go into the
+Royal Society in its present shape. And for the reasons following:--
+
+In the first place, the style is ultra-Parkerian. From a literary
+point of view, my dear friend, you remind me of nothing so much as a
+dog going home. He has a goal before him which he will certainly reach
+sooner or later, but first he is on this side the road, and now on
+that; anon, he stops to scratch at an ancient rat-hole, or maybe he
+catches sight of another dog, a quarter of a mile behind, and bolts
+off to have a friendly, or inimical sniff. In fact, his course
+is...(here a tangled maze is drawn) not --. In the second place, you
+must begin with an earlier stage...That is the logical starting-point
+of the whole affair.
+
+Will you come and dine at 6 on Saturday, and talk over the whole
+business?
+
+If you have drawings of earlier stages you might bring them. I suspect
+that what is wanted might be supplied in plenty of time to get the
+paper in.
+
+[In 1874 he re-dissects the skull of Axolotl to clear up the question
+as to the existence of the] "ventral head or pedicle" [which Parker
+failed to observe:] "If you disbelieve in that pedicle again, I shall
+be guilty of an act of personal violence." [Later,] "I am benevolent
+to all the world, being possessed of a dozen live axolotls and four or
+five big dead mesobranchs. Moreover, I am going to get endless Frogs
+and Toads by judicious exchange with Gunther. [Dr. A.C.L.G. Gunther,
+of the British Museum, where he was appointed Keeper of the Department
+of Zoology in 1875.] We will work up the Amphibia as they have not
+been done since they were crea-- I mean evolved."
+
+[The question of the pedicle comes up again when he simplifies some of
+Parker's results as to the development of the Columella auris in the
+Frog.] "Your suprahyomandibular is nothing but the pedicle of the
+suspensorium over again. It has nothing whatever to do with the
+Columella auris...The whole thing will come out as simply as possible
+without any of your coalescences and combotherations. How you will
+hate me and the pedicle."
+
+[Tracing the development of the columella was a long business, but it
+grew clearer as young frogs of various ages were examined.] "Don't be
+aggravated with yourself," [he writes to Parker in July,] "it's tough
+work, this here Frog." [And on August 5:] "I have worked over Toad and
+I have worked over Frog, and I tell an obstinate man that s.h.m.
+[suprahyomandibular] is a figment--or a vessel, whichever said
+obstinate man pleases." [The same letter contains what he calls his
+final views on the columella, but by the end of the year he has gone
+further, and writes:--]
+
+Be prepared to bust-up with all the envy of which your malignant
+nature is capable. The problem of the vertebrate skull is solved.
+Fourteen segments or thereabouts in Amphioxus; all but one (barring
+possibilities about the ear capsule) aborted in higher vertebrata.
+Skull and brain of Amphioxus shut up like an opera-hat in higher
+vertebrata. So! (Sketch in illustration.)
+
+P.S.--I am sure you will understand the whole affair from this.
+Probably published it already in "Nature!"
+
+[A letter to the "Times" of July 8, 1874, on women's education, was
+evoked by the following circumstances. Miss Jex Blake's difficulties
+in obtaining a medical education have already been referred to. A
+further discouragement was her rejection at the Edinburgh examination.
+Her papers, however, were referred to Huxley, who decided that certain
+answers were not up to the standard.]
+
+As Miss Jex Blake may possibly think that my decision was influenced
+by prejudice against her cause, allow me to add that such prejudice as
+I labour under lies in the opposite direction. Without seeing any
+reason to believe that women are, on the average, so strong
+physically, intellectually, or morally, as men, I cannot shut my eyes
+to the fact that many women are much better endowed in all these
+respects than many men, and I am at a loss to understand on what
+grounds of justice or public policy a career which is open to the
+weakest and most foolish of the male sex should be forcibly closed to
+women of vigour and capacity.
+
+We have heard a great deal lately about the physical disabilities of
+women. Some of these alleged impediments, no doubt, are really
+inherent in their organisation, but nine-tenths of them are
+artificial--the products of their modes of life. I believe that
+nothing would tend so effectually to get rid of these creations of
+idleness, weariness, and that "over-stimulation of the emotions"
+which, in plainer-spoken days, used to be called wantonness, than a
+fair share of healthy work, directed towards a definite object,
+combined with an equally fair share of healthy play, during the years
+of adolescence; and those who are best acquainted with the
+acquirements of an average medical practitioner will find it hardest
+to believe that the attempt to reach that standard is like to prove
+exhausting to an ordinarily intelligent and well-educated young woman.
+
+[The Marine Biological Station at Naples was still struggling for
+existence, and to my father's interest in it is do you the following
+letter, one of several to Dr. Dohrn, whose marriage took place this
+summer:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, June 24, 1874.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+Are you married yet or are you not? It is very awkward to congratulate
+a man upon what may not have happened to him, but I shall assume that
+you are a benedict, and send my own and my wife's and all the happy
+family's good wishes accordingly. May you have as good a wife and as
+much a "happy family" as I have, though I would advise you--the
+hardness of the times being considered--to be satisfied with fewer
+than seven members thereof.
+
+I hear excellent accounts of the progress of the Station from
+Lankester, and I hope that it is now set on its legs permanently. As
+for the English contribution, you must look upon it simply as the
+expression of the hearty goodwill of your many friends in the land of
+fogs, and of our strong feeling that where you had sacrificed so much
+for the cause of science, we were, as a matter of duty,--quite apart
+from goodwill to you personally--bound to do what we could, each
+according to his ability.
+
+Darwin is, in all things, noble and generous--one of those people who
+think it a privilege to let him help. I know he was very pleased with
+what you said to him. He is working away at a new edition of the
+"Descent of Man," for which I have given him some notes on the brain
+question.
+
+And apropos of that, how is your own particular brain? I back la belle
+M-- against all the physicians in the world--even against mine own
+particular Aesculapius, Dr. Clark--to find the sovereignest remedy
+against the blue devils.
+
+Let me hear from you--most abominable of correspondents as I am. And
+why don't you send Madame's photograph that you have promised?
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Pray give my kind remembrances to your father.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, March 31, 1874.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+The brain business is more than half done, and I will soon polish it
+off and send it to you. [A note on the brain in man and the apes for
+the second edition of the "Descent of Man."] We are going down to
+Folkestone for a week on Thursday, and I shall take it with me.
+
+I do not know what is doing about Dohrn's business at present. Foster
+took it in hand, but the last time I heard he was waiting for reports
+from Dew and Balfour.
+
+You have been very generous as always; and I hope that other folk may
+follow your example, but like yourself I am not sanguine.
+
+I have had an AWFULLY tempting offer to go to Yankee-land on a
+lecturing expedition, and I am seriously thinking of making an
+experiment next spring.
+
+The chance of clearing two or three thousand pounds in as many months
+is not to be sneezed at by a pere de famille. I am getting sick of the
+state of things here.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I have heard no more about the spirit photographs!
+
+4 Marlborough Place, April 16, 1874.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+Put my contribution into the smallest type possible, for it will be
+read by none but anatomists; and never mind where it goes.
+
+I am glad you agree with me about the hand and foot and skull
+question. As Ward [W.G. Ward.] said of Mill's opinions, you can only
+account for the views of Messrs. -- and Co. on the supposition of
+"grave personal sin" on their part.
+
+I had a letter from Dohrn a day or two ago in which he tells me he has
+written to you. I suspect he has been very ill.
+
+Let us know when you are in town, and believe me,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The allusion in the letter of March 31 to certain "spirit
+photographs" refers to a series of these wonderful productions sent to
+him by a connection of Mr. Darwin's, who was interested in these
+matters, and to whom he replied, showing how the effect might have
+been produced by simple mechanical means.
+
+It was at this gentleman's house that in January a carefully organised
+seance was held, at which my father was present incognito, so far as
+the medium was concerned, and on which he wrote the following report
+to Mr. Darwin, referred to in his "Life," volume 3 page 187.
+
+It must be noted that he had had fairly extensive experience of
+spiritualism; he had made regular experiments with Mrs. Haydon at his
+brother George's house (the paper on which these are recorded is
+undated, but it must have been before 1863); he was referred to as a
+disbeliever in an article in the "Pall Mall Gazette" during January
+1869, as a sequel to which a correspondent sent him an account of the
+confessions of the Fox girls, who had started spiritualism forty years
+before. At the houses of other friends, he had attended seances and
+met mediums by whom he was most unfavourably impressed.
+
+Moreover, when invited to join a committee of investigation into
+spiritualistic manifestations, he replied:--]
+
+I regret that I am unable to accept the invitation of the Committee of
+the Dialectical Society to cooperate with a committee for the
+investigation of "Spiritualism"; and for two reasons. In the first
+place, I have not time for such an inquiry, which would involve much
+trouble and (unless it were unlike all inquiries of that kind I have
+known) much annoyance. In the second place, I take no interest in the
+subject. The only case of "Spiritualism" I have had the opportunity of
+examining into for myself, was as gross an imposture as ever came
+under my notice. But supposing the phenomena to be genuine--they do
+not interest me. If anybody would endow me with the faculty of
+listening to the chatter of old women and curates in the nearest
+cathedral town, I should decline the privilege, having better things
+to do. And if the folk in the spiritual world do not talk more wisely
+and sensibly than their friends report them to do, I put them in the
+same category. The only good that I can see in the demonstration of
+the truth of "Spiritualism" is to furnish an additional argument
+against suicide. Better live a crossing-sweeper than die and be made
+to talk twaddle by a "medium" hired at a guinea a seance. [(Quoted
+from a review in the "Daily News," October 17, 1871, of the Report on
+Spiritualism of the Committee of the London Dialectical Society.)
+
+To the report above-mentioned, Professor G. Darwin, who also was
+present, added one or two notes and corrections.]
+
+REPORT ON SEANCE.
+
+January 27, 1874.
+
+We met in a small room at the top of the house with a window capable
+of being completely darkened by a shutter and curtains opposite the
+door. A small light table with two flaps and four legs, unsteady and
+easily moved, occupied the middle of the room, leaving not much more
+than enough space for the chairs at the sides. There was a chair at
+each end, two chairs on the fireplace side, and one on the other. Mr.
+X (the medium) was seated in the chair at the door end, Mr. Y (the
+host) in the opposite chair, Mr. G. Darwin on the medium's right, Mr.
+Huxley on his left, Mr. Z between Mr. Huxley and Mr. (Darwin) Y. The
+table was small enough to allow these five people to rest their hands
+on it, linking them together. On the table was a guitar which lay
+obliquely across it, an accordion on the medium's side of the guitar,
+a couple of paper horns, a Japanese fan, a matchbox, and a candlestick
+with a candle.
+
+At first the room was slightly darkened (leaving plenty of light from
+the window, however) and we all sat round for half an hour. My right
+foot was against the medium's left foot, and two fingers of my right
+hand had a good grip of the little finger of his left hand. I compared
+my hand (which is NOT small and IS strong) with his, and was edified
+by its much greater massiveness and strength. (No, we didn't link
+until the darkness. G.D.)
+
+G.D.'s left hand was, as I learn, linked with medium's right hand, and
+left foot on medium's (left) right foot.]
+
+We sat thus for half an hour as aforesaid and nothing happened.
+
+The room was next thoroughly darkened by shutting the shutters and
+drawing the curtains. Nevertheless, by great good fortune I espied
+three points of light, coming from the lighted passage outside the
+door. One of these came beneath the door straight to my eye, the other
+two were on the wall (or on a press) obliquely opposite. By still
+greater good fortune, these three points of light had such a position
+in reference to my eye that they gave me three straight lines
+traversing and bounding the space in which the medium sat, and I at
+once saw that if Medium moved his body forwards or backwards he must
+occult one of my three rays. While therefore taking care to feel his
+foot and keep a good grip of his hand, I fixed my eyes intently on
+rays A and B. For I felt sure that I could trust to G.D. keeping a
+sharp look-out on the right hand and foot; and so no instrument of
+motion was left to the medium but his body and head, the movements of
+which could not have been discernible in absolute darkness. Nothing
+happened for some time. At length a very well executed muscular
+twitching of the arm on my side began, and I amused myself by
+comparing it with the convulsions of a galvanised frog's leg, but at
+the same time kept a very bright look-out on my two rays A and B.
+
+The twitchings ceased, and then after a little time A was shut out. B
+then became obscure, and A became visible. "Hoho!" thought I,
+"Medium's head is well over the table. Now we are going to have some
+manifestations." Immediately followed a noise obviously produced by
+the tumbling over of the accordion and some shifting of the position
+of the guitar. Next came a twanging--very slight, but of course very
+audible--of some of the strings, during which B was invisible. By and
+by B and A became visible again, and Medium's voice likewise showed
+that he had got back to his first position. But after he had returned
+to this position there was a noise of the guitar and other things on
+the table being stirred, and creeping noises like something light
+moving over the table. But no more actual twanging.
+
+To my great disgust, G.D. now began to remark that he saw two spots of
+light, which I suppose must have had the same origin as my rays A and
+B, and, moreover, that something occasionally occulted one or other of
+them. [Note: no, not till we changed places. G.H.D.] I blessed him for
+spoiling my game, but the effect was excellent. Nothing more happened.
+By and by, after some talk about these points of light, the medium
+suggested that this light was distracting, and that we had better shut
+it out. The suggestion was very dexterously and indirectly made, and
+was caught up more strongly [I think by Mr. Z). Anyhow, we agreed to
+stop out all light. The circle was broken, and the candle was lighted
+for this purpose. I then took occasion to observe that the guitar was
+turned round into the position noted in the margin, the end being near
+my left hand. On examining it I found a longish end of one of the
+catgut strings loose, and I found that by sweeping this end over the
+strings I could make quite as good twangs as we heard. I could have
+done this just as well with my mouth as with my hand--and I could have
+pulled the guitar about by the end of the catgut in my mouth and so
+have disturbed the other things--as they were disturbed.
+
+Before the candle was lighted some discussion arose as to why the
+spirits would not do any better (started by Mr. Y and Mr. Z, I think),
+in which the medium joined. It appeared that (in the opinion of the
+spirits as interpreted by the medium) we were not quite rightly
+placed. When the discussion arose I made a bet with myself that the
+result would be that either I or G.D. Would have to change places with
+somebody else. And I won my wager (I have just paid it with the
+remarkably good cigar I am now smoking). G.D. Had to come round to my
+side, Mr. Z went to the end, and Mr. Y took G.D.'s place. "Good,
+Medium," said I to myself. "Now we shall see something." We were in
+pitch darkness, and all I could do was to bring my sense of touch to
+bear with extreme tension upon the medium's hand--still well in my
+grip.
+
+Before long Medium became a good deal convulsed at intervals, and soon
+a dragging sound was heard, and Mr. Y told us that the arm-chair (mark
+its position) had moved up against his leg, and was shoving against
+him. By degrees the arm-chair became importunate, and by the manner of
+Mr. Y's remarks it was clear that his attention was entirely given to
+its movements.
+
+Then I felt the fingers of the medium's left hand become tense--in
+such a manner as to show that the muscles of the left arm were
+contracting sympathetically with those of the other arm, on which a
+considerable strain was evidently being put. Mr. Y's observations upon
+the eccentricities of the arm-chair became louder--a noise was heard
+as of the arm-chair descending on the table and shoving the guitar
+before it (while at the same time, or just before, there was a crash
+of a falling thermometer), and the tension of the left arm ceased. The
+chair had got on to the table. Says the medium to Mr. Y, "Your hand
+was against mine all the time." "Well, no," replied Mr. Y, "not quite.
+For a moment as the chair was coming up I don't think it was." But it
+was agreed that this momentary separation made no difference. I said
+nothing, but, like the parrot, thought the more. After this nothing
+further happened. But conversation went on, and more than once the
+medium was careful to point out that the chair came upon the table
+while his hand was really in contact with Mr. Y's.
+
+G.D. will tell you if this is a fair statement of the facts. I believe
+it is, for my attention was on the stretch for those mortal two hours
+and a half, and I did not allow myself to be distracted from the main
+points in any way. My conclusion is that Mr. X is a cheat and an
+imposter, and I have no more doubt that he got Mr. Y to sit on his
+right hand, knowing from the turn of his conversation that it would be
+easy to distract his attention, and that he then moved the chair
+against Mr. Y with his leg, and finally coolly lifted it on to the
+table, than that I am writing these lines.
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+As Mr. G. Darwin wrote of the seance, "it has given me a lesson with
+respect to the worthlessness of evidence which I shall always
+remember, and besides will make me very diffident in trusting myself.
+Unless I had seen it, I could not have believed in the evidence of any
+one with such perfect bona fides as Mr. Y being so worthless."
+
+[On receiving this report Mr. Darwin wrote ("Life" 2 page 188):--
+
+Though the seance did tire you so much, it was, I think, really worth
+the exertion, as the same sort of things are done at all the
+seances...and now to my mind an enormous weight of evidence would be
+requisite to make me believe in anything beyond mere trickery.
+
+The following letter to Mr. Morley, then editor of the "Fortnightly
+Review," shows that my father was already thinking of writing upon
+Hume, though he did not carry out this intention till 1878.
+
+The article referred to in the second letter is that on Animals as
+Automata.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., June 4, 1874.
+
+My dear Mr. Morley,
+
+I assure you that it was a great disappointment to me not to be able
+to visit you, but we had an engagement of some standing for Oxford.
+
+Hume is frightfully tempting--I thought so only the other day when I
+saw the new edition advertised--and now I would gladly write about him
+in the "Fortnightly" if I were only sure of being able to keep any
+engagement to that effect I might make.
+
+But I have yet a course of lectures before me, and an evening
+discourse to deliver at the British Association--to say nothing of
+opening the Manchester Medical School in October--and polishing off a
+lot of scientific work. So you see I have not a chance of writing
+about Hume for months to come, and you had much better not trust to
+such a very questionable reed as I am.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., November 15, 1874.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Many thanks for your abundantly sufficient cheque--rather too much, I
+think, for an article which had been gutted by the newspapers.
+
+I am always very glad to have anything of mine in the "Fortnightly,"
+as it is sure to be in good company; but I am becoming as spoiled as a
+maiden with many wooers. However, as far as the "Fortnightly" which is
+my old love, and the "Contemporary" which is my new, are concerned, I
+hope to remain as constant as a persistent bigamist can be said to be.
+
+It will give me great pleasure to dine with you, and December 1 will
+suit me excellently well.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The year winds up with a New Year's greeting to Professor Haeckel.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 28, 1874.
+
+My dear Haeckel,
+
+This must reach you in time to wish you and yours a happy New Year in
+English fashion. May your shadow never be less, and may all your
+enemies, unbelieving dogs who resist the Prophet of Evolution, be
+defiled by the sitting of jackasses upon their grandmothers' graves!
+an oriental wish appropriate to an ex-traveller in Egypt.
+
+I have written a notice of the "Anthropogenie" for the Academy, but I
+am so busy that I am afraid I should never have done it--but for being
+put into a great passion--by an article in the "Quarterly Review" for
+last July, which I read only a few days ago. My friend Mr. --, to whom
+I had to administer a gentle punishment some time ago, has been at the
+same tricks again, but much worse than his former performance--you
+will see that I have dealt with him as you deal with a "Pfaffe."
+[Parson.] There are "halb-Pfaffen" as well as "halb-Affen." [Lit.
+Half-apes; the Prosimiae and Lemurs.] So if what I say about
+"Anthropogenie" seems very little--to what I say about the "Quarterly
+Review"--do not be offended. It will all serve the good cause.
+
+I have been working very hard lately at the lower vertebrata, and
+getting out results which will interest you greatly. Your suggestion
+that Rathke's canals in Amphioxus [The Lancelet.] are the Wolffian
+ducts was a capital shot, but it just missed the mark because Rathke's
+canals do not exist. Nevertheless there are two half canals, the
+dorsal walls of which meet in the raphe described by Stieda, and the
+plaited lining of this wall (a) is, I believe, the renal organ.
+Moreover, I have found the skull and brain of Amphioxus, both of which
+are very large (like a vertebrate embryo's) instead of being
+rudimentary as we all have thought, and exhibit the primitive
+segmentation of the "Urwirbelthier" skull. [Primitive vertebrate.]
+
+Thus the skull of Petromyzon answers to about fourteen segments of the
+body of Amphioxus, fused together and indistinguishable in even the
+earliest embryonic state of the higher vertebrata.
+
+Does this take your breath away? Well, in due time you shall be
+convinced. I sent in a brief notice to the last meeting of the Royal
+Society, which will soon be in your hands.
+
+I need not tell you of the importance of all this. It is unlucky for
+Semper that he has just put Amphioxus out of the Vertebrata
+altogether--because it is demonstratable that Amphioxus is nearer than
+could have been hoped to the condition of the primitive vertebrate--a
+far more regular and respectable sort of ancestor than even you
+suspected. For you see "Acrania" will have to go.
+
+I think we must have an English translation of the "Anthropogenie."
+There is great interest in these questions now, and your book is very
+readable, to say nothing of its higher qualities.
+
+My wife (who sends her kindest greetings) and I were charmed with the
+photograph. [As for our] publication in that direction, the seven
+volumes are growing into stately folios. You would not know them.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+How will you read this scrawl now that Gegenbaur is gone?
+
+[In the article here referred to, a review of a book by Professor G.H.
+Darwin, a personal attack of an unjustifiable character was made upon
+him, and through him, upon Charles Darwin. The authorship of the
+review in question had come to be known, and Huxley writes to his
+friend:--]
+
+I entirely sympathise with your feeling about the attack on George. If
+anybody tries that on with my boy L., the old wolf will show all the
+fangs he has left by that time, depend upon it...
+
+You ought to be like one of the blessed gods of Elysium, and let the
+inferior deities do battle with the infernal powers. Moreover, the
+severest and most effectual punishment for this sort of moral
+assassination is quietly to ignore the offender and give him the cold
+shoulder. He knows why he gets it, and society comes to know why, and
+though society is more or less of a dunderhead, it has honourable
+instincts, and the man in the cold finds no cloak that will cover him.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.6.
+
+1875-1876.
+
+[In the year 1875 the bitter agitation directed against experimental
+physiology came to a head. It had existed in England for several
+years. In 1870, when President of the British Association, Huxley had
+been violently attacked for speaking in defence of Brown Sequard, the
+French physiologist. The name of vivisection, indifferently applied to
+all experiments on animals, whether carried out by the use of the
+knife or not, had, as Dr. (afterwards Sir) William Smith put it, the
+opposite effect on many minds to that of the "blessed word
+Mesopotamia." Misrepresentation was rife even among the most estimable
+and well-meaning of the opponents of vivisection, because they fancied
+they saw traces of the practice everywhere, all the more, perhaps, for
+not having sufficient technical knowledge for proper discrimination.
+One of the most flagrant instances of this kind of thing was a letter
+in the "Record" charging Huxley with advocating vivisections before
+children, if not by them. Passages from the Introduction to his
+"Elementary Physiology," urging that beginners should be shown the
+structures under discussion, examples for which could easily be
+provided from the domestic animals, were put side by side with later
+passages in the book, such, for instance, as statements of fact as to
+the behaviour of severed nerves under irritation. A sinister inference
+was drawn from this combination, and published as fact without further
+verification. Of this he remarks emphatically in his address on
+"Elementary Instruction in Physiology," 1877 ("Collected Essays" 3
+300):]
+
+It is, I hope, unnecessary for me to give a formal contradiction to
+the silly fiction, which is assiduously circulated by the fanatics who
+not only ought to know, but do know, that their assertions are untrue,
+that I have advocated the introduction of that experimental discipline
+which is absolutely indispensable to the professed physiologist, into
+elementary teaching.
+
+[Moreover, during the debates on the Vivisection Bill in 1876, the
+late Lord Shaftesbury made use of this story. Huxley was extremely
+indignant, and wrote home:--]
+
+Did you see Lord Shaftesbury's speech in Tuesday's "Times?" I saw it
+by chance, and have written a sharp letter to the "Times." [(Being in
+Edinburgh, he had been reading the Scotch papers, and] "the reports of
+the Scotch papers as to what takes place in Parliament are meagre.")
+
+[This letter appeared on May 26, when he wrote again:--]
+
+You will have had my note, and know all about Lord Shaftesbury and his
+lies by this time. Surely you could not imagine on any authority that
+I was such an idiot as to recommend boys and girls to perform
+experiments which are difficult to skilled anatomists, to say nothing
+of other reasons.
+
+LETTER TO THE "TIMES."
+
+In your account of the late debate in the House of Lords on the
+Vivisection Bill, Lord Shaftesbury is reported to have said that in my
+"Lessons in Elementary Physiology," it is strongly insisted that such
+experiments as those subjoined shall not merely be studied in the
+manual, but actually repeated, either by the boys and girls themselves
+or else by the teachers in their presence, as plainly appears from the
+preface to the second edition.
+
+I beg leave to give the most emphatic and unqualified contradiction to
+this assertion, for which there is not a shadow of justification
+either in the preface to the second edition of my "Lessons" or in
+anything I have ever said or written elsewhere. The most important
+paragraph of the preface which is the subject of Lord Shaftesbury's
+misquotation and misrepresentation stands as follows:--
+
+"For the purpose of acquiring a practical, though elementary,
+acquaintance with physiological anatomy and histology, the organs and
+tissues of the commonest domestic animals afford ample materials. The
+principal points in the structure and mechanism of the heart, the
+lungs, the kidneys, or the eye of man may be perfectly illustrated by
+the corresponding parts of a sheep; while the phenomena of the
+circulation, and many of the most important properties of living
+tissues are better shown by the common frog than by any of the higher
+animals."
+
+If Lord Shaftesbury had the slightest theoretical or practical
+acquaintance with the subject about which he is so anxious to
+legislate, he would know that physiological anatomy is not exactly the
+same thing as experimental physiology; and he would be aware that the
+recommendations of the paragraph I have quoted might be fully carried
+into effect without the performance of even a solitary "vivisection."
+The assertion that I have ever suggested or desired the introduction
+of vivisection into the teaching of elementary physiology in schools
+is, I repeat, contrary to fact.
+
+[On the next day (May 27) appeared a reply from Lord Shaftesbury, in
+which his entire good faith is equally conspicuous with his
+misapprehension of the subject.
+
+LORD SHAFTESBURY'S REPLY.
+
+The letter from Professor Huxley in the "Times" of this morning
+demands an immediate reply.
+
+The object that I supposed the learned professor had in view was
+gathered from the prefaces to the several editions of his work on
+"Elementary Physiology."
+
+The preface to the first edition states that "the following lessons in
+elementary physiology are, primarily, intended to serve the purpose of
+a text-book for teachers and learners in boys' and girls' schools."
+
+It was published, therefore, as a manual for the young, as well as the
+old.
+
+Now, any reader of the preface to the first edition would have come to
+the conclusion that teachers and learners could acquire something
+solid, and worth having, from the text-book before them. But the
+preface to the second edition nearly destroys that expectation. Here
+is the passage:--"It will be well for those who attempt to study
+elementary physiology to bear in mind the important truth that the
+knowledge of science which is attainable by mere reading, though
+infinitely better than ignorance, is knowledge of a very different
+kind from that which arises from direct contact with fact."
+
+"Direct contact with fact!" What can that mean (so, at least, very
+many ask) but a declaration, on high authority, to teachers and
+learners that vivisection alone can give them any real and effective
+instruction?
+
+But the subsequent passage is still stronger, for it states "that the
+worth of the pursuit of science, as an intellectual discipline, is
+almost lost by those who only seek it in books."
+
+Is not language like this calculated to touch the zeal and vanity of
+teachers and learners at the very quick, and urge them to improve
+their minds and stand well in the eyes of the profession and the
+public by positive progress in experimental physiology? Ordinary
+readers, most people would think, could come to no other conclusion.
+
+But a disclaimer from Professor Huxley is enough; I am sorry to have
+misunderstood him; and I must ask his pardon. I sincerely rejoice to
+have received such an assurance that his great name shall never be
+used for such a project as that which excited our fears.
+
+On this he wrote:--]
+
+You will have seen Lord Shaftesbury's reply to my letter. I thought it
+frank and straightforward, and I have written a private letter to the
+old boy of a placable and proper character. ["Huxley, the Professor,
+has written me a very civil, nay kind, letter. I replied in the same
+spirit." (Lord Shaftesbury, "Life and Work" 3 373 June 3, 1876.)
+
+In 1874 he had also had a small passage of arms with the late Mr. W.E.
+Forster, then Vice-President of the Council, upon the same subject.
+Mr. Forster was about to leave office, and when he gave his official
+authorisation for summer courses of lectures at South Kensington on
+Biology, Chemistry, Geology, etc., he did so with the special proviso
+that there be no vivisection experiments in any of the courses, and
+further, appended a Memorandum, explaining the reasons on which he
+acted.
+
+Now, although Huxley was mentioned by name as having taken care to
+avoid inflicting pain in certain previous experiments which had come
+to Mr. Forster's knowledge, the memorandum evoked from him a strong
+protest to the Lord President, to whom, as Mr. Forster expressly
+intimated, an appeal might properly be made.
+
+To begin with, the memorandum contained a mistake in fact, referring
+to his regular course at South Kensington experiments which had taken
+place two years before at one of the Courses to Teachers. This course
+was non-official; Huxley's position in it was simply that of a private
+person to whom the Department offered a contract, subject to official
+control and criticism, so far as touched that course, and entirely
+apart from his regular position at the School of Mines. The
+experiments of 1872 were performed, as he had reason to believe, with
+the full sanction of the Department. If the Board chose to go back
+upon what had happened two years before, he was of course subject to
+their criticism, but then he ought in justice to be allowed to explain
+in what these experiments really consisted. What they were appears
+from a note to Sir J. Donnelly:--]
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+It will be the best course, perhaps, if I set down in writing what I
+have to say respecting the vivisections for physiological purposes
+which have been performed here, and concerning which you made me a
+communication from the Vice-President of the Council this morning.
+
+I have always felt it my duty to defend those physiologists who, like
+Brown Sequard, by making experiments on living animals, have added
+immensely not only to scientific physiology, but to the means of
+alleviating human suffering, against the often ignorant and sometimes
+malicious clamour which has been raised against them.
+
+But personally, indeed I may say constitutionally, the performance of
+experiments upon living and conscious animals is extremely
+disagreeable to me, and I have never followed any line of
+investigation in which such experiments are required.
+
+When the course of instruction in Physiology here was commenced, the
+question of giving experimental demonstrations became a matter of
+anxious consideration with me. It was clear that, without such
+demonstrations, the subject could not be properly taught. It was no
+less clear from what had happened to me when, as President of the
+British Association, I had defended Brown Sequard, that I might expect
+to meet with every description of abuse and misrepresentation if such
+demonstrations were given.
+
+It did not appear to me, however, that the latter consideration ought
+to weigh with me, and I took such a course as I believe is defensible
+against everything but misrepresentation.
+
+I gave strict instructions to the Demonstrators who assisted me that
+no such experiments were to be performed, unless the animal were
+previously rendered insensible to pain either by destruction of the
+brain or by the administration of anaesthetics, and I have every
+reason to believe that my instructions were carried out. I do not see
+what I can do beyond this, or how I can give Mr. Forster any better
+guarantee than is given in my assurance that my dislike to the
+infliction of pain both as a matter of principle and of feeling is
+quite as strong as his own can be.
+
+If Mr. Forster is not satisfied with this assurance, and with its
+practical result that our experiments are made only on non-sentient
+animals, then I am afraid that my position as teacher of Physiology
+must come to an end.
+
+If I am to act in that capacity I cannot consent to be prohibited from
+showing the circulation in a frog's foot because the frog is made
+slightly uncomfortable by being tied up for that purpose; nor from
+showing the fundamental properties of nerves, because extirpating the
+brain of the same animal inflicts one-thousandth part of the prolonged
+suffering which it undergoes when it makes its natural exit from the
+world by being slowly forced down the throat of a duck, and crushed
+and asphyxiated in that creature's stomach.
+
+I shall be very glad to wait upon Mr. Forster if he desires to see me.
+Of course I am most anxious to meet his views as far as I can,
+consistently with my position as a person bound to teach properly any
+subject in which he undertakes to give instruction. But I am quite
+clear as to the amount of freedom of action which it is necessary I
+should retain, and if you will kindly communicate the contents of this
+letter to the Vice-President of the Council, he will be able to judge
+for himself how far his sense of what is right will leave me that
+freedom, or render it necessary for me to withdraw from what I should
+regard as a false position.
+
+[But there was a further and more vital question. He had already
+declared through Major (now Sir John) Donnelly, that he would only
+undertake a course which involved no vivisection. Further to require
+an official assurance that he would not do that which he had
+explicitly affirmed he did not intend to do, affected him personally,
+and he therefore declined the proposal made to him to give the course
+in question.
+
+It followed from the fact that experiments on animals formed no part
+of his official course, and from his refusal under the circumstances
+to undertake the non-official course, that his opinions and present
+practises in regard to the question of vivisection did not come under
+their Lordships' jurisdiction, and he protested against the
+introduction of his name, and of the approbation or disapprobation of
+his views, into an official document relating to a matter with which
+he had nothing to do.
+
+In an intermediate paragraph of the same document, he could not resist
+asking for an official definition of vivisection as forbidden, in its
+relation to the experiments he had made to the class of teachers.]
+
+I should have to ask whether it means that the teacher who has
+undertaken to perform no "vivisection experiments" is thereby debarred
+from inflicting pain, however slight, in order to observe the action
+of living matter; for it might be said to be unworthy quibbling, if,
+having accepted the conditions of the minute, he thought himself at
+liberty to inflict any amount of pain, so long as he did not actually
+cut.
+
+But if such is the meaning officially attached to the word
+"vivisection," the teacher would be debarred from showing the
+circulation in a frog's foot or in a tadpole's tail; he must not show
+an animalcule, uncomfortably fixed under the microscope, nor prick his
+own finger for the sake of obtaining a drop of living blood. The
+living particles which float in that liquid undoubtedly feel as much
+(or as little) as a frog under the influence of anaesthetics, or
+deprived of its brain, does; and the teacher who shows his pupils the
+wonderful phenomena exhibited by dying blood, might be charged with
+gloating over the agonies of the colourless corpuscles, with quite as
+much justice as I have been charged with inciting boys and girls to
+cruelty by describing the results of physiological experiments, which
+they are as likely to attempt as they are to determine the longitude
+of their schoolroom.
+
+However, I will not trouble your Lordship with any further indication
+of the difficulties which, as I imagine, will attend the attempt to
+carry the Minute into operation, if instruction is to be given in
+Physiology, or even in general Biology.
+
+[The upshot of the matter was that the Minute was altered so as to
+refer solely to future courses, and on February 20 he wrote to Mr.
+Forster:--]
+
+I cannot allow you to leave office without troubling you with the
+expression of my thanks for the very great kindness and consideration
+which I have received from you on all occasions, and particularly in
+regard to the question of vivisection, on which I ventured to some
+extent, though I think not very widely or really, to differ from you.
+
+The modification which you were good enough to make in your minute
+removed all my objections to undertaking the Summer Course.
+
+And I am sure that if that course had happened to be a physiological
+one I could do all I want to do in the way of experiment, without
+infringing the spirit of your minute, though I confess that the letter
+of it would cause me more perplexity.
+
+[As to his general attitude to the subject, it must be noted, as said
+above in the letter to Sir J. Donnelly, that he never followed any
+line of research involving experiments on living and conscious
+animals. Though, as will be seen from various letters, he considered
+such experiments justifiable, his personal feelings prevented him from
+performing them himself. Like Charles Darwin, he was very fond of
+animals, and our pets in London found in him an indulgent master.
+
+But if he did not care to undertake such experiments personally, he
+held it false sentiment to blame others who did disagreeable work for
+the good of humanity, and false logic to allow pain to be inflicted in
+the cause of sport while forbidding it for the cause of science. (See
+his address on "Instruction in Elementary Physiology" "Collected
+Essays" 3 300 seq.) Indeed, he declared that he trusted to the
+fox-hunting instincts of the House of Commons rather than to any real
+interest in science in that body, for a moderate treatment of the
+question of vivisection.
+
+The subject is again dealt with in "The Progress of Science," 1887
+("Collected Essays" 1 122 seq.) from which I may quote two
+sentences:--]
+
+The history of all branches of science proves that they must attain a
+considerable stage of development before they yield practical
+"fruits"; and this is eminently true of physiology.
+
+Unless the fanaticism of philozoic sentiment overpowers the voice of
+humanity, and the love of dogs and cats supersedes that of one's
+neighbour, the progress of experimental physiology and pathology will,
+indubitably, in course of time, place medicine and hygiene upon a
+rational basis.
+
+[The dangers of prohibition by law are discussed in a letter to Sir W.
+Harcourt:--]
+
+You wish me to say what, in my opinion, would be the effect of the
+total suppression of experiments on living animals on the progress of
+physiological science in this country.
+
+I have no hesitation in replying that it would almost entirely arrest
+that progress. Indeed, it is obvious that such an effect must follow
+the measure, for a man can no more develop a true conception of living
+action out of his inner consciousness than he can that of a camel.
+Observation and experiment alone can give us a real foundation for any
+kind of Natural Knowledge, and any one who is acquainted with the
+history of science is aware that not a single one of all the great
+truths of modern physiology has been established otherwise than by
+experiment on living things.
+
+Happily the abolition of physiological experiment in this country,
+should such a fatal legislative mistake ever be made, will be
+powerless to arrest the progress of science elsewhere. But we shall
+import our physiology as we do our hock and our claret from Germany
+and France; those of our young physiologists and pathologists who can
+afford to travel will carry on their researches in Paris and in
+Berlin, where they will be under no restraint whatever, or it may be
+that the foreign laboratories will carry out the investigations
+devised here by the few persons who have the courage, in spite of all
+obstacles, to attempt to save British science from extinction.
+
+I doubt if such a result will contribute to the diminution of animal
+suffering. I am sure that it will do as much harm as anything can do
+to the English school of Physiology, Pathology, and Pharmacology, and
+therefore to the progress of rational medicine.
+
+[Another letter on the subject may be given, which was written to a
+student at a theological college, in reply to a request for his
+opinion on vivisection, which was to be discussed at the college
+debating society.]
+
+Grand Hotel, Eastbourne, September 29, 1890.
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+I am of the opinion that the practice of performing experiments on
+living animals is not only reconcilable with true humanity, but under
+certain circumstances is imperatively demanded by it.
+
+Experiments on living animals are of two kinds. First, those which are
+made upon animals which, although living, are incapable of sensation,
+in consequence of the destruction or the paralysis of the sentient
+machinery.
+
+I am not aware that the propriety of performing experiments of this
+kind is seriously questioned, except in so far as they may involve
+some antecedent or subsequent suffering. Of course those who deny that
+under any circumstances it can be right to inflict suffering on other
+sentient beings for our own good, must object to even this much of
+what they call cruelty. And when they prove their sincerity by leaving
+off animal food; by objecting to drive castrated horses, or indeed to
+employ animal labour at all; and by refusing to destroy rats, mice,
+fleas, bugs and other sentient vermin, they may expect sensible people
+to listen to them, and sincere people to think them other than
+sentimental hypocrites.
+
+As to experiments of the second kind, which do not admit of the
+paralysis of the sentient mechanism, and the performance of which
+involves severe prolonged suffering to the more sensitive among the
+higher animals, I should be sorry to make any sweeping assertion. I am
+aware of a strong personal dislike to them, which tends to warp my
+judgment, and I am prepared to make any allowance for those who,
+carried away by still more intense dislike, would utterly prohibit
+these experiments.
+
+But it has been my duty to give prolonged and careful attention to
+this subject, and putting natural sympathy aside, to try and get at
+the rights and wrongs of the business from a higher point of view,
+namely, that of humanity, which is often very different from that of
+emotional sentiment.
+
+I ask myself--suppose you knew that by inflicting prolonged pain on
+100 rabbits you could discover a way to the extirpation of leprosy, or
+consumption, or locomotor ataxy, or of suicidal melancholia among
+human beings, dare you refuse to inflict that pain? Now I am quite
+unable to say that I dare. That sort of daring would seem to me to be
+extreme moral cowardice, to involve gross inconsistency.
+
+For the advantage and protection of society, we all agree to inflict
+pain upon man--pain of the most prolonged and acute character--in our
+prisons, and on our battlefields. If England were invaded, we should
+have no hesitation about inflicting the maximum of suffering upon our
+invaders for no other object than our own good.
+
+But if the good of society and of a nation is a sufficient plea for
+inflicting pain on men, I think it may suffice us for experimenting on
+rabbits or dogs.
+
+At the same time, I think that a heavy moral responsibility rests on
+those who perform experiments of the second kind.
+
+The wanton infliction of pain on man or beast is a crime; pity is that
+so many of those who (as I think rightly) hold this view, seem to
+forget that the criminality lies in the wantonness and not in the act
+of inflicting pain per se.
+
+I am, sir, yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[So far back as 1870 a committee had been appointed by the British
+Association, and reported upon the conditions under which they
+considered experiments on living animals justifiable. In the early
+spring of 1875 a bill to regulate physiological research was
+introduced into the Upper House by Lord Hartismere, but not proceeded
+with. When legislation seemed imminent Huxley, in concert with other
+men of science, interested himself in drawing up a petition to
+Parliament to direct opinion on the subject and provide a fair basis
+for future legislation, which indeed took shape immediately after in a
+bill introduced by Dr. Lyon Playfair (afterwards Lord Playfair),
+Messrs. Walpole and Ashley. This bill, though more just to science,
+did not satisfy many scientific men, and was withdrawn upon the
+appointment of a Royal Commission.
+
+The following letters to Mr. Darwin bear on this period:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 22, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I quite agree with your letter about vivisection as a matter of right
+and justice in the first place, and secondly as the best method of
+taking the wind out of the enemy's sails. I will communicate with
+Burdon Sanderson and see what can be done.
+
+My reliance as against -- and her fanatical following is not in the
+wisdom and justice of the House of Commons, but in the large number of
+fox-hunters therein. If physiological experimentation is put down by
+law, hunting, fishing, and shooting, against which a much better case
+can be made out, will soon follow.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+South Kensington, April 21, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+The day before yesterday I met Playfair at the club, and he told me
+that he had heard from Miss Elliott that _I_ was getting up what she
+called a "Vivisector's Bill," and that Lord Cardwell was very anxious
+to talk with some of us about the matter.
+
+So you see that there is no secret about our proceedings. I gave him a
+general idea of what was doing, and he quite confirmed what Lubbock
+said about the impossibility of any action being taken in Parliament
+this session.
+
+Playfair said he should like very much to know what we proposed doing,
+and I should think it would be a good thing to take him into
+consultation.
+
+On my return I found that Pfluger had sent me his memoir with a note
+such as he had sent to you.
+
+I read it last night, and I am inclined to think that it is a very
+important piece of work.
+
+He shows that frogs absolutely deprived of oxygen give off carbonic
+acid for twenty-five hours, and gives very strong reasons for
+believing that the evolution of carbonic acid by living matter in
+general is the result of a process of internal rearrangement of the
+molecules of the living matter, and not of direct oxidation.
+
+His speculations about the origin of living matter are the best I have
+seen yet, so far as I understand them. But he plunges into the depths
+of the higher chemistry in which I am by no means at home. Only this I
+can see, that the paper is worth careful study.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+31 Royal Terrace, Edinburgh, May 19, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+Playfair has sent a copy of his bill to me, and I am sorry to find
+that its present wording is such as to render it very unacceptable to
+all teachers of physiology. In discussing the draught with Litchfield
+I recollect that I insisted strongly on the necessity of allowing
+demonstrations to students, but I agreed that it would be sufficient
+to permit such demonstrations only as could be performed under
+anaesthetics.
+
+The second clause of the bill, however, by the words "for the purpose
+of new scientific discovery and for no other purpose," absolutely
+prohibits any kind of demonstration. It would debar me from showing
+the circulation in the web of a frog's foot or from exhibiting the
+pulsations of the heart in a decapitated frog.
+
+And by its secondary effect it would prohibit discovery. Who is to be
+able to make discoveries unless he knows of his own knowledge what has
+been already made out? It might as well be ruled that a chemical
+student should begin with organic analysis.
+
+Surely Burdon Sanderson did not see the draft of the bill as it now
+stands. The Professors here are up in arms about it, and as the papers
+have associated my name with the bill I shall have to repudiate it
+publicly unless something can be done. But what in the world is to be
+done? I have not written to Playfair yet, and shall wait to hear from
+you before I do. I have an excellent class here, 340 odd, and like the
+work. Best regards to Mrs. Darwin.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+31 Royal Terrace, Edinburgh, June 5, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I see I have forgotten to return Playfair's letter, which I enclose.
+He sent me a copy of his last letter to you, but it did not reach me
+till some days after my return from London. In the meanwhile I saw him
+and Lord Cardwell at the House of Commons on Friday (last week).
+
+Playfair seems rather disgusted at our pronunciamento against the
+bill, and he declares that both Sanderson and Sharpey assented to it.
+What they were dreaming about I cannot imagine. To say that no man
+shall experiment except for purpose of original discovery is about as
+reasonable as to ordain that no man shall swim unless he means to go
+from Dover to Calais.
+
+However the Commission is to be issued, and it is everything to gain
+time and let the present madness subside a little. I vowed I would
+never be a member of another Commission if I could help it, but I
+suppose I shall have to serve on this.
+
+I am very busy with my lectures, and am nearly half through. I shall
+not be sorry when they are over, as I have been grinding away now
+since last October.
+
+With kindest regards to Mrs. Darwin, ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He was duly asked to serve on the Commission. Though his lectures in
+Edinburgh prevented him from attending till the end of July no
+difficulty was made over this, as the first meetings of the
+Commission, which began on June 30, were to be devoted to taking the
+less controversial evidence. In accepting his nomination he wrote to
+Mr. Cross (afterwards Lord Cross), at that time Home Secretary:--]
+
+If I can be of any service I shall be very glad to act on the
+Commission, sympathising as I do on the one hand with those who abhor
+cruelty to animals, and, on the other, with those who abhor the still
+greater cruelty to man which is involved in any attempt to arrest the
+progress of physiology and of rational medicine.
+
+[The other members of the Commission were Lords Cardwell and
+Winmarleigh, Mr. W.E. Forster, Sir J.B. Karslake, Professor Erichssen,
+and Mr. R.H. Hutton.
+
+The evidence given before the Commission bore out the view that
+English physiologists inflicted no more pain upon animals than could
+be avoided; but one witness, not an Englishman, and not having at that
+time a perfect command of the English language, made statements which
+appeared to the Commission at least to indicate that the witness was
+indifferent to animal suffering. Of this incident Huxley writes to Mr.
+Darwin at the same time as he forwarded a formal invitation for him to
+appear as a witness before the Commission:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 30, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+The inclosed tells its own story. I have done my best to prevent your
+being bothered, but for various reasons which will occur to you I did
+not like to appear too obstructive, and I was asked to write to you.
+The strong feeling of my colleagues (and my own I must say also) is
+that we ought to have your opinions in our minutes. At the same time
+there is a no less strong desire to trouble you as little as possible,
+and under no circumstances to cause you any risk of injury to health.
+
+What with occupation of time, worry and vexation, this horrid
+Commission is playing the deuce with me. I have felt it my duty to act
+as counsel for Science, and was well satisfied with the way things
+were going. But on Thursday when I was absent at the Council of the
+Royal Society -- was examined, and if what I hear is a correct account
+of the evidence he gave I may as well throw up my brief.
+
+I am told that he openly professed the most entire indifference to
+animal suffering, and said he only gave anaesthetics to keep animals
+quiet!
+
+I declare to you I did not believe the man lived who was such an
+unmitigated cynical brute as to profess and act upon such principles,
+and I would willingly agree to any law which would send him to the
+treadmill.
+
+The impression his evidence made on Cardwell and Forster is profound,
+and I am powerless (even if I had the desire which I have not) to
+combat it. He has done more mischief than all the fanatics put
+together.
+
+I am utterly disgusted with the whole business.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Of course keep the little article on Species. It is in some American
+Encyclopaedia published by Appleton. And best thanks for your book. I
+shall study it some day, and value it as I do every line you have
+written. Don't mention what I have told you outside the circle of
+discreet Darwindom.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 2, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+Our secretary has telegraphed to you to Down, and written to Queen
+Anne Street.
+
+But to make sure, I send this note to say that we expect you at 13
+Delahay Street [Where the Commission was sitting.] at 2 o'clock
+to-morrow. And that I have looked out the highest chair that was to be
+got for you. [Mr. Darwin was long in the leg. When he came to our
+house the biggest hassock was always placed in an arm-chair to give it
+the requisite height for him.]
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The Commission reported early in 1876, and a few months after Lord
+Carnarvon introduced a bill intituled "An Act to amend the law
+relating to Cruelty to Animals." It was a more drastic measure than
+was demanded. As a writer in "Nature" (1876 page 248) puts it: "The
+evidence on the strength of which legislation was recommended went
+beyond the facts, the report went beyond the evidence, the
+recommendations beyond the report, and the bill can hardly be said to
+have gone beyond the recommendations, but rather to have contradicted
+them."
+
+As to the working of the law, Huxley referred to it the following year
+in the address, already cited, on "Elementary Instruction in
+Physiology" ("Collected Essays" 3 310).]
+
+But while I should object to any experimentation which can justly be
+called painful, and while as a member of a late Royal Commission I did
+my best to prevent the infliction of needless pain for any purpose, I
+think it is my duty to take this opportunity of expressing my regret
+at a condition of the law which permits a boy to troll for pike or set
+lines with live frog bait for idle amusement, and at the same time
+lays the teacher of that boy open to the penalty of fine and
+imprisonment if he uses the same animal for the purpose of exhibiting
+one of the most beautiful and instructive of physiological
+spectacles--the circulation in the web of the foot. No one could
+undertake to affirm that a frog is not inconvenienced by being wrapped
+up in a wet rag and having his toes tied out, and it cannot be denied
+that inconvenience is a sort of pain. But you must not inflict the
+least pain on a vertebrated animal for scientific purposes (though you
+may do a good deal in that way for gain or for sport) without due
+licence of the Secretary of State for the Home Department, granted
+under the authority of the Vivisection Act.
+
+So it comes about that, in this year of grace 1877, two persons may be
+charged with cruelty to animals. One has impaled a frog, and suffered
+the creature to writhe about in that condition for hours; the other
+has pained the animal no more than one of us would be pained by tying
+strings round his fingers and keeping him in the position of a
+hydropathic patient. The first offender says, "I did it because I find
+fishing very amusing," and the magistrate bids him depart in
+peace--nay, probably wishes him good sport. The second pleads, "I
+wanted to impress a scientific truth with a distinctness attainable in
+no other way on the minds of my scholars," and the magistrate fines
+him five pounds.
+
+I cannot but think that this is an anomalous and not wholly creditable
+state of things.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.7.
+
+1875-1876.
+
+[Huxley only delivered one address outside his regular work in 1875,
+on "Some Results of the 'Challenger' Expedition," given at the Royal
+Institution on January 29. For all through the summer he was away from
+London, engaged upon the summer course of lectures on Natural History
+at Edinburgh. This was due to the fact that Professor (afterwards Sir)
+Wyville Thomson was still absent on the "Challenger" expedition, and
+Professor Victor Carus, who had acted as his substitute before, was no
+longer available. Under these circumstances the Treasury granted
+Huxley leave of absence from South Kensington. His course began on May
+3, and ended on July 23, and he thought it a considerable feat to deal
+with the whole Animal Kingdom in 54 lectures. No doubt both he and his
+students worked at high pressure, especially when the latter came
+scantily prepared for the task, like the late Joseph Thomson,
+afterwards distinguished as an African traveller, who has left an
+account of his experience in this class. Thomson's particular weak
+point was his Greek, and the terminology of the lectures seems to have
+been a thorn in his side. This account, which actually tells of the
+1876 course, occurs on pages 36 and 37 of his "Life."
+
+The experience of studying personally under Huxley was a privilege to
+which he had been looking forward with eager anticipation; for he had
+already been fascinated with the charm of Huxley's writings, and had
+received from them no small amount of mental stimulus. Nor were his
+expectations disappointed. But he found the work to be unexpectedly
+hard, and very soon he had the sense of panting to keep pace with the
+demands of the lecturer. It was not merely that the texture of
+scientific reasoning in the lectures was so closely knit,--although
+that was a very palpable fact,--but the character of Huxley's
+terminology was entirely strange to him. It met him on his weakest
+side, for it presupposed a knowledge of Greek (being little else than
+Greek compounds with English terminations) and of Greek he had none.
+
+Huxley's usual lectures, he writes, are something awful to listen to.
+One half of the class, which numbers about four hundred, have given up
+in despair from sheer inability to follow him. The strain on the
+attention of each lecture is so great as to be equal to any ordinary
+day's work. I feel quite exhausted after them. And then to master his
+language is something dreadful. But, with all these drawbacks, I would
+not miss them, even if they were ten times as difficult. They are
+something glorious, sublime!
+
+Again he writes:--
+
+Huxley is still very difficult to follow, and I have been four times
+in his lectures completely stuck and utterly helpless. But he has
+given us eight or nine beautiful lectures on the frog...If you only
+heard a few of the lectures you would be surprised to find that there
+were so few missing links in the chain of life, from the amoeba to the
+genus homo.
+
+It was a large class, ultimately reaching 353 and breaking the record
+of the Edinburgh classes without having recourse to the factitious
+assistance proposed in the letter of May 16.
+
+His inaugural lecture was delivered under what ought to have been
+rather trying circumstances. On the way from London he stopped a night
+with his old friends, John Bruce and his wife (one of the Fannings),
+at their home, Barmoor Castle, near Beal. He had to leave at 6 next
+morning, reaching Edinburgh at 10, and lecturing at 2.] "Nothing," [he
+writes,] "could be much worse, but I am going through it with all the
+cheerfulness of a Christian martyr."
+
+[On May 3 he writes to his wife from the Bruce's Edinburgh house,
+which they had lent him.]
+
+I know that you will be dying to hear how my lecture went off
+to-day--so I sit down to send you a line, though you did hear from me
+to-day.
+
+The theatre was crammed. I am told there were 600 auditors, and I
+could not have wished for more thorough attention. But I had to
+lecture in gown and Doctor's hood and the heat was awful. The
+Principal and the chief professors were present, and altogether it was
+a state affair. I was in great force, although I did get up at six
+this morning and travelled all the way from Barmoor. But I won't do
+that sort of thing again, it's tempting Providence.
+
+May 5.
+
+Fanny and her sisters and the Governess flit to Barmoor to-day and I
+shall be alone in my glory. I shall be very comfortable and well cared
+for, so make your mind easy, and if I fall ill I am to send for Clark.
+He expressly told me to do so as I left him!
+
+I gave my second lecture yesterday to an audience filling the theatre.
+The reason of this is that everybody who likes--comes for the first
+week and then only those who have tickets are admitted. How many will
+become regular students I don't know yet, but there is promise of a
+big class. The Lord send three extra--to make up for...[(a sudden
+claim upon his purse before he left home.)
+
+And he writes of this custom to Professor Baynes on June 12:--]
+
+My class is over 350 and I find some good working material among them.
+Parsons mustered strong in the first week, but I fear they came to
+curse and didn't remain to pay.
+
+[He was still Lord Rector of Aberdeen University, and on May 10 writes
+how he attended a business meeting there:--]
+
+I have had my run to Aberdeen and back--got up at 5, started from
+Edinburgh at 6.25, attended the meeting of the Court at 1. Then drove
+out with Webster to Edgehill in a great storm of rain and was received
+with their usual kindness. I did not get back till near 8 o'clock last
+night and, thanks to "The Virginians" and a good deal of Virginia, I
+passed the time pleasantly enough...There are 270 tickets gone up to
+this date, so I suppose I may expect a class of 300 men. 300 x 4 =
+1200. Hooray.
+
+To his eldest daughter:--]
+
+Edinburgh, May 16, 1875.
+
+My dearest Jess,
+
+Your mother's letter received this morning reminds me that I have not
+written to "Cordelia" (I suppose she means Goneril) by a message from
+that young person--so here is reparation.
+
+I have 330 students, and my class is the biggest in the
+University--but I am quite cast down and discontented because it is
+not 351,--being one more than the Botany Class last year--which was
+never so big before or since.
+
+I am thinking of paying 21 street boys to come and take the extra
+tickets so that I may crow over all my colleagues.
+
+Fanny Bruce is going to town next week to her grandmother's and I want
+you girls to make friends with her. It seems to me that she is very
+nice--but that is only a fallible man's judgment, and Heaven forbid
+that I should attempt to forestall Miss Cudberry's decision on such a
+question. Anyhow she has plenty of energy and, among other things,
+works very hard at German.
+
+M-- says that the Roottle-Tootles have a bigger drawing-room than
+ours. I should be sorry to believe these young beginners guilty of so
+much presumption, and perhaps you will tell them to have it made
+smaller before I visit them.
+
+A Scotch gentleman has just been telling me that May is the worst
+month in the year, here; so pleasant! but the air is soft and warm
+to-day, and I look out over the foliage to the castle and don't care.
+
+Love to all, and specially M--. Mind you don't tell her that I dine
+out to-day and to-morrow--positively for the first and last times.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[However, the class grew without such adventitious aid, and he writes
+to Mr. Herbert Spencer on June 15:--]
+
+...I have a class of 353, and instruct them in dry facts--particularly
+warning them to keep free of the infidel speculations which are
+current under the name of evolution.
+
+I expect an "examiner's call" from a Presbytery before the course is
+over, but I am afraid that the pay is not enough to induce me to
+forsake my "larger sphere of influence" in London.
+
+[In the same letter he speaks of a flying visit to town which he was
+about to make on the following Thursday, returning on the Saturday for
+lack of a good Sunday train:--]
+
+May hap I may chance to see you at the club--but I shall be torn to
+pieces with things to do during my two days' stay.
+
+If Moses had not existed I should have had three days in town, which
+is a curious concatenation of circumstances.
+
+[As for health during this period, it maintained, on the whole, a
+satisfactory level, thanks to the regime of which he writes to
+Professor Baynes:--]
+
+I am very sorry to hear that you have been so seriously ill. You will
+have to take to my way of living--a mutton chop a day and no grog, but
+much baccy. Don't begin to pick up your threads too fast.
+
+No wonder you are uneasy if you have crabs on your conscience. [I.e.
+an article for the "Encyclopaedia Britannica."] Thank Heaven they are
+not on mine!
+
+I am glad to hear you are getting better, and I sincerely trust that
+you may find all the good you seek in the baths.
+
+As to coming back a "new man," who knows what that might be? Let us
+rather hope for the old man in a state of complete repair--A1 copper
+bottomed.
+
+Excuse my nautical language.
+
+[The following letters also touch on his Edinburgh lectures:--]
+
+Cragside, Morpeth, August 11, 1875.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We are staying here with Sir W. Armstrong--the whole brood--Miss
+Matthaei and the majority of the chickens being camped at a farm-house
+belonging to our host about three miles off. It is wetter than it need
+be, otherwise we are very jolly.
+
+I finished off my work in Edinburgh on the 23rd and positively
+polished off the Animal Kingdom in 54 lectures. French without a
+master in twelve lessons is nothing to this feat. The men worked very
+well on the whole, and sent in some creditable examination papers. I
+stayed a few days to finish up the abstracts of my lectures for the
+"Medical Times"; then picked up the two elder girls who were at
+Barmoor and brought them on here to join the wife and the rest.
+
+How is it that Dohrn has been and gone? I have been meditating a
+letter to him for an age. He wanted to see me, and I did not know how
+to manage to bring about a meeting.
+
+Edinburgh is greatly exercised in its mind about the vivisection
+business and "Vagus" "swells wisibly" whenever the subject is
+mentioned. I think there is an inclination to regard those who are
+ready to consent to legislation of any kind as traitors, or at any
+rate, trimmers. It sickens me to reflect on the quantity of time and
+worry I shall have to give to that subject when I get back.
+
+I see that -- has been blowing the trumpet at the Medical Association.
+He has about as much tact as a flyblown bull.
+
+I have just had a long letter from Wyville Thomson. The "Challenger"
+inclines to think that Bathybius is a mineral precipitate! in which
+case some enemy will probably say that it is a product of my
+precipitation. So mind, I was the first to make that "goak." Old
+Ehrenberg suggested something of the kind to me, but I have not his
+letter here. I shall eat my leek handsomely, if any eating has to be
+done. They have found pseudopodia in Globerigina.
+
+With all good wishes from ours to yours.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Cragside, Morpeth, August 13, 1875.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I find that in the midst of my work in Edinburgh I omitted to write to
+De Vrij, so I have just sent him a letter expressing my pleasure in
+being able to co-operate in any plan for doing honour to old Benedict
+[Spinoza, a memorial to whom was being raised in Holland.], for whom I
+have a most especial respect.
+
+I am not sure that I won't write something about him to stir up the
+Philistines.
+
+My work at Edinburgh got itself done very satisfactorily, and I
+cleared about 1000 pounds by the transaction, being one of the few
+examples known of a Southron coming north and pillaging the Scots.
+However, I was not sorry when it was all over, as I had been hard at
+work since October and began to get tired.
+
+The wife and babies from the south, and I from the north, met here a
+fortnight ago and we have been idling very pleasantly ever since. The
+place is very pretty and our host kindness itself. Miss Matthaei and
+five of the bairns are at Cartington--a moorland farmhouse three miles
+off--and in point of rosy cheeks and appetites might compete with any
+five children of their age and weight. Jess and Mady are here with us
+and have been doing great execution at a ball at Newcastle. I really
+don't know myself when I look at these young women, and my hatred of
+possible sons-in-law is deadly. All send their love.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Wish you joy of Bristol.
+
+[The following letter to Darwin was written when the Polar Expedition
+under Sir George Nares was in preparation. It illustrates the range of
+observation which his friends had learned to expect in him:--]
+
+Athenaeum Club, January 22, 1875.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I write on behalf of the Polar Committee of the Royal Society to ask
+for any suggestions you may be inclined to offer us as instructions to
+the naturalists who are to accompany the new expedition.
+
+The task of drawing up detailed instructions is divided among a lot of
+us; but you are as full of ideas as an egg is full of meat, and are
+shrewdly suspected of having, somewhere in your capacious cranium, a
+store of notions which would be of great value to the naturalists.
+
+All I can say is, that if you have not already "collated facts" on
+this topic, it will be the first subject I ever suggested to you on
+which you had not.
+
+Of course we do not expect you to put yourself to any great
+trouble--nor ask for such a thing--but if you will jot down any notes
+that occur to you we shall be thankful.
+
+We must have everything in hand for printing by March 15.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letter dates from soon after the death of Charles
+Kingsley:--]
+
+Science Schools, South Kensington, October 22, 1875.
+
+Dear Miss Kingsley,
+
+I sincerely trust that you believe I have been abroad and prostrated
+by illness, and have thereby accounted for receiving no reply to your
+letter of a fortnight back.
+
+The fact is that it has only just reached me, owing to the neglect of
+the people in Jermyn Street, who ought to have sent it on here.
+
+I assure you I have not forgotten the brief interview to which you
+refer, and I have often regretted that the hurry and worry of life
+(which increases with the square of your distance from youth) never
+allowed me to take advantage of your kind father's invitation to
+become better acquainted with him and his. I found his card in Jermyn
+Street when I returned last year, with a pencilled request that I
+would call on him at Westminster.
+
+I meant to do so, but the whirl of things delayed me until, as I
+bitterly regret, it was too late.
+
+I am not sure that I have any important letter of your father's but
+one, written to me some fifteen years ago, on the occasion of the
+death of a child who was then my only son. It was in reply to a letter
+of my own written in a humour of savage grief. Most likely he burned
+the letter, and his reply would be hardly intelligible without it.
+Moreover, I am not at all sure that I can lay my hands upon your
+father's letter in a certain chaos of papers which I have never had
+the courage to face for years. But if you wish I will try.
+
+I am very grieved to hear of Mrs. Kingsley's indisposition. Pray make
+my kindest remembrances to her, and believe me your very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+P.S.--By the way, letters addressed to my private residence,
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W.,
+
+are sure not to be delayed. And I have another reason for giving the
+address--the hope that when you come to Town you will let my wife and
+daughters make your acquaintance.
+
+[His continued interest in the germ-theory and the question of the
+origin of life ("Address at the British Association" 1870 see 2 page
+14, sq.), appears from the following:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 15, 1875.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+Will you bring with you to the x to-morrow a little bottle full of
+fluid containing the bacteria you have found developed in your
+infusions? I mean a good characteristic specimen. It will be useful to
+you, I think, if I determine the forms with my own microscope, and
+make drawings of them which you can use.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I can't tell you how delighted I was with the experiments.
+
+[Throughout this period, and for some time later, he was in frequent
+communication with Thomas Spencer Baynes, Professor of Logic and
+English Literature at St. Andrews University, the editor of the new
+"Encyclopaedia Britannica," work upon which was begun at the end of
+1873. From the first Huxley was an active helper, both in classifying
+the biological subjects which ought to be treated of, suggesting the
+right men to undertake the work, and himself writing several articles,
+notably that on Evolution. (Others were "Actinozoa," "Amphibia,"
+"Animal Kingdom," and "Biology.")
+
+Extracts from his letters to Professor Baynes between the years 1873
+and 1884, serve to illustrate the work which he did and the relations
+he maintained with the genial and learned editor.]
+
+November 2, 1873.
+
+I have been spending my Sunday morning in drawing up a list of
+headings, which will I think exhaust biology from the Animal point of
+view, and each of which does not involve more than you are likely to
+get from one man. In many cases, i.e. "Insecta," "Entomology," I have
+subdivided the subjects, because, by an unlucky peculiarity of workers
+in these subjects, men who understand zoology from its systematic side
+are often ignorant of anatomy, and those who know fossils are often
+weak in recent forms.
+
+But of course the subdivision does not imply that one man should not
+take the whole if he is competent to do so. And if separate
+contributors supply articles on these several subdivisions, somebody
+must see that they work in harmony.
+
+[But with all the good will in the world, he was too hard pressed to
+get his quota done as quickly as he wished. He suggests at once that
+"Hydrozoa" and "Actinozoa," in his list, should be dealt with by the
+writer of the article "Coelenterata."]
+
+Shunting "Actinozoa" to "Coelenterata" would do no harm, and would
+have the great merit of letting me breathe a little. But if you think
+better that "Actinozoa" should come in its place under A, I will try
+what I can do.
+
+December 30, 1873.
+
+As to "Anthropology," I really am afraid to promise. At present I am
+plunged in "Amphibia," doing a lot of original work to settle
+questions which have been hanging vaguely in my mind for years. If
+"Amphibia" is done by the end of January it is as much as it will be.
+
+In February I must give myself--or at any rate my spare self--up to my
+Rectorial Address [His Rectorial Address at Aberdeen, see above.],
+which (tell it not in Gath) I wish at the bottom of the Red Sea. And I
+do not suppose I shall be able to look seriously at either "Animal
+Kingdom" or "Anthropology" before the address is done with. And all
+depends on the centre of my microcosm--intestinum colon--which plays
+me a trick every now and then.
+
+I will do what I can if you like, but if you trust me it is at your
+proper peril.
+
+February 8, 1874.
+
+How astonished folks will be if eloquent passages out of the address
+get among the "Amphibia," and comments on Frog anatomy into the
+address. As I am working at both just now this result is not
+improbable.
+
+[Meanwhile the address and the ten days' stay at Aberdeen had been]
+"playing havoc with the "Amphibia," [but on returning home, he went to
+work upon the latter, and writes on March 12:--]
+
+I did not care to answer your last letter until I had an instalment of
+"Amphibia" ready. Said instalment was sent off to you, care of Messrs.
+Black, yesterday, and now I feel like Dick Swiveller, when happy
+circumstances having enabled him to pay off an old score he was able
+to begin running up another.
+
+June 8.
+
+I have had sundry proofs and returned them. My writing is lamentable
+when I am in a hurry, but I never provoked a strike before! I declare
+I think I write as well as the editor, on ordinary occasions.
+
+[He was pleased to find someone who wrote as badly as, or worse than,
+himself, and several times rallies Baynes on that score. Thus, when
+Mrs. Baynes had acted as her husband's amanuensis, he writes (February
+11, 1878):--]
+
+My respectful compliments to the "mere machine," whose beautiful
+calligraphy (if that isn't a tautology) leaves no doubt in my mind
+that whether the writing of your letters by that agency is good for
+you or not it is admirable for your correspondents.
+
+Why people can't write a plain legible hand I can't imagine.
+[(NB.--This sentence is written purposely in a most illegible hand.)
+
+And on another occasion he adds a postcript to say,] "You write worse
+than ever. So do I."
+
+[However, the article got finished in course of time:--]
+
+August 5.
+
+I have seen and done with all "Amphibia" but the last sheet, and that
+only waits revise. Considering it was to be done in May, I think I am
+pretty punctual.
+
+[The next year, immediately before taking Sir Wyville Thomson's
+lectures at Edinburgh, he writes about another article which he had in
+hand:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., March 16, 1875.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+I am working against time to get a lot of things done--amongst others
+BIOLOGY--before I go north. I have written a large part of said
+article, and it would facilitate my operation immensely if what is
+done were set up and I had two or three proofs, one for Dyer, who is
+to do part of the article.
+
+Now, if I send the manuscript to North Bridge will you swear by your
+gods (0--1--3--1 or any greater number as the case may be) that I
+shall have a proof swiftly and not be kept waiting for weeks till the
+whole thing has got cold, and I am at something else a hundred miles
+away from Biology?
+
+If not I will keep the manuscript till it is all done, and you know
+what that means.
+
+Ever yours very truly,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Cragside, Morpeth, August 12, 1875.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+The remainder of the proof of "Biology" is posted to-day--"Praise de
+Lor'."
+
+I have a dim recollection of having been led by your soft and
+insinuating ways to say that I would think (only THINK) about some
+other article. What the deuce was it?
+
+I have told the Royal Society people to send you a list of Fellows,
+addressed to Black's.
+
+We have had here what may be called bad weather for England, but it
+has been far better than the best Edinburgh weather known to my
+experience.
+
+All my friends are out committing grouse-murder. As a vivisection
+Commissioner I did not think I could properly accompany them.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Cragside, Morpeth, August 24, 1875.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+I think -- is like enough to do the "Coelenterata" well if you can
+make sure of his doing it at all. He is a man of really great
+knowledge of the literature of Zoology, and if it had not been for the
+accident of being a procrastinating impracticable ass, he could have
+been a distinguished man. But he is a sort of Balaam-Centaur with the
+asinine stronger than the prophetic moiety.
+
+I should be disposed to try him, nevertheless.
+
+I don't think I have had final revise of Biology yet.
+
+I do not know that "Coelenterata" is Lankester's speciality. However,
+he is sure to do it well if he takes it up.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., October 12, 1875.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+Do you remember my telling you that I should before long be publishing
+a book, of which general considerations on Biology would form a part,
+and that I should have to go over the same ground as in the article
+for the Encyclopaedia?
+
+Well, that prediction is about to be verified, and I want to know what
+I am to do.
+
+You see, as I am neither dealing with Theology, nor History, nor
+Criticism, I can't take a fresh departure and say something entirely
+different from what I have just written.
+
+On the other hand, if I republish what stands in the article, the
+Encyclopaedia very naturally growls.
+
+What do the sweetest of Editors and the most liberal of Proprietors
+say ought to be done under the circumstances?
+
+I pause for a reply.
+
+I have carried about Stanley's note in my pocket-book until I am sorry
+to say the flyleaf has become hideously stained. [The Dean's
+handwriting was proverbial.]
+
+The wife and daughters could make nothing of it, but I, accustomed to
+the manuscript of certain correspondents, have no doubt as to the
+fourth word of the second sentence. It is "Canterbury." [The writing
+of this word is carefully slurred until it is almost as illegible as
+the original.] Nothing can be plainer.
+
+Hoping the solution is entirely satisfactory,
+
+Believe me, ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Though he refused to undertake the article on "Distribution," he
+managed to write that on "Evolution" (republished in "Collected
+Essays" 2 187). Thus on July 28, 1877, he writes:--]
+
+_I_ ought to do "Evolution," but I mightn't and I shouldn't. Don't see
+how it is practicable to do justice to it with the time at my
+disposal, though I really should like to do it, and I am at my wits'
+end to think of anybody who can be trusted with it.
+
+Perhaps something may turn up, and if so I will let you know.
+
+[The something in the world of more time did turn up by dint of extra
+pressure, and the article got written in the course of the autumn, as
+appears from the following of December 29, 1877:--]
+
+I send you the promised skeleton (with a good deal of the flesh) of
+Evolution. It is costing me infinite labour in the way of reading, but
+I am glad to be obliged to do the work, which will be a curious and
+instructive chapter in the history of Science.
+
+[The lawyer-like faculty of putting aside a subject when done with,
+which is indicated in the letter of March 16, 1875, reappears in the
+following:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., March 18, 1878.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+Your printers are the worst species of that diabolic genus I know of.
+It is at least a month since I sent them a revise of "Evolution" by no
+means finished, and from that time to this I have had nothing from
+them.
+
+I shall forget all about the subject, and then at the last moment they
+will send me a revise in a great hurry, and expect it back by return
+of post.
+
+But if they get it, may I go to their Father!
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Later on, the pressure of work again forbade him to undertake further
+articles on "Harvey," "Hunter," and "Instinct."]
+
+I am sorry to say that my hands are full, and I have sworn by as many
+gods as Hume has left me, to undertake nothing more for a long while
+beyond what I am already pledged to do, a small book anent Harvey
+being one of these things.
+
+[And on June 9:--]
+
+After nine days' meditation (directed exclusively to the Harvey and
+Hunter question) I am not any "forrarder," as the farmer said after
+his third bottle of Gladstone claret. So perhaps I had better mention
+the fact. I am very glad you have limed Flower for "Mammalia" and
+"Horse"--nobody could be better.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., July 1, 1879.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+On Thursday last I sought for you at the Athenaeum in the middle of
+the day, and told them to let me know if you came in the evening when
+I was there again. But I doubt not you were plunged in dissipation.
+
+My demonstrator Parker showed me to-day a letter he had received from
+Black's, asking him to do anything in the small Zoology way between H
+and L.
+
+He is a modest man, and so didn't ask what the H--L he was to do, but
+he looked it.
+
+Will you enlighten him or me, and I will convey the information on?
+
+I had another daughter married yesterday. She was a great pet and it
+is very hard lines on father and mother. The only consolation is that
+she has married a right good fellow, John Collier the artist.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+July 19, 1879.
+
+Many thanks for your and Mrs. Baynes' congratulations. I am very well
+content with my son-in-law, and have almost forgiven him for carrying
+off one of my pets, which shows a Christian spirit hardly to be
+expected of me.
+
+South Kensington, July 2, 1880.
+
+My dear Baynes,
+
+I have been thinking over the matter of Instinct, and have come to the
+conclusion that I dare not undertake anything fresh.
+
+There is an address at Birmingham in the autumn looming large, and
+ghosts of unfinished work flitter threateningly.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.8.
+
+1876.
+
+[The year 1876 was again a busy one, almost as busy as any that went
+before. As in 1875, his London work was cut in two by a course of
+lectures in Edinburgh, and sittings of the Royal Commission on
+Scottish Universities, and furthermore, by a trip to America in his
+summer vacation.
+
+In the winter and early spring he gave his usual lectures at South
+Kensington; a course to working men "On the Evidence as to the Origin
+of Existing Vertebrated Animals," from February to April ("Nature"
+volumes 13 and 14); a lecture at the Royal Institution (January 28)
+"On the Border Territory between the Animal and Vegetable Kingdoms"
+("Collected Essays" 8 170); and another at Glasgow (February 15) "On
+the Teleology and Morphology of the Hand."
+
+In this lecture, which he never found time to get into final shape for
+publication, but which was substantially repeated at the Working Men's
+College in 1878, he touched upon one of the philosophic aspects of the
+theory of evolution, namely, how far is it consistent with the
+argument from design?
+
+Granting provisionally the force of Paley's argument in individual
+cases of adaptation, and illustrating it by the hand and its
+representative in various of the Mammalia, he proceeds to show by the
+facts of morphology that the argument, as commonly stated, fails; that
+each mechanism, each animal, was not specially made to suit the
+particular purpose we find it serving, but was developed from a single
+common type. Yet in a limited and special sense he finds teleology to
+be not inconsistent with morphology. The two sets of facts flow from a
+common cause, evolution. Descent by modification accounts for
+similarity of structure; the process of gradual adaptation to
+conditions accounts for the existing adaptation to purpose. To be a
+teleologist and yet accept evolution it is only necessary] "to suppose
+that the original plan was sketched out--that the purpose was
+foreshadowed in the molecular arrangements out of which the animals
+have come."
+
+[This was no new view of his. While, ever since his first review of
+the "Origin" in 1859 ("Collected Essays" 2 6), he had declared the
+commoner and coarser forms of teleology to find their most formidable
+opponent in the theory of evolution, and in 1869, addressing the
+Geological Society, had spoken of] "those final causes, which have
+been named barren virgins, but which might be more fitly termed the
+hetairae of philosophy, so constantly have they led men astray" [(ib.
+8 80; cp. 2 21, 36), he had, in his "Criticism of the Origin" (1864 2
+86), and the "Genealogy of Animals" (1869 2 109 sqq.), shown how]
+"perhaps the most remarkable service to the philosophy of Biology
+rendered by Mr. Darwin is the reconciliation of teleology and
+morphology, and the explanation of the facts of both which his views
+offer...the wider teleology, which is actually based upon the
+fundamental proposition of evolution."
+
+[His notebook shows that he was busy with Reptilia from Elgin and from
+India; and with his "Manual of Invertebrate Anatomy," which was
+published the next year; while he refused to undertake a course of ten
+lectures at the Royal Institution, saying that he had already too much
+other work to do, and would have no time for original work.
+
+About this time, also, in answer to a request from a believer in
+miracles,] "that those who fail to perceive the cogency of the
+evidence by which the occurrence of miracles is supported, should not
+confine themselves to the discussion of general principles, but should
+grapple with some particular case of an alleged miracle," [he read
+before the Metaphysical Society a paper dealing with the evidence for
+the miracle of the resurrection. (See volume 1.)
+
+Some friends wished him to publish the paper as a contribution to
+criticism; but his own doubts as to the opportuneness of so doing were
+confirmed by a letter from Mr. John Morley, then editor of the
+"Fortnightly Review," to which he replied (January 18):--]
+
+To say truth, most of the considerations you put so forcibly had
+passed through my mind--but one always suspects oneself of cowardice
+when one's own interests may be affected.
+
+[At the beginning of May he went to Edinburgh. He writes home on May
+8:--]
+
+I am in hopes of being left to myself this time, as nobody has called
+but Sir Alexander Grant the Principal, Crum Brown, whom I met in the
+street just now, and Lister, who has a patient in the house. I have
+been getting through an enormous quantity of reading, some tough
+monographs that I brought with me, the first volume of Forster's "Life
+of Swift," "Goodsir's Life," and a couple of novels of George Sand,
+with a trifle of Paul Heyse. You should read George Sand's "Cesarine
+Dietrich" and "La Mare au Diable" that I have just finished. She is
+bigger than George Eliot, more flexible, a more thorough artist. It is
+a queer thing, by the way, that I have never read "Consuelo." I shall
+get it here. When I come back from my lecture I like to rest for an
+hour or two over a good story. It freshens me wonderfully.
+
+[However, social Edinburgh did not leave him long to himself, but
+though he might thus lose something of working time, this loss was
+counterbalanced by the dispelling of some of the fits of depression
+which still assailed him from time to time.
+
+On May 25 he writes:--]
+
+The General Assembly is sitting now, and I thought I would look in. It
+was very crowded and I had to stand, so I was soon spied out and
+invited to sit beside the Lord High Commissioner, who represents the
+Crown in the Assembly, and there I heard an ecclesiastical row about
+whether a certain church should be allowed to have a cover with IHS on
+the Communion Table or not. After three hours' discussion the IHSers
+were beaten. I was introduced to the Commissioner Lord Galloway, and
+asked to dine to-night. So I felt bound to go to the special levee at
+Holyrood with my colleagues this morning, and I shall have to go to my
+Lady Galloway's reception in honour of the Queen's birthday to-morrow.
+Luckily there will be no more of it. Vanity of Vanities! Saturday
+afternoon I go out to Lord Young's place to spend Sunday. I have been
+in rather a hypochondriacal state of mind, and I will see if this
+course of medicine will drive the seven devils out.
+
+[One of the chief friendships which sprang from this residence in
+Edinburgh was that with Dr. (afterwards Sir John) Skelton, widely
+known under his literary pseudonym of "Shirley." A Civil servant as
+well as a man of letters, he united practical life with literature, a
+combination that appealed particularly to Huxley, so that he was a
+constant visitor at Dr. Skelton's picturesque house, the Hermitage of
+Braid, near Edinburgh. A number of letters addressed to Skelton from
+1875 to 1891 show that with him Huxley felt the stimulus of an
+appreciative correspondent.]
+
+4 Melville Street, Edinburgh, June 23, 1876.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+I do not understand how it is that your note has been so long in
+reaching me; but I hasten to repel the libellous insinuation that I
+have vowed a vow against dining at the Hermitage.
+
+I wish I could support that repudiation by at once accepting your
+invitation for Saturday or Sunday, but my Saturdays and Sundays are
+mortgaged to one or other of your judges (good judges, obviously).
+
+Shall you be at home on Monday or Tuesday? If so, I would put on a
+kilt (to be as little dressed as possible), and find my way out and
+back; happily improving my mind on the journey with the tracts you
+mention.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Melville Street, Edinburgh, July 1, 1876.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+Very many thanks for the copy of the "Comedy of the Noctes," which
+reached me two or three days ago. Turning over the pages I came upon
+the Shepherd's "Terrible Journey of Timbuctoo," which I enjoyed as
+much as when I first read it thirty odd years ago.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On June 23 he writes home:--]
+
+Did you read Gilman's note asking me to give the inaugural discourse
+at the Johns Hopkins University, and offering 100 pounds sterling on
+the part of the trustees? I am minded to do it on our way back from
+the south, but don't much like taking money for the performance. Tell
+me what you think about this at once, as I must reply.
+
+[This visit to America had been under discussion for some time. It is
+mentioned as a possibility in a letter to Darwin two years before.
+Early in 1876 Mr. Frederic Harrison was commissioned by an American
+correspondent--who, by the way, had named his son Thomas Huxley--to
+give my father the following message:--"The whole nation is
+electrified by the announcement that Professor Huxley is to visit us
+next fall. We will make infinitely more of him than we did of the
+Prince of Wales and his retinue of lords and dukes." Certainly the
+people of the States gave him an enthusiastic welcome; his writings
+had made him known far and wide; as the manager of the Californian
+department at the Philadelphia Exhibition told him, the very miners of
+California read his books over their camp fires; and his visit was so
+far like a royal progress, that unless he entered a city disguised
+under the name of Jones or Smith, he was liable not merely to be
+interviewed, but to be called upon to "address a few words" to the
+citizens.
+
+Leaving their family under the hospitable care of Sir W. and Lady
+Armstrong at Cragside, my father and mother started on July 27 on
+board the "Germanic," reaching New York on August 5. My father
+sometimes would refer, half-jestingly, to the trip as his second
+honeymoon, when, for the first time in twenty years, he and my mother
+set forth by themselves, free from all family cares. And indeed, there
+was the underlying resemblance that this too came at the end of a
+period of struggle to attain, and marked the beginning of a more
+settled period. His reception in America may be said to emphasise his
+definite establishment in the first rank of English thinkers. It was a
+signal testimony to the wide extent of his influence, hardly
+suspected, indeed, by himself; an influence due above all to the fact
+that he did not allow his studies to stand apart from the moving
+problems of existence, but brought the new and regenerating ideas into
+contact with life at every point, and that his championship of the new
+doctrines had at the same time been a championship of freedom and
+sincerity in thought and word against shams and self-deceptions of
+every kind. It was not so much the preacher of new doctrines who was
+welcomed, as the apostle of veracity--not so much the student of
+science as the teacher of men.
+
+Moreover, another sentiment coloured this holiday visit. He was to see
+again the beloved sister of his boyhood. She had always prophesied his
+success, and now after thirty years her prophesy was fulfilled by his
+coming, and, indeed, exceeded by the manner of it.
+
+Mr. Smalley, then London correspondent of the "New York Tribune," was
+a fellow passenger of his on board the "Germanic," and tells an
+interesting anecdote of him:--
+
+Mr. Huxley stood on the deck of the "Germanic" as she steamed up the
+harbour of New York, and he enjoyed to the full that marvellous
+panorama. At all times he was on intimate terms with Nature and also
+with the joint work of Nature and Man; Man's place in Nature being to
+him interesting from more points of view than one. As we drew near the
+city--this was in 1876, you will remember--he asked what were the tall
+tower and tall building with a cupola, then the two most conspicuous
+objects. I told him the Tribune and the Western Union Telegraph
+buildings. "Ah," he said, "that is interesting; that is American. In
+the old World the first things you see as you approach a great city
+are steeples; here you see, first, centres of intelligence." Next to
+those the tug-boats seemed to attract him as they tore fiercely up and
+down and across the bay. He looked long at them and finally said,] "If
+I were not a man I think I should like to be a tug." [They seemed to
+him the condensation and complete expression of the energy and force
+in which he delighted.
+
+The personal welcome he received from the friends he visited was of
+the warmest. On the arrival of the "Germanic" the travellers were met
+by Mr. Appleton the publisher, and carried off to his country house at
+Riverdale. While his wife was taken to Saratoga to see what an
+American summer resort was like, he himself went on the 9th to New
+Haven, to inspect the fossils at Yale College, collected from the
+Tertiary deposits of the Far West by Professor Marsh, with great
+labour and sometimes at the risk of his scalp. Professor Marsh told me
+how he took him to the University, and proposed to begin by showing
+him over the buildings. He refused.] "Show me what you have got inside
+them; I can see plenty of bricks and mortar in my own country." [So
+they went straight to the fossils, and as Professor Marsh writes
+("American Journal of Science" volume 1 August 1895.):--
+
+One of Huxley's lectures in New York was to be on the genealogy of the
+horse, a subject which he had already written about, based entirely
+upon European specimens. My own explorations had led me to conclusions
+quite different from his, and my specimens seemed to me to prove
+conclusively that the horse originated in the New World and not in the
+Old, and that its genealogy must be worked out here. With some
+hesitation, I laid the whole matter frankly before Huxley, and he
+spent nearly two days going over my specimens with me, and testing
+each point I made.
+
+At each inquiry, whether he had a specimen to illustrate such and such
+a point or exemplify a transition from earlier and less specialised
+forms to later and more specialised ones, Professor Marsh would simply
+turn to his assistant and bid him fetch box number so and so, until
+Huxley turned upon him and said,] "I believe you are a magician;
+whatever I want, you just conjure it up."
+
+[The upshot of this examination was that he recast a great part of
+what he meant to say at New York. When he had seen the specimens, and
+thoroughly weighed their import, continues Professor Marsh:--
+
+He then informed me that all this was new to him, and that my facts
+demonstrated the evolution of the horse beyond question, and for the
+first time indicated the direct line of descent of an existing animal.
+With the generosity of true greatness, he gave up his own opinions in
+the face of new truth, and took my conclusions as the basis of his
+famous New York lecture on the horse. He urged me to prepare without
+delay a volume on the genealogy of the horse, based upon the specimens
+I had shown him. This I promised, but other work and new duties have
+thus far prevented.
+
+A letter to his wife describes his visit to Yale:--]
+
+My excellent host met me at the station, and seems as if he could not
+make enough of me. I am installed in apartments which were occupied by
+his uncle, the millionaire Peabody, and am as quiet as if I were in my
+own house. We have had a preliminary canter over the fossils, and I
+have seen some things which were worth all the journey across.
+
+This is the most charmingly picturesque town, with the streets lined
+by avenues of elm trees which meet overhead. I have never seen
+anything like it, and you must come and look at it. There is fossil
+work enough to occupy me till the end of the week, and I have arranged
+to go to Springfield on Monday to examine the famous footprints of the
+Connecticut Valley.
+
+The Governor has called upon me, and I shall have to go and do
+pretty-behaved chez lui to-morrow. An application has come for an
+autograph, but I have not been interviewed!
+
+[This immunity, however, did not last long. He appears to have been
+caught by the interviewer the next day, for he writes on the 11th:--]
+
+I have not seen the notice in the "World" you speak of. You will be
+amused at the article written by the interviewer. He was evidently
+surprised to meet with so little of the "high falutin" philosopher in
+me, and says I am "affable" and of "the commercial or mercantile"
+type. That is something I did not know, and I am rather proud of it.
+We may be rich yet.
+
+[As to his work at Yale Museum, he writes in the same letter:--]
+
+We are hard at work still. Breakfast at 8.30--go over to the Museum
+with Marsh at 9 or 10--work till 1.30--dine--go back to Museum to work
+till 6. Then Marsh takes me for a drive to see the views about the
+town, and back to tea about half-past eight. He is a wonderfully good
+fellow, full of fun and stories about his Western adventures, and the
+collection of fossils is the most wonderful thing I ever saw. I wish I
+could spare three weeks instead of one to study it.
+
+To-morrow evening were are to have a dinner by way of winding up, and
+he has asked a lot of notables to meet me. I assure you I am being
+"made of," as I thought nobody but the little wife was foolish enough
+to do.
+
+[On the 16th he left to join Professor Alexander Agassiz at Newport,
+whence he wrote the following letters:--]
+
+Newport, August 17, 1876.
+
+My dear Marsh,
+
+I really cannot say how much I enjoyed my visit to New Haven. My
+recollections are sorting themselves out by degrees and I find how
+rich my store is. The more I think of it the more clear it is that
+your great work is the settlement of the pedigree of the horse.
+
+My wife joins with me in kind regards. I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To Mr. Clarence King.]
+
+Newport, August 19, 1876.
+
+My dear Sir,
+
+In accordance with your wish, I very willingly put into writing the
+substance of the opinion as to the importance of Professor Marsh's
+collection of fossils which I expressed to you yesterday. As you are
+aware, I devoted four or five days to the examination of this
+collection, and was enabled by Professor Marsh's kindness to obtain a
+fair conception of the whole.
+
+I am disposed to think that whether we regard the abundance of
+material, the number of complete skeletons of the various species, or
+the extent of geological time covered by the collection, which I had
+the good fortune to see at New Haven, there is no collection of fossil
+vertebrates in existence, which can be compared with it. I say this
+without forgetting Montmartre, Siwalik, or Pikermi--and I think that I
+am quite safe in adding that no collection which has been hitherto
+formed approaches that made by Professor Marsh, in the completeness of
+the chain of evidence by which certain existing mammals are connected
+with their older tertiary ancestry.
+
+It is of the highest importance to the progress of Biological Science
+that the publication of this evidence, accompanied by illustrations of
+such fulness as to enable paleontologists to form their own judgment
+as to its value, should take place without delay.
+
+I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Breaking their journey at Boston, they went from Newport to
+Petersham, in the highlands of Worcester County, where they were the
+guests of Mr. and Mrs. John Fiske, at their summer home. Among the
+other visitors were the eminent musical composer Mr. Paine, the poet
+Cranch, and daughters of Hawthorne and Longfellow, so that they found
+themselves in the midst of a particularly cheerful and delightful
+party. From Petersham they proceeded to Buffalo, the meeting-place
+that year of the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
+which my father had promised to attend. Here they stayed with Mr.
+Marshall, a leading lawyer, who afterwards visited them in England.
+
+Awake was spent at Niagara, partly in making holiday, partly in
+shaping the lectures which had to be delivered at the end of the trip.
+As to the impression made upon him by the Falls--an experience which,
+it is generally presumed, every traveller is bound to record--I may
+note that after the first disappointment at their appearance,
+inevitable wherever the height of a waterfall is less than the
+breadth, he found in them an inexhaustible charm and fascination. As
+in duty bound, he, with my mother, completed his experiences by going
+under the wall of waters to the "Cave of the Winds." But of all things
+nothing pleased him more than to sit of an evening by the edge of the
+river, and through the roar of the cataract to listen for the
+under-sound of the beaten stones grinding together at its foot.
+
+Leaving Niagara on September 2, they travelled to Cincinnati, a
+20-hours' journey, where they rested a day; on the 4th another 10
+hours took them to Nashville, where they were to meet his sister, Mrs.
+Scott. Though 11 years his senior, she maintained her vigour and
+brightness undimmed, as indeed she did to the end of her life,
+surviving him by a few weeks. As she now stood on the platform at
+Nashville, Mrs. Huxley, who had never seen her, picked her out from
+among all the people by her piercing black eyes, so like those of her
+mother as described in the Autobiographical sketch ("Collected Essays"
+1).
+
+Nashville, her son's home, had been chosen as the meeting-place by
+Mrs. Scott, because it was not so far south nor so hot as Montgomery,
+where she was then living. Nevertheless in Tennessee the heat of the
+American summer was very trying, and the good people of the town
+further drew upon the too limited opportunities of their guest's brief
+visit by sending a formal deputation to beg that he would either
+deliver an address, or be entertained at a public dinner, or "state
+his views"--to an interviewer I suppose. He could not well refuse one
+of the alternatives; and the greater part of one day was spent in
+preparing a short address on the geology of Tennessee, which was
+delivered on the evening of September 7. He spoke for twenty minutes,
+but had scarcely any voice, which was not to be wondered at, as he was
+so tired that he had kept his room the whole day, while his wife
+received the endless string of callers.
+
+The next day they returned to Cincinnati; and on the 9th went on to
+Baltimore, where they stayed with Mr. Garrett, then President of the
+Baltimore and Ohio railway.
+
+The Johns Hopkins University at Baltimore, for which he was to deliver
+the opening address, had been instituted by its founder on a novel
+basis. It was devoted to post-graduate study; the professors and
+lecturers received incomes entirely independent of the pupils they
+taught. Men came to study for the sake of learning, not for the sake
+of passing some future examination. The endowment was devoted in the
+first place to the furtherance of research; the erection of buildings
+was put into the background.] "It has been my fate," [commented
+Huxley,] "to see great educational funds fossilise into mere bricks
+and mortar in the petrifying springs of architecture, with nothing
+left to work them. A great warrior is said to have made a desert and
+called it peace. Trustees have sometimes made a palace and called it a
+university."
+
+[Half the fortune of the founder had gone to this university; the
+other half to the foundation of a great and splendidly equipped
+hospital for Baltimore. This was the reason why the discussion of
+medical training occupies fully half of the address upon the general
+principles of education, in which, indeed, lies the heart of his
+message to America, a message already delivered to the old country,
+but specially appropriate for the new nation developing so rapidly in
+size and physical resources.]
+
+I cannot say that I am in the slightest degree impressed by your
+bigness or your material resources, as such. Size is not grandeur,
+territory does not make a nation. The great issue, about which hangs a
+true sublimity, and the terror of overhanging fate, is, what are you
+going to do with all these things?...
+
+The one condition of success, your sole safeguard, is the moral worth
+and intellectual clearness of the individual citizen. Education cannot
+give these, but it can cherish them and bring them to the front in
+whatever station of society they are to be found, and the universities
+ought to be and may be, the fortresses of the higher life of the
+nation.
+
+[This address was delivered under circumstances of peculiar
+difficulty. The day before, an expedition had been made to Washington,
+from which Huxley returned very tired, only to be told that he was to
+attend a formal dinner and reception the same evening.] "I don't know
+how I shall stand it," [he remarked. Going to his room, he snatched an
+hour or two of rest, but was then called upon to finish his address
+before going out. It seems that it had to be ready for simultaneous
+publication in the New York papers. Now the lecture was not written
+out; it was to be given from notes only. So he had to deliver it in
+extenso to the reporter, who took it down in shorthand, promising to
+let him have a longhand copy in good time the next morning. It did not
+come till the last moment. Glancing at it on his way to the lecture
+theatre, he discovered to his horror that it was written upon
+"flimsy," from which he would not be able to read it with any success.
+He wisely gave up the attempt, and made up his mind to deliver the
+lecture as best he could from memory. The lecture as delivered was
+very nearly the same as that which he had dictated the night before,
+but with some curious discrepancies between the two accounts, which,
+he used to say, occurring as they did in versions both purporting to
+have been taken down from his lips, might well lead the ingenious
+critic of the future to pronounce them both spurious, and to declare
+that the pretended original was never delivered under the
+circumstances alleged. (Cp. the incident at Belfast.)
+
+There was an audience of some 2000, and I am told that when he began
+to speak of the time that would come when they too would experience
+the dangers of over-population and poverty in their midst, and would
+then understand what Europe had to contend with more fully than they
+did, a pin could have been heard to drop. At the end of the lecture,
+amid the enthusiastic applause of the crowd, he made his way to the
+front of the box where his hosts and their party were, and received
+their warm congratulations. But he missed one voice amongst them, and
+turning to where his wife sat in silent triumph almost beyond speech,
+he said,] "And have you no word for me?" [then, himself also deeply
+moved, stooped down and kissed her.
+
+This address was delivered on Tuesday, September 12. On the 14th he
+went to Philadelphia, and on the 15th to New York, where he delivered
+his three lectures on Evolution on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday,
+September 18, 20, and 22.
+
+These lectures are very good examples of the skill with which he could
+present a complicated subject in a simple form, the subject seeming to
+unroll itself by the force of its own naked logic, and carrying
+conviction the further through the simplicity of its presentation.
+Indeed, an unfriendly critic once paid him an unintended compliment,
+when trying to make out that he was no great speaker; that all he did
+was to set some interesting theory unadorned before his audience, when
+such success as he attained was due to the compelling nature of the
+subject itself.
+
+Since his earlier lectures to the public on evolution, the
+paleontological evidences had been accumulating; the case could be
+stated without some of the reservations of former days; and he brings
+forward two telling instances in considerable detail, the one showing
+how the gulf between two such apparently distinct groups as Birds and
+Reptiles is bridged over by ancient fossils intermediate in form; the
+other illustrating from Professor Marsh's new collections the lineal
+descent of the specialised Horse from the more general type of
+quadruped.
+
+The farthest back of these was a creature with four toes on the front
+limb and three on the hind limb. Judging from the completeness of the
+series or forms so far, he ventured to indulge in a prophecy.]
+
+Thus, thanks to these important researches, it has become evident
+that, so far as our present knowledge extends, the history of the
+horse-type is exactly and precisely that which could have been
+predicted from a knowledge of the principles of evolution. And the
+knowledge we now possess justifies us completely in the anticipation
+that when the still lower Eocene deposits, and those which belong to
+the Cretaceous epoch, have yielded up their remains of ancestral
+equine animals, we shall find, first, a form with four complete toes
+and a rudiment of the innermost or first digit in front, with,
+probably, a rudiment of the fifth digit in the hind foot; while, in
+still older forms, the series of the digits will be more and more
+complete, until we come to the five-toed animals, in which, if the
+doctrine of evolution is well founded, the whole series must have
+taken its origin.
+
+[Seldom has prophecy been sooner fulfilled. Within two months,
+Professor Marsh had discovered a new genus of equine mammals,
+Eohippus, from the lowest Eocene deposits of the West, which
+corresponds very nearly to the description given above.
+
+He continues:--]
+
+That is what I mean by demonstrative evidence of evolution. An
+inductive hypothesis is said to be demonstrated when the facts are
+shown to be in entire accordance with it. If that is not scientific
+proof, there are no merely inductive conclusions which can be said to
+be proved. And the doctrine of evolution, at the present time, rests
+upon exactly as secure a foundation as the Copernican theory of the
+motions of the heavenly bodies did at the time of its promulgation.
+Its logical basis is of precisely the same character--the coincidence
+of the observed facts with theoretical requirements.
+
+[He left New York on September 23.] "I had a very pleasant trip in
+Yankee-land," [he writes to Professor Baynes,] "and did NOT give
+utterance to a good deal that I am reported to have said there." [He
+reached England in good time for the beginning of his autumn lectures,
+and his ordinary busy life absorbed him again. He did not fail to give
+his London audiences the results of the recent discoveries in American
+paleontology, and on December 4, delivered a lecture at the London
+Institution, "On Recent Additions to the Knowledge of the Pedigree of
+the Horse." In connection with this he writes to Professor Marsh:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., December 27, 1876.
+
+My dear Marsh,
+
+I hope you do not think it remiss of me that I have not written to you
+since my return, but you will understand that I plunged into a coil of
+work, and will forgive me. But I do not mean to let you slip away
+without sending you all our good wishes for its successor--which I
+hope will not vanish without seeing you among us.
+
+I blew your trumpet the other day at the London Institution in a
+lecture about the Horse question. I did not know then that you had got
+another step back as I see you have by the note to my last lecture,
+which Youmans has just sent me.
+
+I must thank you very heartily for the pains you have taken over the
+woodcuts of the lectures. It is a great improvement to have the
+patterns of the grinders.
+
+I promised to give a lecture at the Royal Institution on the 21st
+January next, and I am thinking of discoursing on the Birds with
+teeth. Have you anything new to tell on that subject? I have implicit
+faith in the inexhaustibility of the contents of those boxes.
+
+Our voyage home was not so successful as that out. The weather was
+cold and I got a chill which laid me up for several days, in fact I
+was not well for some weeks after my return. But I am vigorous again
+now.
+
+Pray remember me kindly to all New Haven friends. My wife joins with
+me in kindest regards and good wishes for the new year. "Tell him we
+expect to see him next year."
+
+I am, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On December 16 he delivered a lecture "On the Study of Biology," in
+connection with the Loan Collection of Scientific Apparatus at South
+Kensington ("Collected Essays" 3 262), dealing with the origin of the
+name Biology, its relation to Sociology--] "we have allowed that
+province of Biology to become autonomous; but I should like you to
+recollect that this is a sacrifice, and that you should not be
+surprised if it occasionally happens that you see a biologist
+apparently trespassing in the region of philosophy or politics; or
+meddling with human education; because, after all, that is a part of
+his kingdom which he has only voluntarily forsaken"]--how to learn
+biology, the use of Museums, and above all, the utility of biology, as
+helping to give right ideas in this world, which] "is after all,
+absolutely governed by ideas, and very often by the wildest and most
+hypothetical ideas."
+
+[This lecture on Biology was first published among the "American
+Addresses" in 1877.
+
+It was about this time that an extremely Broad Church divine was
+endeavouring to obtain the signatures of men of science to a document
+he had drawn up protesting against certain orthodox doctrines. Huxley,
+however, refused to sign the protest, and wrote the following letter
+of explanation, a copy of which he sent to Mr. Darwin.]
+
+November 18, 1876.
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+I have read the "Protest," with a copy of which you have favoured me,
+and as you wish that I should do so, I will trouble you with a brief
+statement of my reasons for my inability to sign it.
+
+I object to clause 2 on the ground long since taken by Hume that the
+order of the universe such as we observe it to be, furnishes us with
+the only data upon which we can base any conclusion as to the
+character of the originator thereof.
+
+As a matter of fact, men sin, and the consequences of their sins
+affect endless generations of their progeny. Men are tempted, men are
+punished for the sins of others without merit or demerit of their own;
+and they are tormented for their evil deeds as long as their
+consciousness lasts.
+
+The theological doctrines to which you refer, therefore, are simply
+extensions of generalisations as well based as any in physical
+science. Very likely they are illegitimate extensions of these
+generalisations, but that does not make them wrong in principle.
+
+And I should consider it waste of time to "protest" against that which
+is.
+
+As regards clause 3 I find that as a matter of experience, erroneous
+beliefs are punished, and right beliefs are rewarded--though very
+often the erroneous belief is based upon a more conscientious study of
+the facts than the right belief. I do not see why this should not be
+as true of theological beliefs as any others. And as I said before, I
+do not care to protest against that which is.
+
+Many thanks for your congratulations. My tour was very pleasant and
+taught me a good deal.
+
+I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+P.S.--You are at liberty to make what use you please of this letter.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 19, 1876.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+I confess I have less sympathy with the half-and-half sentimental
+school which he represents than I have with thoroughgoing orthodoxy.
+
+If we are to assume that anybody has designedly set this wonderful
+universe going, it is perfectly clear to me that he is no more
+entirely benevolent and just in any intelligible sense of the words,
+than that he is malevolent and unjust. Infinite benevolence need not
+have invented pain and sorrow at all--infinite malevolence would very
+easily have deprived us of the large measure of content and happiness
+that falls to our lot. After all, Butler's "Analogy" is unassailable,
+and there is nothing in theological dogmas more contradictory to our
+moral sense, than is to be found in the facts of nature. From which,
+however, the Bishop's conclusion that the dogmas are true doesn't
+follow.
+
+With best remembrances to Mrs. Darwin, ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This incident suggests the story of a retort he once made upon what
+he considered an unseasonable protest in church, a story which
+exemplifies, by the way, his strong sense of the decencies of life,
+appearing elsewhere in his constant respect for the ordinary
+conventions of his dislike for mere Bohemianism as such.
+
+Once in a country house he was sitting at dinner next to his hostess,
+a lady who, as will sometimes happen, liked to play the part of Lady
+Arbitress of the whole neighbourhood. She told him how much she
+disapproved of the Athanasian Creed, and described how she had risen
+and left the village church when the parson began to read it; and
+thinking to gain my father's assent, she turned to him and said
+graciously, "Now Mr. Huxley, don't you think I was quite right to mark
+my disapproval?"]
+
+"My dear Lady --" [he replied,] "I should as soon think of rising and
+leaving your table because I disapproved of one of the entrees."
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.9.
+
+1877.
+
+[In this year he delivered lectures and addresses on the "Geological
+History of Birds," at the Zoological Society's Gardens, June 7; on
+"Starfishes and their Allies," at the Royal Institution, March 7; at
+the London Institution, December 17, on "Belemnites" (a subject on
+which he had written in 1864, and which was doubtless suggested anew
+by his autumn holiday at Whitby, where the Lias cliffs are full of
+these fossils); at the Anthropological Conference, May 22, on
+"Elementary Instruction in Physiology" ("Collected Essays" 3 294),
+with special reference to the recent legislation as to experiments on
+living animals; and on "Technical Education" to the Working Men's Club
+and Institute, December 1 ("Collected Essays" 3 404): a perilous
+subject, indeed, considering, as he remarks, that] "any candid
+observer of the phenomena of modern society will readily admit that
+bores must be classed among the enemies of the human race; and a
+little consideration will probably lead him to the further admission,
+that no species of that extensive genus of noxious creatures is more
+objectionable than the educational bore...In the course of the last
+ten years, to go back no farther, I am afraid to say how often I have
+ventured to speak of education; indeed, the only part of this wide
+region into which, as yet, I have not adventured, is that into which I
+propose to intrude to-day."
+
+[The choice of subject for this address was connected with a larger
+campaign for the establishment of technical education on a proper
+footing, which began with his work on the School Board, and was this
+year brought prominently before the public by another address
+delivered at the Society of Arts. The Clothworkers Company had already
+been assisting the Society of Arts in their efforts for the spread of
+technical education; and in July 1877 a special committee of the
+Guilds applied to him, amongst half a dozen others, to furnish them
+with a report as to the objects and methods of a scheme of technical
+education. This paper fills sixteen pages in the Report of the Livery
+Companies' Committee for 1878. The fundamental principles on which he
+bases his practical recommendations are contained in the following
+paragraph:--]
+
+It appears to me that if every person who is engaged in an industry
+had access to instruction in the scientific principles on which that
+industry is based; in the mode of applying these principles to
+practice; in the actual use of the means and appliances employed; in
+the language of the people who know as much about the matter as we do
+ourselves; and lastly, in the art of keeping accounts, Technical
+Education would have done all that can be required of it.
+
+[And his suggestions about buildings was at once adopted by the
+Committee, namely, that they should be erected at a future date,
+regard being had primarily rather to what is wanted in the inside than
+what will look well from the outside.
+
+Now the Guilds formed a very proper body to set such a scheme on foot,
+because only such wealthy and influential members of the first
+mercantile city in the world could afford to let themselves be
+despised and jeered at for professing to teach English manufacturers
+and English merchants that they needed to be taught; and to spend
+25,000 pounds a year towards that end for some time without apparent
+result.
+
+That they eventually succeeded, is due no little to the careful plans
+drawn out by Huxley. He may be described as "really the engineer of
+the City and Guilds Institute; for without his advice," declared one
+of the leading members, "we should not have known what to have done."
+
+At the same time he warned them against indiscriminate zeal;] "though
+under-instruction is a bad thing, it is not impossible that
+over-instruction may be worse." [The aim of the Livery Companies
+should specially be to aid the PRACTICAL teaching of science, so that
+at bottom the question turns mainly on the supply of teachers.
+
+On December 11, 1879, he found a further opportunity of urging the
+cause of Technical Education. A lecture on Apprenticeships was
+delivered before the Society of Arts by Professor Silvanus Thompson.
+Speaking after the lecturer (see report in "Nature" 1879 page 139) he
+discussed the necessity of supplying the place of the old
+apprenticeships by educating children in the principles of their
+particular crafts, beyond the time when they were forced to enter the
+workshops. This could be done by establishing schools in each centre
+of industry, connected with a central institution, such as was to be
+found in Paris or Zurich. As for complaints of deficient teaching of
+handicrafts in the Board Schools, it was more important for them to
+make intelligent men than skilled workmen, as again was indicated in
+the French system.
+
+As President of the Royal Society, he was on the above-mentioned
+Committee of the Guilds from 1883 to 1885, and on December 10, 1883,
+distributed the prizes in connection with the institution in the
+Clothworkers' Hall. After sketching the inception of the whole scheme,
+he referred to the Central Institute, then in course of building
+(begun in 1882, it was finished in 1884; the Technical College,
+Finsbury, was older by a year), and spoke of the difficulties in the
+way of organising such an institution:--]
+
+That building is simply the body, not the flesh and bones, but the
+bricks and stones, of the Central Institute, and the business upon
+which Sir F. Bramwell and my other colleagues on the Committee have
+been so much occupied, is the making a soul for this body; and I can
+assure you making a soul for anything is an amazingly difficult
+operation. You are always in danger of doing as the man in the story
+of Frankenstein did, and making something which will eventually devour
+you instead of being useful to you.
+
+[And here I may give a letter which refers to the movement for
+technical education, and the getting the City Companies under way in
+the matter. In the words of Mr. George Howell, M.P. (who sent it to
+the "Times" (July 3, 1895) just after Huxley's death), it has an
+additional interest "as indicating the nature of his own epitaph"; as
+a man "whose highest ambition ever was to uplift the masses of the
+people and promote their welfare intellectually, socially, and
+industrially."]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 2, 1880.
+
+Dear Mr. Howell,
+
+Your letter is a welcome New Year's gift. There are two things I
+really care about--one is the progress of scientific thought, and the
+other is the bettering of the condition of the masses of the people by
+bettering them in the way of lifting themselves out of the misery
+which has hitherto been the lot of the majority of them. Posthumous
+fame is not particularly attractive to me, but, if I am to be
+remembered at all, I would rather it should be as "a man who did his
+best to help the people" than by other title. So you see it is no
+small pleasure and encouragement to me to find that I have been, and
+am, of any use in this direction.
+
+Ever since my experience on the School Board, I have been convinced
+that I should lose rather than gain by entering directly into
+politics...But I suppose I have some ten years of activity left in me,
+and you may depend upon it I shall lose no chance of striking a blow
+for the cause I have at heart. I thought the time had come the other
+day at the Society of Arts, and the event proves I was not mistaken.
+The animal is moving, and by a judicious exhibition of carrots in
+front and kicks behind, we shall get him into a fine trot presently.
+In the meantime do not let the matter rest...The (City) companies
+should be constantly reminded that a storm is brewing. There are
+excellent men among them, who want to do what is right, and need help
+against the sluggards and reactionaries. It will be best for me to be
+quiet for a while, but you will understand that I am watching for the
+turn of events.
+
+I am, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This summer, too, he delivered a course on Biology for Teachers at
+South Kensington, and published not only his "American Addresses," but
+also the "Physiography," founded upon the course delivered seven years
+before. The book, of which 3386 copies were sold in the first six
+weeks, was fruitful in two ways; it showed that a geographical subject
+could be invested with interest, and it set going what was almost a
+new branch of teaching in natural science, even in Germany, the
+starting place of most educational methods, where it was immediately
+proposed to bring out an adaptation of the book, substituting, e.g.
+the Elbe for the Thames, as a familiar example of river action.
+
+He was immensely pleased by a letter from Mr. John Morley, telling how
+his step-son, a boy of non-bookish tastes, had been taken with it. "My
+step-son was reading it the other night. I said, 'isn't it better to
+read a novel before going to bed, instead of worrying your head over a
+serious book like that?' 'Oh,' said he, 'I'm at an awfully interesting
+part, and I can't leave off.'" It was, Mr. Morley continued, "the way
+of making Nature, as she comes before us every day, interesting and
+intelligible to young folks."
+
+To this he replied on December 14:--]
+
+I shall get as vain as a peacock if discreet folk like you say such
+pretty things to me as you do about the "Physiography."
+
+But it is very pleasant to me to find that I have succeeded in what I
+tried to do. I gave the lectures years ago to show what I thought was
+the right way to lead young people to the study of nature--but nobody
+would follow suit--so now I have tried what the book will do.
+
+Your step-son is a boy of sense, and I hope he may be taken as a type
+of the British public!
+
+[A good deal of time was taken up in the first half of the year by the
+Scottish Universities Commission, which necessitated his attendance in
+Edinburgh the last week in February, the first week in April, and the
+last week in July. He had hoped to finish off the necessary business
+at the first of these meetings, but no sooner had he arrived in
+Edinburgh, after a pleasant journey down with J.A. Froude, than he
+learned that] "the chief witness we were to have examined to-day, and
+whose due evisceration was one of the objects of my coming, has
+telegraphed to say he can't be here." [Owing to this and to the
+enforced absence of the judges on the Commission from some of the
+sittings, it was found necessary to have additional meetings at
+Easter, much to his disgust. He writes:--]
+
+I am sorry to say I shall have to come here again in Easter week. It
+is the only time the Lord President is free from his courts, and
+although we all howled privately, there was no help for it. Whether we
+finish then or not will depend on the decision of the Government, as
+to our taking up the case of you troublesome women, who want admission
+into the University (very rightly too I think). If we have to go into
+this question it will involve the taking of new evidence and no end of
+bother. I find my colleagues very reasonable, and I hope some good may
+be done, that is the only consolation.
+
+I went out with Blackie last evening to dine with the Skeltons, at a
+pretty place called the Hermitage, about three miles from
+here...Blackie and I walked home with snow on the ground and a sharp
+frost. I told you it would turn cold as soon as I got here, but I am
+none the worse.
+
+[It was just the same in April:--]
+
+It is quite cold here as usual, and there was ice on the ponds we
+passed this morning...I am much better lodged than I was last time,
+for the same thanks to John Bruce, but I do believe that the Edinburgh
+houses are the coldest in the universe. In spite of a good breakfast
+and a good fire, the half of me that is writing to you is as cold as
+charity.
+
+April 4.
+
+We toil at the Commission every day, and don't make any rapid
+progress. An awful fear creeps over me that we shall not finish this
+bout.
+
+[While he was in Edinburgh for the third time, his attention was
+called to an article in the "Echo," the organ of the anti-vivisection
+party. He writes:--]
+
+The "Echo" is pretty. It is one of a long series of articles from the
+same hand, but I don't think they hurt anybody and they evidently
+please the writer. For some reason or other they have not attacked me
+yet, but I suppose my turn will come.
+
+[Again:--]
+
+Thank you for sending me John Bright's speeches. They are very good,
+but hardly up to his old mark of eloquence. Some parts are very
+touching.
+
+[His health was improving, as he notes with satisfaction:--]
+
+Every day this week we have had about four hours of the Commission,
+and I have dined out four days out of the six. But I'm no the waur,
+and the late dinners have not been visited by fits of morning blue
+devils. So I am in hopes that I am getting back to the normal state
+that Clark prophesied for me.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., April 29, 1877.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+Best thanks for your second edition. You paint the system (i.e. of
+Scotch education.) in such favourable colours, that I am thinking of
+taking advantage of it for my horde of "young barbarians." I am sure
+Scotch air would be of service to them--and in after-life they might
+have the inestimable advantage of a quasi-Scotch nationality--that
+greatest of all practical advantages in Britain.
+
+We are to sit again in the end of July when Mrs. Skelton and you, if
+you are wise, will be making holiday.
+
+Your invitation is most tempting, and if I had no work to do I should
+jump at it.
+
+But alas! I shall have a deal of work, and I must go to my Patmos in
+George Street. Ingrained laziness is the bane of my existence; and you
+don't suppose that with the sun shining down into your bosky dell, and
+Mrs. Skelton radiant, and Froude and yourself nicotiant, I am such a
+Philistine as to do a stroke of work?
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[From Edinburgh he went to St. Andrews to make arrangements for his
+elder son to go to the University there as a student the following
+winter. Then he paid a visit to Sir W. Armstrong in Northumberland,
+afterwards spending a month at Whitby. His holiday work consisted in a
+great part of the article on "Evolution" for the "Encyclopaedia
+Britannica," which is noted as finished on October 24, though not
+published till the next year.
+
+In November the honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred upon Charles
+Darwin at Cambridge,] "a great step for Cambridge, though it may not
+seem much in itself," [he writes to Dohrn, November 21. In the evening
+after the public ceremony there was a dinner of the Philosophical
+Club, at which he spoke in praise of Darwin's services to science.
+Darwin himself was unable to be present, but received an enthusiastic
+account of the proceedings from his son, and wrote to thank Huxley,
+who replied:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 21, 1877.
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+Nothing ever gave me greater pleasure than the using the chance of
+speaking my mind about you and your work which was afforded me at the
+dinner the other night. I said not a word beyond what I believe to be
+strictly accurate; and, please Sir, I didn't sneer at anybody. There
+was only a little touch of the whip at starting, and it was so tied
+round with ribbons that it took them some time to find out where the
+flick had hit.
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He writes to his wife:--]
+
+I will see if I can recollect the speech. I made a few notes sitting
+in Dewar's room before the dinner. But as usual I did not say some
+things I meant to say and said others that came up on the spur of the
+moment.
+
+[And again:--]
+
+Please I didn't say that Reaumur was the other greatest scientific man
+since Aristotle. But I said that in a certain character of his work he
+was the biggest man between Aristotle and Darwin. I really must write
+out an "authorised version" of my speech. I hear the Latin oration is
+to be in "Nature" this week, and Lockyer wanted me to give him the
+heads of my speech, but I did not think it would be proper to do so,
+and refused. I have written out my speech as well as I can recollect
+it. I do not mind any friend seeing it, but you must not let it get
+about as the dinner was a private one.
+
+[The notes of his speech run as follows:--]
+
+Mr. President,
+
+I rise with pleasure and with alacrity to respond to the toast which
+you have just proposed, and I may say that I consider one of the
+greatest honours which have befallen me, to be called upon to
+represent my distinguished friend Mr. Darwin upon this occasion. I say
+to represent Mr. Darwin, for I cannot hope to personate him, or to say
+all that would be dictated by a mind conspicuous for its powerful
+humility and strong gentleness.
+
+Mr. Darwin's work had fully earned the distinction you have to-day
+conferred upon him four-and-twenty years ago; but I doubt not that he
+would have found in that circumstance an exemplification of the wise
+foresight of his revered intellectual mother. Instead of offering her
+honours when they ran a chance of being crushed beneath the
+accumulated marks of approbation of the whole civilised world, the
+University has waited until the trophy was finished, and has crowned
+the edifice with the delicate wreath of academic appreciation.
+
+This is what I suppose Mr. Darwin might have said had he been happily
+able to occupy my place. Let me now speak in my own person and in
+obedience to your suggestion, let me state as briefly as possible what
+appear to me to be Mr. Darwin's distinctive merits.
+
+From the time of Aristotle to the present day I know of but one man
+who has shown himself Mr. Darwin's equal in one field of research--and
+that is Reaumur. In the breadth of range of Mr. Darwin's
+investigations upon the ways and works of animals and plants, in the
+minute patient accuracy of his observations, and in the philosophical
+ideas which have guided them, I know of no one who is to be placed in
+the same rank with him except Reaumur.
+
+Secondly, looking back through the same long period of scientific
+history, I know of but one man, Lyonnet, who not being from his youth
+a trained anatomist, has published such an admirable minute anatomical
+research as is contained in Mr. Darwin's work on the Cirripedes.
+
+Thirdly, in that region which lies between Geology and Biology, and is
+occupied by the problem of the influence of life on the structure of
+the globe, no one, so far as I know, has done a more brilliant and
+far-reaching piece of work than the famous book upon Coral Reefs.
+
+I add to these as incidental trifles the numerous papers on Geology,
+and that most delightful of popular scientific books, the "Journal of
+a Naturalist," and I think I have made out my case for the
+justification of to-day's proceedings.
+
+But I have omitted something. There is the "Origin of Species," and
+all that has followed it from the same marvellously fertile brain.
+
+Most people know Mr. Darwin only as the author of this work, and of
+the form of evolutional doctrine which it advocates. I desire to say
+nothing about that doctrine. My friend Dr. Humphry has said that the
+University has by to-day's proceedings committed itself to the
+doctrine of evolution. I can only say "I am very glad to hear it." But
+whether that doctrine be true or whether it be false, I wish to
+express the deliberate opinion, that from Aristotle's great summary of
+the Biological knowledge of his time down to the present day, there is
+nothing comparable to the "Origin of Species," as a connected survey
+of the phenomena of life permeated and vivified by a central idea. In
+remote ages the historian of science will dwell upon it as the
+starting-point of the Biology of his present and our future.
+
+My friend Dr. Humphry has adverted to somebody about whom I know
+nothing, who says that the exact and critical studies pursued in this
+University are ill-calculated to preserve a high tone of mind.
+
+I presume that this saying must proceed from some one wholly
+unacquainted with Cambridge. Whoever he may be, I beg him, if he can,
+to make the acquaintance of Charles Darwin.
+
+In Mr. Darwin's name I beg leave to thank you for the honour you have
+done him.
+
+[It happened that the quadrennial election of a Lord Rector at St.
+Andrews University fell in this year, and on behalf of a number of
+students, Huxley received a telegram from his son, now newly entered
+at St. Andrews, asking him to stand. He writes to his wife:--]
+
+That boy of yours has just sent me a telegram, which I enclose. I sent
+back message to say that as a Commissioner on the Scotch Universities
+I could not possibly stand. The cockerel is beginning to crow early. I
+do believe that to please the boy I should have assented to it if it
+had not been for the Royal Commission.
+
+[Apropos of controversies (November 23)]
+
+We had a grand discussion at the Royal Society last night between
+Tyndall and Burdon Sanderson. The place was crammed, and we had a late
+sitting. I'm not sure, however, that we had got much further at the
+end than at the beginning, which is a way controversies have.
+
+[The following story is worth recording, as an illustration not only
+of the way in which Huxley would give what help was in his power to
+another man of science in distress, but of the ready aid proffered on
+this, as on many other occasions, by a wealthy northern merchant who
+was interested in science. A German scientific worker in England, whom
+we will call H., had fallen into distress, and applied to him for
+help, asking if some work could not be put in his way. Huxley could
+think of nothing immediate but to suggest some lessons in German
+literature to his children, though in fact they were well provided for
+with a German governess; nevertheless he thought it a proper occasion
+to avail himself of his friend's offer to give help in deserving
+cases. He writes to his wife:--]
+
+I made up my mind to write to X. the day before yesterday; this
+morning by return of post he sends me a cheque not only for the 60
+pounds which I said H. needed, but 5 pounds over for his present needs
+with a charming letter.
+
+It came in the nick of time, as H. came an hour or two after it
+arrived, and with many apologies told me he was quite penniless. The
+poor old fellow was quite overcome when I told him of how matters
+stood, and it was characteristic that as soon as he got his breath
+again, he wanted to know when he would begin teaching the children! I
+sent him to get an order on the Naples bank for discharge of his debt
+there. X.'s express stipulation was that his name should not be
+mentioned, so mind you say not a word about his most kind and generous
+act.
+
+[The following letters of miscellaneous interest were written in this
+year:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 21, 1877.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+I am always at the command of the "Fortnightly" so long as you are
+editor, but I don't think that the Belemnite business would do for
+you. [The lecture at the London Institution mentioned above.] The
+story would hardly be intelligible without illustrations.
+
+There are two things I am going to do which may be more to the
+purpose. One is a screed on Technical Education which I am going to
+give to the Working Men's Union on the 1st December.
+
+The other is a sort of Eloge on Harvey at the Royal Institution in
+March apropos of his 300th birthday--which was Allfools Day.
+
+You shall have either of these you like, but I advise Harvey; as if I
+succeed in doing what I shall aim at it will be interesting.
+
+Why the deuce do you live at Brighton? St. John's Wood is far less
+cockneyfied, and its fine and Alpine air would be much better for you,
+and I believe for Mrs. Morley, than the atmosphere of the melancholy
+main, the effects of which on the human constitution have been so well
+expounded by that eminent empiric, Dr. Dizzy.
+
+Anyhow, I wish we could see something of you now and then.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Darwin got his degree with great eclat on Saturday. I had to return
+thanks for his health at the dinner of the Philosophical Society; and
+oh! I chaffed the dons so sweetly.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., November 27, 1877.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+You shall have both the articles--if it is only that I may enjoy the
+innocent pleasure of Knowles' face when I let him know what has become
+of them. [The rival editor. Cp. above.]
+
+Stormy ocean, forsooth! I back the storm and rain through which I came
+home to-night against anything London-super-mare has to show.
+
+I will send the manuscript to Virtue as soon as it is in a reasonable
+state.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 8, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Many thanks for the cheque. In my humble judgment it is quite as much
+as the commodity is worth.
+
+It was a great pleasure to us all to have you with us on New Year's
+Day. My wife claims it as her day, and I am not supposed to know
+anything about the guests except Spencer and Tyndall. None but the
+very elect are invited to the sacred feast--so you see where you stand
+among the predestined who cannot fall away from the state of grace.
+
+I have not seen Spencer in such good form and good humour combined for
+an age.
+
+I am working away at Harvey, and will send the manuscript to Virtue's
+as soon as I am sufficiently forward.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 9, 1877.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I am so sorry to have been out when Mrs. Tyndall called to-day. By
+what we heard at the x on Thursday, I imagined you were practically
+all right again, or I should have been able to look after you to-day.
+
+But what I bother you with this note for is to beg you not to lecture
+at the London Institution to-morrow, but to let me change days with
+you, and so give yourself a week to recover. And if you are seedy,
+then I am quite ready to give them another lecture on the Hokypotamus
+or whatever else may turn up.
+
+But don't go and exert yourself in your present condition. These
+severe colds have often nothing very tangible about them, but are not
+to be trifled with when folks are past fifty.
+
+Let me have an answer to say that I may send a telegram to Nicholson
+first thing to-morrow morning to say that I will lecture vice you. My
+"bottled life," as Hutton calls it in the "Spectator" this week, is
+quite ready to go off. [The "Spectator" for December 8, 1877, began an
+article thus:--"Professor Huxley delivered a very amusing address last
+Saturday at the Society of Arts, on the very unpromising subject of
+technical education; but we believe that if Professor Huxley were to
+become the President of the Social Science Association, or of the
+International Statistical Congress, he would still be amusing, so much
+bottled life does he infuse into the driest topic on which human
+beings ever contrived to prose."]
+
+Now be a sane man and take my advice.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.10.
+
+1878.
+
+[The year 1878 was the tercentenary of Harvey's birth, and Huxley was
+very busy with the life and work of that great physician. He spoke at
+the memorial meeting at the College of Physicians (July 18), he gave a
+lecture on Harvey at the Royal Institution on January 25, afterwards
+published in "Nature" and the "Fortnightly Review," and intended to
+write a book on him in a projected "English Men of Science" series.
+(See below.)]
+
+I am very glad you like "Harvey" [he writes to Professor Baynes on
+February 11]. He is one of the biggest scientific minds we have had. I
+expect to get well vilipended not only by the anti-vivisection folk,
+for the most of whom I have a hearty contempt, but apropos of Bacon. I
+have been oppressed by the humbug of the "Baconian Induction" all my
+life, and at last THE WORM HAS TURNED.
+
+[Now in this lecture he showed that Harvey employed vivisection to
+establish the doctrine of the circulation of the blood, and
+furthermore, that he taught this doctrine before the "Novum Organum"
+was published, and that his subsequent "Exercitatio" displays no trace
+of being influenced by Bacon's work. After glancing at the
+superstitious reverence for the "Baconian Induction," he pointed out
+Bacon's ignorance of the progress of science up to his time, and his
+inability to divine the importance of what he knew by hearsay of the
+work of Copernicus, or Kepler, or Galileo; of Gilbert, his
+contemporary, or of Galen; and wound up by quoting Ellis's severe
+judgment of Bacon in the General Preface to the Philosophic Works, in
+Spedding's classical edition (page 38):--] "That his method is
+impracticable cannot, I think, be denied, if we reflect, not only that
+it never has produced any result, but also that the process by which
+scientific truths have been established cannot be so presented as even
+to appear to be in accordance with it."
+
+[How early this conviction had forced itself upon him, I cannot say;
+but it was certainly not later than 1859, when the "Origin of Species"
+was constantly met with "Oh, but this is contrary to the Baconian
+method." He had long felt what he expresses most clearly in the
+"Progress of Science" ("Collected Essays" 1 46-57), that Bacon's]
+"majestic eloquence and fervid vaticinations," [which] "drew the
+attention of all the world to the 'new birth of Time,'" [were yet, for
+all practical results on discovery,] "a magnificent failure." [The
+desire for "fruits" has not been the great motive of the discoverer;
+nor has discovery waited upon collective research.] "Those who refuse
+to go beyond fact," [he writes,] "rarely get as far as fact; and any
+one who has studied the history of science knows that almost every
+great step therein has been made by the 'anticipation of nature,' that
+is, by the invention of hypotheses, which, though verifiable, often
+had very little foundation to start with; and, not unfrequently, in
+spite of a long career of usefulness, turned out to be wholly
+erroneous in the long-run."
+
+[Thus he had been led to a settled disbelief in Bacon's scientific
+greatness, that reasoned "prejudice" against which Spedding himself
+was moved to write twice in defence of Bacon. In his first letter he
+criticised a passage in the lecture touching this question. On the one
+hand, he remarks, "Bacon would probably have agreed with you as to his
+pretensions as a scientific discoverer (he calls himself a bellman to
+call other wits together, or a trumpeter, or a maker of bricks for
+others to build with)." On the other hand, he asks, ought a passage
+from a fragment--the "Temporis partus masculus"--unpublished in
+Bacon's lifetime, to be treated as one of his representative opinions?
+
+In his second letter he adduces, on other grounds, his own more
+favourable impression of Bacon's philosophical influence. A peculiar
+interest of this letter lies in its testimony to the influence of
+Huxley's writings even on his elder contemporaries.
+
+From James Spedding.
+
+February 1, 1878.
+
+...When you admit that you study Bacon with a PREJUDICE, you mean of
+course an unfavourable opinion previously formed on sufficient
+grounds. Now I am myself supposed to have studied him with a prejudice
+the other way: but this I cannot admit, in any sense of the word; for
+when I first made his acquaintance I had no opinion or feeling about
+him at all--more than the ordinary expectation of a young man to find
+what he is told to look for. My earliest impression of his character
+came probably from Thomson--whose portrait of him, except as touched
+and softened by the tenderer hand of "the sweet-souled poet of the
+Seasons," did not differ from the ordinary one. It was not long indeed
+before I did begin to form an opinion of my own; one of those
+AFTER-judgments which are liable to be mistaken for prejudices by
+those who judge differently, and which, being formed, do, no doubt,
+tell upon the balance. For it was not long before I found myself
+indebted to him for the greatest benefit probably that any man, living
+or dead, can confer on another. In my school and college days I had
+been betrayed by an ambition to excel in themes and declamations into
+the study, admiration, and imitation of the rhetoricians. In the
+course of my last long vacation--the autumn of 1830--I was inspired
+with a new ambition, namely, to think justly about everything which I
+thought about at all, and to act accordingly; a conviction for which I
+cannot cease to feel grateful, and which I distinctly trace to the
+accident of having in the beginning of that same vacation given two
+shillings at a second-hand bookstall for a little volume of Dove's
+classics, containing the Advancement of Learning. And if I could tell
+you how many superlatives I have since that time degraded into the
+positive; how many innumerables and infinities I have replaced by
+counted numbers and estimated quantities; how many assumptions,
+important to the argument in hand, I have withdrawn because I found on
+more consideration that the fact might be explained otherwise; and how
+many effective epithets I have discarded when I found that I could not
+fully verify them; you would think it no less than just that I should
+claim for myself and concede to others the right of being judged by
+the last edition rather than the first. That a persistent endeavour to
+free myself from what you regard as Bacon's characteristic vice should
+have been the fruit of a desire to follow his example, will seem
+strange to you, but it is fact. Perhaps you will think it not less
+strange, but it is my real belief, that if your own writings had been
+in existence and come in my way at the same critical stage of my moral
+and mental development, they would have taught me the same lesson and
+inspired me with the same ambition; for in that particular (if I may
+say it without offence) I look upon you BOTH as eminent examples of
+the SAME virtue.
+
+To the lecture he refers once more in a letter to Mr. John Morley. The
+political situation touched on in this and the next letter is that of
+the end of the Russo-Turkish war and the beginning of the Afghan war.]
+
+Science Schools, South Kensington, February 7, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Many thanks for the cheque, and still more for your good word for the
+article. [On Harvey.] I knew it would "draw" Hutton, and his ingenuity
+has as usual made the best of the possibilities of attack. I am glad
+to find, however, that he does not think it expedient to reiterate his
+old story about the valuelessness of vivisection in the establishment
+of the doctrine of the circulation.
+
+I hear that that absurd creature R-- goes about declaring that I have
+made all sorts of blunders. Could not somebody be got to persuade him
+to put what he has to say in black and white?
+
+Controversy is as abhorrent to me as gin to a reclaimed drunkard; but
+oh dear! it would be so nice to squelch that pompous imposter.
+
+I hope you admire the late aspects of the British Lion. His tail goes
+up and down from the intercrural to the stiffly erect attitude per
+telegram, while his head is sunk in the windbag of the House of
+Commons.
+
+I am beginning to think that a war would be a good thing if only for
+the inevitable clean sweep of all the present governing people which
+it would bring about.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To his eldest daughter.]
+
+Science Schools, South Kensington, December 7, 1878.
+
+Dearest Jess,
+
+You are a badly used young person--you are; and nothing short of that
+conviction would get a letter out of your still worse used Pater, the
+bete noire of whose existence is letter-writing.
+
+Catch me discussing the Afghan question with you, you little pepper
+pot. No, not if I know it. Read Fitzjames Stephen's letter in the
+"Times," also Bartle Frere's memorandum, also Napier of Magdala's
+memo. Them's my sentiments.
+
+Also read the speech of Lord Hartington on the address. He is a man of
+sense like his father, and you will observe that he declares that the
+Government were perfectly within their right in declaring war without
+calling Parliament together...
+
+If you had lived as long as I have and seen as much of men, you would
+cease to be surprised at the reputations men of essentially
+commonplace powers--aided by circumstances and some amount of
+cleverness--obtain.
+
+I am as strong for justice as any one can be, but it is real justice,
+not sham conventional justice which the sentimentalists howl for.
+
+At this present time real justice requires that the power of England
+should be used to maintain order and introduce civilisation wherever
+that power extends.
+
+The Afghans are a pack of disorderly treacherous blood-thirsty thieves
+and caterans who should never have been allowed to escape from the
+heavy hand we laid upon them, after the massacre of twenty thousand of
+our men, women, and children in the Khoord Cabul Pass thirty years
+ago.
+
+We have let them be, and the consequence is they now lend themselves
+to the Russians, and are ready to stir up disorder and undo all the
+good we have been doing in India for the last generation.
+
+They are to India exactly what the Highlanders of Scotland were to the
+Lowlanders before 1745; and we have just as much right to deal with
+them in the same way.
+
+I am of opinion that our Indian Empire is a curse to us. But so long
+as we make up our minds to hold it, we must also make up our minds to
+do those things which are needful to hold it effectually, and in the
+long run it will be found that so doing is real justice both for
+ourselves, our subject population, and the Afghans themselves.
+
+There, you plague.
+
+Ever your affectionate Daddy,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A few days later he writes to his son:--]
+
+The Liberals are making fools of themselves, and "the family" declare
+I am becoming a Jingo! another speech from Gladstone is expected to
+complete my conversion.
+
+[Among other occupations he still had to attend the Scottish
+Universities Commission, for which he wrote the paragraph on
+examinations in its report; he lectured on the Hand at the Working
+Men's College; prepared new editions of the "Physiography,"
+"Elementary Physiology," and "Vertebrate Anatomy," and at length
+brought out the "Introductory Primer" in the Science Primer Series, in
+quite a different form from what he had originally sketched out. But
+his chief interest lay in the Invertebrata. From April 29 to June 3 he
+lectured to working men at Jermyn Street upon the Crayfish; read a
+paper on the Classification and Distribution of Crayfishes at the
+Zoological Society on June 4, and lectured at the Zoological Gardens
+weekly from May 17 to June 21 on Crustaceous Animals. In all this work
+lay the foundations of his subsequent book on the Crayfish, which I
+find jotted down in the notes of this year to be written as an
+introduction to "Zoology," together with the "Dog" as an introduction
+to the "Mammalia", and "Man"--already dealt with in "Man's Place in
+Nature"--as an introduction to "Anthropology." This projected series
+is completed with a half-erased note of an introduction to
+"Psychology," which perhaps found some expression in parts of the
+"Hume," also written this year.
+
+He notes down also, work on the Ascidians, and on the morphology of
+the Mollusca and Cephalopods brought back by the "Challenger," in
+connection with which he now began the monograph on the rare creature
+Spirula, a remarkable piece of work, being based upon the dissections
+of a single specimen, but destined never to be completed by his hand,
+though his drawings were actually engraved, and nothing remained but
+to put a few finishing touches and to write detailed descriptions of
+the plates.
+
+Letters to W.K. Parker and Professor Haeckel touch on this part of his
+work; the former, indeed, offering a close parallel to a story,
+obviously of the same period, which the younger Parker tells in his
+reminiscences, to illustrate the way in which he would be utterly
+engrossed in a subject for the time being. Jeffery Parker, while
+demonstrator of biology, came to him with a question about the brain
+of the codfish at a time when he was deep in the investigation of some
+invertebrate group.] "Codfish?" [he replied,] "that's a vertebrate,
+isn't it? Ask me a fortnight hence, and I'll consider it."
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 25, 1878.
+
+My dear Parker,
+
+As far as I recollect Ammocoetes is a vertebrated animal--and I ignore
+it.
+
+The paper you refer to was written by my best friend--a carefulish
+kind of man--and I am as sure that he saw what he says he saw, as if I
+had seen it myself.
+
+But what the fact may mean and whether it is temporary or
+permanent--is thy servant a dog that he should worry himself about
+other things with backbones? Not if I know it.
+
+Churchill has got over a whole batch of the American edition of the
+Vertebrata, so I have a respite. Mollusks are far more
+interesting--bugs sweeter--while the dinner crayfish hath no parallel
+for intense and absorbing interest in the three kingdoms of Nature.
+
+What saith the Scripture? "Go to the ANT thou sluggard." In other
+words, study the Invertebrata.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Sketch of a vast winged ant advancing on a midget, and saying, as it
+looks through a pair of eyeglasses, "Well, really, what an absurd
+creature!!"]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, April 28, 1878.
+
+My dear Haeckel,
+
+Since the receipt of your letter three months ago, I have been making
+many inquiries about Medusae for you, but I could hear of none--and so
+I have delayed my reply, until I doubt not you have been blaspheming
+my apparent neglect.
+
+My "Sammlung"!! [Collection.] My dear friend, my cabin on board H.M.S.
+"Rattlesnake" was 7 feet long, 6 feet wide, and 5 feet 6 inches high.
+When my bed and my clothes were in it, there was not much room for any
+collection, except the voluntary one made by some thousands of
+specimens of Blatta orientalis [The cockroach.], with whose presence I
+should have been very glad to dispense.
+
+My Medusae were never published. I have heaps of notes and drawings
+and half-a-dozen engraved plates. But after the publication of the
+"Oceanic Hydrozoa" I was obliged to take to quite other occupations,
+and all that material is like the "full many a flower, born to blush
+unseen," of our poet.
+
+If you would pay us a visit you should look through the whole mass, if
+you liked, and you might find something interesting.
+
+At present, I am very busy about Crayfishes (Flusskrebse), working out
+the relations between their structure and their Geographical
+Distribution, which are very curious and interesting.
+
+I have also nearly finished the anatomy of Spirula for the
+"Challenger." It is essentially a cuttlefish, and the shell is really
+internal. With only one specimen, it has been a long and troublesome
+job--but I shall establish all the essential points and give
+half-a-dozen plates of anatomy.
+
+You will recollect my eldest little daughter? She is going to be
+married next Saturday. It is the first break in our family, and we are
+very sad to lose her--though well satisfied with her prospects. She is
+but just twenty and a charming girl, though you may put that down to
+fatherly partiality if you like.
+
+The second daughter has taken to art, and will make a painter if she
+be wise enough not to marry for some years.
+
+My eldest son who comes next is taller than I am. He has been at one
+of the Scotch Universities for the last six months; and one of these
+fine days, next month, you will see a fair-haired stripling asking for
+Herr Professor Haeckel.
+
+I am going to send him to Jena for three months to pick up your noble
+vernacular; and in the meanwhile to continue his Greek and
+Mathematics, in which the young gentleman is fairly proficient. If you
+can recommend any Professor under whom he can carry on his studies, it
+will be a great kindness.
+
+I will give him a letter to you, and while I beg you not to give
+yourself any trouble about him, I need not say I shall be very
+grateful for any notice you may take of him.
+
+I am giving him as much independence of action as possible, in order
+that he may learn to take care of himself.
+
+Now that is enough about my children. Yours must yet be young--and you
+have not yet got to the marriage and university stage--which I assure
+you is much more troublesome than the measles and chicken-pox period.
+
+My wife unites with me in kindest remembrances and good wishes.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[An outbreak of diphtheria among his children made the spring of 1878
+a time of overwhelming anxiety. How it told upon his strong and
+self-contained chief is related by T.J. Parker--"I never saw a man
+more crushed than he was during the dangerous illness of one of his
+daughters, and he told me that, having then to make an after-dinner
+speech, he broke down for the first time in his life, and for one
+painful moment forgot where he was and what he had to say." This was
+one of the few occasions of his absence from College during the
+seventies. "When, after two days, he looked in at the laboratory,"
+writes Professor Howes, "his dejected countenance and tired expression
+betokened only too plainly the intense anxiety he had undergone."
+
+The history of the outbreak was very instructive. Huxley took a
+leading part in organising an inquiry and in looking into the matter
+with the health officer.] "As soon as I can get all the facts
+together," [he writes on December 10,] "I am going to make a great
+turmoil about our outbreak of diphtheria--and see whether I cannot get
+our happy-go-lucky local government mended." [As usual, the epidemic
+was due to culpable negligence. In the construction of some drains,
+too small a pipe was laid down. The sewage could not escape, and
+flooded back in a low-lying part of Kilburn. Diphtheria soon broke out
+close by. While it was raging there, a St. John's Wood dairyman
+running short of milk, sent for more to an infected dairy in Kilburn.
+Every house which he supplied that day with Kilburn milk was attacked
+with diphtheria.
+
+But with relief from this heavy strain, his spirits instantly revived,
+and he writes to Tyndall.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 20, 1878.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I wrote you a most downhearted letter this morning about Madge, and
+not without reason. But having been away four hours, I come home to
+find a wonderful and blessed change. The fever has abated and she is
+looking like herself. If she could only make herself heard, I should
+have some sauciness. I see it in her eyes.
+
+If you will be so kind as to kiss everybody you meet on my account it
+will be a satisfaction to me. You may begin with Mrs. Tyndall!
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Professor Marsh, with whom Huxley had stayed at Yale College in 1876,
+paid his promised visit to England immediately after this.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., June 24, 1878 (Evening).
+
+My dear Marsh,
+
+Welcome to England! I am delighted to hear of your arrival--but the
+news has only just reached me, as I have been away since Saturday with
+my wife and sick daughter who are at the seaside. A great deal has
+happened to us in the last six or seven weeks. My eldest daughter
+married, and then a week after an invasion of diphtheria, which struck
+down my eldest son, my youngest daughter, and my eldest remaining
+daughter altogether. Two of the cases were light, but my poor Madge
+suffered terribly, and for some ten days we were in sickening anxiety
+about her. She is slowly gaining strength now, and I hope there is no
+more cause for alarm--but my household is all to pieces--the Lares and
+Penates gone, and painters and disinfectors in their places.
+
+You will certainly have to run down to Margate and see my wife--or
+never expect forgiveness in this world.
+
+I shall be at the Science Schools, South Kensington, to-morrow till
+four--and if I do not see you before that time I shall come and look
+you up at the Palace Hotel.
+
+I am, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+"Is it not provoking," [he writes to his wife,] "that we should all be
+dislocated when I should have been so glad to show him a little
+attention?" [Still, apart from this weekend at the seaside, Professor
+Marsh was not entirely neglected. He writes in his "Recollections"
+(page 6):--
+
+How kind Huxley was to everyone who could claim his friendship, I have
+good cause to know. Of the many instances which occur to me, one will
+suffice. One evening in London at a grand annual reception of the
+Royal Academy, where celebrities of every rank were present, Huxley
+said to me,] "When I was in America, you showed me every extinct
+animal that I had read about, or even dreamt of. Now, if there is a
+single living lion in all Great Britain that you wish to see, I will
+show him to you in five minutes." [He kept his promise, and before the
+reception was over, I had met many of the most noted men in England,
+and from that evening, I can date a large number of acquaintances, who
+have made my subsequent visits to that country an ever-increasing
+pleasure.
+
+As for his summer occupations, he writes to his eldest daughter on
+July 2:--]
+
+No, young woman, you don't catch me attending any congresses I can
+avoid, not even if F. is an artful committee-man. I must go to the
+British Association at Dublin--for my sins--and after that we have
+promised to pay a visit in Ireland to Sir Victor Brooke. After that I
+must settle myself down in Penmaenmawr and write a little book about
+David Hume--before the grindery of the winter begins.
+
+[The meeting of the British Association took place this year in the
+third week of August at Dublin. Huxley gave an address in the
+Anthropological subsection ("Informal Remarks on the Conclusions of
+Anthropology" "British Association Report" 1878 pages 573-578.), and
+on the 20th received the honorary degree of LL.D. from Dublin
+University, the Public Orator presenting him in the following words:--
+
+Praesento vobis Thomam Henricum Huxley--hominem vere physicum--hominem
+facundum, lepidum, venustum--eundem autem nihil (philosophia modo sua
+lucem praeferat) reformidantem--ne illud quidem Ennianum,
+
+Simia quam similis, turpissima bestia, nobis.
+
+The extract above given contains the first reference to the book on
+Hume (In the "English Men of Letters" series, edited by Mr. John
+Morley.), written this summer as a holiday occupation at Penmaenmawr.
+The speed at which it was composed is remarkable, even allowing for
+his close knowledge of the subject, acquired many years before. Though
+he had been "picking at it" earlier in the summer, the whole of the
+philosophical part was written during September, leaving the
+biographical part to be done later.
+
+The following letters from Marlborough Place show him at work upon the
+book:--]
+
+March 31, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+I like the notion of undertaking your Hume book, and I don't see why I
+should not get it done this autumn. But you must not consider me
+pledged on that point, as I cannot quite command my time.
+
+Tulloch sent me his book on Pascal. It was interesting as everything
+about Pascal must be, but Tulloch is not a model of style.
+
+I have looked into Bruton's book, but I shall now get it and study it.
+Hume's correspondence with Rousseau seems to me typical of the man's
+sweet, easy-going nature. Do you mean to have a portrait of each of
+your men? I think it is a great comfort in a biography to get a notion
+of the subject in the flesh.
+
+I have rather made it a rule not to part with my property in my
+books--but I daresay that can be arranged with Macmillan. Anyhow I
+shall be content to abide by the general arrangement if you have made
+one.
+
+We have had a bad evening. Clifford has been here, and he is extremely
+ill--in fact I fear the worst for him. [See below.]
+
+It is a thousand pities, for he has a fine nature all round, and time
+would have ripened him into something very considerable. We are all
+very fond of him.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+July 6, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Very many thanks for Diderot. I have made a plunge into the first
+volume and found it very interesting. I wish you had put a portrait of
+him as a frontispiece. I have seen one--a wonderful face, something
+like Goethe's.
+
+I am picking at Hume at odd times. It seems to me that I had better
+make an analysis and criticism of the "Inquiry," the backbone of the
+essay--as it touches all the problems which interest us most just now.
+I have already sketched out a chapter on Miracles, which will, I hope,
+be very edifying in consequence of its entire agreement with the
+orthodox arguments against Hume's a priori reasonings against
+miracles.
+
+Hume wasn't half a sceptic after all. And so long as he got deep
+enough to worry Orthodoxy, he did not care to go to the bottom of
+things.
+
+He failed to see the importance of suggestions already made both by
+Locke and Berkeley.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+September 30, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Praise me! I have been hard at work at Hume at Penmaenmawr, and I have
+got the hard part of the business--the account of his
+philosophy--blocked out in the bodily shape of about 180 pages
+foolscap manuscript.
+
+But I find the job as tough as it is interesting. Hume's diamonds,
+before the public can see them properly, want a proper setting in a
+methodical and consistent shape--and that implies writing a small
+psychological treatise of one's own, and then cutting it down into as
+unobtrusive a form as possible.
+
+So I am working away at my draft--from the point of view of an
+aesthetic jeweller.
+
+As soon as I get it into such a condition as will need only verbal
+trimming, I should like to have it set up in type. For it is a defect
+of mine that I can never judge properly of any composition of my own
+in manuscript.
+
+Moreover (don't swear at this wish) I should very much like to send it
+to you in that shape for criticism.
+
+The Life will be an easy business. I should like to get the book out
+of hand before Christmas, and will do so if possible. But my lectures
+begin on Tuesday, and I cannot promise.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+October 21, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+I have received slips up to chapter 9 of Hume, and so far I do not
+think (saving your critical presence) that there will be much need of
+much modification or interpolation.
+
+I have made all my citations from a 4-volume edition of Hume,
+published by Black and Tait in 1826, which has long been in my
+possession.
+
+Do you think I ought to quote Green and Grose's edition? It will be a
+great bother, and I really don't think that the understanding of Hume
+is improved by going back to eighteenth-century spelling.
+
+I am at work upon the Life, which should not take long. But I wish
+that I had polished that off at Penmaenmawr as well. What with
+lecturing five days a week, and toiling at two anatomical monographs,
+it is hard to find time.
+
+As soon as I have gone through all the eleven chapters about the
+Philosophy--I will send them to you and get you to come and dine some
+day--after you have looked at them--and go into it.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Science Schools, South Kensington, October 29, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+Your letter has given me great pleasure. For though I have thoroughly
+enjoyed the work, and seemed to myself to have got at the heart of
+Hume's way of thinking, I could not tell how it would appear to
+others, still less could I pretend to judge of the literary form of
+what I had written. And as I was quite prepared to accept your
+judgment if it had been unfavourable, so being what it is, I hug
+myself proportionately and begin to give myself airs as a man of
+letters.
+
+I am through all the interesting part of Hume's life--that is, the
+struggling part of it--and David the successful and the feted begins
+rather to bore me, as I am sorry to say most successful people do. I
+hope to send the first chapter to press in another week.
+
+Might it not be better, by the way, to divide the little book into two
+parts?
+
+Part 1.--Life, Literary and Political work,
+Part 2.--Philosophy,
+
+subdividing the latter into chapters or sections? please tell me what
+you think.
+
+I have not received the last chapter from the printer yet. When I do I
+will finish revising, and then ask you to come and have a symposium
+over it.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+P.S.--Macmillan has a lien on "The Hand." I gave part of the lecture
+in another shape at Glasgow two years ago and M. had it reported for
+his magazine. If he is good and patient he will get it in some shape
+some day!
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., November 5, 1878.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+"Davie's" philosophy is now all in print, and all but a few final
+pages of his biography.
+
+So I think the time has come when that little critical symposium may
+take place.
+
+Can you come and dine on Tuesday next (12) at 7? Or if any day except
+Wednesday 15th, next week, will suit you better, it will do just as
+well for me. There will be nobody but my wife and daughters, so don't
+dress.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+P.S.--Will you be disgusted if in imitation of the "English Men of
+Letters" I set agoing an "English Men of Science." Few people have any
+conception of the part Englishmen have played in science, and I think
+it would be both useful and interesting to bring the truth home to the
+English mind.
+
+I had about three thousand people to hear me on Saturday at
+Manchester, and it would have done you good to hear how they cheered
+at my allusion to personal rule. I had to stop and let them ease their
+souls.
+
+Behold my P.S. is longer than my letter. It's the strong feminine
+element in my character oozing out. "Desinit in piscem" though, and a
+mighty queer fish too.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 12, 1879.
+
+Dear Lecky,
+
+I am very much obliged for your suggestion about the note at page 9. I
+am ashamed to say that though the eleven day correction was familiar
+enough to me, I had never thought about the shifting of the beginning
+of the year till you mentioned it. It is a law of nature, I believe,
+that when a man says what he need not say he is sure to blunder. The
+note shall go out.
+
+All I know about Sprat is as the author of a dull history of the Royal
+Society, so I was surprised to meet with Hume's estimate of him.
+
+No doubt about the general hatred of the Scotch, but you will observe
+that I make Millar responsible for the peace-making assurance.
+
+What you said to me in conversation some time ago led me to look at
+Hume's position as a moralist with some care, and I quoted the passage
+at page 206 that no doubt might be left on the matter.
+
+The little book threatened to grow to an undue length, and therefore
+the question of morals is treated more briefly than was perhaps
+desirable.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Early in November I find the first reference to a proposed, but never
+completed, "English Men of Science" series in the letter to Mr. Morley
+above. The following letters, especially those to Sir H. Roscoe, with
+whom he was concerting the series, give some idea of its scope:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 10, 1878.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+You will think that I have broken out into letter-writing in a very
+unwonted fashion, but I forgot half of what I had to say this morning.
+
+After a good deal of consultation with Macmillans, who were anxious
+that the "English Men of Science" series should not be too extensive,
+I have arranged the books as follows:--
+
+1. Roger Bacon.
+
+2. Harvey and the Physiologists of the 17th century.
+
+3. Robert Boyle and the Royal Society.
+
+4. Isaac Newton.
+
+5. Charles Darwin.
+
+6. English Physicists, Gilbert, Young, Faraday, Joule.
+
+7. English Chemists, Black, Priestley, Cavendish, Davy, Dalton.
+
+8. English Physiologists and Zoologists of the 18th century, Hunter,
+etc.
+
+9. English Botanists, Ray, Crew, Hales, Brown.
+
+10. English Geologists, Hutton, Smith, Lyell.
+
+We may throw in the astronomers if the thing goes.
+
+Green of Leeds will undertake 10; Dyer, with Hooker's aid, 9; M.
+Foster eight and I look to you for 7.
+
+Tyndall has half promised to do Boyle, and I hope he will.
+Clerk-Maxwell can't undertake Newton, and hints X. But I won't have
+X.--he is too much of a bolter to go into the tandem. I am thinking of
+asking Moulton, who is strongly recommended by Spottiswoode, and is a
+very able fellow, likely to put his strength into it.
+
+Do you know anything about Chrystal of St. Andrews? [Now Professor of
+Mathematics at Edinburgh.] I forget whether I asked you before. From
+all I hear of him I expect he would do Number 6 very well. I have
+written to Adamson by this post.
+
+I shall get off with Harvey and Darwin to my share.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 26, 1878.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+I was very loth to lump the chemists together, but Max was very strong
+about not having too many books in the series; and on the other hand,
+I had my doubts how far the chemists were capable of "dissociation"
+without making the book too technical.
+
+But I do not regard the present arrangement as unalterable, and if you
+think the early chemists and the later chemists would do better in two
+separate groups, the matter is quite open to consideration.
+
+Maxwell says he is overdone with work already, and altogether declines
+to take anything new. I shall have to look about me for a man to do
+the Physikers.
+
+Of course Adamson will have to take in a view of the science of the
+Middle Ages. That will be one of the most interesting parts of the
+book, and I hope he will do it well. I suppose he knows his Dante.
+
+The final cause of boys is to catch something or other. I trust that
+yours is demeasling himself properly.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 1878.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I consider your saying the other evening that you would see "any one
+else d--d first," before you would assent to the little proposal I
+made to you, as the most distinct and binding acceptance you are
+capable of. You have nothing else to swear by, and so you swear at
+everybody but me when you want to pledge yourself.
+
+It will release me of an immense difficulty if you will undertake R.
+Boyle and the Royal Society (which of course includes Hooke); and the
+subject is a capital one.
+
+The book should not exceed about 200 pages, and you need not be ready
+before this time next year. There could not be a more refreshing piece
+of work just to enliven the dolce far niente of the Bel Alp. (That is
+quite a la Knowles, and I begin to think I have some faculty as an
+editor.)
+
+Settle your own terms with Macmillan. They will be as joyful as I
+shall be to know you are going to take part in the enterprise.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 31, 1878.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I would sooner have your Boyle, however long we may have to wait for
+it, than anybody else's d--d simmer. (Now that's a "goak," and you
+must ask Mrs. Tyndall to explain it to you.)
+
+Two years will I give you from this blessed New Year's eve, 1878, and
+if it isn't done on New Year's Day 1881 you shall not be admitted to
+the company of the blessed, but your dinner shall be sent to you
+between two plates to the most pestiferous corner of the laboratory of
+the Royal Institution. I am very glad you will undertake the job, and
+feel that I have a proper New Year's gift.
+
+By the way, you ought to have had Hume ere this. Macmillan sent me two
+or three copies, just to keep his word, on Christmas Day, and I
+thought I should have a lot more at once.
+
+But there is no sign--not even an advertisement--and I don't know what
+has become of the edition. Perhaps the bishops have bought it up.
+
+With all good wishes,
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Two letters--both to Tyndall--show his solicitude for his friends.
+The one speaks of a last and unavailing attempt made by W.K.
+Clifford's friends to save his life by sending him on a voyage (he
+died not long after at Madeira); the other urges Tyndall himself to be
+careful of his health.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, April 2, 1878.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+We had a sort of council about Clifford at Clark's house yesterday
+morning--H. Thompson, Corfield, Payne, Pollock, and myself, and I am
+sure you will be glad to hear the result.
+
+From the full statement of the nature of his case made by Clark and
+Corfield, it appears that though grave enough in all conscience, it is
+not so bad as it might be, and that there is a chance, I might almost
+say a fair chance, for him yet. It appears that the lung mischief has
+never gone so far as the formation of a cavity, and that it is at
+present quiescent, and no other organic disease discoverable. The
+alarming symptom is a general prostration--very sadly obvious when he
+was with us on Sunday--which, as I understand, rather renders him
+specially obnoxious to a sudden and rapid development of the lung
+disease than is itself to be feared.
+
+It was agreed that they should go at once to Gibraltar by the P. and
+O., and report progress when he gets there. If strong enough he is to
+go on a cruise round the Mediterranean, and if he improves by this he
+is to go away for a year to Bogota (in South America), which appears
+to be a favourable climate for such cases as his.
+
+If he gets worse he can but return. I have done my best to impress
+upon him and his wife the necessity of extreme care, and I hope they
+will be wise.
+
+It is very pleasant to find how good and cordial everybody is, helpful
+in word and deed to the poor young people. I know it will rejoice the
+cockles of your generous old heart to hear it.
+
+As for yourself, I trust you are mending and allowing yourself to be
+taken care of by your household goddess.
+
+With our united love to her and yourself,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I sent your cheque to Yeo.
+
+May, 1878.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+You were very much wanted on Saturday, as your wife will have told
+you, but for all that I would not have had you come on any account.
+You want a thorough long rest and freedom from excitement of all
+sorts, and I am rejoiced to hear that you are going out of the
+hurly-burly of London as soon as possible; and, not to be uncivil, I
+do hope you will stay away as long as possible, and not be deluded
+into taking up anything exciting as soon as you feel lively again
+among your mountains.
+
+Pray give up Dublin. If you don't, I declare I will try if I have
+enough influence with the council to get you turned out of your office
+of Lecturer, and superseded.
+
+Do seriously consider this, as you will be undoing the good results of
+your summer's rest. I believe your heart is as sound as your watch was
+when you went on your memorable slide [On the Piz Morteratsch; "Hours
+of Exercise in the Alps" by J. Tyndall chapter 19.], but if you go
+slithering down avalanches of work and worry you can't always expect
+to pick up "the little creature" none the worse. The apparatus is by
+one of the best makers, but it has been some years in use, and can't
+be expected to stand rough work.
+
+You will be glad to hear that we had cheerier news of Clifford on
+Saturday. He was distinctly better, and setting out on his
+Mediterranean voyage.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A birthday letter to his son concludes the year:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 10, 1878.
+
+Your mother reminds me that to-morrow is your eighteenth birthday, and
+though I know that my "happy returns" will reach you a few hours too
+late, I cannot but send them.
+
+You are touching manhood now, my dear laddie, and I trust that as a
+man your mother and I may always find reason to regard you as we have
+done throughout your boyhood.
+
+The great thing in the world is not so much to seek happiness as to
+earn peace and self-respect. I have not troubled you much with
+paternal didactics--but that bit is "ower true" and worth thinking
+over.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.11.
+
+1879.
+
+[Much of the work noted down for 1878 reappears in my father's list
+for 1879. He was still at work upon, or meditating his Crayfish, his
+Introduction to Psychology, the Spirula Memoir, and a new edition of
+the Elementary Physiology. Professor H.N. Martin writes about the
+changes necessary for adapting the "Practical Biology" to American
+needs; the article on Harvey was waiting to be put into permanent
+form. Besides giving an address at the Working Men's College, he
+lectured on Sensation and the Uniformity of the Sensiferous Organs
+("Collected Essays" 6.), at the Royal Institution, Friday evening,
+March 7; and on Snakes, both at the Zoological Gardens, June 5, and at
+the London Institution, December 1. On February 3 he read a paper at
+the Royal Society on "The Characters of the Pelvis in the Mammalia,
+and the Conclusions respecting the Origin of Mammals which may be
+based on them"; and published in "Nature" for November 6 a paper on
+"Certain Errors Respecting the Structure of the Heart, attributed to
+Aristotle."
+
+Great interest attaches to this paper. He had always wondered how
+Aristotle, in dissecting a heart, had come to assert that it contained
+only three chambers; and the desire to see for himself what stood in
+the original, uncommented on by translators who were not themselves
+anatomists, was one of the chief reasons (I think the wish to read the
+Greek Testament in the original was another) which operated in making
+him take up the study of Greek late in middle life. His practice was
+to read in his book until he had come to ten new words; these he
+looked out, parsed, and wrote down together with their chief
+derivatives. This was his daily portion.
+
+When at last he grappled with the passage in question, he found that
+Aristotle had correctly described what he saw under the special
+conditions of his dissection, when the right auricle actually appears
+as he described it, an enlargement of the "great vein." So that this,
+at least, ought to be removed from the list of Aristotle's errors. The
+same is shown to be the case with his statements about respiration.
+His own estimate of Aristotle as a physiologist is between the
+panegyric of Cuvier and the depreciation of Lewes: "he carried science
+a step beyond the point at which he found it; a meritorious, but not a
+miraculous, achievement." And it will interest scholars to know that
+from his own experience as a lecturer, Huxley was inclined to favour
+the theory that the original manuscripts of the "Historia Animalium,"
+with their mingled accuracy and absurdity, were notes taken by some of
+his students. This essay was reprinted in "Science and Culture" page
+180.
+
+This year he brought out his second volume of essays on various
+subjects, written from 1870 to 1878, under the title of "Critiques and
+Addresses," and later in the year, his long-delayed and now entirely
+recast "Introductory Primer" in the Science Primer Series.]
+
+6 Barnepark Terrace, Teignmouth, September 12, 1879.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+I send you by this post my long-promised Primer, and a like set of
+sheets goes to Stewart. [Balfour Stewart, Professor of Natural
+Philosophy in Owens College, Manchester.]
+
+You will see that it is quite different from my first sketch, Geikie's
+primer having cut me out of that line--but _I_ think it much better.
+
+You will see that the idea is to develop Science out of common
+observation, and to lead up to Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and
+Psychology.
+
+I want the thing to be good as far as it goes, so don't spare
+criticism.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Best remembrances from us all, which we are jolly.
+
+[To his other duties he now added that of a Governor of Eton College,
+a post which he held till 1888, when, after doing what he could to
+advance progressive ideas of education, and in particular, getting a
+scheme adopted for making drawing part of the regular curriculum,
+ill-health compelled him to resign.]
+
+As for other pressure of work [he writes to Dr. Dohrn, February 16],
+with the exception of the Zoological Society, I never have anything to
+do with the affairs of any society but the Royal now--I find the
+latter takes up all my disposable time...Take comfort from me. I find
+53 to be a very youthful period of existence. I have been better
+physically, and worked harder mentally, this last twelve month than in
+any year of my life. So a mere boy, not yet 40 like you, may look to
+the future hopefully.
+
+[From about this time dates the inception of a short-lived society, to
+be called the Association of Liberal Thinkers. It had first taken
+shape in the course of a conversation at Professor W.K. Clifford's
+house; the chief promoter and organiser being a well-known Theistic
+preacher, while on the council were men of science, critics, and
+scholars in various branches of learning. Huxley was chosen President,
+and the first meeting of officers and council took place at his house
+on January 25.
+
+Professor G.J. Romanes was asked to join, but refused on the ground
+that even if the negations which he supposed the society would
+promulgate, were true, it was not expedient to offer them to the
+multitude. To this Huxley wrote the following reply (January 2,
+1879):--]
+
+Many thanks for your letter. I think it is desirable to explain that
+our Society is by no means intended to constitute a propaganda of
+negations, but rather to serve as a centre of free thought.
+
+Of course I have not a word to say in respect of your decision. I
+quite appreciate your view of the matter, though it is diametrically
+opposed to my own conviction that the more rapidly truth is spread
+among mankind the better it will be for them.
+
+Only let us be sure that it is truth.
+
+[However, a course of action was proposed which by no means commended
+itself to several members of the council. Tyndall begs Huxley "not to
+commit us to a venture of the kind unless you see clearly that it
+meets a public need, and that it will be worked by able men," and on
+February 6 the latter writes:--]
+
+After careful consideration of the whole circumstances of the case, I
+have definitely arrived at the conclusion that it is not expedient to
+go on with the undertaking.
+
+I therefore resign my Presidency, and I will ask you to be so good as
+to intimate my withdrawal from the association to my colleagues.
+
+[In spite of having long ago "burned his ships" with regard to both
+the great Universities, Huxley was agreeably surprised by a new sign
+of the times from Cambridge. The University now followed up its
+recognition of Darwin two years before, by offering Huxley an honorary
+degree, an event of which he wrote to Professor Baynes on June 9:--]
+
+I shall be glorious in a red gown at Cambridge to-morrow, and
+hereafter look to be treated as a PERSON OF RESPECTABILITY.
+
+I have done my best to avoid that misfortune, but it's of no use.
+
+[A curious coincidence occurred here. Mr. Sandys, the public orator,
+in his speech presenting him for the degree, picked out one of his
+characteristics for description in the Horatian phrase, "Propositi
+tenax." Now this was the family motto; and Huxley wrote to point out
+the coincidence. (The speech delivered by the public orator on this
+occasion (June 10, 1879) ran as follows:--Academi inter silvas qui
+verum quaerunt, non modo ipsi veritatis lumine vitam hanc umbratilem
+illustrare conantur, sed illustrissimum quemque veritatis
+investigatorem aliunde delatum ea qua par est comitate excipiunt.
+Adest vir cui in veritate exploranda ampla sane provincia contigit,
+qui sive in animantium sive in arborum et herbarum genere quicquid
+vivit investigat, ipsum illud vivere quid sit, quali ex origine natum
+sit; qui exquirit quae cognationis necessitudo inter priores illas
+viventium species et has quae etiam nunc supersunt, intercedat. Olim
+in Oceano Australi, ubi rectis "oculis monstra natantia" vidit,
+victoriam prope primam, velut alter Perseus, a Medusa reportavit;
+varias deinceps animantium formas quasi ab ipsa Gorgone in saxum
+versas sagacitate singulari explicavit; vitae denique universae
+explorandae vitam suam totam dedicavit. Physicorum inter principes diu
+honoratus, idem (ut verbum mutuemur a Cartesio illo cujus laudes ipse
+in hac urbe quondam praedicavit) etiam "metaphysica" honore debito
+prosecutus est. Illum demum liberaliter educatum esse existimat qui
+cum ceteris animi et corporis dotibus instructus sit, tum praesertim
+quicquid turpe sit oderit, quicquid sive in arte sive in rerum natura
+pulchrum sit diligat; neque tamen ipse (ut ait Aristotles) "animalium
+parum pulchorum contemplationem fastidio puerili reformidat"; sed in
+perpetua animantium serie hominis vestigia perscrutari conatus, satis
+ampla liberalitate in universa rerum natura "humani nihil a se alienum
+putat." Duco ad vos virum intrepidum, facundum, propositi tenacem,
+Thomam Henricum Huxley.)]
+
+Science and Art Department, South Kensington, June 11, 1879.
+
+My dear Mr. Sandys,
+
+I beg your acceptance of the inclosed photograph, which is certainly
+the best ever executed of me.
+
+And by way of a memento of the claim which you established not only to
+the eloquence but also the insight of a prophet, I have added an
+impression of the seal with "Tenax propositi" writ plain, if not
+large. As I mentioned to you, it belonged to my eldest brother, who
+has been dead for many years. I trust that the Heralds' College may be
+as well satisfied as he was about his right to the coat of arms and
+crest.
+
+My own genealogical inquiries have taken me so far back that I confess
+the later stages do not interest me.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The British Association met at Sheffield in 1879, and Huxley took
+this occasion to "eat the leek" in the matter of Bathybius (see volume
+1). It must be remembered that his original interpretation of the
+phenomenon did not involve any new theory of the origin of life, and
+was not put forward because of its supposed harmony with Darwin's
+speculations.] ("That which interested me in the matter was the
+apparent analogy of Bathybius with other well-known forms of lower
+life, such as the plasmodia of the Myxomycetes and the Rhizopods.
+Speculative hopes or fears had nothing to do with the matter; and if
+Bathybius were brought up alive from the bottom of the Atlantic
+to-morrow, the fact would not have the slightest bearing, that I can
+discern, upon Mr. Darwin's speculations, or upon any of the disputed
+problems of biology. It would merely be one elementary organism the
+more added to the thousands already known.") [("Collected Essays 5
+154.)
+
+In supporting a vote of thanks to Dr. Allman, the President, for his
+address, he said (see "Nature" August 28, 1879):--]
+
+I will ask you to allow me to say one word rather upon my own account,
+in order to prevent a misconception which, I think, might arise, and
+which I should regret if it did arise. I daresay that no one in this
+room, who has attained middle life, has been so fortunate as to reach
+that age without being obliged, now and then, to look back upon some
+acquaintance, or, it may be, intimate ally of his youth, who has not
+quite verified the promises of that youth. Nay, let us suppose he has
+done quite the reverse, and has become a very questionable sort of
+character, and a person whose acquaintance does not seem quite so
+desirable as it was in those young days; his way and yours have
+separated; you have not heard much about him; but eminently
+trustworthy persons have assured you he has done this, that, or the
+other; and is more or less of a black sheep, in fact. The President,
+in an early part of his address, alluded to a certain thing--I hardly
+know whether I ought to call it a thing or not--of which he gave you
+the name Bathybius, and he stated, with perfect justice, that I had
+brought that thing into notice; at any rate, indeed, I christened it,
+and I am, in a certain sense, its earliest friend. For some time after
+that interesting Bathybius was launched into the world, a number of
+admirable persons took the little thing by the hand, and made very
+much of it, and as the President was good enough to tell you, I am
+glad to be able to repeat and verify all the statements, as a matter
+of fact, which I had ventured to make about it. And so things went on,
+and I thought my young friend Bathybius would turn out a credit to me.
+But I am sorry to say, as time has gone on, he has not altogether
+verified the promise of his youth.
+
+In the first place, as the President told you, he could not be found
+when he was wanted; and in the second place, when he was found, all
+sorts of things were said about him. Indeed, I regret to be obliged to
+tell you that some persons of severe minds went so far as to say that
+he was nothing but simply a gelatinous precipitate of slime, which had
+carried down organic matter. If that is so, I am very sorry for it,
+for whoever may have joined in this error, I am undoubtedly primarily
+responsible for it. But I do not know at the present time of my own
+knowledge how the matter stands. Nothing would please me more than to
+investigate the matter afresh in the way it ought to be investigated,
+but that would require a voyage of some time, and the investigation of
+this thing in its native haunts is a kind of work for which, for many
+years past, I have had no opportunity, and which I do not think I am
+very likely to enjoy again. Therefore my own judgment is in an
+absolute state of suspension about it. I can only assure you what has
+been said about this friend of mine, but I cannot say whether what is
+said is justified or not. But I feel very happy about the matter.
+There is one thing about us men of science, and that is, no one who
+has the greatest prejudice against science can venture to say that we
+ever endeavour to conceal each other's mistakes. And, therefore, I
+rest in the most entire and complete confidence that if this should
+happen to be a blunder of mine, some day or other it will be carefully
+exposed by somebody. But pray let me remind you whether all this story
+about Bathybius be right or wrong, makes not the slightest difference
+to the general argument of the remarkable address put before you
+to-night. All the statements your President has made are just as true,
+as profoundly true, as if this little eccentric Bathybius did not
+exist at all.
+
+[Several letters of miscellaneous interest may be quoted.
+
+The following acknowledges the receipt of "Essays in Romance":--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., January 1879.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+Being the most procrastinating letter-writer in existence, I thought,
+or pretended to think, when I received your "Essays in Romance" that
+it would not be decent to thank you until I had read the book. And
+when I had done myself that pleasure, I further pretended to think
+that it would be much better to wait till I could send you my Hume
+book, which as it contains a biography, is the nearest approach to a
+work of fiction of which I have yet been guilty.
+
+The "Hume" was sent, and I hope reached you a week ago; and as my
+conscience just now inquired in a very sneering and unpleasant tone
+whether I had any further pretence for not writing on hand, I thought
+I might as well stop her mouth at once.
+
+You will see oddly enough that I have answered your question about
+dreams in a sort of way on page 96. [Cp. "Essays in Romance" page 329;
+Huxley's "Hume" page 96.]
+
+You will get nothing but praise for your book, and I shall be
+vilipended for mine. Is that fact, or is it not, an evidence of a
+special Providence and Divine Government?
+
+Pray remember me very kindly to Mrs. Skelton. I hope your interrupted
+visit will yet become a fact. We have a clean bill of health now.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Scottish University Commission, 31 Queen Street, Edinburgh, April 2,
+1879.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+I shall be delighted to dine with you on Wednesday, and take part in
+any discussion either moral or immoral that may be started.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+March 15, 1879.
+
+My dear Mrs. Tyndall,
+
+Your hearty letter is as good as a bottle of the best sunshine. Yes, I
+will lunch with you on Friday with pleasure, and Jess proposes to
+attend on the occasion...Her husband is in Gloucester, and so doesn't
+count. The absurd creature declares she must go back to him on
+Saturday--stuff and sentiment. She has only been here six or seven
+weeks. There is nothing said in scripture about a wife cleaving to her
+husband!
+
+With all our loves, ever yours very sincerely,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The next is to his son, then at St. Andrews University, on winning a
+scholarship tenable at Oxford.]
+
+South Kensington, April 21, 1879.
+
+My dear Boy,
+
+I was very glad to get your good news this morning, and I need not
+tell you whether M-- was pleased or not.
+
+But the light of nature doth not inform us of the value and duration
+of the "Guthrie"--and from a low and material point of view I should
+like to be informed on that subject. However, this is "mere matter of
+detail" as the Irishman said when he was asked HOW he had killed his
+landlord. The pleasure to us is that you have made good use of your
+opportunities, and finished this first stage of your journey so
+creditably.
+
+I am about to write to the Master of Balliol for advice as to your
+future proceedings. In the meanwhile, go in for the enjoyment of your
+holiday with a light heart. You have earned it.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following, to Mrs. Clifford, was called forth by a hitch in
+respect to the grant to her of a Civil List pension after the death of
+her husband:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, July 19, 1879.
+
+My dear Lucy,
+
+I am just off to Gloucester to fetch M-- back, and I shall have a long
+talk with that sage little woman over your letter.
+
+In the meanwhile keep quiet and do nothing. I feel the force of what
+you say very strongly--so strongly, in fact, that I must morally ice
+myself and get my judgment clear and cool before I advise you what is
+to be done.
+
+I am very sorry to hear you have been so ill. For the present dismiss
+the matter from your thoughts and give your mind to getting better.
+Leave it all to be turned over in the mind of that cold-blooded,
+worldly, cynical old fellow, who signs himself,
+
+Your affectionate Pater.
+
+[The last is to Mr. Edward Clodd, on receiving his book "Jesus of
+Nazareth."]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, Abbey Road, N.W., December 21, 1879.
+
+My dear Mr. Clodd,
+
+I have been spending all this Sunday afternoon over the book you have
+been kind enough to send me, and being a swift reader, I have
+travelled honestly from cover to cover.
+
+It is the book I have been longing to see; in spirit, matter and form
+it appears to me to be exactly what people like myself have been
+wanting. For though for the last quarter of a century I have done all
+that lay in my power to oppose and destroy the idolatrous accretions
+of Judaism and Christianity, I have never had the slightest sympathy
+with those who, as the Germans say, would "throw the child away along
+with the bath"--and when I was a member of the London School Board I
+fought for the retention of the Bible, to the great scandal of some of
+my Liberal friends--who can't make out to this day whether I was a
+hypocrite, or simply a fool on that occasion.
+
+But my meaning was that the mass of the people should not be deprived
+of the one great literature which is open to them--not shut out from
+the perception of their relations with the whole past history of
+civilised mankind--not excluded from such a view of Judaism and Jesus
+of Nazareth as that which at last you have given us.
+
+I cannot doubt that your work will have a great success not only in
+the grosser, but the better sense of the word.
+
+I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The winter of 1879-80 was memorable for its prolonged spell of cold
+weather. One result of this may be traced in a New Year's letter from
+Huxley to his eldest daughter.] "I have had a capital holiday--mostly
+in bed--but I don't feel so grateful for it as I might do." [To be
+forced to avoid the many interruptions and distractions of his life in
+London, which claimed the greatest part of his time, he would regard
+as an unmixed blessing; as he once said feelingly to Professor Marsh,]
+"If I could only break my leg, what a lot of scientific work I could
+do!" [But he was less grateful for having entire inaction forced upon
+him.
+
+However, he was soon about again, and wrote as follows in answer to a
+letter from Sir Thomas (afterwards Lord) Farrer, which called his
+attention, as an old Fishery Commissioner, to a recent report on the
+sea-fisheries.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 9, 1880.
+
+My dear Farrer,
+
+I shall be delighted to take a dive into the unfathomable depths of
+official folly; but your promised document has not reached me.
+
+Your astonishment at the tenacity of life of fallacies, permit me to
+say, is shockingly unphysiological. They, like other low organisms,
+are independent of brains, and only wriggle the more, the more they
+are smitten on the place where the brains ought to be--I don't know
+B., but I am convinced that A. has nothing but a spinal cord, devoid
+of any cerebral development. Would Mr. Cross give him up for purposes
+of experiment? Lingen and you might perhaps be got to join in a
+memorial to that effect.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A fresh chapter of research, the results of which he now began to
+give to the public, was the history of the Dog. On April 6 and 13 he
+lectured at the Royal Institution "On Dogs and the Problems connected
+with them"--their relation to other animals, and the problem of the
+origin of the domestic dog, and the dog-like animals in general. As so
+often before, these lectures were the outcome of the careful
+preparation of a course of instruction for his students. The dog had
+been selected as one of the types of mammalian structure upon which
+laboratory work was to be done. Huxley's own dissections had led him
+on to a complete survey of the genus, both wild and domestic. As he
+writes to Darwin on May 10:--]
+
+I wish it were not such a long story that I could tell you all about
+the dogs. They will make out such a case for "Darwinismus" as never
+was. From the South American dogs at the bottom (C. vetulus,
+cancrivorus, etc.) to the wolves at the top, there is a regular
+gradual progression the range of variation of each "species"
+overlapping the ranges of those below and above. Moreover, as to the
+domestic dogs, I think I can prove that the small dogs are modified
+jackals, and the big dogs ditto wolves. I have been getting capital
+material from India, and working the whole affair out on the basis of
+measurements of skulls and teeth.
+
+However, my paper for the Zoological Society is finished, and I hope
+soon to send you a copy of it...
+
+[Unfortunately he never found time to complete his work for final
+publication in book form, and the rough, unfinished notes are all that
+remain of his work, beyond two monographs "On the Epipubis in the Dog
+and Fox" ("Proceedings of the Royal Society" 30 162-63), and "On the
+Cranial and Dental Characters of the Canidae" ("Proceedings of the
+Zoological Society" 1880 pages 238-288).
+
+The following letters deal with the collection of specimens for
+examination:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 17, 1880.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+I happened to get hold of two foxes this week--a fine dog fox and his
+vixen wife; and among other things, I have been looking up Cowper's
+glands, the supposed absence of which in the dogs has always "gone
+agin' me." Moreover, I have found them (or their representatives) in
+the shape of two small sacs, which open by conspicuous apertures into
+the urethra immediately behind the bulb. If your Icticyon was a male,
+I commend this point to your notice.
+
+ITEM.
+
+If you have not already begun to macerate him, do look for the
+"marsupial" fibro-cartilages, which I have mentioned in my "Manual,"
+but the existence of which blasphemers have denied. I found them again
+at once in both Mr. and Mrs. Vulpes. You spot them immediately by the
+pectineus which is attached to them.
+
+The dog-fox's caecum is so different from the vixen's that Gray would
+have made distinct genera of them.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., May 2, 1880.
+
+My dear Fayrer,
+
+I am greatly obliged for the skulls, and I hope you will offer my best
+thanks to your son for the trouble he has taken in getting them.
+
+The "fox" is especially interesting because it is not a fox, by any
+manner of means, but a big jackal with some interesting points of
+approximation towards the cuons.
+
+I do not see any locality given along with the specimens. Can you
+supply it?
+
+I have got together some very curious evidence of the wider range of
+variability of the Indian jackal, and the "fox" which your son has
+sent is the most extreme form in one direction I have met with.
+
+I wish I could get some examples from the Bombay and Madras
+Presidencies and from Ceylon, as well as from Central India. Almost
+all I have seen yet are from Bengal.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Between the two lectures on the Dog, mentioned above, on April 9,
+Huxley delivered a Friday evening discourse, at the same place, "On
+the Coming of Age of the Origin of Species" ("Collected Essays" 2
+227). Reviewing the history of the theory of evolution in the
+twenty-one years that had elapsed since the "Origin of Species" first
+saw the light in 1859, he did not merely dwell on the immense
+influence the "Origin" had exercised upon every field of biological
+inquiry.] "Mere insanities and inanities have before now swollen to
+portentous size in the course of twenty years." "History warns us that
+it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies, and to
+end as superstitions." [There was actual danger lest a new generation
+should] "accept the main doctrines of the "Origin of Species" with as
+little reflection, and it may be with as little justification, as so
+many of our contemporaries, years ago, rejected them."
+
+[So dire a consummation, he declared, must be prevented by unflinching
+criticism, the essence of the scientific spirit,] "for the scientific
+spirit is of more value than its products, and irrationally held
+truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors."
+
+[What, then, were the facts which justified so great a change as had
+taken place, which had removed some of the most important
+qualifications under which he himself had accepted the theory? He
+proceeded to enumerate the] "crushing accumulation of evidence"
+[during this period, which had proved the imperfection of the
+geological record; had filled up enormous gaps, such as those between
+birds and reptiles, vertebrates and invertebrates, flowering and
+flowerless plants, or the lowest forms of animal and plant life. More:
+paleontology alone has effected so much--the fact that evolution has
+taken place is so irresistibly forced upon the mind by the study of
+the Tertiary mammalia brought to light since 1859, that] "if the
+doctrine of evolution had not existed, paleontologists must have
+invented it." [He further developed the subject by reading before the
+Zoological Society a paper "On the Application of the Laws of
+Evolution to the Arrangement of the Vertebrata, and more particularly
+of the Mammalia" ("Proceedings of the Zoological Society" 1880 pages
+649-662). In reply to Darwin's letter thanking him for the "Coming of
+Age" ("Life and Letters" 3 24), he wrote on May 10:--]
+
+My dear Darwin,
+
+You are the cheeriest letter-writer I know, and always help a man to
+think the best of his doings.
+
+I hope you do not imagine because I had nothing to say about "Natural
+Selection," that I am at all weak of faith on that article. On the
+contrary, I live in hope that as paleontologists work more and more in
+the manner of that "second Daniel come to judgment," that wise young
+man M. Filhal, we shall arrive at a crushing accumulation of evidence
+in that direction also. But the first thing seems to me to be to drive
+the fact of evolution into people's heads; when that is once safe, the
+rest will come easy.
+
+I hear that ce cher X. is yelping about again; but in spite of your
+provocative messages (which Rachel retailed with great glee), I am not
+going to attack him nor anybody else.
+
+[Another popular lecture on a zoological subject was that of July 1 on
+"Cuttlefish and Squids," the last of the "Davis" lectures given by him
+at the Zoological Gardens.
+
+More important were two other essays delivered this year. The "Method
+of Zadig" ("Collected Essays" 4 1), an address at the Working Men's
+College, takes for its text Voltaire's story of the philosopher at the
+Oriental court, who, by taking note of trivial indications, obtains a
+perilous knowledge of things which his neighbours ascribe either to
+thievery or magic. This introduces a discourse on the identity of the
+methods of science and of the judgments of common life, a fact which,
+twenty-six years before, he had briefly stated in the words,] "Science
+is nothing but trained and organised common sense" [("Collected
+Essays" 3 45).
+
+The other is "Science and Culture" ("Collected Essays" 3 134), which
+was delivered on October 1, as the opening address of the Josiah Mason
+College at Birmingham, and gave its name to a volume of essays
+published in the following year. Here was a great school founded by a
+successful manufacturer, which was designed to give an education at
+once practical and liberal, such as the experience of its founder
+approved, to young men who meant to embark upon practical life. A
+"mere" literary training--i.e. in the classical languages--was
+excluded, but not so the study of English literature and modern
+languages. The greatest stress was laid on training in the scientific
+theory and practice on which depend the future of the great
+manufactures of the north.
+
+The question dealt with in this address is whether such an education
+can give the culture demanded of an educated man to-day. The answer is
+emphatically Yes. English literature is a field of culture second to
+none, and for solely literary purposes, a thorough knowledge of it,
+backed by some other modern language, will amply suffice. Combined
+with this, a knowledge of modern science, its principles and results,
+which have so profoundly modified society and have created modern
+civilisation, will give a "criticism of life," as Matthew Arnold
+defined "the end and aim of all literature," that is to say culture,
+unattainable by any form of education which neglects it. In short,
+although the "culture" of former periods might be purely literary,
+that of to-day must be based, to a great extent, upon natural science.
+
+This autumn several letters passed between him and Darwin. The latter,
+contrary to his usual custom, wrote a letter to "Nature," in reply to
+an unfair attack which had been made upon evolution by Sir Wyville
+Thomson in his Introduction to "The Voyage of the Challenger" (see
+Darwin "Life and Letters" 3 242), and asked Huxley to look over the
+concluding sentences of the letter, and to decide whether they should
+go with the rest to the printer or not. "My request," he writes
+(November 5), "will not cost you much trouble--i.e. to read two
+pages--for I know that you can decide at once." Huxley struck them
+out, replying on the 14th,] "Your pinned-on paragraph was so good
+that, if I had written it myself, I should have been unable to refrain
+from sending it on to the printer. But it is much easier to be
+virtuous on other people's account; and though Thomson deserved it and
+more, I thought it would be better to refrain. If I say a savage
+thing, it is only 'Pretty Fanny's way'; but if you do, it is not
+likely to be forgotten."
+
+[The rest of this correspondence has to do with a plan of Darwin's,
+generous as ever, to obtain a Civil List pension for the veteran
+naturalist, Wallace, whose magnificent work for science had brought
+him but little material return. He wrote to consult Huxley as to what
+steps had best be taken; the latter replied in the letter of November
+14:--]
+
+The papers in re Wallace have arrived, and I lose no time in assuring
+you that all my "might, amity, and authority," as Essex said when that
+sneak Bacon asked him for a favour, shall be exercised as you wish.
+
+On December 11 he sends Darwin the draft of a memorial on the subject,
+and on the 28th suggests that the best way of moving the official
+world would be for Darwin himself to send the memorial, with a note of
+his own, to Mr. Gladstone, who was then Prime Minister and First Lord
+of the Treasury:--]
+
+Mr. G. can do a thing gracefully when he is so minded, and unless I
+greatly mistake, he will be so minded if you write to him.
+
+[The result was all that could be hoped. On January 7 Darwin
+writes:--"Hurrah! hurrah! read the enclosed. Was it not
+extraordinarily kind of Mr. Gladstone to write himself at the present
+time?...I have written to Wallace. He owes much to you. Had it not
+been for your advice and assistance, I should never have had courage
+to go on."
+
+The rest of the letter to Darwin of December 28 is characteristic of
+his own view of life. As he wrote four years before (see above), he
+was no pessimist any more than he was a professed optimist. If the
+vast amount of inevitable suffering precluded the one view, the
+gratuitous pleasures, so to speak, of life preclude the other. Life
+properly lived is worth living, and would be even if a malevolent fate
+had decreed that one should suffer, say, the pangs of toothache two
+hours out of every twenty-four. So he writes:--]
+
+We have had all the chicks (and the husbands of such as are therewith
+provided) round the Christmas table once more, and a pleasant sight
+they were, though I say it that shouldn't. Only the grand-daughter
+left out, the young woman not having reached the age when change and
+society are valuable.
+
+I don't know what you think about anniversaries. I like them, being
+always minded to drink my cup of life to the bottom, and take my
+chance of the sweets and bitters.
+
+[The following is to his Edinburgh friend Dr. Skelton, whose
+appreciation of his frequent companionship had found outspoken
+expression in the pages of "The Crookit Meg."]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 14, 1880.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+When the "Crooked Meg" reached me I made up my mind that it would be a
+shame to send the empty acknowledgment which I give (or don't give)
+for most books that reach me.
+
+But I am over head and ears in work--time utterly wasted in mere
+knowledge getting and giving--and for six weeks not an hour for real
+edification with a wholesome story.
+
+But this Sunday afternoon being, by the blessing of God, as beastly a
+November day as you shall see, I have attended to my spiritual side
+and been visited by a blessing in the shape of some very pretty and
+unexpected words anent mysel'. [The passage referred to stands on page
+72 of "The Crookit Meg," and describes the village naturalist and
+philosopher, Adam Meldrum, "who in his working hours cobbled old
+boats, and knew by heart the plays of Shakespeare and the 'Pseudodoxia
+Epidemica' of Sir Thomas Browne."
+
+"For the rest it will be enough to add that this long, gaunt, bony
+cobbler of old boats was--was--(May I take the liberty, Mr.
+Professor?) a village Huxley of the year One. The colourless
+brilliancy of the great teacher's style, the easy facility with which
+the drop of light forms itself into a perfect sphere as it falls from
+his pen, belong indeed to a consummate master of the art of
+expression, which Adam of course was not; but the mental lucidity,
+justice, and balance, as well as the reserve of power, and the
+Shakespearean gaiety of touch, which made the old man one of the most
+delightful companions in the world, were essentially Huxleian."]
+
+In truth, it is a right excellent story, though, distinctly in love
+with Eppie, I can only wonder how you had the heart to treat her so
+ill. A girl like that should have had two husbands--one "wisely ranged
+for show" and t'other de par amours.
+
+Don't ruin me with Mrs. Skelton by repeating this, but please remember
+me very kindly to her.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letter to Tyndall was called forth by an incident in
+connection with the starting of the "Nineteenth Century." Huxley had
+promised to help the editor by looking over the proofs of a monthly
+article on contemporary science. But his advertised position as merely
+adviser in this to the editor was overlooked by some who resented what
+they supposed to be his assumption of the role of critic in general to
+his fellow-workers in science. At a meeting of the x Club, Tyndall
+made a jesting allusion to this; Huxley, however, thought the mere
+suggestion too grave for a joke, and replied with all seriousness to
+clear himself from the possibility of such misconception. And the same
+evening he wrote to Tyndall:--]
+
+Athenaeum Club, Pall Mall, S.W., December 2, 1880.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I must tell you the ins and outs of this "Nineteenth Century"
+business. I was anxious to help Knowles when he started the journal,
+and at his earnest and pressing request I agreed to do what I have
+done. But being quite aware of the misinterpretation to which I should
+be liable if my name "sans phrase" were attached to the article, I
+insisted upon the exact words which you will find at the head of it;
+and which seemed, and still seem to me, to define my position as a
+mere adviser of the editor.
+
+Moreover, by diligently excluding any expression of opinion on the
+part of the writers of the compilation, I thought that nobody could
+possibly suspect me of assuming the position of an authority even on
+the subjects with which I may be supposed to be acquainted, let alone
+those such as physics and chemistry, of which I know no more than any
+one of the public may know.
+
+Therefore your remarks came upon me to-night with the sort of painful
+surprise which a man feels who is accused of the particular sin of
+which he flatters himself he is especially NOT GUILTY, and "roused my
+corruption" as the Scotch have it. But there is no need to say
+anything about that, for you were generous and good as I have always
+found you. Only I pray you, if hereafter it strikes you that any doing
+of mine should be altered or amended, tell me yourself and privately,
+and I promise you a very patient listener, and what is more a very
+thankful one.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Tyndall replied with no less frankness, thanking him for the friendly
+promptitude of his letter, and explaining that he had meant to speak
+privately on the matter, but had been forestalled by the subject
+coming up when it did. And he wound up by declaring that it would be
+too absurd to admit the power of such an occasion "to put even a
+momentary strain upon the cable which has held us together for nine
+and twenty years."
+
+At the very end of the year, George Eliot died. A proposal was
+immediately set on foot to inter her remains in Westminster Abbey, and
+various men of letters pressed the matter on the Dean, who was
+unwilling to stir without a very strong and general expression of
+opinion. To Mr. Herbert Spencer, who had urged him to join in
+memorialising the Dean, Huxley replied as follows:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 27, 1880.
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+Your telegram which reached me on Friday evening caused me great
+perplexity, inasmuch as I had just been talking with Morley, and
+agreeing with him that the proposal for a funeral in Westminster Abbey
+had a very questionable look to us, who desired nothing so much as
+that peace and honour should attend George Eliot to her grave.
+
+It can hardly be doubted that the proposal will be bitterly opposed,
+possibly (as happened in Mill's case with less provocation), with the
+raking up of past histories, about which the opinion even of those who
+have least the desire or the right to be pharisaical is strongly
+divided, and which had better be forgotten.
+
+With respect to putting pressure on the Dean of Westminster, I have to
+consider that he has some confidence in me, and before asking him to
+do something for which he is pretty sure to be violently assailed, I
+have to ask myself whether I really think it a right thing for a man
+in his position to do.
+
+Now I cannot say I do. However much I may lament the circumstance,
+Westminster Abbey is a Christian Church and not a Pantheon, and the
+Dean thereof is officially a Christian priest, and we ask him to
+bestow exceptional Christian honours by this burial in the Abbey.
+George Eliot is known not only as a great writer, but as a person
+whose life and opinions were in notorious antagonism to Christian
+practice in regard to marriage, and Christian theory in regard to
+dogma. How am I to tell the Dean that I think he ought to read over
+the body of a person who did not repent of what the Church considers
+mortal sin, a service not one solitary proposition in which she would
+have accepted for truth while she was alive? How am I to urge him to
+do that which, if I were in his place, I should most emphatically
+refuse to do?
+
+You tell me that Mrs. Cross wished for the funeral in the Abbey. While
+I desire to entertain the greatest respect for her wishes, I am very
+sorry to hear it. I do not understand the feeling which could create
+such a desire on any personal grounds, save those of affection, and
+the natural yearning to be near even in death to those whom we have
+loved. And on public grounds the wish is still less intelligible to
+me. One cannot eat one's cake and have it too. Those who elect to be
+free in thought and deed must not hanker after the rewards, if they
+are to be so called, which the world offers to those who put up with
+its fetters.
+
+Thus, however I look at the proposal it seems to me to be a profound
+mistake, and I can have nothing to do with it.
+
+I shall be deeply grieved if this resolution is ascribed to any other
+motives than those which I have set forth at more length than I
+intended.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.12.
+
+1881.
+
+[The last ten years had found Huxley gradually involved more and more
+in official duties. Now, with the beginning of 1881, he became yet
+more deeply engrossed in practical and administrative work, more
+completely cut off from his favourite investigations, by his
+appointment to an Inspectorship of Fisheries, in succession to the
+late Frank Buckland. It is almost pathetic to note how he snatched at
+any spare moments for biological research. No sooner was a long
+afternoon's work at the Home Office done, than, as Professor Howes
+relates, he would often take a hansom to the laboratory at South
+Kensington, and spend a last half-hour at his dissections before going
+home.
+
+The Inspectorship, which was worth 700 pounds a year, he held in
+addition to his post at South Kensington, the official description of
+which now underwent another change. In the first place, his official
+connection with the Survey appears to have ceased this year, the last
+report made by him being in 1881. His name, however, still appeared in
+connection with the post of Naturalist until his retirement in 1885,
+and it was understood that his services continued to be available if
+required. Next, in October of this year, the Royal School of Mines was
+incorporated with the newly established Normal School--or as it was
+called in 1890, Royal College of Science, and the title of Lecturer on
+General Natural History was suppressed, and Huxley became Professor of
+Biology and Dean of the College at a salary of 800 pounds, for it was
+arranged on his appointment to the Inspectorship, that he should not
+receive the salary attached to the post of Dean. Thus the Treasury
+saved 200 pounds a year.
+
+As Professor of Biology, he was under the Lord President of the
+Council; as Inspector of Fisheries, under the Board of Trade; hence
+some time passed in arranging the claims of the two departments before
+the appointment was officially made known, as may be gathered from the
+following letters:--]
+
+To Sir John Donnelly.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 27, 1880.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I tried hard to have a bad cold last night, and though I blocked him
+with quinine, I think I may as well give myself the benefit of the
+Bank Holiday and keep the house to-day.
+
+There is a chance of your getting early salmon yet. I wrote to decline
+the post on Friday, but on Saturday evening the Home Secretary sent a
+note asking to see me yesterday. As he had re-opened the question, of
+course I felt justified in stating all the pros and cons of the case
+as personal to myself and my rather complicated official position...He
+entered into the affair with a warmth and readiness which very
+agreeably surprised me, and he proposes making such arrangements as
+will not oblige me to have anything to do with the weirs or the actual
+inspection. Under these circumstances the post would be lovely--if I
+can hold it along with the other things. And of his own motion the
+Home Secretary is going to write to Lord Spencer about it to see if he
+cannot carry the whole thing through.
+
+If this could be managed, I could get great things done in the matter
+of fish culture and fish diseases at South Kensington, if poor dear
+X.'s rattle trappery could be turned to proper account, without in any
+way interfering with the work of the School.
+
+At any rate, my book stands not to lose, and may win--the innocence of
+the dove is not always divorced from the wisdom of the sarpent.
+[Sketch of the "Sarpent."]
+
+To Lord Farrer.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 18, 1881.
+
+My dear Farrer,
+
+I have waited a day or two before thanking you for your very kind
+letter, in the hope that I might be able to speak as one knowing where
+he is.
+
+But as I am still, in an official sense, nowhere, I will not delay any
+longer.
+
+I had never thought of the post, but the Home Secretary offered it to
+me in a very kind and considerate manner, and after some hesitation I
+accepted it. But some adjustment had to be made between my master, the
+Lord President, and the Treasury; and although everybody seems
+disposed to be very good to me, the business is not yet finally
+settled. Whence the newspapers get their information I don't know--but
+it is always wrong in these matters.
+
+As you know, I have had a good apprenticeship to the work [He had
+already served on two Fishery Committees, 1862 and 1864-5.]--and I
+hope to be of some use; of the few innocent pleasures left to men past
+middle life--the jamming common-sense down the throats of fools is
+perhaps the keenest.
+
+May we do some joint business in that way!
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+To his eldest son.
+
+February 14, 1881.
+
+I have entered upon my new duties as Fishery Inspector, but you are
+not to expect salmon to be much cheaper just yet.
+
+My colleague and I have rooms at the Home Office, and I find there is
+more occupation than I expected, but no serious labour.
+
+Every now and then I shall have to spend a few days in the country,
+holding inquiries, and as salmon rivers are all in picturesque parts
+of the country, I shall not object to that part of the business.
+
+[The duties of the new office were partly scientific, partly
+administrative. On the one hand, the natural history and diseases of
+fish had to be investigated; on the other, regulations had to be
+carried out, weirs and salmon passes approved, disputes settled,
+reports written. I find, for instance, that apart from the work in
+London, visits of inspection in all parts of the country took up
+twenty-eight days between March and September this year.
+
+Sir Spencer Walpole, who was his colleague for some years, has kindly
+given me an account of their work together.
+
+Early in 1881, Sir William Harcourt appointed Professor Huxley one of
+Her Majesty's Inspectors of Fisheries. The office had become vacant
+through the untimely death, in the preceding December, of the late Mr.
+Frank Buckland. Under an Act, passed twenty years before, the charge
+of the English Salmon Fisheries had been placed under the Home Office,
+and the Secretary of State had been authorised to appoint two
+Inspectors to aid him in administering the law. The functions of the
+Home Office and of the Inspectors were originally simple, but they had
+been enlarged by an Act passed in 1873, which conferred on local
+conservators elaborate powers of making bye-laws for the development
+and preservation of the Fisheries. These bye-laws required the
+approval of the Secretary of State, who was necessarily dependent on
+the advice of his Inspectors in either allowing or disallowing them.
+
+In addition to the nominal duties of the Inspectors, they became--by
+virtue of their position--the advisers of the Government on all
+questions connected with the Sea Fisheries of Great Britain. These
+fisheries are nominally under the Board of Trade, but, as this Board
+at that time had no machinery at its disposal for the purpose, it
+naturally relied on the advice of the Home Office Inspectors in all
+questions of difficulty, on which their experience enabled them to
+speak with authority.
+
+For duties such as these, which have been thus briefly described,
+Professor Huxley had obvious qualifications. On all subjects relating
+to the Natural History of Fish he spoke with decisive authority. But,
+in addition to his scientific attainments, from 1863 to 1865 he had
+been a member of the Commission which had conducted an elaborate
+investigation into the condition of the Fisheries of the United
+Kingdom, and had taken a large share in the preparation of a Report,
+which--notwithstanding recent changes in law and policy--remains the
+ablest and most exhaustive doctrine which has ever been laid before
+Parliament on the subject.
+
+This protracted investigation had convinced Professor Huxley that the
+supply of fish in the deep sea was practically inexhaustible; and
+that, however much it might be necessary to enforce the police of the
+seas by protecting particular classes of sea fishermen from injury
+done to their instruments by the operations of other classes, the
+primary duty of the legislature was to develop sea fishing, and not to
+place restrictions on sea fishermen for any fears of an exhaustion of
+fish.
+
+His scientific training, moreover, made him ridicule the modern notion
+that it was possible to stock the sea by artificial methods. He wrote
+to me, when the Fisheries Exhibition of 1883 was in contemplation,]
+"You may have seen that we have a new Fish Culture Society. C-- talked
+gravely about our stocking the North Sea with cod! After that I
+suppose we shall take up herrings: and I mean to propose whales,
+which, as all the world knows, are terribly over fished!" [And after
+the exhibition was over he wrote to me again, with reference to a
+report which the Commission had asked me to draw up: ["I have just
+finished reading your report, which has given me a world of
+satisfaction...I am particularly glad that you have put in a word of
+warning to the fish culturists." [When I was asked to write the report
+on this Commission, I said that I would do so if Sir E. Birkbeck, its
+chairman, and Professor Huxley, both met me to discuss the points to
+be noticed. The meeting duly took place: and I opened it by asking
+what was the chief lesson to be drawn from the exhibition?] "Well,"
+[said Professor Huxley,] "the chief lesson to be drawn from the
+exhibition is that London is in want of some open air amusement on
+summer evenings."
+
+[He was not, however, equally certain that particular areas of Sea
+Shore might not be exhausted by our fishing. He extended in 1883 an
+order which Mr. Buckland and I had made in 1879 for restricting the
+taking of crabs and lobsters on the coast of Norfolk, and he wrote to
+me on that occasion:] "I was at Cromer and Sheringham last week,
+holding an inquiry for the Board of Trade about the working of your
+order of 1879. According to all accounts, the crabs have multiplied
+threefold in 1881 and 1882. Whether this is post hoc or propter hoc is
+more than I should like to say. But at any rate, this is a very good
+prima facie case for continuing the order, and I shall report
+accordingly. Anyhow, the conditions are very favourable for a
+long-continued experiment in the effects of regulation, and, ten years
+hence, there will be some means of judging of the value of these
+restrictions."
+
+[If, however, Professor Huxley was strongly opposed to unnecessary
+interference with the labours of sea fishermen, he was well aware of
+the necessity of protecting migratory fish like salmon, against
+over-fishing: and his reports for 1882 and 1883--in which he gave
+elaborate accounts of the results of legislation on the Tyne and on
+the Severn--show that he keenly appreciated the necessity of
+regulating the Salmon Fisheries.
+
+It so happened that at the time of his appointment, many of our
+important rivers were visited by "Saprolegnia ferax," the fungoid
+growth which became popularly known as Salmon Disease. Professor
+Huxley gave much time to the study of the conditions under which the
+fungus flourished: he devoted much space in his earlier reports to the
+subject: and he read a paper upon it at a remarkable meeting of the
+Royal Society in the summer of 1881. He took a keen interest in these
+investigations, and he wrote to me from North Wales, at the end of
+1881,] "The salmon brought to me here have not been so badly diseased
+as I could have wished, and the fungus dies so rapidly out of the
+water that only one specimen furnished me with materials in lively
+condition. These I have cultivated: and to my great satisfaction have
+got some flies infected. With nine precious muscoid corpses, more or
+less ornamented with a lovely fur trimming of Saprolegnia, I shall
+return to London to-morrow, and shall be ready in a short time, I
+hope, to furnish Salmon Disease wholesale, retail, or for
+exportation."
+
+[In carrying out the duties of our office, Professor Huxley and I were
+necessarily thrown into very close communication. There were few days
+in which we did not pass some time in each other's company: there were
+many weeks in which we travelled together through the river basins of
+this country. I think that I am justified in saying that official
+intercourse ripened into warm personal friendship, and that, for the
+many months in which we served together, we lived on terms of intimacy
+which are rare among colleagues or even among friends.
+
+It is needless to say that, as a companion, Professor Huxley was the
+most delightful of men. Those who have met him in society, or enjoyed
+the hospitality of his house, must have been conscious of the singular
+charm of a conversation, which was founded on knowledge, enlarged by
+memory, and brightened by humour. But, admirable as he was in society,
+no one could have realised the full charm of his company who had not
+conversed with him alone. He had the rare art of placing men, whose
+knowledge and intellect were inferior to his own, at their ease. He
+knew how to draw out all that was best in the companion who suited
+him; and he had equal pleasure in giving and receiving. Our
+conversation ranged over every subject. We discussed together the
+grave problems of man and his destiny; we disputed on the minor
+complications of modern politics; we criticised one another's literary
+judgments; and we laughed over the stories which we told one another,
+and of which Professor Huxley had an inexhaustible fund.
+
+In conversation Professor Huxley displayed the quality which
+distinguished him both as a writer and a public speaker. He invariably
+used the right words in the right sense. Those who are jointly
+responsible--as he and I were often jointly responsible--for some
+written document, have exceptional opportunities of observing this
+quality. Professor Huxley could always put his finger on a wrong word,
+and he always instinctively chose the right one. It was this
+qualification--a much rarer one than people imagine--which made
+Professor Huxley's essays clear to the meanest understanding, and
+which made him, in my judgment, the greatest master of prose of his
+time. The same quality was equally observable in his spoken speech. I
+happened to be present at the anniversary dinner of the Royal Society,
+at which Professor Huxley made his last speech. And, as he gave an
+admirable account of the share which he had taken in defending Mr.
+Darwin against his critics, I overheard the present Prime Minister
+(Lord Salisbury.) say, "What a beautiful speaker he is."
+
+In 1882, the duties of another appointment forced me to resign the
+Inspectorship, which I had held for so long: and thenceforward my
+residence in the Isle of Man gave me fewer opportunities of seeing
+Professor Huxley: our friendship, however, remained unbroken; and
+occasional visits to London gave me many opportunities of renewing it.
+He retained his own appointment as Inspector for more than three years
+after my resignation. He served, during the closing months of his
+officialship, on a Royal Commission on trawling, over which the late
+Lord Dalhousie presided. But his health broke down before the
+commissioners issued their report, and he was ordered abroad. It so
+happened that in the spring of 1885 I was staying at Florence, when
+Professor and Mrs. Huxley passed through it on their way home. He had
+at that time seen none of his old friends, and was only slowly
+regaining strength. After his severe illness Mrs. Huxley encouraged me
+to take him out for many short walks, and I did my best to cheer him
+in his depressed condition. He did not then think that he had ten
+years of--on the whole--happy life before him. He told me that he was
+about to retire from all his work, and he added, that he had never
+enjoyed the Inspectorship after I had left it. I am happy in believing
+that the remark was due to the depression from which he was suffering,
+for he had written to me two years ago,] "The office would be quite
+perfect, if they did not want an annual report. I can't go in for a
+disquisition on river basins after the manner of Buckland, and you
+have exhausted the other topics. I polished off the Salmon Disease
+pretty fully last year, so what the deuce am I to write about?"
+
+[I saw Professor Huxley for the last time on the Christmas day before
+his death. I spent some hours with him, with no other companions than
+Mrs. Huxley and my daughter. I had never seen him brighter or happier,
+and his rich, playful and sympathetic talk vividly recalled the many
+brilliant hours which I had passed in his company some twelve or
+thirteen years before.
+
+One word more. No one could have known Professor Huxley intimately
+without recognising that he delighted in combat. He was never happier
+than when he was engaged in argument or controversy, and he loved to
+select antagonists worthy of his steel. The first public inquiry which
+we held together was attended by a great nobleman, whom Professor
+Huxley did not know by sight, but who rose at the commencement of our
+proceedings to offer some suggestions. Professor Huxley directed him
+to sit down, and not interrupt the business. I told my colleague in a
+whisper whom he was interrupting. And I was amused, as we walked away
+to luncheon together, by his quaint remark to me,] "We have begun very
+well, we have sat upon a duke." [(Of this he wrote home on March 15,
+1881:] "Somebody produced the 'Punch' yesterday and showed it to me,
+to the great satisfaction of the Duke of --, who has attended our two
+meetings. I nearly had a shindy with him at starting, but sweetness
+and light (in my person) carried the day." [This "Punch" contained the
+cartoon of Huxley in nautical costume riding on a salmon; contrary to
+the custom of "Punch," it made an unfair hit in appending to his name
+the letters L.s.d. (Pounds, shillings and pence.) Never was any one
+who deserved the imputation less.)
+
+If, however, a love of argument and controversy occasionally led him
+into hot water, I do not think that his polemical tendencies ever cost
+him a friend. His antagonists must have recognised the fairness of his
+methods, and must have been susceptible to the charm of the man. The
+high example which he set in controversy, moreover, was equally
+visible in his ordinary life. Of all the men I have ever known, his
+ideas and his standard were--on the whole--the highest. He recognised
+that the fact of his religious views imposed on him the duty of living
+the most upright of lives, and I am very much of the opinion of a
+little child, now grown into an accomplished woman, who, when she was
+told that Professor Huxley had no hope of future rewards, and no fear
+of future punishments, emphatically declared: "Then I think Professor
+Huxley is the best man I have ever known."
+
+Extracts from his letters home give some further idea of the kind of
+work entailed. Thus in March and again in May he was in Wales, and
+writes:--]
+
+Cromffyratellionptrroch, May 24.
+
+Mr. Barrington's very pretty place about five miles from Abergavenny,
+wherein I write, may or may not have the name which I have written on
+at the top of the page, as it is Welsh; however it is probably that or
+something like it. I forgot to inquire.
+
+We are having the loveliest weather, and yesterday went looking up
+weirs with more or less absurd passes up a charming valley not far
+hence. It is just seven o'clock, and we are going to breakfast and
+start at eight to fit in with the tides of the Severn. It is not
+exactly clear where we shall be to-night...Now I must go to breakfast,
+for I got up at six. Figurez vous ca.
+
+Hereford, May 29.
+
+We are favoured by the weather again, though it is bitter cold under
+the bright sunshine. We stopped at Worcester yesterday, and I went to
+examine some weirs hard by. This involved three or four miles' country
+walking, and was all to the good. If the Inspector business were all
+of this sort it would be all that fancy painted it. We shall have a
+long sitting to-day...[(He fears to be detained into the night by
+"over-fluent witnesses.")
+
+In April he spent several days at Norwich, in connection with the
+National Fishery Exhibition held there.]
+
+April 19.
+
+We had a gala day yesterday...The exhibition of all manner of fish and
+fishing apparatus was ready, for a wonder, and looked very well. The
+Prince and Princess arrived, and we had the usual address and reply
+and march through. Afterwards a mighty dejeuner in the St. Andrew's
+Hall--a fine old place looking its best. I was just opposite the
+Princess, and I could not help looking at her with wonderment. She
+looked so fresh and girlish. She came and talked to me afterwards in a
+very pleasant simple way.
+
+Walpole and I went in with our host yesterday afternoon and started to
+return on the understanding that he should pick us up a few miles out.
+Of course we took the wrong road, and walked all the way, some eight
+miles or so. However, it did us good, and after a champagne lunch we
+thought we could not do better than repeat the operation yesterday.
+
+I feel quite set up by finding that after standing about for hours I
+can walk eight miles without any particular fatigue. Life in the old
+dog yet! Walpole is a capital companion--knows a great many things,
+and talks well about them, so we get over the ground pleasantly.
+
+April 20.
+
+There was a long day of it yesterday looking over things in the
+Exhibition till late in the afternoon, and then a mighty dinner in St.
+Andrew's Hall given by a Piscatorial Society of which my host is
+President. It was a weary sitting of five hours with innumerable
+speeches. Of course I had to say "a few words," and if I can get a
+copy of the papers I will send them to you. I flatter myself they were
+words of wisdom, though hardly likely to contribute to my popularity
+among the fishermen.
+
+[On the 21st he gave an address on the Herring. To describe the
+characteristics of this fish in the Eastern Counties, he says, might
+seem like carrying coals to Newcastle; nevertheless the fisherman's
+knowledge is not the same as that of the man of science, and includes
+none but the vaguest notions of the ways of life of the fish and the
+singularities of its organisation which perplexed biologists. His own
+study of the problems connected with the herring had begun nineteen
+years before, when he served on the first of his two Fishery
+Commissions; and one of his chief objects in this address was to
+insist upon a fact, borne out partly by the inquiries of the
+Commission, partly by later investigations in Europe and America,
+which it was difficult to make people appreciate, namely, the
+impossibility of man's fisheries affecting the numbers of the herring
+to any appreciable extent, a year's catch not amounting to the
+estimated number of a single shoal; while the flatfish and cod
+fisheries remove many of the most destructive enemies of the herring.
+Those who had not studied the question in this light would say that
+"it stands to reason" that vast fisheries must tend to exterminate the
+fish; apropos of which, he made his well-known remark, that in
+questions of biology] "if any one tells me 'it stands to reason' that
+such and such things must happen, I generally find reason to doubt the
+safety of his standing."
+
+[This year, also, he began the investigations which completed former
+inquiries into the subject, and finally elucidated the nature of the
+salmon disease. The last link in the chain of evidence which proved
+its identity with a fungoid disease of flies, was not reached until
+March 1883; and on July 3 following he delivered a full account of the
+disease, its nature and origin, in an address at the Fisheries
+Exhibition in London.
+
+In 1881, then, at the end of December, he went to North Wales to study
+on the fresh fish the nature of the epidemic of salmon disease which
+had broken out in the Conway, in spite of being in such bad health
+that he was persuaded to let his younger son come and look after him.
+But this was only a passing premonition of the breakdown which was to
+come upon him three years after.
+
+One year's work as Inspector was very like another. In 1882, for
+instance, on January 21, he is at Berwick, "voiceless but jolly"; in
+the spring he had to attend a Fisheries Exhibition in Edinburgh, and
+writes:--]
+
+April 12.
+
+We have opened our Exhibition, and I have been standing about looking
+at the contents until my back is broken.
+
+April 13.
+
+The weather here is villainous--a regular Edinburgh "coorse day." I
+have seen all I wanted to see of the Exhibition, eaten two heavy
+dinners, one with Primrose and one with Young, and want to get home.
+Walpole and I are dining domestically at home this evening, having
+virtuously refused all invitations.
+
+[In June he was in Hampshire; on July 25 he writes from Tynemouth:--]
+
+I reached here about 5 o'clock, and found the bailiff or whatever they
+call him of the Board of Conservators, awaiting me with a boat at my
+disposal. So we went off to look at what they call "The
+Playground"--two bays in which the salmon coming from the sea rest and
+disport themselves until a fresh comes down the river and they find it
+convenient to ascend. Harbottle bailiff in question is greatly
+disturbed at the amount of poaching that goes on in the playground,
+and unfolded his griefs to me at length. It was a lovely evening, very
+calm, and I enjoyed my boat expedition. To-morrow there is to be
+another to see the operations of a steam trawler, which in all
+probability I shall not enjoy so much. I shall take a light breakfast.
+
+[These were the pleasanter parts of the work. The less pleasant was
+sitting all day in a crowded court, hearing a disputed case of fishing
+rights, or examining witnesses who stuck firmly to views about fish
+which had long been exploded by careful observation. But on the whole
+he enjoyed it, although it took him away from research in other
+departments. This summer, on the death of Professor Rolleston, he was
+sounded on the question whether he would consent to accept the Linacre
+Professorship of Physiology at Oxford. He wrote to the Warden of
+Merton:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, June 22, 1881.
+
+My dear Brodrick,
+
+Many thanks for your letter. I can give you my reply at once, as my
+attention has already been called to the question you ask; and it is
+that I do not see my way to leaving London for Oxford. My reasons for
+arriving at this conclusion are various. I am getting old, and you
+should have a man in full vigour. I doubt whether the psychical
+atmosphere of Oxford would suit me, and still more, whether I should
+suit it after a life spent in the absolute freedom of London. And
+last, but by no means least, for a man with five children to launch
+into the world, the change would involve a most serious loss of
+income. No doubt there are great attractions on the other side; and,
+if I had been ten years younger, I should have been sorely tempted to
+go to Oxford, if the University would have had me. But things being as
+they are, I do not see my way to any other conclusion than that which
+I have reached.
+
+[The same feeling finds expression in a letter to Professor
+(afterwards Sir William) Flower, who was also approached on the same
+subject, and similarly determined to remain in London.]
+
+July 21, 1881.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+I am by no means surprised, and except for the sake of the University,
+not sorry that you have renounced the Linacre.
+
+Life is like walking along a crowded street--there always seem to be
+fewer obstacles to getting along on the opposite pavement--and yet, if
+one crosses over, matters are rarely mended.
+
+I assure you it is a great comfort to me to think that you will stay
+in London and help in keeping things straight in this world of
+crookedness.
+
+I have thought a good deal about --, but it would never do. No one
+could value his excellent qualities of all kinds, and real genius in
+some directions, more than I do; but, in my judgment, nobody could be
+less fitted to do the work which ought to be done in Oxford--I mean to
+give biological science a status in the eyes of the Dons, and to force
+them to acknowledge it as a part of general education. Moreover, his
+knowledge, vast and minute as it is in some directions, is very
+imperfect in others, and the attempt to qualify himself for the post
+would take him away from the investigations, which are his delight and
+for which he is specially fitted...
+
+I was very much interested in your account of the poor dear Dean's
+illness. I called on Thursday morning, meeting Jowett and Grove at the
+door, and we went in and heard such an account of his state that I had
+hopes he might pull through. We shall not see his like again.
+
+The last time I had a long talk with him was about the proposal to
+bury George Eliot in the Abbey, and a curious revelation of the
+extraordinary catholicity and undaunted courage of the man it was. He
+would have done it had it been pressed upon him by a strong
+representation.
+
+I see he is to be buried on Monday, and I suppose and hope I shall
+have the opportunity of attending.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This letter refers to the death of his old friend Dean Stanley. The
+Dean had long kept in touch with the leaders of scientific thought,
+and it is deeply interesting to know that on her death-bed, five years
+before, his wife said to him as one of her parting counsels, "Do not
+lose sight of the men of science, and do not let them lose sight of
+you." "And then," writes Stanley to Tyndall, "she named yourself and
+Huxley."
+
+Strangely enough, the death of the Dean involved another invitation to
+Huxley to quit London for Oxford. By the appointment of Dean Bradley
+to Westminster, the Mastership of University College was left vacant.
+Huxley, who was so far connected with the college that he had examined
+there for a science Fellowship, was asked if he would accept it, but
+after careful consideration declined. He writes to his son, who had
+heard rumours of the affair in Oxford:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 4, 1881.
+
+My dear Lens,
+
+There is truth in the rumour; in so far as this that I was asked if I
+would allow myself to be nominated for the Mastership of University,
+that I took the question into serious consideration and finally
+declined.
+
+But I was asked to consider the communication made to me confidential,
+and I observed the condition strictly. The leakage must have taken
+place among my Oxford friends, and is their responsibility, but at the
+same time I would rather you did not contribute to the rumour on the
+subject. Of course I should have told you if I had not been bound to
+reticence.
+
+I was greatly tempted for a short time by the prospect of rest, but
+when I came to look into the matter closely there were many
+disadvantages. I do not think I am cut out for a Don nor your mother
+for a Donness--we have had thirty years' freedom in London, and are
+too old to put in harness.
+
+Moreover, in a monetary sense I should have lost rather than gained.
+
+My astonishment at the proposal was unfeigned, and I begin to think I
+may yet be a Bishop.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[His other occupations this year were the Medical Acts Commission,
+which sat until the following year, and the International Medical
+Congress.
+
+The Congress detained him in London this summer later than usual. It
+lasted from the 3rd to the 9th of August, on which day he delivered a
+concluding address on "The Connection of the Biological Sciences with
+Medicine" ("Collected Essays" 3 page 347). He showed how medicine was
+gradually raised from mere empiricism and based upon true pathological
+principles, through the independent growth of physiological knowledge,
+and its correlation to chemistry and physics.] "It is a peculiarity,"
+[he remarks,] "of the physical sciences that they are independent in
+proportion as they are imperfect." [Yet] "there could be no real
+science of pathology until the science of physiology had reached a
+degree of perfection unattained, and indeed unattainable, until quite
+recent times." [Historically speaking, modern physiology, he pointed
+out, began with Descartes' attempt to explain bodily phenomena on
+purely physical principles; but the Cartesian notion of one
+controlling central mechanism had to give way before the proof of
+varied activities residing in various tissues, until the cell-theory
+united something of either view. "The body is a machine of the nature
+of an army, not that of a watch or of a hydraulic apparatus." On this
+analogy, diseases are derangements either of the physiological units
+of the body, or of their coordinating machinery: and the future of
+medicine depends on exact knowledge of these derangements and of the
+precise alteration of the conditions by the administration of drugs or
+other treatment, which will redress those derangements without
+disturbing the rest of the body.
+
+A few extracts from letters to his wife describe his occupation at the
+Congress, which involved too much "society" for his liking.]
+
+August 4.
+
+The Congress began with great eclat yesterday, and the latter part of
+Paget's address was particularly fine. After, there was the lunch at
+the Paget's with the two Royalties. After that, an address by Virchow.
+After that, dinner at Sanderson's, with a confused splutter of German
+to the neighbours on my right. After that a tremendous soiree at South
+Kensington, from which I escaped as soon as I could, and got home at
+midnight. There is a confounded Lord Mayor's dinner this evening ("The
+usual turtle and speeches to the infinite bewilderment and delight of
+the foreigners," August 6), and to-morrow a dinner at the
+Physiological Society. But I have got off the Kew party, and mean to
+go quietly down to the Spottiswoodes [i.e. at Sevenoaks] on Saturday
+afternoon, and get out of the way of everything except the College of
+Surgeons' Soiree, till Tuesday. Commend me for my prudence.
+
+[On the 5th he was busy all day with Government Committees, only
+returning to correct proofs of his address before the social functions
+of the evening. Next morning he writes:--]
+
+I have been toiling at my address this morning. It is all printed, but
+I must turn it inside out, and make a speech of it if I am to make any
+impression on the audience in St. James' Hall. Confound all such
+bobberies.
+
+August 9.
+
+I got through my address to-day as well as I ever did anything. There
+was a large audience, as it was the final meeting of the Congress, and
+to my surprise I found myself in excellent voice and vigour. So there
+is life in the old dog yet. But I am greatly relieved it is over, as I
+have been getting rather shaky.
+
+[When the Medical Congress was over, he joined his family at Grasmere
+for the rest of August. In September he attended the British
+Association at York, where he read a paper on the "Rise and Progress
+of Palaeontology," and ended the month with fishery business at
+Aberystwith and Carmarthen.
+
+The above paper is to be found in "Collected Essays," 4 page 24. In it
+he concludes an historical survey of the views held about fossils by a
+comparison of the opposite hypothesis upon which the vast store of
+recently accumulated facts may be interpreted; and declaring for the
+hypothesis of evolution, repeats the remarkable words of the "Coming
+of Age of the Origin of Species," that] "the paleontological
+discoveries of the last decade are so completely in accordance with
+the requirements of this hypothesis that, if it had not existed, the
+paleontologist would have had to invent it."
+
+[In February died Thomas Carlyle. Mention has already been made of the
+influence of his writings upon Huxley in strengthening and fixing once
+for all, at the very outset of his career, that hatred of shams and
+love of veracity, which were to be the chief principle of his whole
+life. It was an obligation he never forgot, and for this, if for
+nothing else, he was ready to join in a memorial to the man. In reply
+to a request for his support in so doing, he wrote to Lord Stanley of
+Alderley on March 9:--]
+
+Anything I can do to help in raising a memorial to Carlyle shall be
+most willingly done. Few men can have dissented more strongly from his
+way of looking at things than I; but I should not yield to the most
+devoted of his followers in gratitude for the bracing wholesome
+influence of his writings when, as a very young man, I was essaying
+without rudder or compass to strike out a course for myself.
+
+[Mention has already been made of his ill-health at the end of the
+year, which was perhaps a premonition of the breakdown of 1883. An
+indication of the same kind may be found in the following letter to
+Mrs. Tyndall, who had forwarded a document which Dr. Tyndall had meant
+to send himself with an explanatory note.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, March 25, 1881.
+
+My dear Mrs. Tyndall,
+
+But where is his last note to me? That is the question on which I have
+been anxiously hoping for light since I received yours and the
+enclosure, which contains such a very sensible proposition that I
+should like to know how it came into existence, abiogenetically or
+otherwise.
+
+As I am by way of forgetting everything myself just now, it is a
+comfort to me to believe that Tyndall has forgotten he forgot to send
+the letter of which he forgot the inclosure. The force of
+disremembering could no further go.
+
+In affectionate bewilderment, ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[His general view of his health, however, was much more optimistic, as
+appears from a letter to Mrs. May (wife of the friend of his boyhood)
+about her son, whose strength had been sapped by typhoid fever, and
+who had gone out to the Cape to recruit.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, June 10, 1881.
+
+My dear Mrs. May,
+
+I promised your daughter the other day that I would send you the
+Bishop of Natal's letter to me. Unfortunately I had mislaid it, and it
+only turned up just now when I was making one of my periodical
+clearances in the chaos of papers that accumulates on my table.
+
+You will be pleased to see how fully the good Bishop appreciates
+Stuart's excellent qualities, and as to the physical part of the
+business, though it is sad enough that a young man should be impeded
+in this way, I think you should be hopeful. Delicate young people
+often turn out strong old people--I was a thread paper of a boy
+myself, and now I am an extremely tough old personage...
+
+With our united kind regards to Mr. May and yourself,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Perhaps if he had been able each year to carry out the wish expressed
+in the following letter, which covered an introduction to Dr. Tyndall
+at his house on the Bel Alp, the breakdown of 1883 might have been
+averted.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., July 5 [1881?].
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+It is a great deal more than I would say for everybody, but I am sure
+Tyndall will be very much obliged to me for making you known to him;
+and if you, insignificant male creature, how very much more for the
+opportunity of knowing Mrs. Skelton!
+
+For which last pretty speech I hope the lady will make a prettier
+curtsey. So go boldly across the Aletsch, and if they have a knocker
+(which I doubt), knock and it shall be opened unto you.
+
+I wish I were going to be there too; but Royal Commissions are a kind
+of endemic in my constitution, and I have a very bad one just now.
+[The Medical Acts Commission 1881-2.]
+
+With kind remembrances to Mrs. Skelton,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The ecclesiastical sound of his new title of Dean of the College of
+Science afforded him a good deal of amusement. He writes from
+Grasmere, where he had joined his family for the summer vacation:--]
+
+August 18, 1881.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I am astonished that you don't known that a letter to a Dean ought to
+be addressed "The Very Reverend." I don't generally stand much upon
+etiquette, but when my sacred character is touched I draw the line.
+
+We had athletics here yesterday, and as it was a lovely day, all
+Cumberland and Westmoreland sent contingents to see the fun...
+
+This would be a grand place if it were drier, but the rain it raineth
+every day--yesterday being the only really fine day since our arrival.
+
+However, we all thrive, so I suppose we are adapting ourselves to the
+medium, and shall be scaly and finny before long.
+
+Haven't you done with Babylon yet? It is high time you were out of it.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.13.
+
+1882.
+
+[The year 1882 was a dark year for English science. It was marked by
+the death of both Charles Darwin and of Francis Balfour, the young
+investigator, of whom Huxley once said,] "He is the only man who can
+carry out my work." [The one was the inevitable end of a great career,
+in the fulness of time; the other was one of those losses which are
+the more deplorable as they seem unnecessary, the result of a chance
+slip, in all the vigour of youth. I remember his coming to our house
+just before setting out on his fatal visit to Switzerland, and my
+mother begging him to be careful about risking so valuable a life as
+his in dangerous ascents. He laughingly replied that he only wanted to
+conquer one little peak on Montblanc. A few days later came the news
+of his fatal fall upon the precipices of the Aiguille Blanche. Since
+the death of Edward Forbes, no loss outside the circle of his family
+had affected my father so deeply. For three days he was utterly
+prostrated, and was scarcely able either to eat or sleep.
+
+There was indeed a subtle affinity between the two men. My mother, who
+was greatly attached to Francis Balfour, said once to Sir M. Foster,
+"He has not got the dash and verve, but otherwise he reminds me
+curiously of what my husband was in his 'Rattlesnake' days." "How
+strange," replied Sir Michael, "when he first came to the front,
+Lankester wrote asking me, 'Who is this man Balfour you are always
+talking about?' and I answered, 'Well, I can only describe him by
+saying he is a younger Huxley.'"
+
+Writing to Dr. Dohrn on September 24, Huxley says:--]
+
+Heavy blows have fallen upon me this year in losing Darwin and
+Balfour, the best of the old and the best of the young. I am beginning
+to feel older than my age myself, and if Balfour had lived I should
+have cleared out of the way as soon as possible, feeling that the
+future of Zoological Science in this country was very safe in his
+hands. As it is, I am afraid I may still be of use for some years, and
+shall be unable to sing my "Nunc dimittis" with a good conscience.]
+
+Darwin was in correspondence with him till quite near the end; having
+received the volume "Science and Culture," he wrote on January 12,
+1882:--
+
+With respect to automatism (The allusion is to the 1874 address on
+"Animals as Automata," which was reprinted in "Science and Culture."),
+I wish that you could review yourself in the old, and, of course,
+forgotten, trenchant style, and then you would have to answer yourself
+with equal incisiveness; and thus, by Jove, you might go on ad
+infinitum to the joy and instruction of the world.
+
+And again on March 27:--
+
+Your most kind letter has been a real cordial to me...once again
+accept my cordial thanks, my dear old friend. I wish to God there were
+more automata in the world like you.
+
+Darwin died on April 19, and a brief notice being required for the
+forthcoming number of "Nature" on the 27th, Huxley made shift to write
+a brief article, which is printed in the "Collected Essays" 2 page
+244. But as neither he nor Sir Joseph Hooker could at the moment
+undertake a regular obituary notice, this was entrusted to Professor
+Romanes, to whom the following letters were written.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, April 26, 1882.
+
+My dear Romanes,
+
+Thank you for your hearty letter. I spent many hours over the few
+paragraphs I sent to "Nature," in trying to express what all who
+thoroughly knew and therefore loved Darwin, must feel in language
+which should be absolutely free from rhetoric or exaggeration.
+
+I have done my best, and the sad thing is that I cannot look for those
+cheery notes he used to send me in old times, when I had written
+anything that pleased him.
+
+In case we should miss one another to-day, let me say that it is
+impossible for me to undertake the obituary in "Nature." I have a
+conglomeration of business of various kinds upon my hands just now. I
+am sure it will be very safe in your hands.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Pray do what you will with what I have written in "Nature."
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 9, 1882.
+
+My dear Romanes,
+
+I feel it very difficult to offer any useful criticism on what you
+have written about Darwin, because, although it does not quite please
+me, I cannot exactly say how I think it might be improved. My own way
+is to write and rewrite things, until by some sort of instinctive
+process they acquire the condensation and symmetry which satisfies me.
+And I really could not say how my original drafts are improved until
+they somehow improve themselves.
+
+Two things however strike me. I think there is too much of the letter
+about Henslow. I should be disposed to quote only the most
+characteristic passages.
+
+The other point is that I think strength would be given to your
+panegyric by a little pruning here and there.
+
+I am not likely to take a low view of Darwin's position in the history
+of science, but I am disposed to think that Buffon and Lamarck would
+run him hard in both genius and fertility. In breadth of view and in
+extent of knowledge these two men were giants, though we are apt to
+forget their services. Von Baer was another man of the same stamp;
+Cuvier, in a somewhat lower rank, another; and J. Muller another.
+
+"Colossal" does not seem to me to be the right epithet for Darwin's
+intellect. He had a clear rapid intelligence, a great memory, a vivid
+imagination, and what made his greatness was the strict subordination
+of all these to his love of truth.
+
+But you will be tired of my carping, and you had much better write
+what seems right and just to yourself.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Two scientific papers published this year were on subjects connected
+with his work on the fisheries, one "A Contribution to the Pathology
+of the Epidemic known as the 'Salmon Disease'" read before the Royal
+Society on the occasion of the Prince of Wales being admitted a Fellow
+(February 21; "Proceedings of the Royal Society" 33 pages 381-389);
+the other on "Saprolegnia in relation to the Salmon Disease"
+("Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science" 22 pages 311-333). A
+third, at the Zoological Society, was on the "Respiratory Organs of
+Apteryx" ("Proceedings of the Zoological Society" 1882 pages 560-569).
+He delivered an address before the Liverpool Institution on "Science
+and Art in Relation to Education" ("Collected Essays" 3 page 160), and
+was busy with the Medical Acts Commission, which reported this year.
+
+The aim of this Commission was to level up the varying qualifications
+bestowed by nearly a score of different licensing bodies in the United
+Kingdom, and to establish some central control by the State over the
+licensing of medical practitioners. (For a fuller account of this
+Commission and the part played in it by Huxley, see his "State and
+Medical Education" ("Collected Essays" 3 323) published 1884.)
+
+The report recommended the establishment of Boards in each division of
+the United Kingdom containing representatives of all the medical
+bodies in the division. These boards would register students, and
+admit to a final examination those who had passed the preliminary and
+minor examinations at the various universities and other bodies
+already granting degrees and qualifications. Candidates who passed
+this final examination would be licensed by the General Medical
+Council, a body to be elected no longer by the separate bodies
+interested in medical education, but by the Divisional Boards.
+
+The report rejected a scheme for joint examination by the existing
+bodies, assisted by outside examiners appointed by a central
+authority, on the ground of difficulty and expense, as well as one for
+a separate State examination. It also provided for compensation from
+the fees to be paid by the candidates to existing bodies whose
+revenues might suffer from the new scheme.
+
+To this majority report, six of the eleven Commissioners appended
+separate reports, suggesting other methods for carrying out the
+desired end. Among the latter was Huxley, who gave his reasons for
+dissenting from the principle assumed by his colleagues, though he had
+signed the main report as embodying the best means of carrying out a
+reform, that principle being granted.]
+
+"The State examination" [he thought,] "was ideally best, but for many
+reasons impossible." [But the] "conjoint scheme" [recommended in the
+report appeared to punish the efficient medical authorities for the
+abuses of the inefficient. Moreover, if the examiners of the
+Divisional Board did not affiliate themselves to any medical
+authority, the compensation to be provided would be very heavy; if
+they did,] "either they will affiliate without further examination,
+which will give them the pretence of a further qualification, without
+any corresponding reality, or they will affiliate in examination, in
+which case the new examination deprecated by the general voice of the
+profession will be added, and any real difference between the plan
+proposed and the 'State examination' scheme will vanish."
+
+[The compensation proposed too, would chiefly fall to the discredited
+bodies, who had neglected their duties.]
+
+The scheme [he writes in his report], which I ventured to suggest is
+of extreme simplicity; and while I cannot but think that it would
+prove thoroughly efficient, it interferes with no fair vested interest
+in such a manner as to give a claim for compensation, and it inflicts
+no burden either in the way of taxation or extra examination on the
+medical profession.
+
+This proposal is, that if any examining body satisfies the Medical
+Council (or other State authority), that it requires full and
+efficient instruction and examination in the three branches of
+medicine, surgery, and midwifery; and if it admits a certain number of
+coadjutor examiners appointed by the State authority, the certificate
+of that authority shall give admission to the Medical Register.
+
+I submit that while the adopting this proposal would secure a
+practically uniform minimum standard of examination, it would leave
+free play to the individuality of the various existing or future
+universities and medical corporations; that the revenues of such
+bodies derived from medical examinations would thenceforth increase or
+diminish in the ratio of their deserts; that a really efficient
+inspection of the examinations would be secured, and that no one could
+come upon the register without a complete qualification.
+
+[That there was no difficulty in this scheme was shown by the
+experience of the Scotch Universities; and the expense would be less
+than the proposed compensation tax.
+
+The chief part of the summer vacation Huxley spent at Lynton, on the
+north coast of Devonshire.] "The Happy Family," [he writes to Dr.
+Dohrn,] "has been spending its vacation in this pretty place, eighteen
+miles of up hill and down dale from any railway." [It was a country
+made for the long rambles he delighted in after the morning's due
+allowance of writing. And although he generally preferred complete
+quiet on his holidays, with perfect freedom from all social
+exigencies, these weeks of rest were rendered all the pleasanter by
+the unstudied and unexacting friendliness of the family party which
+centred around Mr. and Mrs. F. Bailey of Lee Abbey hard by--Lady
+Tenterden, the Julius and the Henry Pollocks, the latter old friends
+of ours.
+
+Though his holiday was curtailed at either end, he was greatly set up
+by it, and writes to chaff his son-in-law for taking too little
+rest:--]
+
+I was glad to hear that F. had stood his fortnight's holiday so well;
+three weeks might have knocked him up!
+
+[On the same day, September 26, he wrote the letter to Dr. Dohrn,
+mentioned above, answering two inquiries--one as to arrangements for
+exhibiting at the Fisheries Exhibition to be held in London the
+following year, the other as to whether England would follow the
+example of Germany and Italy in sending naval officers to the
+Zoological Station at Naples to be instructed in catching and
+preserving marine animals for the purposes of scientific research.
+
+[With respect to question Number 2, I am afraid my answer must be less
+hopeful. So far as the British Admiralty is represented by the
+ordinary British admiral, the only reply to such a proposition as you
+make that I should expect would be that he (the British admiral, to
+wit) would see you d--d first. However, I will speak of the matter to
+the Hydrographer, who really is interested in science, at the first
+opportunity.
+
+[For many years before this, and until the end of his life, there was
+another side to his correspondence which deserves mention.
+
+I wish that more of the queer letters, which arrived in never-failing
+streams, had been preserved. A favourite type was the anonymous
+letter. It prayed fervently, over four pages, that the Almighty would
+send him down quick into the pit, and was usually signed simply "A
+Lady." Others came from cranks of every species: the man who
+demonstrated that the world was flat, or that the atmosphere had no
+weight--an easy proof, for you weigh a bottle full of air; then break
+it to pieces, so that it holds nothing; weigh the pieces, and they are
+the same weight as the whole bottle full of air! Or, again, that the
+optical law of quality between the angle of incidence and the angle of
+reflection is a delusion, whence it follows that all our established
+latitudes are incorrect, and the difference of temperature between
+Labrador and Ireland, nominally on the same parallel, is easily
+accounted for. Then came the suggestions of little pieces of work that
+might so easily be undertaken by a man of Huxley's capacity, learning,
+and energy. Enormous manuscripts were sent him with a request that he
+would write a careful criticism of them, and arrange for their
+publication in the proceedings of some learned society or first-rate
+magazine. One of the most delightful came this year. A doctor in
+India, having just read "John Inglesant," begged Professor Huxley to
+do for Science what Mr. Shorthouse had done for the Church of England.
+As for the material difficulties in the way of getting such a book
+written in the midst of other work, the ingenious doctor suggested the
+use of a phonograph driven by a gas-engine. The great thoughts
+dictated into it from the comfort of an armchair, could easily be
+worked up into novel shape by a collaborator.
+
+India, again, provided the following application of 1885, made in all
+seriousness by a youthful Punjaubee with scientific aspirations, who
+feared to be forced into the law. After an intimate account of his
+life, he modestly appeals for a post in some scientific institution,
+where he may get his food, do experiments three or four hours a day,
+and learn English. Latterly his mental activity had been very
+great:--"I have been contemplating," he says, "to give a new system of
+Political Economy to the world. I have questioned, perhaps with
+success, the validity of some of the fundamental doctrines of Herbert
+Spencer's synthetic philosophy," and so on.
+
+Another remarkable communication is a reply-paid telegram from the
+States, in 1892, which ran as follows:--
+
+Unless all reason and all nature have deceived me, I have found the
+truth. It is my intention to cross the ocean to consult with those who
+have helped me most to find it. Shall I be welcome? Please answer at
+my expense, and God grant we all meet in life on earth.
+
+Another, of British origin this time, was from a man who had to read a
+paper before a local Literary Society on the momentous question,
+"Where are we?" so he sent round a circular to various authorities to
+reinforce his own opinions on the six heads into which he proposed to
+divide his discourse, namely:
+
+Where are we in Space?
+
+Where are we in Science?
+
+Where are we in Politics?
+
+Where are we in Commerce?
+
+Where are we in Sociology?
+
+Where are we in Theology?
+
+The writer received an answer, and a mild one:--]
+
+Any adequate reply to your inquiry would be of the nature of a
+treatise, and that, I regret, I cannot undertake to write.
+
+[Two letters of this year touch on Irish affairs, in which he was
+always interested, having withal a certain first-hand knowledge of the
+people and the country they lived in, from his visits there, both as a
+Fishery Commissioner and on other occasions. He writes warmly to the
+historian who treated of Ireland without prejudice or rancour.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, April 16, 1882.
+
+My dear Lecky,
+
+Accept my best thanks for your two volumes, which I found on my return
+from Scotland yesterday.
+
+I can give no better evidence of my appreciation of their contents
+than by the confession that they have caused me to neglect my proper
+business all yesterday evening and all to-day.
+
+The section devoted to Irish affairs is a model of lucidity, and bears
+on its face the stamp of justice and fair dealing. It is a most worthy
+continuation of the chapter on the same subject in the first volume,
+and that is giving high praise.
+
+You see I write as if I knew something about the subject, but you are
+responsible for creating the delusion.
+
+With kindest remembrances to Mrs. Lecky,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A few weeks later, the murder of Lord Frederick Cavendish sent a
+thrill of horror throughout England. Huxley was as deeply moved as
+any, but wrote calmly of the situation.
+
+To his eldest son:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 9, 1882.
+
+My dear Leonard,
+
+Best thanks for your good wishes [For his birthday, May 4.].
+Notwithstanding the disease of A.D., which always proves mortal sooner
+or later, I am in excellent case...
+
+I knew both Lord F. Cavendish and his wife and Mr. Burke. I have never
+been able to get poor Lady Frederick out of my head since the news
+arrived.
+
+The public mind has been more stirred than by anything since the
+Indian Mutiny. But if the Government keep their heads cool, great good
+may come out of the evil, horrible as it is. The Fenians have reckoned
+on creating an irreparable breach between England and Ireland. It
+should be our business to disappoint them first and extirpate them
+afterwards. But the newspaper writers make me sick, especially the
+"Times".
+
+Ever your affectionate father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[It is interesting, also, to see how he appeared about this time to
+one of a younger generation, acute, indeed, and discriminating, but
+predisposed by circumstances and upbringing to regard him at first
+with curiosity rather than sympathy. For this account I am indebted to
+one who has the habit, so laudable in good hands, of keeping a journal
+of events and conversations. I have every confidence in the
+substantial accuracy of so well trained a reporter.
+
+EXTRACT FROM JOURNAL.
+
+November 25, 1882.
+
+In the evening we dined at the --'s, chiefly a family party with the
+addition of Professor Huxley and his wife and ourselves. Much lively
+conversation, after dinner, begun among the ladies, but continued
+after the gentlemen appeared, on the subjects of Truth, Education, and
+Women's Rights, or, more strictly speaking, women's capabilities. Our
+hostess (Lady --) was, if possible, more vehement and paradoxical than
+her wont, and vigorously maintained that TRUTH was no virtue in
+itself, but must be inculcated for expediency's sake. The opposite
+view found a champion in Professor Huxley, who described himself as]
+"almost a fanatic for the sanctity of truth." [Lady -- urged that
+truth was often a very selfish virtue, and that a man of noble and
+unselfish character might lie for the sake of a friend, to which some
+one replied that after a course of this unselfish lying the noble
+character was pretty sure to deteriorate, while the Professor
+laughingly suggested that the owner had a good chance of finding
+himself landed ultimately in Botany Bay.
+
+The celebrated instance of John Inglesant's perjury for the sake of
+Charles I. was then brought forward, and it was this which led
+Professor Huxley to say that in his judgment no one had the right
+passively to submit to a false accusation, and that] "moral suicide"
+[was as blameworthy as physical suicide.] "He may refuse to commit
+another, but he ought not to allow himself to be believed worse than
+he actually is. It is a loss to the world of MORAL FORCE, which cannot
+be afforded."
+
+[...Then as regards women's powers. The Professor said he did not
+believe in their ever succeeding in a competition with men. Then he
+went on:--] "I can't help looking at women with something of the eye
+of a physiologist. Twenty years ago I thought the womanhood of England
+was going to the dogs," [but now, he said, he observed a wonderful
+change for the better. We asked to what he attributed it. Was it to
+lawn tennis and the greater variety of bodily exercises?] "Partly,"
+[he answered,] "but much more to their having more PURSUITS--more to
+interest them and to occupy their thoughts and time."
+
+[The following letter bears upon the question of employing retired
+engineer officers in administrative posts in the Science and Art
+Department:--]
+
+The Rookery, Lynton, September 19, 1882.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+Your letter seems to have arrived here the very day I left for Whitby,
+whither I had to betake myself to inspect a weir, so I did not get it
+until my return last night.
+
+I am extremely sorry to hear of the possibility of Martin's giving up
+his post. He took so much interest in the work and was so very
+pleasant to deal with, that I do not think we shall easily find any
+one to replace him.
+
+If you will find another R.E. at all like him, in Heaven's name catch
+him and put him in, job or no job.
+
+The objection to a small clerk is that we want somebody who knows how
+to deal with men, and especially young men on the one hand, and
+especially cantankerous (more or less) old scientific buffers on the
+other.
+
+The objection to a man of science is that (1) we want a man of
+business and not a m.s., and (2) that no man scientifically worth
+having that I know of is likely to take such an office.
+
+"As at present advised" I am all for an R.E., so I cannot have the
+pleasure even of trying to convert you.
+
+With our united kindest regards,
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I return next Monday.
+
+[Two letters of thanks follow, one at the beginning of the year to Mr.
+Herbert Spencer for the gift of a very fine photograph of himself; the
+other, at the end of the year, to Mr. (afterwards Sir John) Skelton,
+for his book on Mary Queen of Scots and the Casket Letters.
+
+As to the former, it must be premised that Mr. Spencer abhorred
+exaggeration and inexact talk, and would ruthlessly prick the airy
+bubbles which endued the conversation of the daughters of the house
+with more buoyancy than strict logic, a gift which, he averred, was
+denied to woman.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 25, 1882.
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+Best thanks for the photograph. It is very good, though there is just
+a touch of severity in the eye. We shall hang it up in the
+dining-room, and if anybody is guilty of exaggerated expressions or
+bad logic (five womenkind habitually sit round that table), I trust
+they will feel that that eye is upon them.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 31, 1882.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+If I may not thank you for the book you have been kind enough to send
+me, I may at any rate wish you and Mrs. Skelton a happy New Year and
+many on 'em.
+
+I am going to read your vindication of Mary Stuart as soon as I can.
+Hitherto I am sorry to say I have classed her with Eve, Helen,
+Cleopatra, Delilah, and sundry other glorious --s who have lured men
+to their destruction.
+
+But I am open to conviction, and ready to believe that she blew up her
+husband only a little more thoroughly than other women do, by reason
+of her keener perception of logic.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.14.
+
+1883.
+
+[The pressure of official work, which had been constantly growing
+since 1880, reached its highest point in 1883. Only one scientific
+memoir was published by him this year, and then no more for the next
+four years. (Contributions to Morphology, Ichthyopsida, Number 2. On
+the Oviducts of Osmerus; with remarks on the relations of the
+Teleostean with the Ganoid Fishes "Proceedings of the Zoological
+Society" 1883 pages 132-139). The intervals of lecturing and examining
+were chiefly filled by fishery business, from which, according to his
+usual custom when immersed in any investigation, he chose the subject,
+"Oysters and the Oyster Question," both for his Friday evening
+discourse at the Royal Institution on May 11, and for his course to
+Working Men between January 8 and February 12.
+
+There are the usual notes of all seasons at all parts of England. A
+deserted hotel at Cromer in January was uninviting.]
+
+My windows look out on a wintry sea, and it is bitter cold.
+Notwithstanding, a large number of the aquatic gentleman to whom I
+shall have the pleasure of listening, by and by, are loafing against
+the railings opposite, as only fishermen can loaf.
+
+[In April he had been ill, and his wife begged him to put off some
+business which had to be done at York. But unless absolutely ordered
+to bed by his doctor, nothing would induce him to put personal
+convenience before public duty. However, he took his son to look after
+him.]
+
+I am none the worse for my journey [he writes from York], rather the
+better; so Clark is justified, and I should have failed in my duty if
+I had not come. H. Looks after me almost as well as you could do.
+
+[To make amends, fishery business in the west country during a fine
+summer had] "a good deal of holiday in it," [though a cross journey at
+the beginning of August from Abergavenny to Totness made him write:--]
+
+If ever (except to-morrow, by the way) I travel within measurable
+distance of a Bank Holiday by the Great Western, may jackasses sit on
+my grandmother's grave.
+
+[As the business connected with the Inspectorship had been enlarged in
+the preceding years by exhibitions at Norwich and Edinburgh, so it was
+enlarged this year, and to a still greater extent, by the Fisheries
+Exhibition in London. This involved upon him as Commissioner, not only
+the organisation of the Conference on Fish Diseases and the paper on
+the Diseases of Fish already mentioned, but administration, committee
+meetings, and more--a speech on behalf of the Commissioners in reply
+to the welcome given them by the Prince of Wales at the opening of the
+Exhibition. On the following day he expressed his feelings at this
+mode of spending his time in a letter to Sir M. Foster.]
+
+I am dog-tired with yesterday's function. Had to be at the Exhibition
+in full fig at 10 a.m., and did not get home from the Fishmongers'
+dinner till 1.20 this morning.
+
+Will you tell me what all this has to do with my business in life, and
+why the last fragments of a misspent life that are left to me are to
+be frittered away in all this drivel?
+
+Yours savagely,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Later in the year, also, he had to serve on another Fishery
+Commission much against his will, though on the understanding that, in
+view of his other engagements, he need not attend all the sittings.
+
+A more satisfactory result of the Exhibition was that he found himself
+brought into close contact with several of the great city companies,
+whose enormous resources he had long been trying, not without some
+success, to enlist on behalf of technical and scientific education.
+
+Among these may be noted the Fishmongers, the Mercers, who had already
+interested themselves in technical education, and gave their hall for
+the meetings of the City and Guilds Council, of which Huxley was an
+active member; the Clothworkers, in whose schools he distributed the
+prizes this year; and, not least, the Salters, who presented him with
+their freedom on November 13. Their master, Mr. J.W. Clark, writing in
+August, after Huxley had accepted their proposal, says: "I think you
+must admit that the City Companies have yielded liberally to the
+gentle compassion you have exercised on them. So far from helping you
+to act the traitor, we propose to legitimise your claim for education,
+which several of us shall be willing to unite with you in promoting."
+(See above.)
+
+The crowning addition, however, to Huxley's official work was the
+Presidency of the Royal Society. He had resigned the Secretaryship in
+1880, after holding office for nine years under three
+Presidents--Airy, Hooker, and Spottiswoode. Spottiswoode, like Hooker,
+was a member of the x Club, and was regarded with great affection and
+respect by Huxley, who in 1887 wrote of him to Mr. John Morley:--]
+
+It is quite absurd you don't know Spottiswoode, and I shall do both
+him and you a good turn by bringing you together. He is one of my best
+friends, and comes under the A1 class of "people with whom you may go
+tiger-hunting."
+
+[On June 7, writing to Professor (afterwards Sir E.) Frankland, he
+says:--]
+
+You will have heard that Spottiswoode is seriously ill. The physicians
+suspect typhoid, but are not quite certain. I called this morning, and
+hear that he remains much as he has been for the last two or three
+days. So many of our friends have dropped away in the course of the
+last two years that I am perhaps morbidly anxious about Spottiswoode,
+but there is no question that his condition is such as to cause grave
+anxiety.
+
+[But by the end of the month his fears were realised. Consequently it
+devolved upon the Council of the Royal Society to elect one of their
+own body to hold office until the St. Andrew's Day following, when a
+regular President would be elected at a general meeting of the
+Society.
+
+Huxley himself had no wish to stand. He writes to Sir M. Foster on
+June 27, announcing Spottiswoode's death, which had taken place that
+morning:--]
+
+It is very grievous in all ways. Only the other day he and I were
+talking of the almost miraculous way in which the x Club had held
+together without a break for some 18 years, and little did either of
+us suspect that he would be the first to go.
+
+A heavy responsibility falls on you in the Royal Society. It strikes
+me you will have to call another meeting of the Council before the
+recess for the consideration of the question of the Presidency. It is
+hateful to talk of these things, but I want you to form some notion of
+what had best be done as you come up to-morrow.
+
+-- is a possibility, but none of the other officers, I think.
+
+[Indeed, he wished to diminish his official distractions rather than
+to increase them. His health was unlikely to stand any additional
+strain, and he longed to devote the remainder of his working years to
+his unfinished scientific researches. But he felt very strongly that
+the President of the Royal Society ought to be chosen for his eminence
+in science, not on account of social position, or of wealth, even
+though the wealth might have been acquired through the applications of
+science. The acknowledgment of this principle had led some years back
+to the great revolution from within, which succeeded in making the
+Society the living centre and representative of science for the whole
+country, and he was above all things anxious that the principle should
+be maintained. He was assured, however, from several quarters that
+unless he allowed himself to be put forward, there was danger lest the
+principle should be disregarded.
+
+Moved by these considerations of public necessity, he unwillingly
+consented to be nominated, but only to fill the vacancy till the
+general meeting, when the whole Society could make a new choice. Yet
+even this limitation seemed difficult to maintain in the face of the
+widely expressed desire that he would then stand for the usual period
+of five years.] "The worst of it is," [he wrote to Sir M. Foster on
+July 2,] "that I see myself gravitating towards the Presidency en
+permanence, that is to say, for the ordinary period. And that is what
+I by no means desired. -- has been at me (as a sort of deputation, he
+told me, from a lot of the younger men) to stand. However, I suppose
+there is no need to come to any decision yet."
+
+[The following letters, in reply to congratulations on his election,
+illustrate his attitude of mind in the affair:--]
+
+To the Warden of Merton.
+
+Hindhead, July 8, 1883.
+
+My dear Brodrick,
+
+I do not get so many pleasant letters that I can afford to leave the
+senders of such things unthanked.
+
+I am very much obliged for your congratulations, and I may say that I
+accepted the office inter alia for the purpose of getting people to
+believe that such places may be properly held by people who have
+neither riches nor station--who want nothing that statesmen can
+give--and who care for nothing except upholding the dignity and the
+freedom of science.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+To Sir W.H. Flower, F.R.S.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, July 7, 1883.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+I am overwhelmed by the kind letters I get from all sides, and I need
+hardly say that I particularly value yours.
+
+A month ago I said that I ought not, could not, and would not take the
+Presidency under any circumstances whatever. My wife was dead against
+it, and you know how hen-pecked I am.
+
+Even when I was asked to take the Presidency to the end of the year
+and agreed, I stipulated for my freedom next St. Andrew's Day.
+
+But such strong representations were made to me by some of the younger
+men about the dangers of the situation, that at the last moment almost
+I changed my mind.
+
+However, I wanted it to be clearly understood that the Council and the
+Society are, so far as I am concerned, perfectly free to put somebody
+else in my place next November. All I stipulate for is that my
+successor shall be a man of science.
+
+I will not, if I can help it, allow the chair of the Royal Society to
+become the appanage of rich men, or have the noble old Society
+exploited by enterprising commercial gents who make their profit out
+of the application of science.
+
+Mrs. President was NOT pleased--quite the contrary--but she is
+mollified by the kindly expressions, public and private, which have
+received the election.
+
+And there are none which we both value more than yours. (I see I said
+that before, but I can't say it too often.)
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hindhead, July 8, 1883.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+Many thanks for your comforting letter. When I am fairly committed to
+anything I generally have a cold fit--and your judgment that I have
+done right is "grateful and comforting" like Epps' Cocoa. It is not so
+much work as distraction that is involved; and though it may put a
+stop to my purely scientific work for a while, I don't know that I
+could be better employed in the interests of science than in trying to
+keep the Royal Society straight.
+
+My wife was very much against it at first--and indeed when I was first
+spoken to I declared that I would not go on after next St. Andrew's
+Day. But a good deal of pressure was brought to bear by some of my
+friends, and if the Fellows don't turn me out I shall say with
+MacMahon, "J'y suis et j'y reste."
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+We have run down here for a day, but are back to-morrow.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, July 10, 1883.
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+What an agreeable surprise your letter has been. I have been expecting
+the most awful scolding for taking more work, and behold as sweetly
+congratulatory an epistle as a man could wish.
+
+Three weeks ago I swore by all my gods that I would not take the offer
+at any price, but I suppose the infusion of Theism was too homeopathic
+for the oath to bind.
+
+Go on sleeping, my dear friend. If you are so amiable with three
+nights, what will you be with three weeks?
+
+What a shame no rain is sent you. You will be speaking about
+Providence as I heard of a Yankee doing the other day--"Wal, sir, I
+guess he's good; but he's careless."
+
+I think there is a good deal in that view of the government of the
+world.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To his eldest daughter:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, July 14, 1883.
+
+Dearest Jess,
+
+I am not sure either whether my accession to the Presidency is a
+matter for congratulation. Honour and glory are all very fine, but on
+the whole I prefer peace and quietness, and three weeks ago I declared
+I would have nothing to do with it.
+
+But there are a good many circumstances in the present state of
+affairs which weighed heavily in the scale, and so I made up my mind
+to try the experiment.
+
+If I don't suit the office or the office doesn't suit me, there is a
+way out every 30th of November.
+
+There was more work connected with the Secretaryship--but there is
+more trouble and responsibility and distraction in the Presidency.
+
+I am amused with your account of your way of governing your headstrong
+boy. I find the way of governing headstrong men to be very similar,
+and I believe it is by practising the method that I get the measure of
+success with which people credit me.
+
+But they are often very fractious, and it is a bother for a man who
+was meant for a student.
+
+Poor Spottiswoode's death was a great blow to me. Never was a better
+man, and I hoped he would stop where he was for the next ten years...
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He finally decided that the question of standing again in November
+must depend on whether this course was likely to cause division in the
+ranks of the Society. He earnestly desired to avoid anything like a
+contest for scientific honours (As he wrote a little later:--] "I have
+never competed in the way of honour in my life, and I cannot allow
+myself to be even thought of as in such a position now, where, with
+all respect to the honour and glory, they do not appear to me to be in
+any way equivalent to the burden. And I am not at all sure that I may
+not be able to serve the right cause outside the Chair rather than in
+it."); [he was almost morbidly anxious that the temporary choice of
+himself should not be interpreted as binding the electors in any way.
+
+I give the following letters to show his sensitiveness on every
+question of honour and of public advantage:--]
+
+Brechin Castle, Brechin, N.B., September 19, 1883.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We got here yesterday. The Commission does not meet till next week, so
+like the historical donkey of Jeshurun I have nothing to do but wax
+fat and kick in this excellent pasture.
+
+At odd times lately my mind has been a good deal exercised about the
+Royal Society. I am quite willing to go on in the Chair if the Council
+and the Society wish it. But it is quite possible that the Council who
+chose me when the choice was limited to their own body, might be
+disposed to select some one else when the range of choice is extended
+to the whole body of the Society. And I am very anxious that the
+Council should be made to understand, when the question comes forward
+for discussion after the recess, that the fact of present tenancy
+constitutes no claim in my eyes.
+
+The difficulty is, how is this to be done? I cannot ask the Council to
+do as they please, without reference to me, because I am bound to
+assume that that is what they will do, and it would be an impertinence
+to assume the contrary.
+
+On the other hand, I should at once decline to be put in nomination
+again, if it could be said that by doing so I had practically forced
+myself either upon the Council or upon the Society.
+
+Heaven be praised I have not many enemies, but the two or three with
+whom I have to reckon don't stick at trifles, and I should not like by
+any inadvertance to give them a handle.
+
+I have had some thought of writing a letter to Evans [Sir John Evans,
+K.C.B., then Treasurer of the Royal Society.], such as he could read
+to the Council at the first meeting in October, at which I need not be
+present.
+
+The subject could then be freely discussed, without any voting or
+resolution on the minutes, and the officers could let me know whether
+in their judgment it is expedient I should be nominated or not.
+
+In the last case I should withdraw on the ground of my other
+occupations--which, in fact, is a very real obstacle, and one which
+looms large in my fits of blue-devils, which have been more frequent
+of late than they should be in holiday time.
+
+Now, will you turn all this over in your mind? Perhaps you might talk
+it over with Stokes.
+
+Of course I am very sensible of the honour of being P.R.S., but I
+should be much more sensible of the dishonour of being in that place
+by a fluke, or in any other way, than by the free choice of the
+Council and Society.
+
+In fact I am inclined to think that I am morbidly sensitive on the
+last point; and so, instead of acting on my own impulse, as I have
+been tempted to do, I submit myself to your worship's wisdom.
+
+I am not sure that I should not have been wiser if I had stuck to my
+original intention of holding office only till St. Andrew's Day.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Secretary of State, Home Department, October 3, 1883.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+There was an Irish bricklayer who once bet a hodman he would not carry
+him up to the top of an exceeding high ladder in his hod. The hod man
+did it, but Paddy said, "I had great hopes, now, ye'd let me fall just
+about six rounds from the top."
+
+I told the story before when I was up for the School Board, but it is
+so applicable to the present case that I can't help coming out with it
+again.
+
+If you, dear good hodmen, would have but let me fall!
+
+However, as the thing is to be, it is very pleasant to find Evans and
+Williamson and you so hearty in the process of elevation, and in spite
+of blue-devils I will do my best to "do my duty in the state of life
+I'm called to."
+
+But I believe you never had the advantage of learning the Church
+Catechism.
+
+If there is any good in what is done you certainly deserve the credit
+of it, for nothing but your letter stopped me from kicking over the
+traces at once. Do you see how Evolution is getting made into a bolus
+and oiled outside for the ecclesiastical swallow? [This refers to
+papers read before the Church Congress that year by Messrs. W.H.
+Flower and F. Le Gros Clarke.]
+
+Ever thine,
+
+Thomas, P.R.S.
+
+[The same feeling appears in his anxiety as President to avoid the
+slightest appearance of committing the Society to debatable opinions
+which he supported as a private individual. Thus, although he had
+"personally, politically, and philosophically" no liking for Charles
+Bradlaugh, he objected on general grounds to the exclusion of Mrs.
+Besant and Miss Bradlaugh from the classes at University College, and
+had signed a memorial in their favour. On the other hand, he did not
+wish it to be asserted that the Royal Society, through its president,
+had thrown its influence into what was really a social and political,
+not a scientific question. He writes to Sir M. Foster on July 18:--]
+
+It is very unlucky for me that I signed the memorial requesting the
+Council of University College to reconsider their decision about Mrs.
+Besant and Miss Bradlaugh when I was quite innocent of any possibility
+of holding the P.R.S.
+
+I must go to the meeting of members to-day and define my position in
+the matter with more care, under the circumstances.
+
+Mrs. Besant was a student in my teacher's class here last year, and a
+very well-conducted lady-like person; but I have never been able to
+get hold of the "Fruits of Philosophy," and do not know to what
+doctrine she has committed herself.
+
+They seem to have excluded Miss Bradlaugh simply on the noscitur a
+sociis principle.
+
+It will need all the dexterity I possess to stand up for the principle
+of religious and philosophical freedom, without giving other people a
+hold for saying I that have identified myself with Bradlaugh.
+
+[It was the same a little later with the Sunday Society, which had
+offered him its presidency. He writes to the Honorary Secretary on
+February 11, 1884:--]
+
+I regret that it is impossible for me to accept the office which the
+Sunday Society honours me by offering.
+
+It is not merely a disinclination to add to the work which already
+falls to my share which leads me to say this. So long as I am
+President of the Royal Society, I shall feel bound to abstain from
+taking any prominent part in public movements as to the propriety of
+which the opinions of the Fellows of the Society differ widely.
+
+My own opinions on the Sunday question are exactly what they were
+five-and-twenty years ago. They have not been hid under a bushel, and
+I should not have accepted my present office if I had felt that so
+doing debarred me from reiterating them whenever it may be necessary
+to do so.
+
+But that is a different matter from taking a step which would, in the
+eyes of the public, commit the Royal Society, through its President,
+to one side of the controversy in which you are engaged, and in which
+I, personally, hope you may succeed as warmly as ever I did.
+
+[One other piece of work during the first half of the year remains to
+be mentioned, namely, the Rede Lecture, delivered at Cambridge on June
+12. This was a discourse on Evolution, based upon the consideration of
+the Pearly Nautilus.
+
+He first traced the evolution of the individual from the ovum, and
+replied to the three usual objections raised to evolution, that it is
+impossible, immoral, and contrary to the argument of design, by
+replying to the first, that it does occur in every individual; to the
+second, that the morality which opposes itself to truth commits
+suicide; and to the third that Paley--the most interesting Sunday
+reading allowed him when a boy--had long since answered this
+objection.
+
+Then he proceeded to discuss the evolution of the 100 species, all
+extinct but two, of Nautilus. The alternative theory of new
+construction, a hundred times over, is opposed alike to tradition and
+to sane science. On the other hand, evolution, tested by paleontology,
+proves a sound hypothesis. The great difficulty of science is in
+tracing every event to those causes which are in present operation;
+the hypothesis of evolution is analogous to what is going on now.
+
+The summer was passed at Milford, near Godalming, in a house at the
+very edge of the heather country which from there stretches unbroken
+past Hindhead and into Wolmer Forest. So well did he like the place
+that he took it again the following year. But his holiday was like to
+have been spoilt at the beginning by the strain of an absurd adventure
+which involved much fatigue and more anxiety.]
+
+I came back only last night [he writes to Sir M. Foster on August 1]
+from Paris, where I sped on Sunday night, in a horrid state of alarm
+from a cursed blundering telegram which led me to believe that Leonard
+(you know he got his first class to our great joy) who had left for
+the continent on Saturday, was ill or had had an accident.
+
+[It was indeed a hurried journey. On receipt of the telegram, he
+rushed to Victoria only to miss the night mail. The booking-clerk
+suggested that he should drive to London Bridge, take train to Lewes,
+and thence take a fly to Newhaven, where he ought to catch a later
+boat. The problem was to catch the London Bridge train. There was
+barely a quarter of an hour, but thanks to a good horse and the Sunday
+absence of traffic, the thing was done, establishing, I believe, what
+the modern mind delights in, a record in cab-driving. Happily the
+anxiety at not finding his son in Paris was soon allayed by another
+telegram from home, where his son-in-law, the innocent sender of the
+original message, had meanwhile arrived. He writes to Sir M.
+Foster:--]
+
+Judging by my scrawl, which is worse than usual, I should say the
+anxiety had left its mark, but I am none the worse otherwise.
+
+[This was indeed the case. Other letters to Sir M. Foster show that he
+was unusually well, perhaps because he was really making holiday to
+some extent. Thus on August 16, he writes:--]
+
+This is a lovely country, and I have been reading novels and walking
+about for the last four days. I must be all right, wind and limb, for
+I walked over twenty miles the day before yesterday, and except a
+blister on one heel, was none the worse.
+
+[And again on September 12:--]
+
+Have been very lazy lately, which means that I have done a great many
+things that I need not have done, and have left undone those which I
+ought to have done. Nowadays that seems to me to be the real
+definition of a holiday.
+
+[For once he was not doing very much holiday work, though he was
+filing at the Rede Lecture to get it into shape for publication. The
+examinations for the Science and Art Department were over, and indeed
+he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+Don't bother your head about the balance--now or hereafter. To tell
+you the truth I do so little in the Examiner business that I am
+getting ashamed of taking even the retaining fee, and you will do me a
+favour if you will ease my conscience.
+
+[A week of fishery business in South Wales and Devon had] "a good deal
+of holiday in it." [for the rest:--]
+
+I have just been put on Senate of University of London [a Crown
+nomination]. I tried hard to get Lord Granville to let me off--in fact
+I told him I could not attend the meetings except now and then, but
+there was no escape. I must have a talk with you about what is to be
+done there.
+
+Item:
+
+There is a new Fishery Commission that I also strongly objected to,
+but had to cave in so far as I agreed to attend some meetings in
+latter half of September.
+
+[On this occasion Lord Granville had written back:--
+
+11 Carlton House Terrace, July 28, 1883.
+
+My dear Professor Huxley,
+
+Clay, the great whist player, once made a mistake and said to his
+partner, "My brain is softening," the latter answered "Never mind, I
+will give you ten thousand pounds down for it, just as it is."
+
+On that principle and backed up by Paget I shall write to Harcourt on
+Monday.
+
+Yours sincerely,
+
+Granville.
+
+The Commission of course cut short the stay at Milford, and on
+September 12, he writes:--]
+
+We shall leave this on Friday as my wife has some fal-lals to look
+after before we start for the north on Monday.
+
+The worst of it is that it is not at all certain that the Commission
+will meet and do any work. However I am pledged to go, and I daresay
+that Brechin Castle is a very pleasant place to stay in.
+
+[Lastly, he was thinking over the obituary notice of Darwin which he
+had undertaken to write for the Royal Society--though it did not
+appear till 1888--that on F. Balfour being written by Sir M. Foster.]
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, August 27, 1883.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+I do not see anything to add or alter to what you have said about
+Balfour, except to get rid of that terrible word "urinogenital," which
+he invented, and I believe I once adopted, out of mere sympathy I
+suppose.
+
+Darwin is on my mind, and I will see what can be done here by and by.
+Up to the present I have been filing away at the Rede Lecture. I
+believe that getting things into shape takes me more and more trouble
+as I get older--whether it is a loss of faculty or an increase of
+fastidiousness I can't say--but at any rate it costs me more time and
+trouble to get things finished--and when they are done I should prefer
+burning to publishing them.
+
+Haven't you any suggestions to offer for Anniversary address? I think
+the Secretaries ought to draw it up, like a Queen's speech.
+
+Mind we have a talk some day about University of London. I suppose you
+want an English Sorbonne. I have thought of it at times, but the
+Philistines are strong.
+
+Weather jolly, but altogether too hot for anything but lying on the
+grass "under the tegmination of the patulous fage," as the poet
+observes.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The remaining letters of this year are for the most part on Royal
+Society business, some of which, touching the anniversary dinner, may
+be quoted:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 10, 1883.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+...I have been trying to get some political and other swells to come
+to the dinner. Lord Mayor is coming--thought I would ask him on
+account of City and Guilds business--Lord Chancellor, probably,
+Courtney, M.P., promised, and I made the greatest blunder I ever made
+in all my life by thoughtlessly writing to ask Chamberlain (!!!)
+utterly forgetting the row with Tyndall. [Concerning the Lighthouses.]
+
+By the mercy of Providence he can't come this year, though I must ask
+him next (if I am not kicked out for my sins before that), as he is
+anxious to come. Science ought to be in league with the Radicals...
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[He had made prompt confession as soon as he discovered his mistake,
+to Tyndall himself, who ultimately came to the dinner and proposed the
+health of his old friend Hirst.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 9, 1883.
+
+My dear Tyndall,
+
+I have been going to write to you for two or three days to ask you to
+propose Hirst's health as Royal Medallist on the 30th November. I am
+sure your doing so would give an extra value to the medal to him.
+
+But now I realise the position of those poor devils I have seen in
+lunatic asylums and who believed they have committed the unforgivable
+sin. It came upon me suddenly in Waterloo Place this evening, that I
+had done so; and I went straight to the Royal Institution to make
+confession, and if possible get absolution. But I heard you had gone
+to Hindhead, and so I write.
+
+Yesterday I was sending some invitations to the dinner on the 30th,
+and thinking to please the Society I made a shot at some ministers.
+The only two I know much about are Harcourt and Chamberlain, and the
+devil (in whom I now firmly believe) put it into my head to write to
+both.
+
+The enormous stupidity of which I had been guilty in asking
+Chamberlain under the circumstances, and the sort of construction you
+and others might put upon it, never entered my head till this
+afternoon. It really made me ill, and I went straight to find you. If
+Providence is good to me the letter will miscarry and he won't come.
+But anyhow I want you to know that I have been idiotically stupid, and
+that I shall wish the Presidency and the dinner and everything
+connected with it at the bottom of the sea, if you are as much
+disgusted with me as you have a perfect right to be.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following refers to the Tyneside Sunday Lecture Society at
+Newcastle, which had invited him to become one of its
+vice-presidents:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 30, 1883.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+The Newcastle people wrote to me some time ago telling me that Sir W.
+Armstrong was going to be their President. [The actual words of the
+Secretary were "We have asked Sir W. Armstrong to be President," and
+Huxley was mistaken in supposing this intimation to imply that, as
+generally happens in such cases, Sir William had previously intimated
+his willingness to accept the position if formally asked.] Armstrong
+is an old friend of mine, so I wrote to him to make inquiries. He told
+me that he was not going to be President, and knew nothing about the
+people who were getting up the Society. So I declined to have anything
+to do with it.
+
+However, the case is altered now that you are in the swim. You have no
+gods to swear by, unfortunately; but if you will affirm, in the name
+of X, that under no circumstances shall I be called upon to do
+anything, they may have my name among the V.-P.'s and much good may it
+do them.
+
+All our good wishes to you and yours. The great thing one has to wish
+for as time goes on is vigour as long as one lives, and death as soon
+as vigour flags.
+
+It is a curious thing that I find my dislike to the thought of
+extinction increasing as I get older and nearer the goal.
+
+It flashes across me at all sorts of times with a sort of horror that
+in 1900 I shall probably know no more of what is going on than I did
+in 1800. I had sooner be in hell a good deal--at any rate in one of
+the upper circles where the climate and company are not too trying. I
+wonder if you are plagued in this way.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letters, to his family or to intimate friends, are in
+lighter vein. The first is to Sir M. Foster; the concluding item of
+information in reply to several inquiries. The Royal Society wished
+some borings made in Egypt to determine the depth of the stratum of
+Nile mud:--]
+
+The Egyptian exploration society is wholly archaeological--at least
+from the cut of it I have no doubt it is so--and they want all their
+money to find out the pawnbrokers' shops which Israel kept in Pithom
+and Rameses--and then went off with the pledges.
+
+This is the real reason why Pharaoh and his host pursued them; and
+then Moses and Aaron bribed the post-boys to take out the linch pins.
+
+That is the real story of the Exodus--as detailed in a recently
+discovered papyrus which neither Brugsch nor Maspero have as yet got
+hold of.
+
+[To his youngest daughter:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., April 12, 1883.
+
+Dearest Pabelunza,
+
+I was quite overcome to-day to find that you had vanished without a
+parting embrace to your "faded but fascinating" parent. [A fragment of
+feminine conversation overheard at the Dublin meeting of the British
+Association, 1878. "Oh, there comes Professor Huxley: faded, but still
+fascinating."] I clean forgot you were going to leave this peaceful
+village for the whirl of Gloucester dissipation this morning--and the
+traces of weeping on your visage, which should have reminded me of our
+imminent parting, were absent.
+
+My dear, I should like to have given you some good counsel. You are
+but a simple village maiden--don't be taken by the appearance of
+anybody. Consult your father--inclosing photograph and measurement (in
+inches)--in any case of difficulty.
+
+Also give my love to the matron your sister, and tell her to look
+sharp after you. Treat her with more respect than you do your
+venerable P.--whose life will be gloom hidden by a film of heartless
+jests till you return.
+
+Item.--Kisses to Ria and Co.
+
+Your desolated Pater.
+
+[To his eldest daughter:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 6, 1883.
+
+Dearest Jess,
+
+Best thanks for your good wishes--considering all things, I am a hale
+old gentleman. But I had to speak last night at the Academy dinner,
+and either that or the quantity of cigars I smoked, following the bad
+example of our friend "Wales," has left me rather shaky to-day. It was
+trying, because Jack's capital portrait was hanging just behind
+me--and somebody remarked that it was a better likeness of me than I
+was. If you begin to think of that it is rather confusing.
+
+I am grieved to have such accounts of Ethel, and have lectured her
+accordingly. She threatens reprisals on you--and altogether is in a
+more saucy and irrepressible state than when she left.
+
+M-- is still in bed, though better--I am afraid she won't be able to
+go to Court next week. You see we are getting grand.
+
+I hear great accounts of the children (Ria and Buzzer) and mean to cut
+out T'other Governor when you bring them up.
+
+As we did not see Fred the other day, the family is inclined to think
+that the salmon disagreed with him!
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 10, 1883.
+
+My dear Mrs. Tyndall,
+
+If you will give me a bit of mutton at one o'clock I shall be very
+much your debtor, but as I have business to attend to afterwards at
+the Home Office I must stipulate that my intellect be not imperilled
+by those seductive evil genii who are apt to make their appearance at
+your lunch table. [This is accompanied by a sketch of a champagne
+bottle in the character of a demon.]
+
+M. is getting better, but I cannot let her be out at night yet. She
+thinks she is to be allowed to go to the International Exhibition
+business on Saturday; but if the temperature does not rise very
+considerably I shall have two words to say to that.
+
+Ever yours very sincerely,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I shall be alone. Do you think that I am "subdued to that I work in,"
+and like an oyster, carry my brood about beneath my mantle?
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.15.
+
+1884.
+
+[From this time forward the burden of ill-health grew slowly and
+steadily. Dyspepsia and the hyperchondriacal depression which follows
+in its train, again attacked Huxley as they had attacked him twelve
+years before, though this time the physical misery was perhaps less.
+His energy was sapped; when his official work was over, he could
+hardly bring himself to renew the investigations in which he had
+always delighted. To stoop over the microscope was a physical
+discomfort; he began to devote himself more exclusively to the reading
+of philosophy and critical theology. This was the time of which Sir M.
+Foster writes that "there was something working in him which made his
+hand, when turned to anatomical science, so heavy that he could not
+lift it. Not even that which was so strong within him, the duty of
+fulfilling a promise, could bring him to the work."
+
+Up to the beginning of October, he went on with his official work, the
+lectures at South Kensington, the business as President of the Royal
+Society, and ex officio Trustee of the British Museum; the duties
+connected with the Inspectorship of Fisheries, the City and Guilds
+Technical Education Committee, and the University of London, and
+delivered the opening address at the London Hospital Medical School,
+on "The State and the Medical Profession" ["Collected Essays" 3 323),
+his health meanwhile growing less and less satisfactory. He dropped
+minor offices, such as the Presidency of the National Association of
+Science Teachers, which, he considered, needed more careful
+supervision than he was able to give, and meditated retiring from part
+at least of his main duties, when he was ordered abroad at a moment's
+notice for first one, then another, and yet a third period of two
+months. But he did not definitely retire until this rest had proved
+ineffectual to fit him again for active work.
+
+The President of the Royal Society is, as mentioned above, an ex
+officio Trustee of the British Museum, so that now, as again in 1888,
+circumstances at length brought about the state of affairs which
+Huxley had once indicated--half jestingly--to Robert Lowe, who
+inquired of him what would be the best course to adopt with respect to
+the Natural History collections of the British Museum:--] "Make me a
+Trustee and Flower director." [At this moment, the question of an
+official residence for the Director of the Natural History Museum was
+under discussion with the Treasury, and he writes:--]
+
+February 29, 1884.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+I am particularly glad to hear your news. "Ville qui parle et femme
+qui ecoute se rendent," says the wicked proverb--and it is true of
+Chancellors of the Exchequer.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A pendent to this is a letter of congratulation to Sir Henry Roscoe
+on his knighthood:--]
+
+Science and Art Department, South Kensington, July 7, 1884.
+
+My dear Roscoe,
+
+I am very glad to see that the Government has had the grace to make
+some acknowledgment of their obligation to you, and I wish you and "my
+lady" long enjoyment of your honours. I don't know if you are gazetted
+yet, so I don't indicate them outside.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+P.S.
+
+I wrote some weeks ago to the Secretary of the National Association of
+Science Teachers to say that I must give up the Presidency. I had come
+to the conclusion that the Association wants sharp looking after, and
+that I can't undertake that business.
+
+P.S. 2.
+
+Shall I tell you what your great affliction henceforward will be? It
+will be to hear yourself called Sr'enery Roscoe by the flunkies who
+announce you.
+
+Her Ladyship will please take note of this crumpled rose leaf--I am
+sure of its annoying her.
+
+[The following letter, with its comparison of life to a whirlpool and
+its acknowledgment of the widespread tendency in mankind to make
+idols, was written in answer to some inquiries from Lady Welby:--]
+
+April 8, 1884.
+
+Your letter requires consideration, and I have had very little leisure
+lately. Whether motion disintegrates or integrates is, I apprehend, a
+question of conditions. A whirlpool in a stream may remain in the same
+spot for any imaginable time. Yet it is the effect of the motion of
+the particles of the water in that spot which continually integrate
+themselves into the whirlpool and disintegrate themselves from it. The
+whirlpool is permanent while the conditions last, though its
+constituents incessantly change. Living bodies are just such
+whirlpools. Matter sets into them in the shape of food,--sets out of
+them in the shape of waste products. Their individuality lies in the
+constant maintenance of a characteristic form, not in the preservation
+of material identity. I do not know anything about "vitality" except
+as a name for certain phenomena like "electricity" or "gravitation."
+As you get deeper into scientific questions you will find that "Name
+ist Schall und Rauch" even more emphatically than Faust says it is in
+Theology. Most of us are idolators, and ascribe divine powers to the
+abstractions "Force," "Gravity," "Vitality," which our own brains have
+created. I do not know anything about "inert" things in nature. If we
+reduce the world to matter and motion, the matter is not "inert,"
+inasmuch as the same amount of motion affects different kinds of
+matter in different ways. To go back to my own illustration. The
+fabric of the watch is not inert, every particle of it is in violent
+and rapid motion, and the winding-up simply perturbs the whole
+infinitely complicated system in a particular fashion. Equilibrium
+means death, because life is a succession of changes, while a changing
+equilibrium is a contradiction in terms. I am not at all clear that a
+living being is comparable to a machine running down. On this side of
+the question the whirlpool affords a better parallel than the watch.
+If you dam the stream above or below, the whirlpool dies; just as the
+living being does if you cut off its food, or choke it with its own
+waste products. And if you alter the sides or bottom of the stream you
+may kill the whirlpool, just as you kill the animal by interfering
+with its structure. Heat and oxidation as a source of heat appear to
+supply energy to the living machine, the molecular structure of the
+germ furnishing the "sides and bottom of the stream," that is,
+determining the results which the energy supplied shall produce.
+
+Mr. Ashby writes like a man who knows what he is talking about. His
+exposition appears to me to be essentially sound and extremely well
+put. I wish there were more sanitary officers of the same stamp. Mr.
+Spencer is a very admirable writer, and I set great store by his
+works. But we are very old friends, and he has endured me as a sort of
+"devil's advocate" for thirty-odd years. He thinks that if I can pick
+no holes in what he says he is safe. But I pick a great many holes,
+and we agree to differ.
+
+[Between April and September, Fishery business took him out of London
+for no less than forty-three days, first to Cornwall, then in May to
+Brixham, in June to Cumberland and Yorkshire, in July to Chester, and
+in September to South Devon, Cornwall, and Wales. A few extracts from
+his letters home may be given. Just before starting, he writes from
+Marlborough Place to Rogate, where his wife and one of his daughters
+were staying:--]
+
+April 8.
+
+The weather turned wonderfully muggy here this morning, and turned me
+into wet paper. But I contrived to make a "neat and appropriate" in
+presenting old Hird with his testimonial. Fayrer and I were students
+under him forty years ago, and as we stood together it was a question
+which was the greyest old chap.
+
+April 14.
+
+I have almost given up reading the Egyptian news, I am so disgusted
+with the whole business. I saw several pieces of land to let for
+building purposes about Falmouth, but did not buy. [This was to twit
+his wife with her constant desire that he should buy a bit of land in
+the country to settle upon in their old age.]
+
+April 18.
+
+You don't say when you go back, so I direct this to Rogate. I shall
+expect to see you quite set up. We must begin to think seriously about
+getting out of the hurly-burly a year or two hence, and having an
+Indian summer together in peace and quietness.
+
+April 15, Sunday, Falmouth.
+
+I went out at ten o'clock this morning, and did not get back till near
+seven. But I got a cup of tea and some bread and butter in a country
+village, and by the help of that and many pipes supported nature.
+There was a bitter east wind blowing, but the day was lovely
+otherwise, and by judicious dodging in coves and creeks and sandy
+bays, I escaped the wind and absorbed a prodigious quantity of
+sunshine.
+
+I took a volume of the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" with me.
+I had not read the famous 15th and 16th chapters for ages, and I lay
+on the sands and enjoyed them properly. A lady came and spoke to me as
+I returned, who knew L. at Oxford very well--can't recollect her
+name--and her father and mother are here, and I have just been
+spending an hour with them. Also a man who sat by me at dinner knew me
+from Jack's portrait. So my incognito is not very good. I feel quite
+set up by my day's wanderings.
+
+May 11, Torquay.
+
+We went over to Brixham yesterday to hold an inquiry, getting back
+here to an eight o'clock or nearer nine dinner...Dalhousie has
+discovered that the officer now in command of the "Britannia" is
+somebody whom he does NOT know, so we gave up going to Dartmouth and
+agreed to have a lazy day here. It is the most exquisite summer
+weather you can imagine, and I have been basking in the sun all the
+morning and dreamily looking over the view of the lovely bay which is
+looking its best--but take it all round it does not come up to Lynton.
+Dalhousie is more likeable than ever, and I am just going out for a
+stroll with him.
+
+June 24.
+
+I left Keswick this morning for Cockermouth, took the chair at my
+meeting punctually at twelve, sat six mortal hours listening to
+evidence, nine-tenths of which was superfluous--and turning my lawyer
+faculty to account in sifting the grains of fact out of the other
+tenth.
+
+June 25, Leeds.
+
+...We had a long drive to a village called Harewood on the Wharfe.
+There is a big Lord lives there--Earl of Harewood--and he and his
+ancestors must have taken great care of their tenants, for the
+labourers' houses are the best I ever saw...I cut out the enclosed
+from the "Standard" the other day to amuse you, but have forgotten to
+send it before [Apparently announcing that he was about to accept a
+title. I have not been able to trace the paragraph.] I think we will
+be "Markishes," the lower grades are getting common.
+
+June 27.
+
+...I had a long day's inspection of the Wharfe yesterday, attended a
+meeting of the landed proprietors at Ottley to tell them what they
+must do if they would get salmon up their river...
+
+I shall leave here to-morrow morning, go on to Skipton, whence seven
+or eight miles' drive will take me to Linton where there is an
+obstruction in the river I want to see. In the afternoon I shall come
+home from Skipton, but I don't know exactly by what train. As far as I
+see, I ought to be home by about 10.30, and you may have something
+light for supper, as the "course of true feeding is not likely to run
+smooth"--to-morrow.
+
+[In August he went again to the corner of Surrey which he had enjoyed
+so much the year before. Here, in the intervals of suffering under the
+hands of the dentist, he worked at preparing a new edition of the
+"Elementary Physiology" with Sir M. Foster, alternating with fresh
+studies in critical theology.
+
+The following letters reflect his occupations at this time, together
+with his desire, strongly combated by his friend, of resigning the
+Presidency of the Royal Society immediately.]
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, August 9, 1884.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+I had to go up to town on Friday, and yesterday I went and had all my
+remaining teeth out, and came down here again with a shrewd suspicion
+that I was really drunk and incapable, however respectable I might
+look outwardly. At present I can't eat at all, and I CAN'T SMOKE WITH
+ANY COMFORT. For once I don't mind using italics.
+
+Item.--I send the two cuts.
+
+Heaven be praised! I had brought down no copy of Physiology with me,
+so could not attend to your proof. Got it yesterday, so I am now at
+your mercy.
+
+But I have gone over the proofs now, and send you a deuce of a lot of
+suggestions.
+
+Just think over additions to smell and taste to bring these into
+harmony.
+
+The Saints salute you. I am principally occupied in studying the
+gospels.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, August 26, 1884.
+
+Dearly Beloved,
+
+I have been going over the ear chapter this morning, and, as you will
+see, have suggested some additions. Those about the lamina spiralis
+are certainly necessary--illus. substitution of trihedral for
+triangular. [(On September 8, he writes:--] "I have been laughing over
+my 'trihedron.' It is a regular bull.") I want also very much to get
+into heads of students that in sensation it is all modes of motion up
+to and in sensorium, and that the generation of feeling is the
+specific reaction of a particle of the sensorium when stimulated, just
+as contraction, etc., is the specific reaction of a muscular fibre
+when stimulated by its nerve. The psychologists make the fools of
+themselves they do because they have never mastered this elementary
+fact. But I am not sure whether I have put it well, and I wish you
+would give your mind to it. As for me I have not had much mind to give
+lately--a fortnight's spoon-meat reduced me to inanity, and I am only
+just picking up again. However, I walked ten miles yesterday
+afternoon, so there is not much the matter.
+
+I will see what I can do about the histology business. ("Most of our
+examinees" [he writes on September 5] "have not a notion of what
+histology means at present. I think it will be good for other folks to
+get it into their heads that it is not all sections and carmine.") I
+wanted to re-write it, but I am not sure yet whether I shall be able.
+
+Between ourselves, I have pretty well made up my mind to clear out of
+everything next year, Royal Society included. I loathe the thought of
+wasting any more of my life in endless distractions--and so long as I
+live in London there is no escape for me. I have half a mind to live
+abroad for six months in the year.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+I enclose letter from Deutsch lunatic to go before Council and be
+answered by Foreign Secretary.
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, August 29, 1884.
+
+Dearly Beloved,
+
+I enclose the proofs, having mustered up volition enough to go over
+them at once. I think the alterations will be great improvements. I
+see you interpret yourself about the movements of the larynx.
+
+As to the histology, I shall have a shot at it, but if I do not send
+you manuscript in a week's time, go ahead. I am perplexed about the
+illustrations, but I see nothing for it but to have new ones in all
+the cases which you have marked. Have you anybody in Cambridge who can
+draw the things from preparations?
+
+You are like Trochu with your "plan," and I am anxious to learn it.
+But have you reflected, 1st, that I am getting deafer and deafer, and
+that I cannot hear what is said at the council table and in the
+Society's rooms half the time people are speaking? and 2nd, that so
+long as I am President, so long must I be at the beck and call of
+everything that turns up in relation to the interests of science. So
+long as I am in the chair, I cannot be a faineant or refuse to do
+anything and everything incidental to the position.
+
+My notion is to get away for six months, so as to break with the
+"world, the flesh, and the devil" of London, for all which I have
+conceived a perfect loathing. Six months is long enough for anybody to
+be forgotten twice over by everybody but personal friends.
+
+I am contemplating a winter in Italy, but I shall keep on my house for
+Harry's sake and as a pied a terre in London, and in the summer come
+and look at you at Burlington House, as the old soap-boiler used to
+visit the factory. I shall feel like the man out of whom the legion of
+devils departed when he looked at the gambades of the two thousand
+pigs going at express speed for the waters of Tiberias.
+
+By the way, did you ever read that preposterous and immoral story
+carefully? It is one of the best attested of the miracles...
+
+When I have retired from the chair (which I must not scandalise) I
+shall write a lay sermon on the text. It will be impressive.
+
+My wife sends her love, and says she has her eye on you. She is all
+for retirement.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+I am very sorry to hear of poor Mangles' death, but I suppose there
+was no other chance.
+
+T.H.H.
+
+[In September he hails with delight some intermission of the constant
+depression under which he has been labouring, and writes:--]
+
+So long as I sit still and write or read I am all right, otherwise not
+good for much, which is odd, considering that I eat, drink, and sleep
+like a top. I suppose that everybody starts with a certain capital of
+life-stuff, and that expensive habits have reduced mine.
+
+[And again:--]
+
+I have been very shaky for the last few weeks, but I am picking up
+again, and hope to come up smiling for the winter's punishment.
+
+There was nothing to drink last night, so I had some tea! with my
+dinner--smoked a pipe or two--slept better than usual, and woke
+without blue devils for the first time for a week!!! Query, is that
+the effect of tea or baccy? I shall try them again. We are fearfully
+and wonderfully made, especially in the stomach--which is altogether
+past finding out.
+
+[Still, his humour would flash out in the midst of his troubles; he
+writes in answer to a string of semi-official inquiries from Sir J.
+Donnelly:--]
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming.
+
+Sir,
+
+In reply to your letter of the 9th August (666), I have the honour to
+state:--
+
+1. That I am here.
+
+2. That I have (a) had all my teeth out; (b) partially sprained my
+right thumb; (c) am very hot; (d) can't smoke with comfort; whence I
+may leave even official intelligence to construct an answer to your
+second inquiry.
+
+3. Your third question is already answered under 2a. Not writing might
+be accounted for by 2b, but unfortunately the sprain is not bad
+enough--and "laziness, sheer laziness" is the proper answer.
+
+I am prepared to take a solemn affidavit that I told you and Macgregor
+where I was coming many times, and moreover that I distinctly formed
+the intention of leaving my address in writing--according to those
+official instructions which I always fulfil.
+
+If the intention was not carried out, its blood be upon its own
+head--I wash my hands of it, as Pilate did.
+
+4. As to the question whether I WANT my letters I can sincerely
+declare that I don't--would in fact much rather not see them. But I
+suppose for all that they had better be sent.
+
+5. I hope Macgregor's question is not a hard one--spoon-meat does not
+carry you beyond words of one syllable.
+
+On Friday I signalised my last dinner for the next three weeks by
+going to meet the G.O.M. I sat next him, and he was as lively as a
+bird.
+
+Very sorry to hear about your house. You will have to set up a van
+with a brass knocker and anchor on our common.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[By the beginning of September he had made up his mind that he ought
+before long to retire from active life. The first person to be told of
+his resolution was the head of the Science and Art Department, with
+whom he had worked so long at South Kensington.]
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, September 3, 1884.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I was very glad to have news of you yesterday. I gather you are
+thriving, notwithstanding the appalling title of your place of refuge.
+I should have preferred "blow the cold" to "Cold blow"--but there is
+no accounting for tastes.
+
+I have been going and going to write to you for a week past to tell
+you of a notion that has been maturing in my mind for some time, and
+that I ought to let you know of before anybody else. I find myself
+distinctly aged--tired out body and soul, and for the first time in my
+life fairly afraid of the work that lies before me in the next nine
+months. Physically, I have nothing much to complain of except
+weariness--and for purely mental work, I think I am good for something
+yet. I am morally and mentally sick of society and
+societies--committees, councils--bother about details and general
+worry and waste of time.
+
+I feel as if more than another year of it would be the death of me.
+Next May I shall be sixty, and have been thirty-one mortal years in my
+present office in the School. Surely I may sing my nunc dimittis with
+a good conscience. I am strongly inclined to announce to the Royal
+Society in November that the chair will be vacant that day twelve
+month--to resign my Government posts at mid-summer, and go away and
+spend the winter in Italy--so that I may be out of reach of all the
+turmoil of London.
+
+The only thing I don't like is the notion of leaving you without such
+support as I can give in the School. No one knows better than I do how
+completely it is your work and how gallantly you have borne the
+trouble and responsibility connected with it. But what am I to do? I
+must give up all or nothing--and I shall certainly come to grief if I
+do not have a long rest.
+
+Pray tell me what you think about it all.
+
+My wife has written to Mrs. Donnelly and told her the news.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Read Hobbes if you want to get hard sense in good English.
+
+Highcroft House, Milford, Godalming, September 10, 1884.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+Many thanks for your kind letter. I feel rather like a deserter, and
+am glad of any crumbs of comfort.
+
+Cartwright has done wonders for me, and I can already eat most things
+(I draw the line at tough crusts). I have not even my old enemy,
+dyspepsia--but eat, drink, and sleep like a top.
+
+And withal I am as tired as if I were hard at work, and shirk walking.
+
+So far as I can make out there is not the slightest sign of organic
+disease anywhere, but I will get Clark to overhaul me when I go back
+to town. Sometimes I am inclined to suspect that it is all sham and
+laziness--but then why the deuce should I want to sham and be lazy.
+
+Somebody started a charming theory years ago--that as you get older
+and lose volition, primitive evil tendencies, heretofore mastered,
+come out and show themselves. A nice prospect for venerable old
+gentlemen!
+
+Perhaps my crust of industry is denuded, and the primitive rock of
+sloth is cropping out.
+
+But enough of this egotistical invalidism.
+
+How wonderfully Gordon is holding his own. I should like to see him
+lick the Mahdi into fits before Wolseley gets up. You despise the
+Jews, but Gordon is more like one of the Maccabees of Bar-Kochba than
+any sort of modern man.
+
+My wife sends love to both of you, and says you are (in feminine
+language) "a dear thing in friends."
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Home Office, September 18, 1884.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+We have struck our camp at Milford, and I am going down to Devonshire
+and Cornwall to-morrow--partly on Fishery business, partly to see if I
+can shake myself straighter by change of air. I am possessed by seven
+devils--not only blue, but of the deepest indigo--and I shall try to
+transplant them into a herd of Cornish swine.
+
+The only thing that comforts me is Gordon's telegrams. Did ever a poor
+devil of a Government have such a subordinate before? He is the most
+refreshing personality of this generation.
+
+I shall be back by 30th September--and I hope in better condition for
+harness than now.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Replying to General Donnelly's arguments against his resigning all
+his official posts, he writes:--]
+
+Dartmouth, September 21, 1884.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+Your letters, having made a journey to Penzance (where I told my wife
+I should go last Friday, but did not, and brought up here instead)
+turned up this morning.
+
+I am glad to have seen Lord Carlingford's letter, and I am very much
+obliged to him for his kind expressions. Assuredly I will not decide
+hastily.
+
+Now for your letter--I am all for letters in these matters. Not that
+we are either of us "impatient and irritable listeners"--oh dear, no!
+"I have my faults," as the miser said, "but AVARICE is not one of
+them"--and we have our faults too, but notoriously they lie in the
+direction of long-suffering and apathy.
+
+Nevertheless there is a good deal to be said for writing. MINE is
+itself a discipline in patience for my correspondent.
+
+Imprimis. I scorn all your chaff about Society. My great object for
+years has been to keep out of it, not to go into it. Just you wait
+till the Misses Donnelly grow up--I trust there may be five or ten of
+them--and see what will happen to you. But apart from this, so long as
+I live in London, so long will it be practically impossible for me to
+keep out of dining and giving of dinners--and you know that just as
+well as I do.
+
+2nd. I mean to give up the Presidency, but don't see my way to doing
+so next St. Andrew's Day. I wish I could--but I must deal fairly by
+the Society.
+
+3rd. The suggestion of the holiday at Christmas is the most sensible
+thing you have said. I could get six weeks under the new arrangement
+("Botany," January and half February) without interfering with my
+lectures at all. But then there is the blessed Home Office to
+consider. There might be civil war between the net men and the rod men
+in six weeks, all over the country, without my mild influence.
+
+4th. I must give up my Inspectorship. The mere thought of having to
+occupy myself with the squabbles of these idiots of country squireens
+and poachers makes me sick--and is, I believe, the chief cause of the
+morbid state of my mucous membranes.
+
+All this week shall I be occupied in hearing one Jackass contradict
+another Jackass about questions which are of no importance.
+
+I would almost as soon be in the House of Commons.
+
+Now see how reasonable I am. I agree with you (a) that I must get out
+of the hurly-burly of society; (b) that I must get out of the
+Presidency; (c) that I must get out of the Inspectorship, or rather I
+agree with myself on that matter, you having expressed no opinion.
+
+That being so, it seems to me that I must, willy-nilly, give up South
+Kensington. For--and here is the point you had in your mind when you
+lamented your possible impatience about something I might say--I swear
+by all the gods that are not mine, nothing shall induce me to apply to
+the Treasury for anything but the pound of flesh to which I am
+entitled.
+
+Nothing ever disgusted me more than being the subject of a battle with
+the Treasury over the Home Office appointment--which I should have
+thrown up if I could have done so with decency to Harcourt.
+
+It's just as well for me I couldn't, but it left a nasty taste.
+
+I don't want to leave the School, and should be very glad to remain as
+Dean, for many reasons. But what I don't see is how I am to do that
+and make my escape from the thousand and one entanglements--which seem
+to me to come upon me quite irrespectively of any office I hold--or
+how I am to go on living in London as a (financially) decayed
+philosopher.
+
+I really see nothing for it but to take my pension and go and spend
+the winter of 1885-86 in Italy. I hear one can be a regular swell
+there on 1000 pounds a year.
+
+Six months' absence is oblivion, and I shall take to a new line of
+work, and one which will greatly meet your approval.
+
+As to X-- I am not a-going to--not being given to hopeless
+enterprises. That rough customer at Dublin is the only man who occurs
+to me. I can't think of his name, but that is part of my general
+unfitness.
+
+...I suppose I shall chaff somebody on my death-bed. But I am out of
+heart to think of the end of the lunches in the sacred corner.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On the 21st he writes home about the steps he had begun to take with
+respect to giving up part of his official work.]
+
+I have had a long letter from Donnelly. He had told Lord Carlingford
+of my plans, and encloses a letter from Lord Carlingford to him,
+trusting I will not hastily decide, and with some pretty phrases about
+"support and honour" I give to the School. Donnelly is very anxious I
+should hold on to the School, if only as Dean, and wants me in any
+case to take two months' holiday at Christmas. Of course he looks on
+the Royal Society as the root of all evil. Foster per contra looks on
+the School as the deuce, but would have me stick by the Royal Society
+like grim death.
+
+The only moral obligation that weighs with me is that which I feel
+under, to deal fairly by Donnelly and the School. You must not argue
+against this, as rightly or wrongly I am certain that if I deserted
+the School hastily, or if I did not do all that I can to requite
+Donnelly for the plucky way in which he has stood by it and me for the
+last dozen years, I should never shake off the feeling that I had
+behaved badly. And as I am much given to brooding over my misdeeds, I
+don't want you to increase the number of my hell-hounds. You must help
+me in this...and if I am Quixotic, play Sancho for the nonce.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.16.
+
+1884-1885.
+
+[Towards the end of September he went to the West country to try to
+improve his health before the session began again in London. Thus he
+writes, on September 26, to Mr. W.F. Collier, who had invited him to
+Horrabridge, and on the 27th to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+Fowey, September 26, 1884.
+
+Many thanks for the kind offer in your letter, which has followed me
+here. But I have not been on the track you might naturally have
+supposed I had followed. I have been trying to combine hygiene with
+business, and betook myself, in the first place, to Dartmouth,
+afterwards to Totnes, and then came on here. From this base of
+operations I could easily reach all my places of meeting. To-morrow I
+have to go to Bodmin, but I shall return here, and if the weather is
+fine (raining cats and dogs at present), I may remain a day or two to
+take in stock of fresh air before commencing the London campaign.
+
+I am very glad to hear that your health has improved so much. You must
+feel quite proud to be such an interesting "case." If I set a good
+example myself I would venture to warn you against spending five
+shillings worth of strength on the ground of improvement to the extent
+of half-a-crown.
+
+I am not quite clear as to the extent to which my children have
+colonised Woodtown at present. But it seems to me that there must be
+three or four Huxleys (free or in combination, as the chemists say)
+about the premises. Please give them the paternal benediction; and
+with very kind remembrances to Mrs. Collier, believe me,
+
+Yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Fowey Hotel, Fowey, Cornwall, September 27, 1884.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+I return your proof, with a few trifling suggestions here and there...
+
+I fancy we may regard the award as practically settled, and a very
+good award it will be.
+
+The address is beginning to loom in the distance. I have half a mind
+to devote some part of it to a sketch of the recent novelties in
+histology touching the nucleus question and molecular physiology.
+
+My wife sent me your letter. By all means let us have a confabulation
+as soon as I get back and settle what is to be done with the "aged P."
+
+I am not sure that I shall be at home before the end of the week. My
+lectures do not begin till next week, and the faithful Howes can start
+the practical work without me, so that if I find myself picking up any
+good in these parts, I shall probably linger here or hereabouts. But a
+good deal will depend on the weather--inside as well as outside. I am
+convinced that the prophet Jeremiah (whose works I have been studying)
+must have been a flatulent dyspeptic--there is so much agreement
+between his views and mine.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[But the net result of this holiday is summed up in a note, of October
+5, to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+I got better while I was in Cornwall and Wales, and, at present, I
+don't think there is anything the matter with me except a profound
+disinclination to work. I never before knew the proper sense of the
+term "vis inertiae."
+
+[And writing in the same strain to Sir J. Evans, he adds:]
+
+But I have a notion that if I do not take a long spell of absolute
+rest before long I shall come to grief. However, getting into harness
+again may prove a tonic--it often does, e.g. in the case of
+cab-horses.
+
+[Three days later he found himself ordered to leave England
+immediately, under pain of a hopeless breakdown.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 8, 1884.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We shall be very glad to see you on Friday. I came to the conclusion
+that I had better put myself in Clark's hands again, and he has been
+here this evening overhauling me for an hour.
+
+He says there is nothing wrong except a slight affection of the liver
+and general nervous depression, but that if I go on the latter will
+get steadily worse and become troublesome. He insists on my going away
+to the South and doing nothing but amuse myself for three or four
+months.
+
+This is the devil to pay, but I cannot honestly say that I think he is
+wrong. Moreover, I promised the wife to abide by his decision.
+
+We will talk over what is to be done.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Athenaeum Club, October 13, 1884.
+
+My dear Morley,
+
+I heartily wish I could be with you on the 25th, but it is aliter
+visum to somebody, whether Dis or Diabolis, I can't say.
+
+The fact is, the day after I saw you I had to put myself in Clark's
+hands, and he ordered me to knock off work and go and amuse myself for
+three or four months, under penalties of an unpleasant kind.
+
+So I am off to Venice next Wednesday. It is the only tolerably warm
+place accessible to any one whose wife will not let him go within
+reach of cholera just at present.
+
+If I am a good boy I am to come back all sound, as there is nothing
+organic the matter; but I have had enough of the world, the flesh, and
+the devil, and shall extricate myself from that Trinity as soon as may
+be. Perhaps I may get within measurable distance of Berkeley ("English
+Men of Letters" edited by J.M.) before I die!
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Athenaeum Club, October 18, 1884.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Best thanks for your letter and route. I am giving you a frightful
+quantity of trouble; but as the old woman (Irish) said to my wife,
+when she gave her a pair of my old trousers for her husband, "I hope
+it may be made up to ye in a better world."
+
+She is clear, and I am clear, that there is no reason on my part for
+not holding on if the Society really wishes I should. But, of course,
+I must make it easy for the Council to get rid of a faineant
+President, if they prefer that course.
+
+I wrote to Evans an unofficial letter two days ago, and have had a
+very kind, straightforward letter from him. He is quite against my
+resignation. I shall see him this afternoon here. I had to go to my
+office (Fishery).
+
+Clark's course of physic is lightening my abdominal troubles, but I am
+preposterously weak with a kind of shabby broken-down indifference to
+everything.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The "Indian summer" to which he looked forward was not to be reached
+without passing through a season of more than equinoctial storms and
+tempests. His career had reached its highest point only to be
+threatened with a speedy close. He himself did not exceed more than
+two or three years' longer lease of life, and went by easy stages to
+Venice, where he spent eight days.] "No place," [he writes,] "could be
+better fitted for a poor devil as sick in body and mind as I was when
+I got there."]
+
+Venice itself [he writes to Dr. Foster] just suited me. I chartered a
+capital gondolier, and spent most of my time exploring the Lagoons.
+Especially I paid a daily visit to the Lido, and filled my lungs with
+the sea air, and rejoiced in the absence of stinks. For Venice is like
+her population (at least the male part of it), handsome but odorous.
+Did you notice how handsome the young men are and how little beauty
+there is among the women?
+
+I stayed eight days in Venice and then returned by easy stages first
+to Padua, where I wanted to see Giotto's work, then to Verona, and
+then here (Lugano). Verona delighted me more than anything I have
+seen, and we will spend two other days there as we go back.
+
+As for myself, I really have no positive complaint now. I eat well and
+I sleep well, and I should begin to think I was malingering, if it
+were not for a sort of weariness and deadness that hangs about me,
+accompanied by a curious nervous irritability.
+
+I expect that this is the upshot of the terrible anxiety I have had
+about my daughter M--.
+
+I would give a great deal to be able to escape facing the wedding, for
+my nervous system is in the condition of that of a frog under opium.
+
+But my R. must not go off without the paternal benediction.
+
+[For the first three weeks he was alone, his wife staying to make
+preparations for the third daughter's wedding on November 6th, for
+which occasion he was to return, afterwards taking her abroad with
+him. Unfortunately, just as he started, news was brought him at the
+railway station that his second daughter, whose brilliant gifts and
+happy marriage seemed to promise everything for her future, had been
+stricken by the beginnings of an insidious and, as he too truly
+feared, hopeless disease. Nothing could have more retarded his own
+recovery. It was a bitter grief, referred to only in his most intimate
+letters, and, indeed, for a time kept secret even from the other
+members of the family. Nothing was to throw a shade over the
+brightness of the approaching wedding.
+
+But on his way home, he writes of that journey:--]
+
+I had to bear my incubus, not knowing what might come next, until I
+reached Luzern, when I telegraphed for intelligence, and had my mind
+set at ease as to the measures which were being adopted.
+
+I am a tough subject, and have learned to bear a good deal without
+crying out; but those four-and-twenty hours between London and Luzern
+have taught me that I have yet a good deal to learn in the way of
+"grinning and bearing."
+
+[And although he writes,] "I would give a good deal not to face a lot
+of people next week,"..."I have the feelings of a wounded wild beast
+and hate the sight of all but my best friends," [he hid away his
+feelings, and made this the occasion for a very witty speech, of
+which, alas! I remember nothing but a delightfully mixed polyglot
+exordium in French, German, and Italian, the result, he declared, of
+his recent excursion to foreign parts, which had obliterated the
+recollection of his native speech.
+
+During his second absence he appointed his youngest daughter secretary
+to look after necessary correspondence, about which he forwarded
+instructions from time to time.
+
+The chief matters of interest in the letters of this period are
+accounts of health and travel, sometimes serious, more often jesting,
+for the letters were generally written in the bright intervals between
+his dark days: business of the Royal Society, and the publication of
+the new edition of the "Lessons in Elementary Physiology," upon which
+he and Dr. Foster had been at work during the autumn. But the four
+months abroad were not productive of very great good; the weather was
+unpropitious for an invalid--] "as usual, a quite unusual season"
+[--while his mind was oppressed by the reports of his daughter's
+illness. Under these circumstances recovery was slow and travel
+comfortless; all the Englishman's love of home breaks out in his
+letter of April 8, when he set foot again on English soil.]
+
+Hotel de Londres, Verona, November 18, 1884.
+
+Dearest Babs,
+
+1. Why, indeed, do they ask for more? Wait till they send a letter of
+explanation, and then say that I am out of the country and not
+expected back for several years.
+
+2. I wholly decline to send in any name to Athenaeum. But don't
+mention it.
+
+3. Society of Arts be bothered, also --.
+
+4. Write to Science and Art Club to engage three of the prettiest
+girls as partners for evening. They will look very nice as
+wallflowers.
+
+5. Penny dinners? declined with thanks.
+
+6. Ask the meeting of Herts N.H. Society to come here after next
+Thursday, when we shall be in Bologna.
+
+Business first, my sweet girl secretary with the curly front; and now
+for private affairs, though as your mother is covering reams with
+them, I can only mention a few of the more important which she will
+forget.
+
+The first is that she has a habit of hiding my shirts so that I am
+unable to find them when we go away, and the chambermaid comes rushing
+after us with the garment shamefully displayed.
+
+The second is that she will cover all the room with her things, and I
+am obliged to establish a military frontier on the table.
+
+The third is that she insists on my buying an Italian cloak. So you
+will see your venerable pater equipped in this wise. [Sketch of a
+cloaked figure like a brigand of melodrama.] except in these two
+particulars, she behaves fairly well to me.
+
+In point of climate, so far, Italy has turned out a fraud. We dare not
+face Venice, and Mr. Fenili will weep over my defection; but that is
+better than that we should cough over his satisfaction.
+
+I am quite pleased to hear of the theological turn of the family. It
+must be a drop of blood from one of your eight great-grandfathers, for
+none of your ancestors that I have known would have developed in this
+way.
+
+...Best love to Nettie and Harry. Tell the former that cabbages do not
+cost 5 shillings apiece, and the latter that 11 P.M. is the cloture.
+
+Ever your affectionate Pater.
+
+Hotel Brittanique, Naples, November 30, 1884.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Which being St. Andrew's Day, I think the expatriated P. ought to give
+you some account of himself.
+
+We had a prosperous journey to Locarno, but there plumped into bitter
+cold weather, and got chilled to the bone as the only guests in the
+big hotel, though they did their best to make us comfortable. I made a
+shot at bronchitis, but happily failed, and got all right again.
+
+Pallanza was as bad. At Milan temperature at noon 39 degrees F.,
+freezing at night. Verona much the same. Under these circumstances, we
+concluded to give up Venice and made for Bologna. There found it
+rather colder. Next Ravenna, where it snowed. However, we made
+ourselves comfortable in the queer hotel, and rejoiced in the mosaics
+of that sepulchral marsh.
+
+At Bologna I had assurances that the Sicilian quarantine was going to
+be taken off at once, and as the reports of the railway travelling and
+hotels in Calabria were not encouraging, I determined to make for
+Naples, or rather, by way of extra caution, for Castellamare. All the
+way to Ancona the Apennines were covered with snow, and much of the
+plain also. Twenty miles north of Ancona, however, the weather changed
+to warm summer, and we rejoiced accordingly. At Foggia I found that
+the one decent hotel that used to exist was non-extant, so we went on
+to Naples.
+
+Arriving at 10.30 very tired, got humbugged by a lying Neapolitan, who
+palmed himself off as the commissaire of the Hotel Bristol, and took
+us into an omnibus belonging to another hotel, that of the Bristol
+being, as he said, "broke." After a drive of three miles or so got to
+the Bristol and found it shut up! After a series of adventures and a
+good deal of strong language on my part, knocked up the people here,
+who took us in, though the hotel was in reality shut up like most of
+those in Naples. [Owing to the cholera and consequent dearth of
+travellers.]
+
+As usual the weather is "unusual"--hot in the sun, cold round the
+corner and at night. Moreover, I found by yesterday's paper that the
+beastly Sicilians won't give up their ten days' quarantine. So all
+chance of getting to Catania or Palermo is gone. I am not sure whether
+we shall stay here for some time or go to Rome, but at any rate we
+shall be here a week.
+
+Dohrn is away getting subsidies in Germany for his new ship. We
+inspected the Aquarium this morning. Eisig and Mayer are in charge.
+Madame is a good deal altered in the course of the twelve years that
+have elapsed since I saw her, but says she is much better than she
+was.
+
+As for myself, I got very much better when in North Italy in spite of
+the piercing cold. But the fatigue of the journey from Ancona here,
+and the worry at the end of it, did me no good, and I have been seedy
+for a day or two. However, I am picking up.
+
+I see one has to be very careful here. We had a lovely drive yesterday
+out Pausilippo, but the wife got chilled and was shaky this morning.
+However, we got very good news of our daughter this evening, and that
+has set us both up.
+
+My blessing for to-morrow will reach you after date. Let us hear how
+everything went off.
+
+Your return in May project is really impracticable on account of the
+Fishery Report. I cannot be so long absent from the Home Office
+whatever I might manage with South Kensington.
+
+With our love to Mrs. Foster and you.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[This letter, as he says a week later, was written when he] "was
+rather down in the mouth from the wretched cold weather, and the wife
+being laid up with a bad cold," [besides his own ailments.]
+
+I find I have to be very careful about night air, but nothing does me
+so much good as six or seven miles' walk between breakfast and
+lunch--at a good sharp pace. So I conclude that there cannot be much
+the matter, and yet I am always on the edge, so to speak, of that
+infernal hypochondria.
+
+We have settled down here very comfortably, and I do not think we
+shall care to go any further south. Madame Dohrn and all the people at
+the stazione are very kind, and want to do all sorts of things for us.
+The other day we went in the launch to Capri, intending next day to go
+to Amalfi. But it threatened bad weather, so we returned in the
+evening. The journey knocked us both up, and we had to get out of
+another projected excursion to Ischia to-day. The fact is, I get
+infinitely tired with talking to people and can't stand any deviation
+from regular and extremely lazy habits. Fancy my being always in bed
+by ten o'clock and breakfasting at nine!
+
+[On the 10th, writing to Sir John Evans, who as Vice-President, was
+acting in his stead at the Royal Society, he says:--]
+
+In spite of snow on the ground we had three or four days at
+Ravenna--which is the most interesting deadly lively sepulchre of a
+place I was ever in in my life. The evolution of modern from ancient
+art is all there in a nutshell...
+
+I lead an altogether animal life, except that I have renewed my old
+love for Italian. At present I am rejoicing in the Autobiography of
+that delightful sinner, Benvenuto Cellini. I have some notion that
+there is such a thing as science somewhere. In fact I am fitting
+myself for Neapolitan nobility.
+
+[To his youngest daughter.]
+
+Hotel Brittanique, Naples, December 22, 1884.
+
+But we have had no letters from home for a week...Moreover, if we
+don't hear to-day or to-morrow we shall begin to speculate on the
+probability of an earthquake having swallowed up 4 Marlborough Place
+"with all the young barbarians at play--And I their sire trying to get
+a Roman holiday" (Byron). For we are going to Rome to-morrow, having
+had enough of Naples, the general effect of which city is such as
+would be produced by the sight of a beautiful woman who had not washed
+or dressed her hair for a month. Climate, on the whole, more variable
+than that of London.
+
+We had a lovely drive three days ago to Cumae, a perfect summer's day;
+since then sunshine, heat, cold wind, calms all durcheinander, with
+thunder and lightning last night to complete the variety.
+
+The thermometer and barometer are not fixed to the walls here, as they
+would be jerked off by the sudden changes. At first, it is odd to see
+them dancing about the hall. But you soon get used to it, and the
+porter sees that they don't break themselves.
+
+With love to Nettie and Harry, and hopes that the pudding will be
+good.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[In January 1885 he went to Rome, whence he writes:--]
+
+Hotel Victoria, Via dei due Macelli, Rome, January 8, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We have been here a fortnight very well lodged--south aspect,
+fireplace, and all the rest of the essentials except sunshine. Of this
+last there is not much more than in England, and the grey skies day
+after day are worthy of our native land. Sometimes it rains cats and
+dogs all day by way of a change--as on Christmas Day--but it is not
+cold. "Quite exceptional weather," they tell us, but that seems to be
+the rule everywhere. We have done a respectable amount of
+gallery-slaving, and I have been amusing myself by picking up the
+topography of ancient Rome. I was going to say Pagan Rome, but the
+inappropriateness of the distinction strikes me, papal Rome being much
+more stupidly and childishly pagan than imperial. I never saw a sadder
+sight than the kissing a wretched bedizened doll of a Bambino that
+went on in the Ara Coeli on Twelfth Day. Your puritan soul would have
+longed to arise and slay...
+
+As to myself, though it is a very unsatisfactory subject and one I am
+very tired of bothering my friends about, I am like the farmer at the
+rent-dinner, and don't find myself much "forrarder." That is to say, I
+am well for a few days and then all adrift, and have to put myself
+right by dosing with Clark's pills, which are really invaluable. They
+will make me believe in those pills I saw advertised in my youth, and
+which among other things were warranted to cure "the indecision of
+juries." I really can't make out my own condition. I walked seven or
+eight miles this morning over Monte Mario and out on the Campagna
+without any particular fatigue, and yesterday I was as miserable as an
+owl in sunshine. Something perhaps must be put down to the relapse
+which our poor girl had a week ago, and which became known to us in a
+terrible way. She had apparently quite recovered, and arrangements
+were made for their going abroad, and now everything is upset. I
+warned her husband that this was very likely, but did not sufficiently
+take the warning to myself.
+
+You are taking a world of trouble for me, and Donnelly writes I am to
+do as I like so far as they are concerned. I have heard nothing from
+the Home Office, and I suppose it would be proper for me to write if I
+want any more leave. I really hardly know what to do. I can't say I
+feel very fit for the hurly-burly of London just now, but I am not
+sure that the wholesomest thing for me would not be at all costs to
+get back to some engrossing work. If my poor girl were well, I could
+perhaps make something of the dolce far niente, but at present one's
+mind runs to her when it is not busy in something else.
+
+I expect we shall be here a week or ten days more--at any rate, this
+address is safe--afterwards to Florence.
+
+What am I to do in the Riviera? Here and at Florence there is always
+some distraction. You see the problem is complex.
+
+My wife, who is very lively, thanks you for your letter (which I have
+answered) and joins with me in love to Mrs. Foster and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Writing on the same day to Sir J. Evans, he proposed a considerable
+alteration in the duties of the Assistant Secretary of the Royal
+Society.]
+
+You know that I served a seven years' apprenticeship as Secretary, and
+that experience gave me very solid grounds for the conviction that,
+with the present arrangements, a great deal of the time of the
+Secretaries is wasted over the almost mechanical drudgery of
+proof-reading.
+
+[He suggests new arrangements, and proceeds:--]
+
+At the same time it would be very important to adopt some arrangement
+by which the "Transactions" papers can be printed independently of one
+another.
+
+Why should not the papers be paged independently and be numbered for
+each year. Thus--"Huxley Idleness and Incapacity in Italy." "Phil.
+Trans." 1885 6.
+
+People grumble at the delay in publication, and are quite right in
+doing so, though it is impossible under the present system to be more
+expeditious, and it is not every senior secretary who would slave at
+the work as Stokes does...
+
+But it is carrying coals to Newcastle to talk of such business
+arrangements as these to you.
+
+The only thing I am strong about, is the folly of going on cutting
+blocks with our Secretarial razors any longer.
+
+I am afraid I cannot give a very good account of myself.
+
+The truth of the answer to Mallock's question "Is life worth
+living?"--that depends on the liver--is being strongly enforced upon
+me in the hepatic sense of liver, and I must confess myself fit for
+very little. A week hence we shall migrate to Florence and try the
+effect of the more bracing air. The Pincio is the only part of Rome
+that is fit to live in, and unfortunately the Government does not
+offer to build me a house there.
+
+However, I have got a great deal of enjoyment out of ancient
+Rome--papal Rome is too brutally pagan (and in the worst possible
+taste too) for me.
+
+[To his daughter, Mrs. Roller.]
+
+January 11, 1885.
+
+We have now had nearly three weeks in Rome. I am sick of churches,
+galleries, and museums, and meanly make M-- go and see them and tell
+me about them. As we are one flesh, it is just the same as if I had
+seen them.
+
+Since the time of Constantine there has been nothing but tawdry
+rubbish in the shape of architecture [For his appreciation of the
+great dome of the Pantheon, see below.]--the hopeless bad taste of the
+Papists is a source of continual gratification to me as a good
+Protestant (and something more). As for the skies, they are as
+changeable as those of England--the only advantage is the absence of
+frost and snow--(raining cats and dogs this Sunday morning).
+
+But down to the time of Constantine, Rome is endlessly interesting,
+and if I were well I should like to spend some months in exploring it.
+As it is, I do very little, though I have contrived to pick up all I
+want to know about pagan Rome and the Catacombs, which last are my
+especial weakness.
+
+My master and physician is bothered a good deal with eczema--otherwise
+very lively. All the chief collections in Rome are provided with a
+pair of her spectacles, which she leaves behind. Several new
+opticians' shops are set up on the strength of the purchases in this
+line she is necessitated to make.
+
+I want to be back at work, but I am horribly afraid I should be no
+good yet. We are thinking of going to Florence at the end of this week
+to see what the drier and colder air there will do.
+
+With our dear love to you all--we are wae for a sight of you.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hotel Victoria, Via dei due Macelli, January 16, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+It seems to me that I am giving my friends a world of trouble...
+
+I have had a bad week of it, and the night before last was under the
+impression that I was about to succumb shortly to a complication of
+maladies, and moreover, that a wooden box that my wife had just had
+made would cost thousands of pounds in the way of payment for extra
+luggage before we reached home. I do not know which hypochondriacal
+possession was the most depressing. I can laugh at it now, but I
+really was extraordinarily weak and ill.
+
+We had made up our minds to bolt from Rome to Florence at once, when I
+suddenly got better, and to-day am all right. So as we hear of snow at
+Florence we shall stop where we are. It has been raining cats and dogs
+here, and the Tiber rose 40 feet and inundated the low grounds. But
+"cantabit elevatus"; it can't touch us, and at any rate the streets
+are washed clean.
+
+The climate is mild here. We have a capital room and all the sunshine
+that is to be had, plus a good fire when needful, and at worst one can
+always get a breezy walk on the Pincio hard by.
+
+However, about the leave. Am I to do anything or nothing? I am dying
+to get back to steady occupation and English food, and the sort of
+regimen one can maintain in one's own house. On the other hand, I
+stand in fear of the bitter cold of February and early March, and
+still more of the thousand and one worries of London outside one's
+work. So I suppose it will be better if I keep away till Easter, or at
+any rate to the end of March. But I must hear something definite from
+the Home Office. I have written to Donnelly to the same effect. My
+poor Marian's relapse did not do us any good, for all that I expected
+it. However the last accounts are very favourable.
+
+I wrote to Evans the other day about a re-arrangement of the duties of
+the Secretary and Assistant Secretary. I thought it was better to
+write to him than to you on that subject, and I begged him to discuss
+the matter with the officers. It is quite absurd that Stokes and you
+should waste your time in press drudgery.
+
+We are very prudent here, and the climate suits us both, especially my
+wife, who is so vigorous that I depute her to go and see the Palazzi,
+and tell me all about them when she comes back. Old Rome is endlessly
+interesting to me, and I can always potter about and find occupation.
+I think I shall turn antiquary--it's just the occupation for a decayed
+naturalist, though you need not tell the Treasure I say so.
+
+With our love to Mrs. Foster and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hotel Victoria, Via dei due Macelli, January 18, 1885.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+Official sentence of exile for two months more (up to May 12) arrived
+yesterday. So if my lords will be so kind as to concur I shall be able
+to disport myself with a clear conscience. I hope their lordships
+won't think that I am taking things too easy in not making a regular
+application, and I will do so if you think it better. But if it had
+rested with me I think I should have got back in February and taken my
+chance. That energetic woman that owns me, and Michael Foster,
+however, have taken the game out of my hands, and I have nothing to do
+but to submit.
+
+On the whole I feel it is wise. I shall have more chance if I escape
+not only the cold but the bother of London for a couple of months
+more.
+
+I was very bad a week ago, but I have taken to dosing myself with
+quinine, and either that or something else has given me a spurt for
+the last two days, so that I have been more myself than any time since
+I left, and begin to think that there is life in the old dog yet. If
+one could only have some fine weather! To-day there is the first real
+sunshine we have been favoured with for a week.
+
+We are just back from a great function at St. Peter's. It is the festa
+of St. Peter's chair, and the ex-dragoon Cardinal Howard has been
+fugleman in the devout adorations addressed to that venerable article
+of furniture, which, as you ought to know, but probably don't, is
+inclosed in a bronze double and perched up in a shrine of the worst
+possible taste in the Tribuna of St. Peter's. The display of
+man-millinery and lace was enough to fill the lightest-minded woman
+with envy, and a general concert--some of the music very
+good--prevented us from feeling dull, while the ci-devant
+guardsman--big, burly, and bullet-headed--made God and then eat him.
+
+[A reminiscence of Browning in "The Bishop Orders his Tomb":--
+
+    And then how I shall lie through centuries,
+    And hear the blessed mutter of the mass,
+    And see God made and eaten all day long.]
+
+I must have a strong strain of Puritan blood in me somewhere, for I am
+possessed with a desire to arise and slay the whole brood of idolators
+whenever I assist at one of these ceremonies. You will observe that I
+am decidedly better, and have a capacity for a good hatred still.
+
+The last news about Gordon is delightful. The chances are he will
+rescue Wolseley yet.
+
+With our love.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To his eldest son.]
+
+Rome, January 20, 1885.
+
+I need hardly tell you that I find Rome wonderfully interesting, and
+the attraction increases the longer one stays. I am obliged to take
+care of myself and do but little in the way of sight-seeing, but by
+directing one's attention to particular objects one can learn a great
+deal without much trouble. I begin to understand Old Rome pretty well,
+and I am quite learned in the Catacombs, which suit me, as a kind of
+Christian fossils out of which one can reconstruct the body of the
+primitive Church. She was a simple maiden enough and vastly more
+attractive than the bedizened old harridan of the modern Papacy, so
+smothered under the old clothes of Paganism which she has been
+appropriating for the last fifteen centuries that Jesus of Nazareth
+would not know her if he met her.
+
+I have been to several great papistical functions--among others to the
+festa of the Cathedra Petri in St. Peter's last Sunday, and I confess
+I am unable to understand how grown men can lend themselves to such
+elaborate tomfooleries--nothing but mere fetish worship--in forms of
+execrably bad taste, devised, one would think, by a college of
+ecclesiastical man-milliners for the delectation of school-girls. It
+is curious to notice that intellectual and aesthetic degradation go
+hand in hand. You have only to go from the Pantheon to St. Peter's to
+understand the great abyss which lies between the Roman of paganism
+and the Roman of the papacy. I have seen nothing grander than
+Agrippa's work--the popes have stripped it to adorn their own
+petrified lies, but in its nakedness it has a dignity with which there
+is nothing to compare in the ill-proportioned, worse decorated tawdry
+stone mountain on the Vatican.
+
+The best thing, from an aesthetic point of view, that could be done
+with Rome would be to destroy everything except St. Paolo fuori le
+Mure, of later date than the fourth century.
+
+But you will have had enough of my scrawl, and your mother wants to
+add something. She is in great force, and is gone prospecting to some
+Palazzo or other to tell me if it is worth seeing.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hotel Victoria, Rome, Via dei due Macelli, January 25, 1885.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+Best thanks for the telegram which arrived the day before yesterday
+and set my mind at ease.
+
+I have been screwing up the old machine which I inhabit, first with
+quinine and now with a form of strychnia (which Clark told me to take)
+for the last week, and I have improved a good deal--whether post hoc
+or proper hoc in the present uncertainty of medical science I decline
+to give any opinion.
+
+The weather is very cold for Rome--ice an eighth of an inch thick in
+the Ludovisi Garden the other morning, and every night it freezes, but
+mostly fine sunshine in the day. (This is a remarkable sentence in
+point of grammar, but never mind.) The day before yesterday we came
+out on the Campagna, and it then was as fresh and bracing a breeze as
+you could get in Northumberland.
+
+We are very comfortable and quiet here, and I hold on--till it gets
+warmer. I am told that Florence is detestable at present. As for
+London, our accounts make us shiver and cough.
+
+News about the dynamiting gentry just arrived. A little more mischief
+and there will be an Irish massacre in some of our great towns. If an
+Irish Parnellite member were to be shot for every explosion I believe
+the thing would soon stop. It would be quite just, as they are
+practically accessories.
+
+I think -- would do it if he were Prime Minister. Nothing like a
+thorough Radical for arbitrary acts of power!
+
+I must be getting better, as my disgust at science has ceased, and I
+have begun to potter about Roman geology and prehistoric work. You may
+be glad to learn that there is no evidence that the prehistoric Romans
+had Roman noses. But as I cannot find any particular prevalence of
+them among the modern--or ancient except for Caesar--Romani, the fact
+is not so interesting as it might appear, and I would not advise you
+to tell -- of it.
+
+Behold a Goak--feeble, but promising of better things.
+
+My wife unites with me with love to Mrs. Donnelly and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letter refers to the fourth edition of the "Lessons in
+Elementary Physiology," in the preparation of which Dr. Foster had
+been helping during the summer:--]
+
+Hotel Victoria, Rome, Via dei due Macelli, February 1, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Anything more disgraceful than the way in which I have left your
+letter of more than a fortnight ago unanswered, I don't know. I
+thought the wife had written about the leave (and she thought I had,
+as she has told you), but I knew I had not answered the questions
+about the title, still less considered the awful incubus (x 10,000
+dinners by hepatic deep objection) of the preface.
+
+There is such a thing as justice in this world--not much of it, but
+still some--and it is partly on that ground and partly because I want
+you, in view of future eventualities, to have a copyright in the book,
+that I proposed we should join our names.
+
+Of course, if you would really rather not, for any good reason you may
+have, I have nothing further to say. But I don't think that the
+sentimental reason is a good one, and unless you have a better, I wish
+you would let the original proposal stand.
+
+However, having stated the case afresh I leave it for you to say yes
+or no, and shall abide by your decision without further discussion.
+
+As to the Preface. If I am to write it, please send me the old
+Preface. I think the book was published in 1864, or was it 1866? [In
+1866.] and it ought to be come of age or nearly so.
+
+You might send me the histological chapter, not that I am going to
+alter anything, but I should like to see how it looks. I will knock
+the Preface off at once, as soon as I hear from you.
+
+The fact is, I have been much better in the course of the last few
+days. The weather has been very sunshiny but cool and bracing, and I
+have taken to quinine. Tried Clark's strychnine, but it did not answer
+so well.
+
+I am in hopes that I have taken a turn for the better, and that there
+may yet be the making of something better than a growling
+hypochondriacal old invalid about me. But I am most sincerely glad
+that I am not obliged to be back 10 days hence--there is not much
+capital accumulated yet.
+
+I find that the Italians have been doing an immense deal in
+prehistoric archaeology of late years, and far more valuable work than
+I imagined. But it is very difficult to get at, and as Loescher's head
+man told me the other day when I asked for an Italian book published
+in Rome, "Well, you see it is so difficult to get Roman books in
+Rome."
+
+I am ashamed to be here two months without paying my respects to the
+Lincei, and I am going to-day. The unaccountable creatures meet at 1
+o'clock--lunch time!
+
+Best love from my wife and self to Mrs. Foster and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Rome, February 14, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Voila the preface--a work of great labour! and which you may polish
+and alter as you like, ALL BUT THE LAST PARAGRAPH. You see I have
+caved in. I like your asking to have your own way "for once." My wife
+takes the same line, does whatever she pleases, and then declares I
+leave her no initiative.
+
+If I talk of public affairs, I shall simply fall a-blaspheming. I see
+the "Times" holds out about Gordon, and does not believe he is killed.
+Poor fellow! I wish I could believe that his own conviction (as he
+told me) is true, and that death only means a larger government for
+him to administer. Anyhow, it is better to wind up that way than to go
+growling out one's existence as a ventose hypochondriac, dependent
+upon the condition of a few square inches of mucous membrane for one's
+heaven or hell.
+
+As to private affairs, I think I am getting solidly, but very slowly,
+better. In fact, I can't say there is much the matter with me, except
+that I am weaker than I ought to be, and that a sort of weary
+indolence hangs about me like a fog. M-- is wonderfully better, and
+her husband has taken a house for them at Norwood. If I could be
+rejoiced at anything, I should be at that; but it seems to me as if
+since that awful journey when I first left England, "the springs was
+broke," as that vagabond tout said at Naples.
+
+It has turned very cold here, and we are uncertain when to leave for
+Florence, but probably next week. The Carnival is the most entirely
+childish bosh I have ever met with among grown people. Want to finish
+this now for post, but will write again speedily. Moseley's
+proposition is entirely to my mind, and I have often talked to it. The
+Royal Society rooms ought to be house-of-call and quasi-club for all
+F.R.S. in London.
+
+Wife is bonny, barring a cold. It is as much as I can do to prevent
+her sporting a mask and domino!
+
+With best love,
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Hotel Victoria, Rome, Via dei due Macelli, February 16, 1885.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I have had it on my mind to write to you for the last week--ever since
+the hideous news about Gordon reached us. But partly from a faint hope
+that his wonderful fortune might yet have stood him in good stead, and
+partly because there is no great satisfaction in howling with rage, I
+have abstained.
+
+Poor fellow! I wonder if he has entered upon the "larger sphere of
+action" which he told me was reserved for him in case of such a
+trifling accident as death. Of all the people whom I have met with in
+my life, he and Darwin are the two in whom I have found something
+bigger than ordinary humanity--an unequalled simplicity and directness
+of purpose--a sublime unselfishness.
+
+Horrible as it is to us, I imagine that the manner of his death was
+not unwelcome to himself. Better wear out than rust out, and better
+break than wear out. The pity is that he could not know the feeling of
+his countrymen about him.
+
+I shall be curious to see what defence the super-ingenious Premier has
+to offer for himself in Parliament. I suppose, as usual, the question
+will drift into a brutal party fight, when the furious imbecility of
+the Tories will lead them to spoil their case. That is where we are;
+on the one side, timid imbecility "waiting for instructions from the
+constituencies"; furious imbecility on the other, looking out for
+party advantage. Oh! for a few months of William Pitt.
+
+I see you think there may be some hope that Gordon has escaped yet. I
+am afraid the last telegram from Wolseley was decisive. We have been
+watching the news with the greatest anxiety, and it has seemed only to
+get blacker and blacker.
+
+...
+
+[Touching a determined effort to alter the management of certain
+Technical Education business.]
+
+I trust he may succeed, and that the unfitness of these people to be
+trusted with anything may be demonstrated. I regret I am not able to
+help in the good work. Get the thing out of their hands as fast as
+possible. The prospect of being revenged for all the beastly dinners I
+sat out and all the weary discussions I attended to no purpose, really
+puts a little life into me. Apropos of that, I am better in various
+ways, but curiously weak and washed out; and I am afraid that not even
+the prospect of a fight would screw me up for long. I don't understand
+it, unless I have some organic disease of which nobody can find any
+trace (and in which I do not believe myself), or unless the terrible
+trouble we have had has accelerated the advent of old age. I rather
+suspect that the last speculation is nearest the truth. You will be
+glad to hear that my poor girl is wonderfully better, and, indeed, to
+all appearance quite well. They are living quietly at Norwood.
+
+I shall be back certainly by the 12th April, probably before. We have
+found very good quarters here, and have waited for the weather to get
+warmer before moving; but at last we have made up our minds to begin
+nomadising again next Friday. We go to Florence, taking Siena, and
+probably Pisa, on our way, and reaching Florence some time next week.
+Address--Hotel Milano, Via Cerretani.
+
+For the last week the Carnival has been going on. It strikes me as the
+most elaborate and dreariest tomfoolery I have ever seen, but I doubt
+if I am in the humour to judge it fairly. It is only just to say that
+it entertains my vigorous wife immensely. I have been expecting to see
+her in mask and domino, but happily this is the last day, and there is
+no sign of any yet. I have never seen any one so much benefited by
+rest and change as she is, and that is a good thing for both of us.
+
+After Florence we shall probably make our way to Venice, and come home
+by the Lago di Garda and Germany. But I will let you know when our
+plans are settled.
+
+With best love from we two to you two.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To his youngest daughter.]
+
+Siena, February 23, 1885.
+
+Dearest Ethel,
+
+The cutting you sent me contains one of the numerous "goaks" of a
+Yankee performing donkey who is allowed to disport himself in one of
+the New York papers. I confess it is difficult to see the point of the
+joke, but there is one if you look close. I don't think you need
+trouble to enlighten the simple inquirer. He probably only wanted the
+indignant autograph which he won't get.
+
+The Parker Museum must take care of itself. The public ought to
+support it, not the men of science.
+
+As a grandfather, I am ashamed of my friends who are of the same
+standing; but I think they would take it as a liberty if, in
+accordance with your wish, I were to write to expostulate.
+
+After your mother had exhausted the joys of the Carnival, she
+permitted me to leave Rome for this place, where we arrived last
+Friday evening. My impression is that if we had stayed in Rome much
+longer we should never have left. There is something idle and
+afternoony about the air which whittles away one's resolution.
+
+The change here is wonderfully to the good. We are perched more than a
+thousand feet above the sea, looking over the Tuscan hills for twenty
+or thirty miles every way. It is with them enough sit with the window
+wide open and yet the air is prior and more bracing than in any place
+we have visited. Moreover, the hotel (Grande Albergo) is very
+comfortable.
+
+Then there is one of the most wonderful cathedrals to be seen in all
+North Italy--free from all the gaudy finery and atrocious bad taste
+which have afflicted me all over South Italy. The town is the
+quaintest place imaginable--built of narrow streets on several steep
+hills to start with, and then apparently stirred up with a poker to
+prevent monotony of effect.
+
+Moreover, there is Catherine of Siena, of whom I am reading a
+delightful Catholic life by an Italian father of the Oratory. She died
+500 years ago, but she was one of twenty-five children, and I think
+some of them must have settled in Kent and allied themselves with the
+Heathorns. Otherwise, I don't see why her method of writing to the
+Pope should have been so much like the way my daughters (especially
+the youngest) write to their holy father.
+
+I wish she had not had the stigmata--I am afraid there must have been
+a LEETLE humbug about the business--otherwise she was a very
+remarkable person, and you need not be ashamed of the relationship.
+
+I suppose we shall get to Florence some time this week; the address
+was sent to you before we left Rome--Hotel Milano, Via Cerretani. But
+I am loth to leave this lovely air in which, I do believe, I am going
+to pick up at last. The misfortune is that we did not intend to stay
+here more than three days, and so had letters sent to Florence.
+Everybody told us it would be very cold, and, as usual, everybody told
+taradiddles.
+
+M-- unites in fondest love to you all.
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To his son.]
+
+Siena, February 25, 1885.
+
+...If you had taken to physical science it would have been delightful
+for me for us to have worked together, and I am half inclined to take
+to history that I may earn that pleasure. I could give you some
+capital wrinkles about the physical geography and prehistoric history
+(excuse bull) of Italy for a Roman History primer! Joking apart, I
+believe that history might be, and ought to be, taught in a new
+fashion so as to make the meaning of it a process of
+evolution--intelligible to the young. The Italians have been doing
+wonders in the last twenty years in prehistoric archaeology, and I
+have been greatly interested in acquainting myself with the general
+results of their work.
+
+We moved here last Friday, and only regret that the reports of the
+weather prevented us from coming sooner. More than 1000 feet above the
+sea, in the midst of a beautiful hill country, and with the clearest
+and purist air we have met with in Italy, Siena is perfectly charming.
+The window is wide open and I look out upon a vast panorama, something
+like that of the Surrey hills, only on a larger scale--"Raw Siena,"
+"Burnt Siena," in the foreground, where the colour of the soil is not
+hidden by the sage green olive foliage, purple mountains in the
+distance.
+
+The old town itself is a marvel of picturesque crookedness, and the
+cathedral a marvel. M. and I have been devoting ourselves this morning
+to St. Catarina and Sodoma's pictures.
+
+I am reading a very interesting life of her by Capecelatro, and if my
+liver continues out of order, may yet turn Dominican.
+
+However, the place seems to be doing me good, and I may yet, like
+another person, decline to be a monk.
+
+[To his daughter, Mrs. Roller.]
+
+March 8.
+
+The great merit of Rome is that you have never seen the end of it. M.
+and I have not worked very hard at our galleries and churches, but I
+have got so far as a commencing dislike for the fine arts generally.
+Perhaps after a week or two I shall take to science out of sheer
+weariness.
+
+Hotel de Milano, Florence, March 12, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+My wife and I send you our hearty good wishes (antedated by four
+days). I am not sure we ought not to offer our best thanks to your
+mother for providing us with as staunch a friend as people ever were
+blessed with. It is possible that she did not consider that point nine
+and forty years ago; but we are just as grateful as if she had gone
+through it all on our own account.
+
+We start on our way homeward to-morrow or next day, by Bologna to
+Venice, and then to England by the way we came--taking it easy. The
+Brenner is a long way round and I hear very cold. I think we may stay
+a few days at Lugano, which I liked very much when there before.
+Florence is very charming, but there is not much to be said for the
+climate. My wife has been bothered with sore throat, to which she is
+especially liable, ever since we have been here. Old residents console
+her with the remark that Florentine sore throat is a regular thing in
+the spring. The alternations of heat and cold are detestable. So we
+stand thus--Naples, bad for both--Rome, good for her, bad for
+me--Florence, bad for her, baddish for me. Venice has to be tried, but
+stinks and mosquitoes are sure to render it impossible as soon as the
+weather is warm. Siena is the only place that suited both of us, and I
+don't think that would exactly answer to live in. Nothing like foreign
+travel for making one content with home.
+
+I shall have to find a country lot suited to my fortunes when I am
+paid off. Couldn't you let us have your gardener's cottage? my wife
+understands poultry and I shall probably have sufficient strength to
+open the gate and touch my hat to the Dons as they drive up. I am
+afraid E. is not steady enough for waiting-maid or I would offer her
+services.
+
+...I am rejoiced to hear that the lessons and the questions are
+launched. [The new edition of the "Elementary Physiology."] They loom
+large to me as gigantic undertakings, in which a dim and speculative
+memory suggests I once took part, but probably it is a solar myth, and
+I am too sluggish to feel much compunction for the extra trouble you
+have had.
+
+Perhaps I shall revive when my foot is on my native heath in the shady
+groves of the Evangelist. [St. John's Wood.]
+
+My wife is out photograph hunting--nothing diminishes her
+activity--otherwise she would join in love and good wishes to Mrs.
+Foster and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The two worst and most depressing periods of this vain pilgrimage in
+pursuit of health were the stay at Rome and at Florence. At the latter
+town he was inexpressibly ill and weak; but his daily life was
+brightened by the sympathy and active kindness of Sir Spencer Walpole,
+who would take him out for short walks, talking as little as possible,
+and shield him from the well-meant but tactless attentions of visitors
+who would try to] "rouse him and do him good" [by long talks on
+scientific questions.
+
+His physical condition, indeed, was little improved.]
+
+As for my unsatisfactory carcass [he writes on March 6, to Sir J.
+Donnelly], there seems nothing the matter with it now except that the
+brute objects to work. I eat well, drink well, sleep well, and have no
+earthly ache, pain or discomfort. I can walk for a couple of hours or
+more without fatigue. But half an hour's talking wearies me
+inexpressibly, and "saying a few words," would finish me for the day.
+For all that, I do not mean to confess myself finally beaten till I
+have had another try.
+
+[That is to say, he was still bent upon delivering his regular course
+of lectures at South Kensington as soon as he returned, in spite of
+the remonstrances of his wife and his friends.
+
+In the same letter he contrasts Florence with Siena and its] "fresh,
+elastic air," [its] "lovely country that reminds one of a magnified
+version of the Surrey weald." [The Florentine climate was trying. (A
+week later he writes to Sir J. Evans--] "I begin to look forward with
+great satisfaction to the equability of English weather--to that dear
+little island where doors and windows shut close--where fires warm
+without suffocating--where the chief business of the population in the
+streets is something else than expectoration--and where I shall never
+see fowl with salad again. You perceive I am getting better by this
+prolonged growl...But half an hour's talking knocks me up, and I am
+such an effete creature that I think of writing myself p.R.S. With a
+small p.") "And then there is the awful burden of those miles of
+'treasures of art.'" [He had been to the Uffizii;] "and there is the
+Pitti staring me in the face like drear fate. Why can't I have the
+moral courage to come back and say I haven't seen it? I should be the
+most distinguished of men."
+
+[There is another reference to Gordon:--]
+
+What an awful muddle you are all in in the bright little, tight little
+island. I hate the sight of the English papers. The only good thing
+that has met my eye lately is a proposal to raise a memorial to
+Gordon. I want to join in whatever is done, and unless it will be time
+enough when I return, I shall be glad if you will put me down for 5
+pounds to whatever is the right scheme.
+
+[The following to his daughter, Mrs. Roller, describes the stay in
+Florence.]
+
+Hotel de Milano, Florence, March 7, 1885.
+
+We have been here more than a week and have discovered two things,
+first that the wonderful "art treasures," of which all the world has
+heard, are a sore burden to the conscience if you don't go to see
+them, and an awful trial to the back and legs if you do; and thirdly,
+that the climate is productive of a peculiar kind of relaxed throat.
+M.'s throat discovered it, but on inquiry, it proved to be a law of
+nature, at least, so the oldest inhabitants say. We called on them
+to-day.
+
+But it is a lovely place for all that, far better than Rome as a place
+to live in, and full of interesting things. We had a morning at the
+Uffizii the other day, and came back with minds enlarged and backs
+broken. To-morrow we contemplate attacking the Pitti, and doubt not
+the result will be similar. By the end of the week our minds will
+probably be so large, and the small of the back so small that we
+should probably break if we stayed any longer, so think it prudent to
+be off to Venice. Which Friday is the day we go, reaching Venice
+Saturday or Sunday. Pension Suisse, Canal Grande, as before. And mind
+we have letters waiting for us there, or your affectionate Pater will
+emulate the historical "cocky."
+
+I got much better at Siena, probably the result of the medicinal
+nature of the city, the name of which, as a well-instructed girl like
+you knows, is derived from the senna, which grows wild there, and
+gives the soil its peculiar pigmentary character.
+
+But unfortunately I forgot to bring any with me, and the effect went
+off during the first few days of our residence here, when I was, as
+the Italians say, "molto basso nel bocca." However I am picking up
+again now, and if people wouldn't call upon us, I feel there might be
+a chance for me.
+
+I except from that remark altogether the dear Walpoles who are here
+and as nice as ever. Mrs. Walpole's mother and sister live here, and
+the W's are on a visit to them but leave on Wednesday. They go to
+Venice, but only for two or three days.
+
+We shall probably stay about a fortnight in Venice, and then make our
+way back by easy stages to London. We are wae to see you all again.
+
+Doctor M-- [Mrs. Huxley] has just been called in to a case of sore
+throat in the person of a young lady here, and is quite happy. The
+young lady probably will not be, when she finds herself converted into
+a sort of inverted mustard-pot, with the mustard outside! She is one
+of a very nice family of girls, who (by contrast) remind us of own.
+
+Ever your loving (to all) father,
+
+Pater.
+
+Mrs. M.-- has just insisted on seeing this letter.
+
+[To his youngest daughter.]
+
+Hotel Beau Sejour, San Remo, March 30, 1885.
+
+Dearest Babs,
+
+We could not stand "beautiful Venice the pride of the sea" any longer.
+It blew and rained and colded for eight-and-forty hours consecutively.
+Everybody said it was a most exceptional season, but that did not make
+us any warmer or prevent your mother from catching an awful cold. So
+as soon as she got better we packed up and betook ourselves here by
+way of Milan and Genoa. At Milan it was so like London on a wet day,
+that except for the want of smoke we might have been in our dear
+native land. At Genoa we arrived late one afternoon and were off early
+in the morning--but by dint of taking a tram after dinner (not a dram)
+and going there and back again we are able to say we have seen that
+city of palaces. The basements we saw through the tram windows by
+mixed light of gas and moon may in fact all have belonged to palaces.
+We are not in a position to say they did not.
+
+The quick train from Genoa here is believed to go fully twenty-five
+miles an hour, but starts at 7 A.M., but the early morning air being
+bad for the health, we took the slow train at 9.30, and got here some
+time in the afternoon. But mind you it is a full eighty miles, and
+when we were at full speed between the stations--very few donkeys
+could have gone faster. But the coast scenery is very pretty, and we
+didn't mind.
+
+Here we are very well off and as nearly warm as I expect to be before
+reaching England. You can sit out in the sun with satisfaction, though
+there is a little knife-edge of wind just to remind us of Florence.
+Everybody, however, tells us it is quite an exceptional season, and
+that it ought to be the most balmy air imaginable. Besides there are
+no end of date-palms and cactuses and aloes and odorous flowers in the
+garden--and the loveliest purple sea you can imagine.
+
+Well, we shall stop some days and give San Remo a chance--at least a
+week, unless the weather turns bad.
+
+As to your postcards which have been sent on from Venice and are
+really shabby, I am not going to any dinners whatsoever, either Middle
+Temple or Academy. Just write to both that "Mr. H. regrets he is
+unable to accept the invitation with which -- have honoured him."
+(It's like putting the shutters up," [he said sadly to his wife, when
+he felt unable to attend the Royal Academy dinner as he had done for
+many years.])
+
+I have really nothing the matter with me now--but my stock of strength
+is not great, and I can't afford to spend any on dinners.
+
+The blessedest thing now will be to have done with the nomadic life of
+the last five months--and see your ugly faces (so like their dear
+father) again. I believe it will be the best possible tonic for me.
+
+M-- has not got rid of her cold yet, but a few warm days here will, I
+hope, set her up.
+
+I met Lady Whitworth on the esplanade to-day--she is here with Sir
+Joseph, and this afternoon we went to call on her. The poor old man is
+very feeble and greatly altered since I saw him last.
+
+Write here on receiving this. We shall take easy stages home, but I
+don't know that I shall be able to give you any address.
+
+M-- sends heaps of love to all (including Charles [The cat.]).
+
+Ever your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Tell the "Micropholis" man that it is a fossil lizard with an armour
+of small scales.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.17.
+
+1885.
+
+[On April 8, he landed at Folkestone, and stayed there a day or two
+before going to London. Writing to Sir J. Donnelly, he remarks with
+great satisfaction at getting home:--]
+
+We got here this afternoon after a rather shady passage from Boulogne,
+with a strong north wind in our teeth all the way, and rain galore.
+For all that, it is the pleasantest journey I have made for a long
+time--so pleasant to see one's own dear native mud again. There is no
+foreign mud to come near it.
+
+[And on the same day he sums up to Sir M. Foster the amount of good he
+has gained from his expedition, and the amount of good any patient is
+likely to get from travel:--]
+
+As for myself I have nothing very satisfactory to say. By the oddest
+chance we met Andrew Clark in the boat, and he says I am a very bad
+colour--which I take it is the outward and visible sign of the inward
+and carnal state. I may sum that up by saying that there is nothing
+the matter but weakness and indisposition to do anything, together
+with a perfect genius for making mountains out of molehills.
+
+After two or three fine days at Venice, we have had nothing but wet or
+cold--or hot and cold at the same time, as in that prodigious
+imposture the Riviera. Of course it was the same story everywhere,
+"perfectly unexampled season."
+
+Moral.--If you are perfectly well and strong, brave Italy--but in
+search of health stop at home.
+
+It has been raining cats and dogs, and Folkestone is what some people
+would call dreary. I could go and roll in the mud with satisfaction
+that it is English mud.
+
+It will be jolly to see you again. Wife unites in love.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[To return home was not only a great pleasure; it gave him a fillip
+for the time, and he writes to Sir M. Foster, April 12:--]
+
+It is very jolly to be home, and I feel better already. Clark has just
+been here overhauling me, and feels very confident that he shall screw
+me up.
+
+I have renounced dining out and smoking (!!!) by way of preliminaries.
+God only knows whether I shall be permitted more than the smell of a
+mutton chop for dinner. But I have great faith in Andrew, who set me
+straight before when other "physicians' aid was vain."
+
+[But his energy was fitful; lassitude and depression again invaded
+him. He was warned by Sir Andrew Clark to lay aside all the burden of
+his work. Accordingly, early in May, just after his sixtieth birthday,
+he sent in his formal resignation of the Professorship of Biology, and
+the Inspectorship of Salmon Fisheries; while a few days later he laid
+his resignation of the Presidency before the Council of the Royal
+Society. By the latter he was begged to defer his final decision, but
+his health gave no promise of sufficient amendment before the decisive
+Council meeting in October.
+
+He writes on May 27:--]
+
+I am convinced that what with my perennial weariness and my deafness I
+ought to go, whatever my kind friends may say.
+
+[A curious effect of his illness was that for the first time in his
+life he began to shrink involuntarily from assuming responsibilities
+and from appearing on public occasions; thus he writes on June 16:--]
+
+I am sorry to say that the perkiness of last week was only a spurt
+[I.e. at the unveiling of the Darwin statue at South Kensington.], and
+I have been in a disgusting state of blue devils lately. Can't mark
+out what it is, for I really have nothing the matter, except a strong
+tendency to put the most evil construction upon everything.
+
+I am fairly dreading to-morrow [i.e. receiving the D.C.L. degree at
+Oxford] but why I don't know--probably an attack of modesty come on
+late in life and consequently severe.
+
+Very likely it will do me good and make me "fit" for Thursday [(i.e.
+Council and ordinary meetings of Royal Society).
+
+And a month later:--]
+
+I have been idling in the country for two or three days--but like the
+woman with the issue, "I am not better but rather worse"--blue devils
+and funk--funk and blue devils. Liver, I expect. [(An ailment of which
+he says to Professor Marsh,] "I rather wish I had some respectable
+disease--it would be livelier.")
+
+And again:--]
+
+Everybody tells me I look so much better, that I am really ashamed to
+go growling about, and confess that I am continually in a blue funk
+and hate the thought of any work--especially of scientific or anything
+requiring prolonged attention.
+
+[At the end of July he writes to Sir W. Flower:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, July 27, 1885.
+
+My dear Flower,
+
+I am particularly glad to hear that things went right on Saturday, as
+my conscience rather pricked me for my desertion of the meeting.
+[British Museum Trustees, July 25.] But it was the only chance we had
+of seeing our young married couple before the vacation--and you will
+rapidly arrive at a comprehension of the cogency of THAT argument now.
+
+I will think well of your kind words about the Presidency. If I could
+only get rid of my eternal hypochondria the work of the Royal Society
+would seem little enough. At present, I am afraid of everything that
+involves responsibility to a degree that is simply ridiculous. I only
+wish I could shirk the inquiries I am going off to hold in Devonshire!
+
+P.R.S. in a continual blue funk is not likely to be either dignified
+or useful; and unless I am in a better frame of mind in October I am
+afraid I shall have to go.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[A few weeks at Filey in August did him some good at first; and he
+writes cheerfully of his lodgings in] "a place with the worst-fitting
+doors and windows, and the hardest chairs, sofas, and beds known to my
+experience."
+
+[He continues:--]
+
+I am decidedly picking up. The air here is wonderful, and as we can
+set good cookery against hard lying (I don't mean in the Munchausen
+line) the consequent appetite becomes a mild source of gratification.
+Also, I have not met with more than two people who knew me, and that
+in my present state is a negative gratification of the highest order.
+
+[Later on he tried Bournemouth; being no better, he thought of an
+entirely new remedy.]
+
+The only thing I am inclined to do is to write a book on Miracles. I
+think it might do good and unload my biliary system.
+
+[In this state of indecision, so unnatural to him, he writes to Sir M.
+Foster:--]
+
+I am anything but clear as to the course I had best take myself. While
+undoubtedly much better in general health, I am in a curious state of
+discouragement, and I should like nothing better than to remain buried
+here (Bournemouth) or anywhere else, out of the way of trouble and
+responsibility. It distresses me to think that I shall have to say
+something definite about the Presidency at the meeting of the Council
+in October.
+
+[Finally on October 20, he writes:--]
+
+I think the lowest point of my curve of ups and downs is gradually
+rising--but I have by no means reached the point when I can cheerfully
+face anything. I got over the Board of Visitors (two hours and a half)
+better than I expected, but my deafness was a horrid nuisance.
+
+I believe the strings of the old fiddle will tighten up a good deal,
+if I abstain from attempting to play upon the instrument at
+present--but that a few jigs now will probably ruin that chance.
+
+But I will say my final word at our meeting next week. I would rather
+step down from the chair than dribble out of it. Even the devil is in
+the habit of departing with a "melodious twang," and I like the
+precedent.
+
+[So at the Anniversary meeting on November 30, he definitely announced
+in his last Presidential address his resignation of that] "honourable
+office" [which he could no longer retain] "with due regard to the
+interests of the Society, and perhaps, I may add, of
+self-preservation."
+
+I am happy to say [he continued] that I have good reason to believe
+that, with prolonged rest--by which I do not mean idleness, but
+release from distraction and complete freedom from those lethal
+agencies which are commonly known as the pleasures of society--I may
+yet regain so much strength as is compatible with advancing years. But
+in order to do so, I must, for a long time yet, be content to lead a
+more or less anchorite life. Now it is not fitting that your President
+should be a hermit, and it becomes me, who have received so much
+kindness and consideration from the Society, to be particularly
+careful that no sense of personal gratification should delude me into
+holding the office of its representative one moment after reason and
+conscience have pointed out my incapacity to discharge the serious
+duties which devolve upon the President, with some approach to
+efficiency.
+
+I beg leave, therefore, with much gratitude for the crowning honour of
+my life which you have conferred upon me, to be permitted to vacate
+the chair of the Society as soon as the business of this meeting is at
+an end.
+
+[The settlement of the terms of the pension upon which, after
+thirty-one years of service under Government, he retired from his
+Professorship at South Kensington and the Inspectorship of Fisheries,
+took a considerable time. The chiefs of his own department, that of
+Education, wished him to retire upon full pay, 1500 pounds. The
+Treasury were more economical. It was the middle of June before the
+pension they proposed of 1200 pounds was promised; the end of July
+before he knew what conditions were attached to it.
+
+On June 20, he writes to Mr. Mundella, Vice-President of the
+Council:--]
+
+My dear Mundella,
+
+Accept my warmest thanks for your good wishes, and for all the trouble
+you have taken on my behalf. I am quite ashamed to have been the
+occasion of so much negotiation.
+
+Until I see the Treasury letter, I am unable to judge what the 1200
+pounds may really mean [I.e. Whether he was to draw his salary of 200
+pounds as Dean or not.], but whatever the result, I shall never forget
+the kindness with which my chiefs have fought my battle.
+
+I am, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On July 16, he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+The blessed Treasury can't make up their minds whether I am to be
+asked to stay on as Dean or not, and till they do, I can't shake off
+any of my fetters.
+
+[Early in the year he had written to Sir John Donnelly of the
+necessity of resigning:--]
+
+Nevertheless [he added], it will be a sad day for me when I find
+myself no longer entitled to take part in the work of the schools in
+which you and I have so long been interested.
+
+[But that "sad day" was not to come yet. His connection with the Royal
+College of Science was not entirely severed. He was asked to continue,
+as Honorary Dean, a general supervision of the work he had done so
+much to organise, and he kept the title of Professor of Biology, his
+successors in the practical work of the chair being designated
+Assistant Professors.]
+
+"I retain," [he writes,] "general superintendence as part of the great
+unpaid."
+
+It is a comfort [he writes to his son] to have got the thing settled.
+My great desire at present is to be idle, and I am now idle with a
+good conscience.
+
+[Later in the year, however, a change of Ministry having taken place,
+he was offered a Civil List Pension of 300 pounds a year by Lord
+Iddesleigh. He replied accepting it:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 24, 1885.
+
+My dear Lord Iddesleigh,
+
+Your letters of the 20th November reached me only last night, and I
+hasten to thank you for both of them. I am particularly obliged for
+your kind reception of what I ventured to say about the deserts of my
+old friend Sir Joseph Hooker.
+
+With respect to your lordship's offer to submit my name to Her Majesty
+for a Civil List Pension, I can but accept a proposal which is in
+itself an honour, and which is rendered extremely gratifying to me by
+the great kindness of the expressions in which you have been pleased
+to embody it.
+
+I am happy to say that I am getting steadily better at last, and under
+the regime of "peace with honour" that now seems to have fallen to my
+lot, I may fairly hope yet to do a good stroke of work or two.
+
+I remain, my dear Lord Iddesleigh, faithfully yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 24, 1885.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I believe you have been at work again!
+
+Lord Iddesleigh has written to me to ask if I will be recommended for
+a Civil List Pension of 300 pounds a year, a very pretty letter, not
+at all like the Treasury masterpiece you admired so much.
+
+Didn't see why I should not accept, and have accepted accordingly.
+When the announcement comes out the Liberals will say the Tory
+Government have paid me for attacking the G.O.M.! to a dead certainty.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Five days later he replies to the congratulations of Mr. Eckersley
+(whose son had married Huxley's third daughter):--]
+
+...Lord Iddesleigh's letter offering to submit my name for an honorary
+pension was a complete surprise.
+
+My chiefs in the late Government wished to retire me on full pay, but
+the Treasury did not see their way to it, and cut off 300 pounds a
+year. Naturally I am not sorry to have the loss made good, but the way
+the thing was done is perhaps the pleasantest part of it.
+
+[There was a certain grim appropriateness in his "official death"
+following hard upon his sixtieth birthday, for sixty was the age at
+which he had long declared that men of science ought to be strangled,
+lest age should harden them against the reception of new truths, and
+make them into clogs upon progress, the worse, in proportion to the
+influence they had deservedly won. This is the allusion in a birthday
+letter from Sir M. Foster:--
+
+Reverend Sir,
+
+So the "day of strangulation" has arrived at last, and with it the
+humble petition of your friends that you may be induced to defer the
+"happy despatch" for, say at least ten years, when the subject may
+again come up for consideration. For your petitioners are respectfully
+inclined to think that if your sixtyship may be induced so far to
+become an apostle as to give up the fishery business, and be led to
+leave the Black Board at South Kensington to others, the t'other side
+sixty years, may after all be the best years of your life. In any case
+they would desire to bring under your notice the fact that THEY FEEL
+THEY WANT YOU AS MUCH AS EVER THEY DID.
+
+Ever thine,
+
+M.F.
+
+Reference has been made to the fact that the honorary degree of D.C.L.
+was conferred this May upon Huxley by the University of Oxford. The
+Universities of the sister kingdoms had been the first thus to
+recognise his work; and after Aberdeen and Dublin, Cambridge, where
+natural science had earlier established a firm foothold, showed the
+way to Oxford. Indeed, it was not until his regular scientific career
+was at an end, that the University of Oxford opened its portals to
+him. So, as he wrote to Professor Bartholomew Price on May 20, in
+answer to the invitation,] "It will be a sort of apotheosis coincident
+with my official death, which is imminent. In fact, I am dead already,
+only the Treasury Charon has not yet settled the conditions upon which
+I am to be ferried over to the other side."
+
+[Before leaving the subject of his connection with the Royal Society,
+it may be worth while to give a last example of the straightforward
+way in which he dealt with a delicate point whether to vote or not to
+vote for his friend Sir Andrew Clark, who had been proposed for
+election to the Society. It occurred just after his return from
+abroad; he explains his action to Sir Joseph Hooker, who had urged
+caution on hearing a partial account of the proceedings.]
+
+South Kensington, April 25, 1885.
+
+My dear Hooker,
+
+I don't see very well how I could have been more cautious than I have
+been. I knew nothing of Clark's candidature until I saw his name in
+the list; and if he or his proposer had consulted me, I should have
+advised delay, because I knew very well there would be a great push
+made for -- this year.
+
+Being there, however, it seemed to me only just to say that which is
+certainly true, namely, that Clark has just the same claim as half a
+dozen doctors who have been admitted without question, e.g. Gull,
+Jenner, Risdon Bennett, on the sole ground of standing in the
+profession. And I think that so long as that claim is admitted, it
+will be unjust not to admit Clark.
+
+So I said what you heard; but I was so careful not to press unduly
+upon the Council, that I warned them of the possible prejudice arising
+from my own personal obligations to Clark's skill, and I went so far
+as not to put his name in the FIRST list myself, a step which I now
+regret.
+
+If this is not caution enough, I should like to know what is? As Clive
+said when he came back from India, "By God, sir, I am astonished at my
+own moderation!"
+
+If it is not right to make a man a fellow because he holds a
+first-class place as a practitioner of medicine as the Royal Society
+has done since I have known it, let us abolish the practice. But then
+let us also in justice refuse to recognise the half-and-half claims,
+those of the people who are third-rate as practitioners, and hang on
+to the skirts of science without doing anything in it.
+
+Several of your and my younger scientific friends are bent on bringing
+in their chum --, and Clark's candidature is very inconvenient to
+them. Hence I suspect some of the "outspoken aversion" and criticism
+of Clark's claims you have heard.
+
+I am quite willing to sacrifice my friend for a principle, but not for
+somebody else's friend, and I mean to vote for Clark; though I am not
+going to try to force my notion down any one else's throat.
+
+Ever yours faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On the same subject he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+Obedience be hanged. It would not lie in my mouth, as the lawyers say,
+to object to anybody's getting his own way if he can.
+
+If Clark had not been a personal friend of mine I should not have
+hesitated a moment about deciding in his favour. Under the
+circumstances it was quite clear what I should do if I were forced to
+decide, and I thought it would have been kindly and courteous to the
+President if he had been let off the necessity of making a decision
+which was obviously disagreeable to him.
+
+If, on the other hand, it was wished to fix the responsibility of what
+happened on him, I am glad that he had the opportunity of accepting
+it. I never was more clear as to what was the right thing to do.
+
+[So also at other times; he writes in September to Sir M. Foster, the
+Secretary, with reference to evening gatherings at which smoking
+should be permitted.]
+
+Bournemouth, September 17, 1885.
+
+I am not at all sure that I can give my blessing to the "Tabagie."
+When I heard of it I had great doubts as to its being a wise move. It
+is not the question of "smoke" so much, as the principle of having
+meetings in the Society's rooms, which are not practically (whatever
+they may be theoretically), open to all the fellows, and which will
+certainly be regarded as the quasi-private parties of one of the
+officers. You will have all sorts of jealousies roused, and talk of a
+clique, etc.
+
+When I was Secretary the one thing I was most careful to avoid was the
+appearance of desiring to exert any special influence. But there was a
+jealousy of the x Club, and only the other day, to my great amusement,
+I was talking to an influential member of the Royal Society Club about
+the possibility of fusing it with the Phil. Club, and he said,
+forgetting I was a member of the latter: "Oh! we don't want any of
+those wire-pullers!" Poor dear innocent dull-as-ditchwater Phil. Club!
+
+[Mention has already been made of the unveiling of the Darwin statue
+at South Kensington on June 9, when, as President of the Royal
+Society, Huxley delivered an address in the name of the Memorial
+Committee, on handing over the statue of Darwin to H.R.H. The Prince
+of Wales, as representative of the Trustees of the British Museum. The
+concluding words of the speech deserve quotation:--]
+
+We do not make this request [i.e. to accept the statue] for the mere
+sake of perpetuating a memory; for so long as men occupy themselves
+with the pursuit of truth, the name of Darwin runs no more risk of
+oblivion than does that of Copernicus, or that of Harvey.
+
+Nor, most assuredly, do we ask you to preserve the statue in its
+cynosural position in this entrance hall of our National Museum of
+Natural History as evidence that Mr. Darwin's views have received your
+official sanction; for science does not recognise such sanctions, and
+commits suicide when it adopts a creed.
+
+No, we beg you to cherish this memorial as a symbol by which, as
+generation after generation of students enter yonder door, they shall
+be reminded of the ideal according to which they must shape their
+lives, if they would turn to the best account of the opportunities
+offered by the great institution under your charge.
+
+[Nor was this his only word about Darwin. Somewhat later, Professor
+Mivart sent him the proofs of an article on Darwin, asking for his
+criticism, and received the following reply, which describes better
+than almost any other document, the nature of the tie which united
+Darwin and his friends, and incidentally touches the question of
+Galileo's recantation:--]
+
+November 12, 1885.
+
+My dear Mr. Mivart,
+
+I return your proof with many thanks for your courtesy in sending it.
+I fully appreciate the good feeling shown in what you have written,
+but as you ask my opinion, I had better say frankly that my experience
+of Darwin is widely different from yours as expressed in the passages
+marked with pencil. I have often remarked that I never knew any one of
+his intellectual rank who showed himself so tolerant to opponents,
+great and small, as Darwin did. Sensitive he was in the sense of being
+too ready to be depressed by adverse comment, but I never knew any one
+less easily hurt by fair criticism, or who less needed to be soothed
+by those who opposed him with good reason.
+
+I am sure I tried his patience often enough, without ever eliciting
+more than a "Well there's a good deal in what you say; but--" and then
+followed something which nine times out of ten showed he had gone
+deeper into the business than I had.
+
+I cannot agree with you, again, that the acceptance of Darwin's views
+was in any way influenced by the strong affection entertained for him
+by many of his friends. What that affection really did was to lead
+those of his friends who had seen good reason for his views to take
+much more trouble in his defence and support, and to strike out much
+harder at his adversary than they would otherwise have done. This is
+pardonable if not justifiable--that which you suggest would to my mind
+be neither.
+
+I am so ignorant of what has been going on during the last
+twelvemonth, that I know nothing of your controversy with Romanes. If
+he is going to show the evolution of intellect from sense, he is the
+man for whom I have been waiting, as Kant says.
+
+In your paper about scientific freedom, which I read some time ago
+with much interest, you alluded to a book or article by Father Roberts
+on the Galileo business. Will you kindly send me a postcard to say
+where and when it was published?
+
+I looked into the matter when I was in Italy, and I arrived at the
+conclusion that the Pope and the College of Cardinals had rather the
+best of it. It would complete the paradox if Father Roberts should
+help me to see the error of my ways.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[August and September, as said above, were spent in England, though
+with little good effect. Filey was not a success for either himself or
+his wife. Bournemouth, where they joined their eldest daughter and her
+family, offered a] "temperature much more to the taste of both of us,"
+[and at least undid the mischief done by the wet and cold of the
+north.
+
+The mean line of health was gradually rising; it was a great relief to
+be free at length from administrative distractions, while the retiring
+pensions removed the necessity of daily toil. By nature he was like
+the friend whom he described as] "the man to become hipped to death
+without incessant activity of some sort or other. I am sure that the
+habit of incessant work into which we all drift is as bad in its way
+as dram-drinking. In time you cannot be comfortable without the
+stimulus." [But the variety of interests which filled his mind
+prevented him from feeling the void of inaction after a busy life. And
+just as he was at the turning-point in health, he received a fillip
+which started him again into vigorous activity--the mental tonic
+bracing up his body and clearing away the depression and languor which
+had so long beset him.
+
+The lively fillip came in the shape of an article in the November
+"Nineteenth Century," by Mr. Gladstone, in which he attacked the
+position taken up by Dr. Reville in his "Prolegomena to the History of
+Religions," and in particular, attempted to show that the order of
+creation given in Genesis 1, is supported by the evidence of science.
+This article, Huxley used humorously to say, so stirred his bile as to
+set his liver right at once; and though he denied the soft impeachment
+that the ensuing fight was what had set him up, the marvellous
+curative effects of a Gladstonian dose, a remedy unknown to the
+pharmacopoeia, became a household word among family and friends.
+
+His own reply, "The Interpreters of Genesis and the Interpreters of
+Nature," appeared in the December number of the "Nineteenth Century"
+("Collected Essays" 4 page 139). In January 1886 Mr. Gladstone
+responded with his "Proem to Genesis," which was met in February by
+"Mr. Gladstone and Genesis" ("Collected Essays" 4 page 164). Not only
+did he show that science offers no support to the "fourfold" or the
+"fivefold" or any other order obtained from Genesis by Mr. Gladstone,
+but in a note appended to his second article he gives what he takes to
+be the proper sense of the "Mosaic" narrative of the Creation (4 page
+195), not allowing the succession of phenomena to represent an
+evolutionary notion, as suggested, of a progress from lower to higher
+in the scale of being, a notion assuredly not in the mind of the
+writer, but deducing this order from such ideas as, putting aside our
+present knowledge of nature, we may reasonably believe him to have
+held.
+
+A vast subsidiary controversy sprang up in the "Times" on Biblical
+exegetics; where these touched him at all, as, for instance, when it
+was put to him whether the difference between the "Rehmes" of Genesis
+and "Sheh-retz" of Leviticus, both translated "creeping things," did
+not invalidate his argument as to the identity of such "creeping
+things," he had examined the point already, and surprised his
+interrogator, who appeared to have raised a very pretty dilemma, by
+promptly referring him to a well-known Hebrew commentator.
+
+Several letters refer to this passage of arms. On December 4, he
+writes to Mr. Herbert Spencer:--]
+
+Do read my polishing off of the G.O.M. I am proud of it as a work of
+art, and as evidence that the volcano is not yet exhausted.
+
+To Lord Farrer.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 6, 1885.
+
+My dear Farrer,
+
+From a scientific point of view Gladstone's article was undoubtedly
+not worth powder and shot. But, on personal grounds, the perusal of it
+sent me blaspheming about the house with the first healthy expression
+of wrath known for a couple of years--to my wife's great alarm--and I
+should have "busted up" if I had not given vent to my indignation; and
+secondly, all orthodoxy was gloating over the slap in the face which
+the G.O.M. had administered to science in the person of Reville.
+
+The ignorance of the so-called educated classes in this country is
+stupendous, and in the hands of people like Gladstone it is a
+political force. Since I became an official of the Royal Society, good
+taste seemed to me to dictate silence about matters on which there is
+"great division among us." But now I have recovered my freedom, and I
+am greatly minded to begin stirring the fire afresh.
+
+Within the last month I have picked up wonderfully. If dear old Darwin
+were alive he would say it is because I have had a fight, but in truth
+the fight is consequence and not cause. I am infinitely relieved by
+getting rid of the eternal strain of the past thirty years, and hope
+to get some good work done yet before I die, so make ready for the
+part of the judicious bottle-holder which I have always found you.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 13, 1886.
+
+My dear Farrer,
+
+My contribution to the next round was finished and sent to Knowles a
+week ago. I confess it to have been a work of supererogation; but the
+extreme shiftiness of my antagonist provoked me, and I was tempted to
+pin him and dissect him as an anatomico-psychological exercise. May it
+be accounted unto me for righteousness, though I laughed so much over
+the operation that I deserve no credit.
+
+I think your notion is a very good one, and I am not sure that I shall
+not try to carry it out some day. In the meanwhile, however, I am bent
+upon an enterprise which I think still more important.
+
+After I have done with the reconcilers, I will see whether theology
+cannot be told her place rather more plainly than she has yet been
+dealt with.
+
+However, this between ourselves, I am seriously anxious to use what
+little stuff remains to me well, and I am not sure that I can do
+better service anywhere than in this line, though I don't mean to have
+any more controversy if I can help it.
+
+(Don't laugh and repeat Darwin's wickedness.)
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[However, this] "contribution to the next round" [seemed to the editor
+rather too pungent in tone. Accordingly Huxley revised it, the letters
+which follow describing the process:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 15, 1886.
+
+My dear Knowles,
+
+I will be with you at 1.30. I spent three mortal hours this morning
+taming my wild cat. He is now castrated; his teeth are filed, his
+claws are cut, he is taught to swear like a "mieu"; and to spit like a
+cough; and when he is turned out of the bag you won't know him from a
+tame rabbit.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 20, 1886.
+
+My dear Knowles,
+
+Here is the debonnaire animal finally titivated, and I quite agree,
+much improved, though I mourn the loss of some of the spice. But it is
+an awful smash as it stands--worse than the first, I think.
+
+I shall send you the manuscript of the "Evolution of Theology" to-day
+or to-morrow. It will not do to divide it, as I want the reader to
+have an apercu of the whole process from Samuel of Israel to Sammy of
+Oxford.
+
+I am afraid it will make thirty or thirty-five pages, but it is really
+very interesting, though I say it as shouldn't.
+
+Please have it set up in slip, though, as it is written after the
+manner of a judge's charge, the corrections will not be so extensive,
+nor the strength of language so well calculated to make a judicious
+editor's hair stand on end, as was the case with the enclosed (in its
+unregenerate state).
+
+Ever yours very truly,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Some time later, on September 14, 1890, writing to Mr. Hyde Clarke,
+the philologist, who was ten years his senior, he remarks on his
+object in undertaking this controversy:--]
+
+I am glad to see that you are as active-minded as ever. I have no
+doubt there is a great deal in what you say about the origin of the
+myths in Genesis. But my sole point is to get the people who persist
+in regarding them as statements of fact to understand that they are
+fools.
+
+The process is laborious, and not yet very fruitful of the desired
+conviction.
+
+To Sir Joseph Prestwich.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 16, 1886.
+
+My dear Prestwich,
+
+Accept my best thanks for the volume of your Geology, which has just
+reached me.
+
+I envy the vigour which has led you to tackle such a task, and I have
+no doubt that when I turn to your book for information I shall find
+reason for more envy in the thoroughness with which the task is done.
+
+I see Mr. Gladstone has been trying to wrest your scripture to his own
+purposes, but it is no good. Neither the fourfold nor the fivefold nor
+the sixfold order will wash.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+To Professor Poulton [Hope Professor of Zoology at Oxford.].
+
+4 Marlborough Place, February 19, 1886.
+
+Dear Mr. Poulton,
+
+I return herewith the number of the "Expositor" with many thanks.
+Canon Driver's article contains as clear and candid a statement as I
+could wish of the position of the Pentateuchal cosmogony from his
+point of view. If he more thoroughly understood the actual nature of
+paleontological succession--I mean the species by species replacement
+of old forms by new,--and if he more fully appreciated the great gulf
+fixed between the ideas of "creation" and of "evolution," I think he
+would see (1) that the Pentateuch and science are more hopelessly at
+variance than even he imagines, and (2) that the Pentateuchal
+cosmogony does not come so near the facts of the case as some other
+ancient cosmogonies, notably those of the old Greek philosophers.
+
+Practically, Canon Driver, as a theologian and Hebrew scholar, gives
+up the physical truth of the Pentateuchal cosmogony altogether. All
+the more wonderful to me, therefore, is the way in which he holds on
+to it as embodying theological truth. So far as this question is
+concerned, on all points which can be tested, the Pentateuchal writer
+states that which is not true. What, therefore, is his authority on
+the matter--creation by a Deity--which cannot be tested? What sort of
+"inspiration" is that which leads to the promulgation of a fable as
+divine truth, which forces those who believe in that inspiration to
+hold on, like grim death, to the literal truth of the fable, which
+demoralises them in seeking for all sorts of sophistical shifts to
+bolster up the fable, and which finally is discredited and repudiated
+when the fable is finally proved to be a fable? If Satan had wished to
+devise the best means of discrediting "Revelation" he could not have
+done better.
+
+Have you not forgotten to mention the leg of Archaeopteryx as a
+characteristically bird-like structure? It is so, and it is to be
+recollected that at present we know nothing of the greater part of the
+skeletons of the older Mesozoic mammals--only teeth and jaws. What the
+shoulder-girdle of Stereognathus might be like is uncertain.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letters have a curious interest as showing what, in the
+eyes of a supporter of educational progress, might and might not be
+done at Oxford to help on scientific education:--]
+
+To the Master of Balliol.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 21, 1885.
+
+My dear Master [This is from the first draft of the letter. Huxley's
+letters to Jowett were destroyed by Jowett's orders, together with the
+rest of his correspondence.],
+
+I have been talking to some of my friends about stimulating the Royal
+Society to address the Universities on the subject of giving greater
+weight to scientific acquirements, and I find that there is a better
+prospect than I had hoped for of getting President and Council to
+move. But I am not quite sure about the course which it will be wisest
+for us to adopt, and I beg a little counsel on that matter.
+
+I presume that we had better state our wishes in the form of a letter
+to the Vice-Chancellor, and that we may prudently ask for the
+substitution of modern languages (especially German) and elementary
+science for some of the subjects at present required in the literary
+part of the examinations of the scientific and medical faculties. If
+we could gain this much it would be a great step, not only in itself,
+but in its reaction on the schools.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, December 26, 1885.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Please read the enclosed letter from Jowett (confidentially). I had
+suggested the possibility of diminishing the Greek and Latin for the
+science and medical people, but that, you see, he won't have. But he
+is prepared to load the classical people with science by way of making
+things fair.
+
+It may be worth our while to go in for this, and trust to time for the
+other. What say you?
+
+Merry Christmas to you. The G.O.M. is going to reply, so I am likely
+to have a happy New Year! I expect some fun, and I mean to make it an
+occasion for some good earnest.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[So ends 1885, and with it closes another definite period of Huxley's
+life. Free from official burdens and official restraints, he was at
+liberty to speak out on any subject; his strength for work was less
+indeed, but his time was his own; there was hope that he might still
+recover his health for a few more years. And though the ranks of his
+friends were beginning to thin, though he writes (May 20, to Professor
+Bartholomew Price):--]
+
+The "gaps" are terrible accompaniments of advancing life. It is only
+with age that one realises the full truth of Goethe's quatrain:--
+
+Eine Bruche ist ein jeder Tag, etc.
+
+[and again:--]
+
+The x Club is going to smithereens, as if a charge of dynamite had
+been exploded in the midst of it. Busk is slowly fading away. Tyndall
+is, I fear, in a bad way, and I am very anxious about Hooker:--
+
+[Still the club hung together for many years, and outside it were
+other devoted friends, who would have echoed Dr. Foster's good wishes
+on the last day of the year:--
+
+A Happy New Year! and many of them, and may you more and more
+demonstrate the folly of strangling men at sixty.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.18.
+
+1886.
+
+[The controversy with Mr. Gladstone indicates the nature of the
+subject that Huxley took up for the employment of his newly obtained
+leisure. Chequered as this leisure was all through the year by
+constant illness, which drove him again and again to the warmth of
+Bournemouth or the brisk airs of the Yorkshire moors in default of the
+sovereign medicine of the Alps, he managed to write two more
+controversial articles this year, besides a long account of the
+"Progress of Science," for Mr. T. Humphry Ward's book on "The Reign of
+Queen Victoria," which was to celebrate the Jubilee year 1887.
+Examinations--for the last time, however--the meetings of the Eton
+Governing Body, the business of the Science Schools, the Senate of the
+London University, the Marine Biological Association, the Council of
+the Royal Society, and a round dozen of subsidiary committees, all
+claimed his attention. Even when driven out of town by his bad health,
+he would come up for a few days at a time to attend necessary
+meetings.
+
+One of the few references of this period to biological research is
+contained in a letter to Professor Pelseneer of Ghent, a student of
+the Mollusca, who afterwards completed for Huxley the long unfinished
+monograph on "Spirula" for the "Challenger" Report.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, January 8, 1886.
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+Accept my best thanks for the present of your publications. As you may
+imagine, I find that on the cretaceous crustaceans very interesting.
+It was a rare chance to find the branchiae preserved.
+
+I am glad to be able to send you a copy of my memoir on the morphology
+of the Mollusca. It shows signs of age outside, but I beg you to
+remember that it is 33 years old.
+
+I am rejoiced to think you find it still worth consulting. It has
+always been my intention to return to the subject some day, and to try
+to justify my old conclusions--as I think they may be justified.
+
+But it is very doubtful whether my intention will now ever be carried
+into effect.
+
+I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Mr. Gladstone's second article appeared in the January number of the
+"Nineteenth Century," to this the following letter refers:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., January 21, 1886.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+Thanks for your capital bit of chaff. I took a thought and began to
+mend (as Burns' friend and MY prototype (G.O.M.) is not yet recorded
+to have done) about a couple of months ago, and then Gladstone's first
+article caused such a flow of bile that I have been the better for it
+ever since.
+
+I need not tell you I am entirely crushed by his reply--still the worm
+will turn and there is a faint squeak (as of a rat in the mouth of a
+terrier) about to be heard in the next "Nineteenth."
+
+But seriously, it is to me a grave thing that the destinies of this
+country should at present be seriously influenced by a man, who,
+whatever he may be in the affairs of which I am no judge--is nothing
+but a copious shuffler, in those which I do understand.
+
+With best wishes to Mrs. Skelton and yourself, ever yours very
+faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[With the article in the February number of the "Nineteenth Century,"
+he concluded his tilt with Mr. Gladstone upon the interpretation of
+Genesis. His supposed] "unjaded appetite" [for controversy was already
+satiated; and he begged leave to retire from] "that 'atmosphere of
+contention' in which Mr. Gladstone has been able to live, alert and
+vigorous beyond the common race of men, as if it were purest mountain
+air," [for the] "Elysium" of scientific debate, which "suits my less
+robust constitution better." [A vain hope. Little as he liked
+controversy at bottom, in spite of the skill--it must be allowed, at
+times, a pleasurable skill--in using the weapons of debate, he was not
+to avoid it any more than he was to avoid the east wind when he went
+to Bournemouth from early in February till the end of March, of which
+he writes on February 23:--]
+
+The "English Naples" is rather Florentine so far as a bitter cold east
+wind rather below than above 0 degrees C. goes, but from all I hear it
+is a deal better than London, and I am picking up in spite of it. I
+wish I were a Holothuria, and could get on without my viscera. I
+should do splendidly then.
+
+[Here he wrote a long article on the "Evolution of Theology"
+("Collected Essays" 4 287) which appeared in the March and April
+numbers of the "Nineteenth Century." It was a positive statement of
+the views he had arrived at, which underlay the very partial--and
+therefore misleading--exposition of them possible in controversy. He
+dealt with the subject, not with reference to the truth or falsehood
+of the notions under review, but purely as a question of
+anthropology,] "a department of biology to which I have at various
+times given a good deal of attention." [Starting with the familiar
+ground of the Hebrew Scriptures, he thus explains the paleontological
+method he proposes to adopt:--]
+
+In the venerable record of ancient life, miscalled a book, when it is
+really a library comparable to a selection of works from English
+literature between the times of Beda and those of Milton, we have the
+stratified deposits (often confused and even with their natural order
+inverted) left by the stream of the intellectual and moral life of
+Israel during many centuries. And, embedded in these strata, there are
+numerous remains of forms of thought which once lived, and which,
+though often unfortunately mere fragments, are of priceless value to
+the anthropologist. Our task is to rescue these from their relatively
+unimportant surroundings, and by careful comparison with existing
+forms of theology to make the dead world which they record live again.
+
+[A subsequent letter to Professor Lewis Campbell bears upon this
+essay. It was written in answer to an inquiry prompted by the
+comparison here drawn between the primitive spiritual theories of the
+books of Judges and Samuel, and the very similar development of ideas
+among the Tongans, as described by Mariner, who lived many years among
+the natives.]
+
+Hodeslea, October 10, 1894.
+
+My dear Campbell,
+
+I took a good deal of trouble years ago to satisfy myself about the
+point you mention, and I came to the conclusion that Mariner was
+eminently trustworthy, and that Martin was not only an honest, but a
+shrewd and rather critical, reporter. The story he tells about testing
+Mariner's version of King Theebaw's oration shows his frame of mind
+(and is very interesting otherwise in relation to oral tradition).
+
+I have a lot of books about Polynesia, but of all I possess and have
+read, Mariner is to my mind the most trustworthy.
+
+The missionaries are apt to colour everything, and they never have the
+chance of knowing the interior life as Mariner knew it. It was this
+conviction that led me to make Mariner my cheval de bataille in
+"Evolution of Theology."
+
+I am giving a good deal of trouble--ill for the last week, and at
+present with a sharp lumbago! so nice! With our love to Mrs. Campbell
+and yourself.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The circumstances under which the following letter was written are
+these. The activity of the Home Rulers and the lethargy of Unionists
+had caused one side only of the great question then agitating English
+politics to be represented in the American press, with the result that
+the funds of the Nationalists were swelled by subscriptions from
+persons who might have acted otherwise if the arguments on the other
+side had been adequately laid before them.
+
+Mr. Albert Grey, M.P., therefore had arranged for a series of clear,
+forcible pronouncements from strong representative Englishmen against
+a separate Parliament, to be cabled over to New York to a syndicate of
+influential newspapers, and his American advisers desired that the
+opening statement should be from Huxley.
+
+Although it will be seen from the letter that he would not undertake
+this task, Mr. Grey showed the letter to one or two of the leading
+Liberal Unionists to strengthen their hands, and begged permission to
+publish it for the benefit of the whole party. Accordingly, it
+appeared in the "Times" of April 13, 1886.]
+
+Casalini, W. Bournemouth, March 21, 1886.
+
+Dear Mr. Grey,
+
+I am as much opposed to the Home Rule scheme as any one can possibly
+be, and if I were a political man I would fight against it as long as
+I had any breath left in me; but I have carefully kept out of the
+political field all my life, and it is too late for me now to think of
+entering it.
+
+Anxious watching of the course of affairs for many years past has
+persuaded me that nothing short of some sharp and sweeping national
+misfortune will convince the majority of our countrymen that
+government by average opinion is merely a circuitous method of going
+to the devil; and that those who profess to lead but in fact slavishly
+follow this average opinion are simply the fastest runners and the
+loudest squeakers of the herd which is rushing blindly down to its
+destruction.
+
+It is the electorate, and especially the Liberal electorate, which is
+responsible for the present state of things. It has no political
+education. It knows well enough that 2 and 2 won't make 5 in a ledger,
+and that sentimental stealing in private life is not to be tolerated;
+but it has not been taught the great lesson in history that there are
+like verities in national life, and hence it easily falls a prey to
+any clever and copious fallacy-monger who appeals to its great heart
+instead of reminding it of its weak head.
+
+Politicians have gone on flattering and cajoling this chaos of
+political incompetence until the just penalty of believing their own
+fictions has befallen them, and the average member of Parliament is
+conscientiously convinced that it is his duty, not to act for his
+constituents to the best of his judgment, but to do exactly what they,
+or rather the small minority which drives them, tells him to do.
+
+Have we a real statesman? A man of the calibre of Pitt or Burke, to
+say nothing of Strafford or Pym, who will stand up and tell his
+countrymen that this disruption of the union is nothing but a cowardly
+wickedness--an act bad in itself, fraught with immeasurable
+evil--especially to the people of Ireland; and that if it cost his
+political existence, or his head, for that matter, he is prepared to
+take any and every honest means of preventing the mischief?
+
+I see no sign of any. And if such a man should come to the front what
+chance is there of his receiving loyal and continuous support from a
+majority of the House of Commons? I see no sign of any.
+
+There was a time when the political madness of one party was sure to
+be checked by the sanity, or at any rate the jealousy of the other. At
+the last election I should have voted for the Conservatives (for the
+first time in my life) had it not been for Lord Randolph Churchill;
+but I thought that by thus jumping out of the Gladstonian frying-pan
+into the Churchillian fire I should not mend matters, so I abstained
+altogether.
+
+Mr. Parnell has great qualities. For the first time the Irish
+malcontents have a leader who is not eloquent, but who is honest; who
+knows what he wants and faces the risks involved in getting it. Our
+poor Right Honourable Rhetoricians are no match for this man who
+understands realities. I believe also that Mr. Parnell's success will
+destroy the English politicians who permit themselves to be his
+instruments, as soon as bitter experience of the consequences has
+brought Englishmen and Scotchmen (and I will add Irishmen) to their
+senses.
+
+I suppose one ought not to be sorry for that result, but there are men
+among them over whose fall all will lament.
+
+I am, yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[Some of the newspapers took these concluding paragraphs to imply
+support of Parnell, so that at the end of June he writes:--]
+
+The "Tribune" man seems to have less intelligence than might be
+expected. I spoke approvingly of the way in which Parnell had carried
+out his policy, which is rather different from approving the policy
+itself.
+
+But these newspaper scribes don't take the trouble to understand what
+they read.
+
+[While at Bournemouth he also finished and sent off to the "Youth's
+Companion," an American paper, an article on the evolution of certain
+types of the house, called "From the Hut to the Pantheon." Beginning
+with a description of the Pantheon, that characteristically Roman work
+with its vast dome, so strongly built that it is the only great dome
+remaining without a flaw:--]
+
+For a long time [he says] I was perplexed to know what it was about
+the proportions of the interior of the Pantheon which gave me such a
+different feeling from that made by any other domed space I had ever
+entered.
+
+[The secret of this he finds in the broad and simple design peculiar
+to the building, and then shows in detail how:--]
+
+The round hut, the Aedes Vestae, and the Pantheon are so many stages
+in a process of architectural evolution which was effected between the
+first beginnings of Roman history and the Augustan age.
+
+[The relation between the beehive hut, the terremare, and the
+pile-dwellings of Italy lead to many suggestive bits of early
+anthropology, which, it may be hoped, bore fruit in the minds of some
+of his youthful readers.
+
+We find him also reading over proofs for Mr. Herbert Spencer, who,
+although he might hesitate to ask for his criticism with respect to a
+subject on which they had a "standing difference," still:--
+
+concluded that to break through the long-standing usage, in pursuance
+of which I have habitually submitted my biological writing to your
+castigation, and so often profited by so doing, would seem like a
+distrust of your candour--a distrust which I cannot entertain.
+
+So he wrote in January; and on March 19 he wrote again, with another
+set of proofs:--
+
+Toujours l'audace! More proofs to look over. Don't write a critical
+essay, only marginal notes. Perhaps you will say, like the Roman poet
+to the poetaster who asked him to erase any passages he did not like,
+and who replied, "One erasure will suffice"--perhaps you will say,
+"There needs only one marginal note."
+
+To this he received answer:--]
+
+Casalini, W. Bournemouth, March 22, 1886.
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+More power to your elbow! You will find my blessing at the end of the
+proof.
+
+But please look very carefully at some comments which are not merely
+sceptical criticisms, but deal with matters of fact.
+
+I see the difference between us on the speculative question lies in
+the conception of the primitive protoplasm. I conceive it as a
+mechanism set going by heat--as a sort of active crystal with the
+capacity of giving rise to a great number of pseudomorphs; and I
+conceive that external conditions favour one or the other pseudomorph,
+but leave the fundamental mechanism untouched.
+
+You appear to me to suppose that external conditions modify the
+machinery, as if by transferring a flour-mill into a forest you could
+make it into a saw-mill I am too much of a sceptic to deny the
+possibility of anything--especially as I am now so much occupied with
+theology--but I don't see my way to your conclusion.
+
+And that is all the more reason why I don't want to stop you from
+working it out, or rather to make the "one erasure" you suggest. For
+as to stopping you, "ten on me might," as the navvy said to the little
+special constable who threatened to take him into custody.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Warmth and sea-fogs here for a variety.
+
+[One more letter may be given from this time at Bournemouth--a letter
+to his eldest daughter on the loss of her infant son:--]
+
+Casalini, W. Bournemouth, March 2, 1886.
+
+It's very sad to lose your child just when he was beginning to bind
+himself to you, and I don't know that it is much consolation to
+reflect that the longer he had wound himself up in your heart-strings
+the worse the tear would have been, which seems to have been
+inevitable sooner or later. One does not weigh and measure these
+things while grief is fresh, and in my experience a deep plunge into
+the waters of sorrow is the hopefullest way of getting through them on
+to one's daily road of life again. No one can help another very much
+in these crises of life; but love and sympathy count for something,
+and you know, dear child, that you have these in fullest measure from
+us.
+
+[On coming up to London in April he was very busy, among other things,
+with a proposal that the Marine Biological Association, of which he
+was President, should urge the Government to appoint a scientific
+adviser to the Fishery Board. A letter of his on this subject had
+appeared in the "Times" for March 30. There seemed to him, with his
+practical experience of official work, insuperable objections to the
+status of such an officer. Above all, he would be a representative of
+science in name, without any responsibility to the body of scientific
+men in the country. Some of his younger colleagues on the Council, who
+had not enjoyed the same experience, thought that he had set aside
+their expressions of opinion too brusquely, and begged Sir M. Foster,
+as at once a close friend of his, and one to whose opinion he paid
+great respect, to make representations to him on their behalf, which
+he did in writing, being kept at home by a cold. To this letter, in
+which his friend begged him not to be vexed at a very plain statement
+of the other point of view, but to make it possible for the younger
+men to continue to follow his lead, he replied:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, April 5, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+Mrs. Foster is quite right in looking sharp after your colds, which is
+very generous of me to say, as I am down in the mouth and should have
+been cheered by a chat.
+
+I am very glad to know what our younger friends are thinking about. I
+made up my mind to some such result of the action I have thought it
+necessary to take. But I have no ambition to lead, and no desire to
+drive them, and if we can't agree, the best way will be to go our ways
+separately...
+
+Heaven forbid that I should restrain anybody from expressing any
+opinion in the world. But it is so obvious to me that not one of our
+friends has the smallest notion of what administration in fishery
+questions means, or of the danger of creating a scientific
+Frankenstein in that which he is clamouring for, that I suppose I have
+been over-anxious to prevent mischief, and seemed domineering.
+
+Well, I shall mend my ways. I must be getting to be an old savage if
+you think it risky to write anything to me.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[But he did not stay long in London. By April 20 he was off to Ilkley,
+where he expected to stay] "for a week or two, perhaps longer." [on
+the 24th he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+I was beginning to get wrong before we left Bournemouth, and went
+steadily down after our return to London, so that I had to call in a
+very shrewd fellow who attends my daughter M--. Last Monday he told me
+that more physicking was no good, and that I had better be off here,
+and see what exercise and the fresh air of the moors would do for me.
+So here I came, and mean to give the place a fair trial.
+
+I do a minimum of ten miles per diem without fatigue, and as I eat,
+drink, and sleep well, there ought to be nothing the matter with me.
+Why, under these circumstances, I should never feel honestly cheerful,
+or know any other desire than that of running away and hiding myself,
+I don't know. No explanation is to be found even in Foster's
+"Physiology!" the only thing my demon can't stand is sharp walking,
+and I will give him a dose of that remedy when once I get into trim.
+
+[Indeed he was so much better even after a single day at Ilkley, that
+he writes home:--]
+
+It really seems to me that I am an imposter for running away, and I
+can hardly believe that I felt so ill and miserable four-and-twenty
+hours ago.
+
+[And on the 28th he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+I have been improving wonderfully in the last few days. Yesterday I
+walked to Bolton Abbey, the Strid, etc., and back, which is a matter
+of sixteen miles, without being particularly tired, though the
+afternoon sun was as hot as midsummer.
+
+It is the old story--a case of candle-snuff--some infernal compound
+that won't get burnt up without more oxygenation than is to be had
+under ordinary conditions...
+
+I want to be back and doing something, and yet have a notion that I
+should be wiser if I stopped here a few weeks and burnt up my rubbish
+effectually. A good deal will depend upon whether I can get my wife to
+join me or not. She has had a world of worry lately.
+
+[As to his fortunate choice of an hotel,] "I made up my mind," [he
+writes,] "to come to this hotel merely because Bradshaw said it was on
+the edge of the moor--but for once acting on an advertisement turned
+out well." [The moor ran up six or seven hundred feet just outside the
+garden, and the hotel itself was well outside and above the town and
+the crowd of visitors. Here, with the exception of a day or two in
+May, and a fortnight at the beginning of June, he stayed till July,
+living as far as possible an outdoor life, and getting through a fair
+amount of correspondence.
+
+It was not to be expected that he should long remain unknown, and he
+was sometimes touched, more often bored, by the forms which this
+recognition took. Thus two days after his arrival he writes home:--]
+
+Sitting opposite to me at the table d'hote here is a nice old Scotch
+lady. People have found out my name here by this time, and yesterday
+she introduced herself to me, and expressed great gratitude for the
+advice I gave to a son of hers two or three years ago. I had great
+difficulty in recollecting anything at all about the matter, but it
+seems the youngster wanted to go to Africa, and I advised him not to,
+at any rate at present. However, the poor fellow went, and died, and
+they seem to have found a minute account of his interview with me in
+his diary.
+
+[But all were not of this kind. On the 26th he writes:--]
+
+I took a three hours' walk over the moors this morning with nothing
+but grouse and peewits for company, and it was perfectly delicious. I
+am beginning to forget that I have a liver, and even feel mildly
+disposed to the two fools of women between whom I have to sit every
+meal.
+
+27th.
+
+...I wish you would come here if only for a few days--it would do you
+a world of good after your anxiety and wear and tear for the last
+week. And you say you are feeling weak. Please come and let me take
+care of you a bit; I am sure the lovely air here would set you up. I
+feel better than I have for months...
+
+The country is lovely, and in a few days more all the leaves will be
+out. You can almost hear them bursting. Now come down on Saturday and
+rejoice the "sair een" of your old husband who is wearying for you.
+
+[Another extract from the same correspondence expresses his
+detestation for a gross breach of confidence:--]
+
+April 22.
+
+...I have given Mr. -- a pretty smart setting down for sending me
+Ruskin's letter to him! It really is iniquitous that such things
+should be done. Ruskin has a right to say anything he likes in a
+private letter and -- must be a perfect cad to send it on to me.
+
+[The following letter on the ideal of a Paleontological Museum is a
+specialised and improved version of his earlier schemes on the same
+subject:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, May 3, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+I cannot find Hughes' letter, and fancy I must have destroyed it. So I
+cannot satisfy Newton as to the exact terms of his question.
+
+But I am quite clear that my answer was not meant to recommend any
+particular course for Cambridge, when I know nothing about the
+particular circumstances of the case, but referred to what I should
+like to do if I had carte blanche.
+
+It is as plain as the nose on one's face (mine is said to be very
+plain) that Zoological and Botanical collections should illustrate (1)
+Morphology, (2) Geographical Distribution, (3) Geological Succession.
+
+It is also obvious to me that the morphological series ought to
+contain examples of all the extinct types in their proper places. But
+I think it will be no less plain to any one who has had anything to do
+with Geology and Paleontology that the great mass of fossils is to be
+most conveniently arranged stratigraphically. The Jermyn St. Museum
+affords an example of the stratigraphical arrangement.
+
+I do not know that there is anywhere a collection arranged according
+to Provinces of Geographical Distribution. It would be a great credit
+to Cambridge to set the example of having one.
+
+If I had a free hand in Cambridge or anywhere else I should build (A)
+a Museum, open to the public, and containing three strictly limited
+and selected collections; one morphologically, one geographically, and
+one stratigraphically arranged; and (B) a series of annexes arranged
+for storage and working purposes to contain the material which is of
+no use to any but specialists. I am convinced that this is the only
+plan by which the wants of ordinary people can be supplied
+efficiently, while ample room is afforded for additions to any extent
+without large expense in building.
+
+On the present plan or no plan, Museums are built at great cost, and
+in a few years are choked for want of room.
+
+If you have the opportunity, I wish you would explain that I gave no
+opinion as to what might or might not be expedient under present
+circumstances at Cambridge. I do not want to seem meddlesome.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Don't forget Cayley.
+
+N.B.--As my meaning seems to have been misunderstood I wish, if you
+have the chance, you would make it clear that I do not want three
+brick and mortar museums--but one public museum--containing a
+threefold collection of typical forms, a biological Trinity in Unity
+in fact.
+
+It might conciliate the clerics if you adopted this illustration. But
+as YOUR OWN, mind. I should not like them to think me capable of it.
+
+[However, even Ilkley was not an infallible cure. Thus he writes to
+Sir M. Foster:--]
+
+May 17.
+
+I am ashamed of myself for not going to town to attend the Government
+Grant Committee and Council, but I find I had better stop here till
+the end of the month, when I must return for a while anyhow.
+
+I have improved very much here, and so long as I take heaps of
+exercise every day I have nothing to complain of beyond a fit of blue
+devils when I wake in the morning.
+
+But I don't want to do any manner of work, still less any manner of
+play, such as is going on in London at this time of year, and I think
+I am wise to keep out of it as long as I can.
+
+I wish I knew what is the matter with me. I feel always just on the
+verge of becoming an absurd old hypochondriac, and as if it only
+wanted a touch to send me over.
+
+May 27.
+
+...The blue devils worry me far less than they did. If there were any
+herd of swine here I might cast them out altogether, but I expect they
+would not go into blackfaced sheep.
+
+I am disposed to stop not more than ten days in London, but to come
+back here and bring some work with me. In fact I do not know that I
+should return yet if it were not that I do not wish to miss our usual
+visit to Balliol, and that my Spanish daughter is coming home for a
+few months...
+
+I am overwhelmed at being taken at my word about scientific
+federation. [I.e. a federation between the Royal Society and
+scientific societies in the colonies.] "Something will transpire" as
+old Gutzlaff [This worthy appears to have been an admiral on the China
+station about 1840.] said when he flogged plaintiff, defendant and
+witnesses in an obscure case.
+
+P.S.--I have had an invitation from -- to sign "without committing
+myself to details" an approbation of his grand scheme. [For the
+reorganisation of the Fisheries Department.] A stupendous array of
+names appear thus committed to the "principle of the Bill." I prefer
+to be the Hartington of the situation.
+
+[During this first stay in London he wrote twice to Mr. Herbert
+Spencer, from whom he had received not only some proofs, as before, on
+biological points, but others from his unpublished autobiography.
+After twice reading these, Huxley had merely marked a couple of
+paragraphs containing personal references which might possibly be
+objectionable] "to the 'heirs, administrators and assigns,' if there
+are any, or to the people themselves if they are living still." [He
+continues, June 1:--]
+
+You will be quite taken aback at getting a proof from me with so few
+criticisms, but even I am not so perverse as to think that I can
+improve your own story of your own life!
+
+I notice a curious thing. If Ransom [Dr. Ransom of Nottingham.] had
+not overworked himself, I should probably not be writing this letter.
+
+For if he had worked less hard I might have been first and he second
+at the Examination at the University of London in 1845. In which case
+I should have obtained the Exhibition, should not have gone into the
+navy, and should have forsaken science for practice...
+
+[Again on June 4:--]
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+Here's a screed for you! I wish you well through it.
+
+Mind I have no a priori objection to the transmission of functional
+modifications whatever. In fact, as I told you, I should rather like
+it to be true.
+
+But I argued against the assumption (with Darwin as I do with you) of
+the operation of a factor which, if you will forgive me for saying so,
+seems as far off support by trustworthy evidence now as ever it was.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On the same day he wrote to Mr., afterwards Sir John, Skelton:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., June 4, 1886.
+
+My dear Skelton,
+
+A civil question deserves a civil answer--Yes. I am sorry to say I
+know--nobody better--"what it is to be unfit for work." I have been
+trying to emerge from that condition, first at Bournemouth, and then
+at Ilkley, for the last five months, with such small success that I
+find a few days in London knocks me up, and I go back to the Yorkshire
+moors next week.
+
+We have no water-hens there--nothing but peewits, larks, and
+occasional grouse--but the air and water are of the best, and the
+hills quite high enough to bring one's muscles into play.
+
+I suppose that Nebuchadnezzar was quite happy so long as he grazed and
+kept clear of Babylon; if so, I can hold him for my Scripture
+parallel.
+
+I wish I could accept your moral Number 2, but there is amazingly
+little evidence of "reverential care for unoffending creation" in the
+arrangements of nature, that I can discover. If our ears were sharp
+enough to hear all the cries of pain that are uttered in the earth by
+men and beasts, we should be deafened by one continuous scream!
+
+And yet the wealth of superfluous loveliness in the world condemns
+pessimism. It is a hopeless riddle.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Please remember me to Mrs. Skelton.
+
+[The election of a new Headmaster (Dr. Warre) at Eton, where he was a
+member of the Governing Body, was a matter of no small concern to him
+at this moment. Some parts of the existing system seemed impossible to
+alter, though a reform in the actual scheme and scope of teaching
+seemed to him both possible and necessary for the future well-being of
+the school. He writes to his eldest son on July 6, 1886:--]
+
+The whole system of paying the Eton masters by the profits of the
+boarding-houses they keep is detestable to my mind, but any attempt to
+alter it would be fatal.
+
+...I look to the new appointment with great anxiety. It will make or
+mar Eton. If the new Headmaster has the capacity to grasp the fact
+that the world has altered a good deal since the Eton system was
+invented, and if he has the sense to adapt Eton to the new state of
+things, without letting go that which was good in the old system, Eton
+may become the finest public school in the country.
+
+If on the contrary he is merely a vigorous representative of the old
+system pure and simple, the school will go to the dogs.
+
+I think it is not unlikely that there may be a battle in the Governing
+Body over the business, and that I shall be on the losing side. But I
+am used to that, and shall do what I think right nevertheless.
+
+[The same letter contains his reply to a suggestion that he should
+join a society whose object was to prevent a railway from being run
+right through the Lake district.]
+
+I am not much inclined to join the "Lake District Defence Society." I
+value natural beauty as much as most people--indeed I value it so
+much, and think so highly of its influence that I would make beautiful
+scenery accessible to all the world, if I could. If any engineering or
+mining work is projected which will really destroy the beauty of the
+Lakes, I will certainly oppose it, but I am not disposed, as Goschen
+said, to "give a blank cheque" to a Defence Society, the force of
+which is pretty certain to be wielded by the most irrational fanatics
+amongst its members.
+
+Only the other day I walked the whole length of Bassenthwaite from
+Keswick and back, and I cannot say that the little line of rails which
+runs along the lake, now coming into view and now disappearing,
+interfered with my keen enjoyment of the beauty of the lake any more
+than the macadamised road did. And if it had not been for that railway
+I should not have been able to make Keswick my headquarters, and I
+should have lost my day's delight.
+
+People's sense of beauty should be more robust. I have had apocalyptic
+visions looking down Oxford Street at a sunset before now.
+
+Ever, dear lad, your loving father,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[After this he took his wife to Harrogate,] "just like Clapham Common
+on a great scale," [where she was ordered to drink the waters. For
+himself, it was as good as Ilkley, seeing that he needed] "nothing but
+fresh air and exercise, and just as much work that interests me as
+will keep my mind from getting 'blue mouldy.'" [The work in this case
+was the chapter in the Life of Charles Darwin, which he had promised
+Mr. F. Darwin to finish before going abroad.
+
+On July 10, he writes to Sir M. Foster on the rejection of the Home
+Rule Bill:--]
+
+The smashing of the G.O.M. appears to be pretty complete, though he
+has unfortunately enough left to give him the means of playing an ugly
+game of obstruction in the next Parliament.
+
+You have taken the shine out of my exultation at Lubbock's
+majority--though I confess I was disheartened to see so many educated
+men going in for the disruption policy. If it were not for Randolph I
+should turn Tory, but that fellow will some day oust Salisbury as
+Dizzy ousted old Derby, and sell his party to Parnell or anybody else
+who makes a good bid.
+
+We are flourishing on the whole. Sulphide of wife joins with me in
+love.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On the 21st he writes:--]
+
+The formation of Huxley sulphide will be brought to a sudden
+termination to-morrow when we return to London. The process has
+certainly done my wife a great deal of good and I wish it could have
+gone on a week or two longer, but our old arrangements are upset and
+we must start with the chicks for Switzerland on the 27th, that is
+next Tuesday.
+
+
+CHAPTER 2.19.
+
+1886.
+
+[The earlier start was decided upon for the sake of one of his
+daughters; who had been ill. He went first to Evolena, but the place
+did not suit him, and four days after his arrival went on to Arolla,
+whence he writes on August 3:--]
+
+We reached Evolena on Thursday last...We had glorious weather Thursday
+and Friday, and the latter day (having both been told carefully to
+avoid over-exertion) the wife and I strolled, quite unintentionally,
+as far as the Glacier de Ferpecle and back again. Luckily the wife is
+none the worse, and indeed, I think in which more tired of the two.
+But we saw at once that Evolena was a mistake for our purpose, and
+were confirmed in that opinion by the deluge of rain on Saturday. The
+hotel is down in a hole at the tail of a dirty Swiss village, and only
+redeemed by very good cooking. So, Sunday being fine, I, E. and H.
+started up here to prospect, 18 miles up and down, and 2000 feet to
+climb, and did it beautifully. It is just the place for us, at the
+tail of a glacier in the midst of a splendid amphitheatre of 11 to
+12,000 feet snow heights, and yet not bare and waste, any quantity of
+stone-pines growing about...I rather long for the flesh-pots of
+Evolena--cooking here being decidedly rudimentary--otherwise we are
+very well off.
+
+[The keen air of six thousand feet above sea level worked wonders with
+the invalids. The lassitude of the last two years was swept away, and
+Huxley came home eager for active life. Here too it was that, for
+occupation, he took up the study of gentians; the beginning of that
+love of his garden which was so great a delight to him in his last
+years. On his return home he writes:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 10, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We got back last evening after a very successful trip. Arolla suited
+us all to a T, and we are all in great force. As for me, I have not
+known of the existence of my liver, and except for the fact that I
+found fifteen or sixteen miles with a couple of thousand feet up and
+down quite enough, I could have deluded myself into the fond
+imagination that I was twenty years younger.
+
+By way of amusement I bought a Swiss Flora in Lausanne and took to
+botanising--and my devotion to the gentians led the Bishop of
+Chichester--a dear old man, who paid us (that is the hotel) a
+visit--to declare that I sought the "Ur-gentian" as a kind of Holy
+Grail. The only interruption to our felicity was the death of a poor
+fellow, who was brought down on a guide's back from an expedition he
+ought not to have undertaken, and whom I did my best to keep alive one
+night. But rapid pleuritic effusion finished him the next morning, in
+spite of (I hope not in consequence of) such medical treatment as I
+could give him.
+
+I see you had a great meeting at Birmingham, but I know not details.
+The delegation to Sydney is not a bad idea, but why on earth have they
+arranged that it shall arrive in the middle of the hot weather?
+Speechifying with the thermometer at 90 degrees in the shade will try
+the nerves of the delegates, I can tell them.
+
+I shall remain quietly here and see whether I can stand London. I hope
+I may, for the oestrus of work is upon me--for the first time this
+couple of years. Let me have some news of you. With our love to your
+wife and you.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, N.W., September 14, 1886.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I hear that some of your alguazils were looking after me yesterday, so
+I had better give myself up at once--hoping it will be considered in
+the sentence.
+
+The fact is I have been going to write to you ever since we came back
+last Thursday evening, but I had about fifty other letters to write
+and got sick of the operation.
+
+We are all in great force, and as for me, I never expected a year ago
+to be he well I am. I require to look in the glass and study the
+crows' feet and the increasing snow cap on the summit of my Tete noire
+(as it once was), to convince myself I am not twenty years younger.
+
+How long it will last I don't feel sure, but I am going to give London
+as little chance as possible.
+
+I trust you have all been thriving to a like extent. Scott [Assistant
+Professor of Botany at the Royal College of Science.] wrote to me the
+other day wanting to take his advanced flock (two--one, I believe, a
+ewe-lamb) to Kew. I told him I had no objection, but he had better
+consult you.
+
+I have not been to South Kensington yet--as I have a devil
+(botanical--) and must satisfy him before doing anything else. It's
+the greatest sign of amendment that I have gone in for science afresh.
+When I am ill (and consequently venomous), nothing satisfies me but
+gnawing at theology; it's a sort of crib-biting.
+
+Our love to Mrs. Donnelly. I suppose G.H. [Gordon Huxley Donnelly, Sir
+John's son.] is by this time a kind of Daniel Lambert physically and
+Solomon mentally--my blessing to him.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[As a sequel to the sad event mentioned in the former letter, the
+relations of the young man who had died so suddenly at Arolla wished
+to offer Huxley some gift in grateful recognition of the kindness he
+had shown to the poor fellow; but being unable to fix upon any
+suitable object, begged him to accept a considerable sum of money and
+expend it on any object he pleased as a memento. To this he replied,
+November 21, 1886:--]
+
+I am very much obliged for the kind recognition of my unfortunately
+unavailing efforts to be of service to your brother-in-law which is
+contained in your letter.
+
+But I and those who right willingly helped me did nothing more than
+our plain duty in such a case; and though I fully appreciate the
+motives which actuate Mrs. -- and yourself and friends, and would
+gladly accept any trifle as a memento of my poor friend (I call him
+so, for we really struck up a great friendship in our twelve hours'
+acquaintance), I could not with any comfort use the very handsome
+cheque you offer.
+
+Let me propose a compromise. As you will see by the enclosed paper, a
+colleague of mine has just died leaving widow and children in very
+poor circumstances. Contribute something to the fund which is being
+raised for their benefit, and I shall consider it as the most
+agreeable present you could possibly make to me.
+
+And if you wish me to have a personal memento of our friend, send me a
+pipe that belonged to him. I am greatly devoted to tobacco, and will
+put it in a place of honour in my battery of pipes.
+
+[The bracing effects of Arolla enabled him to stay two months in town
+before again retiring to Ilkley to be] "screwed up." [He had on the
+stocks his Gentian Paper and the chapter for the Darwin Life, besides
+the chapter on the Progress of Science for the "Reign of Queen
+Victoria," all of which he finished off this autumn; he was busy with
+Technical Education, and the Egyptian borings which were being carried
+out under the superintendence of the Royal Society. Finally he was
+induced by a "diabolical plot" on the part of Mr. Spencer to read, and
+in consequence to answer, an article in the "Fortnightly" for November
+by Mr. Lilly on "Materialism and Morality." These are the chief points
+with which the following correspondence is concerned.]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 16, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+I enclose the Report [The Annual Report of the Examiners in Physiology
+under the Science and Art Department, which, being still an Examiner
+he had to sign.] and have nothing to suggest except a quibble at page
+4. If you take a stick in your hand you may feel lots of things and
+determine their form, etc., with the other end of it, but surely the
+stick is properly said to be insensible. Ditto with the teeth. I feel
+very well with mine (which are paid for) but they are surely not
+sensible? Old Tomes once published the opinion that the contents of
+the dentine tubules were sensory nerves, on the ground of our feeling
+so distinctly through our teeth. He forgot the blind man's stick.
+Indeed the reference of sensation to the end of a stick is one of the
+most interesting of psychological facts.
+
+It is extraordinary how those dogs of examinees return to their vomit.
+Almost all the obstinate fictions you mention are of a quarter of a
+century date. Only then they were dominant and epidemic--now they are
+sporadic.
+
+I wish Pasteur or somebody would find some microbe with which the
+rising generation could be protected against them.
+
+We shall have to rearrange the Examination business--this partner
+having made his fortune and retiring from firm. Think over what is to
+be done.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+You don't happen to grow gentians in your Alpine region, do you?
+
+[Of his formal responsibility for the examinations he had written
+earlier in the year:--]
+
+Wells House, Ilkley, June 15, 1886.
+
+My dear Donnelly,
+
+I think it is just as well that you could not lay your hands on ink,
+for if you had you would only have blacked them. (N.B. This is a
+goak.)
+
+You know we resolved that it was as well that I should go on as
+Examiner (unpaid) this year. But I rather repent me of it--for
+although I could be of use over the questions, I have had nothing to
+do with checking the results of the Examination except in honours, and
+I suspect that Foster's young Cambridge allies tend always to screw
+the standard up.
+
+I am inclined to think that I had much better be out of it next year.
+The attempt to look over examination papers now would reduce the
+little brains I have left to mere pulp--and, on the other hand, if
+there is any row about results, it is not desirable that I should have
+to say that I have not seen the answers.
+
+When I go you will probably get seven devils worse than the first--but
+that it is not the fault of the first devil.
+
+I am picking up here wonderfully in spite of the bad weather. It
+rained hard yesterday and blew ditto--to-day it is blowing
+dittoes--but there is sunshine between the rain and squalls.
+
+I hope you are better off. What an outlandish name "Tetronila." I
+don't believe you have spelt it right. With best regards to Mrs.
+Donnelly and my godson.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 16, 1886.
+
+My dear Hooker,
+
+I have sucked Grisebach's brains, looked up "Flora B. Americana," and
+"F. Antarctica and New Zealand," and picked about in other quarters. I
+found I knew as much as Grisebach had to tell me (and more) about
+lutea, purpureo-punctata, acaulis, campestris, and the verna lot,
+which are all I got hold of at Arolla. But he is very good in all but
+classification, which is logically "without form and void, and
+darkness on the face of it."
+
+I shall have to verify lots of statements about gentians I have not
+seen, but at present the general results are very curious and
+interesting. The species fall into four groups, one PRIMARY least
+differentiated--three, specialised.
+
+1. Lobes of corolla fringed. 2. Coronate. 3. Interlobate (i.e. not the
+"plica" between the proper petals).
+
+Now the interesting point is that the Antarctic species are all
+primary and so are the great majority of the Andean forms. Lutea is
+the only old-world primary, unless the Himalayan Moorcroftiana belongs
+here. The Arctic forms are also primary, but the petals more
+extensively united.
+
+The specialised types are all Arctogeal with the exception of half a
+dozen or so Andean species including prostrata.
+
+There is a strange general parallelism with the crayfishes! which also
+have their primary forms in Australia and New Zealand, avoid E. S.
+America and Africa, and become most differentiated in Arctogaea. But
+there are also differences in detail.
+
+It strikes me that this is uncommonly interesting; but, of course, all
+the information about the structure of the flowers, etc., I get at
+second hand, wants verifying.
+
+Have you done the gentians of your "Flora Indica" yet? Do look at them
+from this point of view.
+
+I cannot make out what Grisebach means by his division of
+Chondrophylla. What is a "cartilaginous" margin to a leaf?--"Folia
+margine cartilaginea!" He has a lot of Indian species under this head.
+
+I send you a rough scheme I have drawn up. Please let me have it back.
+Any annotations thankfully received. Shan't apologise for bothering
+you.
+
+I hope the pension is settled at last.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, September 22, 1886.
+
+My dear Hooker,
+
+I have written to Lubbock a long screed stating my views [Referring to
+the relations between the South Kensington department and the City and
+Guilds Committee on Technical Education.] with unmistakable
+distinctness as politeful as may be, and asking him, if he thought
+well, to send them on to whomsoever it may concern. As old Gutzlaff
+used to say when he wanted to get evidence from a Chinee--"Gif him
+four dozen, someting vill transpire." At any rate the Chinee
+transpired, and I hope some official will.
+
+Here beginneth more gentian craze.
+
+I have not examined Moorcroft. yet, but if the figure in Roxb. is
+trustworthy it's a primary and no mistake. I can't understand your
+admitting Amarellae without coronae. The presence of a corona is part
+of the definition of the amarella group, and an amarella without a
+corona is a primary ipso facto.
+
+Taking the facts as I have got them in the rough, and subject to minor
+verifications, the contrast between the Andean, Himalayan, and
+Caucasian Gentian Florae is very striking.
+
+TABLE OF GENTIAN FLORAE.
+
+Column 1: Place.
+Column 2: Simplices.
+Column 3: Ciliatae.
+Column 4: Coronatae.
+Column 5: Interlobatae.
+
+Andes : 27 : 0 (?) : 15 : 2.
+
+Himalayas 1 (Moorecroft.) : 0 : 4 : 32.
+
+Caucasus Pyrenees (all one) : 2 (lutea, umbellata) : 2 : 5 : 21.
+
+I don't think Ciliatae worth anything as a division. I took it as it
+stood.
+
+It is clear that migration helps nothing, as between the old-world and
+South American Florae. It is the case of the Tapirs (Andean and
+Sino-Malayan) over again. Relics of a tertiary Flora which once
+extended from South America to Eurasia through North America (by the
+west, probably).
+
+I see a book by Engler on the development of Floras since tertiary
+epoch. Probably the beggar has the idea.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+Godalming, September 25, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+We are here till to-morrow on a visit to Leonard, seeing how the young
+folks keep house.
+
+I brought the Egyptian report down with me. It is very important, and
+in itself justifies the expenditure. Any day next (that is to say
+this) week that you like I can see Colonel Turner. If you and Evans
+can arrange a day I don't think we need mind the rest of the
+Committee. We must get at least two other borings ten or fifteen miles
+off, if possible on the same parallel, by hook or by crook. It will
+tell us more about the Nile valley than has ever been known. That
+Italian fellow who published sections must have lied considerably.
+
+Touching gentians, I have not examined your specimen yet, but it
+certainly did not look like Andrewsii. You talk of having acaulis in
+your garden. That is one of the species I worked out most carefully at
+Arolla, but its flowering time was almost over, and I only got two
+full-blown specimens to work at. If you have any in flower and don't
+mind sacrificing one with a bit of the rhizoma, and would put it in
+spirit for me, I could settle one or two points still wanting. Whisky
+will do, and you will be all the better for not drinking the whisky!
+
+The distributional facts, when you work them in connection with
+morphology, are lovely. We put up with Donnelly on our way here. He
+has taken a cottage at Felday, eleven miles from hence, in lovely
+country--on lease. I shall have to set up a country residence some
+day, but as all my friends declare their own locality best, I find a
+decision hard. And it is a bore to be tied to one place.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+4 Marlborough Place, October 20, 1886.
+
+My dear Hooker,
+
+I wish you would not mind the trouble of looking through the enclosed
+chapter which I have written at F. Darwin's request, and tell me what
+you think of it. F.D. thinks I am hard upon the "Quarterly Article,"
+but I read it a fresh and it is absolutely scandalous. The anonymous
+vilifiers of the present day will be none the worse for being reminded
+that they may yet hang in chains...
+
+It occurs to me that it might be well to add a paragraph or two about
+the two chief objections made formerly and now to Darwin, the one,
+that it is introducing "chance" as a factor in nature, and the other
+that it is atheistic.
+
+Both assertions are utter bosh. None but parsons believe in "chance";
+and the philosophical difficulties of Theism now are neither greater
+nor less than they have been ever since theism was invented.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The following letter to Mr. Edmund Gosse, who, just before, had been
+roughly handled in the "Quarterly Review," doubtless owed some of its
+vigour to these newly revived memories of the "Quarterly" attack on
+Darwin. But while the interest of the letter lies in a general
+question of literary ethics, the proper methods and limits of
+anonymous criticism, it must be noted that in this particular case its
+edge was turned by the fact that immediately afterwards, the critic
+proceeded to support his criticisms elsewhere uder his own name:--]
+
+October 22, 1886.
+
+Dear Sir,
+
+I beg leave to offer you my best thanks for your letter to the
+"Athenaeum," which I have just read, and to congratulate you on the
+force and completeness of your answer to your assailant.
+
+It is rarely worth while to notice criticism, but when a good chance
+of exposing one of these anonymous libellers who disgrace literature
+occurs, it is a public duty to avail oneself of it.
+
+Oddly enough, I have recently been performing a similar "haute
+oeuvre." The most violent, base, and ignorant of all the attacks on
+Darwin at the time of the publication of the "Origin of Species"
+appeared in the "Quarterly Review" of that time; and I have built the
+reviewer a gibbet as high as Haman's.
+
+All good men and true should combine to stop this system of literary
+moonlighting.
+
+I am yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[On the same date appeared his letter to the "Pall Mall Gazette,"
+which was occasioned by the perversion of the new Chair of English
+Literature at Oxford to "Middle English" philology:--]
+
+I fully agree with you that the relation of our Universities to the
+study of English literature is a matter of great public importance;
+and I have more than once taken occasion to express my
+conviction--Firstly, that the works of our great English writers are
+pre-eminently worthy of being systematically studied in our schools
+and universities as literature; and secondly, that the establishment
+of professional chairs of philology, under the name of literature, may
+be a profit to science, but is really a fraud practised upon letters.
+
+That a young Englishman may be turned out of one of our universities,
+"epopt and perfect," so far as their system takes him, and yet
+ignorant of the noble literature which has grown up in those islands
+during the last three centuries, no less than of the development of
+the philosophical and political ideas which have most profoundly
+influenced modern civilisation, is a fact in the history of the
+nineteenth century which the twentieth will find hard to believe;
+though, perhaps, it is not more incredible than our current
+superstition that whoso wishes to write and speak English well should
+mould his style after the models furnished by classical antiquity. For
+my part, I venture to doubt the wisdom of attempting to mould one's
+style by any other process for that of striving after the clear and
+forcible expression of definite conceptions; in which process the
+Glassian precept, "first catch your definite conceptions," is probably
+the most difficult to obey. But still I mark among distinguished
+contemporary speakers and writers of English, saturated with
+antiquity, not a few to whom, it seems to me, the study of Hobbes
+might have taught dignity; of Swift, concision and clearness; of
+Goldsmith and Defoe, simplicity.
+
+Well, among a hundred young men whose university career is finished,
+is there one whose attention has ever been directed by his literary
+instructors to a page of Hobbes, or Swift, or Goldsmith, or Defoe? In
+my boyhood we were familiar with "Robinson Crusoe," "The Vicar of
+Wakefield," and "Gulliver's Travels"; and though the mysteries of
+"Middle English" were hidden from us, my impression is we ran less
+chance of learning to write and speak the "middling English" of
+popular orators and headmasters than if we had been perfect in such
+mysteries and ignorant of those three masterpieces. It has been the
+fashion to decry the eighteenth century, as young fops laugh at their
+fathers. But we were there in germ; and a "Professor of Eighteenth
+Century History and Literature" we knew his business might tell young
+Englishmen more of that which it is profoundly important they should
+know, but which at present remains hidden from them, than any other
+instructor; and, incidentally, they would learn to know good English
+when they see or hear it--perhaps even to discriminate between
+slipshod copiousness and true eloquence, and that alone would be a
+great gain.
+
+[As for the incitement to answer Mr. Lilly, Mr. Spencer writes from
+Brighton on November 3:--
+
+I have no doubt your combative instincts have been stirred within you
+as you read Mr. Lilly's article, "Materialism and Morality," in which
+you and I are dealt with after the ordinary fashion popular with the
+theologians, who practically say, "You SHALL be materialists whether
+you like it or not." I should not be sorry if you yielded to those
+promptings of your combative instinct. Now that you are a man of
+leisure there is no reason why you should not undertake any amount of
+fighting, providing always that you can find foemen worthy of your
+steel.
+
+I remember that last year you found intellectual warfare good for your
+health, so I have no qualms of conscience in making the suggestion.
+
+To this he replies on the 7th:--]
+
+Your stimulation of my combative instincts is downright wicked. I will
+not look at the "Fortnightly" article lest I succumb to temptation. At
+least not yet. The truth is that these cursed irons of mine, that have
+always given me so much trouble, will put themselves in the fire, when
+I am not thinking about them. There are three or four already.
+
+[On November 21 Mr. Spencer sends him more proofs of his
+autobiography, dealing with his early life:--
+
+See what it is to be known as an omnivorous reader--you get no mercy
+shown you. A man who is ready for anything, from the fairy tale to a
+volume of metaphysics, is naturally one who will make nothing of a
+fragment of a friend's autobiography!
+
+To this he replies on the 25th:--]
+
+4 Marlborough Place, November 25, 1886.
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+In spite of all prohibition I must write to you about two things.
+First, as to the proof returned herewith--I really have no criticisms
+to make (miracles, after all may not be incredible). I have read your
+account of your boyhood with great interest, and I find nothing there
+which does not contribute to the understanding of the man. No doubt
+about the truth of evolution in your own case.
+
+Another point which has interested me immensely is the curious
+similarity to many recollections of my own boyish nature which I find,
+especially in the matter of demanding a reason for things and having
+no respect for authority.
+
+But I was more docile, and could remember anything I had a mind to
+learn, whether it was rational or irrational, only in the latter case
+I hadn't the mind.
+
+But you were infinitely better off than I in the matter of education.
+I had two years of a Pandemonium of a school (between 8 and 10) and
+after that neither help nor sympathy in any intellectual direction
+till I reached manhood. Good heavens! if I had had a father and uncle
+who troubled themselves about my education as yours did about your
+training, I might say as Bethell said of his possibilities had he come
+under Jowett, "There is no knowing to what eminence I might not have
+attained." Your account of them gives me the impression that they were
+remarkable persons. Men of that force of character, if they had been
+less wise and self-restrained, would have played the deuce with the
+abnormal chicken hatched among them.
+
+The second matter is that your diabolical plot against Lilly has
+succeeded--vide the next number of the Fortnightly. ["Science and
+Morals" "Collected Essays" 9 117.] I was fool enough to read his
+article, and the rest followed. But I do not think I should have
+troubled myself if the opportunity had not been good for clearing off
+a lot of old scores.
+
+The bad weather for the last ten days has shown me that I want
+screwing up, and I am off to Ilkley on Saturday for a week or two.
+Ilkley Wells House will be my address. I should like to know that you
+are picking up again.
+
+Ever yours very faithfully,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[And again on December 13:--]
+
+My dear Spencer,
+
+I am very glad to have news of you which on the whole is not
+unsatisfactory. Your conclusion as to the doctors is one I don't mind
+telling you in confidence I arrived at some time ago...
+
+I am glad you liked my treatment of Mr. Lilly...I quite agree with you
+that the thing was worth doing for the sake of the public.
+
+I have in hand another bottle of the same vintage about Modern Realism
+and the abuse of the word Law, suggested by a report I read the other
+day of one of Liddon's sermons. ["Pseudo-Scientific Realism"
+"Collected Essays" 4 59.]
+
+The nonsense these great divines talk when they venture to meddle with
+science is really appalling.
+
+Don't be alarmed about the history of Victorian science. [See above.]
+I am happily limited to the length of a review article or thereabouts,
+and it is (I am happy to say it is nearly done) more of an essay on
+the history of science, bringing out the broad features of the
+contrast between past and present, than the history itself. It seemed
+to me that this was the only way of dealing with such a subject in a
+book intended for the general public.
+
+[The article "Science and Morals" was not only a satisfaction to
+himself, but a success with the readers of the "Fortnightly." To his
+wife he writes:--]
+
+December 2.
+
+Have you had the "Fortnightly"? How does my painting of the Lilly
+look?
+
+December 8.
+
+Harris...says that my article "simply made the December number," which
+pretty piece of gratitude means a lively sense of favours to come.
+
+December 13.
+
+I had a letter from Spencer yesterday chuckling over the success of
+his setting me on Lilly.
+
+[Ilkley had a wonderful effect upon him.] "It is quite absurd," [he
+writes after 24 hours there,] "but I am wonderfully better already."
+[His regimen was of the simplest, save perhaps on one point.] "Clark
+told me," [he says with the utmost gravity,] "always to drink tea and
+eat hot cake at 4.30. I have persevered, however against my will, and
+last night had no dreams, but slept like a top." [Two hours' writing
+in the morning were followed by two hours' sharp walking; in the
+afternoon he first took two hours' walking or strolling if the weather
+were decent;] "then Clark's prescription diligently taken" [(i.e. tea
+and a pipe) and a couple of hours more writing; after dinner reading
+and to bed before eleven.]
+
+I am working away (he writes) in a leisurely comfortable manner at my
+chapter for Ward's Jubilee book, and have got the first few pages
+done, which is always my greatest trouble.
+
+December 8.
+
+...Canon Milman wrote to me to come to the opening of the New
+Buildings for Sion College, which the Prince is going to preside over
+on the 15th. I had half a mind to accept, if only for the drollery of
+finding myself among a solemn convocation of the city clergy. However,
+I thought it would be opening the floodgates, and I prudently
+declined.
+
+[One more letter may perhaps be quoted as illustrating the clearness
+of vision in administrative matters which made it impossible for him
+to sit quietly by and see a tactical blunder being committed, even
+though his formal position might not seem to warrant his interference.
+This is his apologia for such a step.]
+
+December 16, 1886.
+
+My dear Foster,
+
+On thinking over this morning's Committee work [Some Committee of the
+Royal Society.], it strikes my conscience that being neither President
+or Chairman nor officer I took command of the boat in a way that was
+hardly justifiable.
+
+But it occurred to me that our sagacious -- for once was going astray
+and playing into --'s hands, without clearly seeing what he was doing,
+and I be thought me of "salus Societatis suprema lex," and made up my
+mind to stop the muddle we were getting into at all costs. I hope he
+was not disgusted nor you either. X. ought to have cut in, but he did
+not seem inclined to do so.
+
+I am clearly convinced it was the right thing to do--anyhow.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+[The chronicle of the year may fitly close with a letter from Ilkley
+to Dr. Dohrn, apropos of his recommendation of a candidate for a
+biological professorship. The] "honest sixpence got by hard labour,"
+[refers to a tour in the Highlands which he had once taken with Dr.
+Dohrn, when, on a rough day, they were being rowed across Loch Leven
+to Mary Stuart's castle. The boatman, unable to make head
+single-handed against the wind, asked them each to take an oar; but
+when they landed and Huxley tendered the fare, the honest fellow gave
+him back two sixpences, saying, "I canna tak' it: you have wrocht as
+hard as I." Each took a coin; and Huxley remarked that this was the
+first sixpence he had earned by manual labour. Dr. Dohrn, I believe,
+still carries his sixpence in memory of the occasion.]
+
+Wells House, Ilkley, Yorkshire, December 1, 1886.
+
+My dear Dohrn,
+
+You see by my address that I am en retraite, for a time. As good
+catholics withdraw from the world now and then for the sake of their
+souls--so I, for the sake of my body (and chiefly of my liver) have
+retired for a fortnight or so to the Yorkshire moors--the nearest
+place to London where I can find dry air 1500 feet above the sea, and
+the sort of uphill exercise which routs out all the unoxygenated
+crannies of my organism. Hard frost has set in, and I had a walk over
+the moorland which would have made all the blood of the Ost-see
+pirates--which I doubt not you have inherited--alive, and cleared off
+the fumes of that detestable Capua to which you are condemned. I
+should like to have seen the nose of one of your Neapolitan
+nobilissimes after half-an-hour's exposure to the north wind, clear
+and sharp as a razor, which very likely looked down on Loch Leven a
+few hours ago.
+
+Ah well! "fuimus"--I am amused at the difficulty you find in taking up
+the position of a "grave and reverend senior"; because I can by no
+means accustom myself to the like dignity. In spite of my grey hairs
+"age hath not cooled the Douglas blood" altogether, and I have a
+gratifying sense that (liver permitting) I am still capable of much
+folly. All this, however, has not much to do with poor Dr. -- to whom,
+I am sorry to say, your letter could do no good, as it arrived after
+my colleagues and I had settled the business.
+
+But there were a number of strong candidates who had not much chance.
+If it is open to me to serve him hereafter, however, your letter will
+be of use to him, for I know you do not recommend men lightly.
+
+After some eighteen months of misery--the first thing that did me any
+good was coming here. But I was completely set up by six or seven
+weeks at Arolla in the Valais. The hotel was 6400 feet up, and the
+wife and daughters and I spent most of our time in scrambling about
+the 2000 feet between that and the snow. Six months ago I had made up
+my mind to be an invalid, but at Arolla I walked as well as I did when
+you and I made pilgrimages--and earned the only honest sixpence (I, at
+any rate) ever got for hard labour. Three months in London brought me
+down again, so I came here to be "mended."
+
+You know English literature so well that perhaps you have read
+Wordsworth's "White Doe of Rylstone." I am in that country, within
+walk of Bolton Abbey.
+
+Please remember me very kindly to the Signora--and thank her for
+copying the letter in such a charmingly legible hand. I wish mine were
+like it.
+
+If I am alive we shall go to Arolla next summer. Could we not meet
+there? It is a fair half-way.
+
+Ever yours,
+
+T.H. Huxley.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry
+Huxley Volume 2, by Leonard Huxley
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK T.H. HUXLEY VOLUME 2 ***
+
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