Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley — Volume 2

by Thomas Henry Huxley

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.