There are none so blind as those who will not see. Where can your powers of 'observation' have been when you can still remark that I ignore the facts of hybridisation? I can only repeat that from the first I have regarded them as evidence of the utmost importance as establishing a highly general correlation between separate origin of allied species and absence of cross-sterility. In fact, for the last five years I have had experiments going on in my Alpine garden, which I helped in founding for the very purpose of inquiring into this matter. And Focke, with whom I have been in correspondence from the first, and who does understand the theory, writes that in his opinion it will 'solve the whole mystery' of natural hybridisation in relation to artificial.
Since my last letter to you I have been at death's door. On July 11, I was struck down by paralysis of the left side, and am now a wreck. Not the least of my sorrow is that I fear I shall have to leave the verification of phys. sel. to other hands in larger measure than I had hoped. I have little doubt that it will eventually prevail; but more time will probably be needed before it does.
Yours very sincerely,
G. J. Romanes.
Oxford: September 18, 1893.
Dear Dyer,—I am not a little touched by the kind sympathy expressed in your letter of the 16th. When one is descending into the dark valley, scientific squabbles seem to fade away in those elementary principles of good will which bind mankind together. And I am glad to think that in all the large circle of my friends and correspondents there is no vestige of ill will in any quarter, unless it be with —— and ——, who both seem to me half-crazy in their enmity, and therefore not of much count.
As for 'fortitude,' sooner or later the night must come for all of us; and if my daylight is being suddenly eclipsed, there is only the more need to work while it lasts. But, to tell the truth, I do not on this account feel less keenly the pity of it. With five boys—the eldest not yet in his teens and the youngest still in his weeks; with piles of note-books which nobody else can utilise, and heaps of experimental researches in project which nobody else is likely to undertake, I do bitterly feel that my lot is a hard one.
Looking all the facts in the face, I do not expect ever to see another birthday,[119] and therefore, like Job, am disposed to curse my first one. For I know that all my best work was to have been published in the next ten or fifteen years; and it is wretched to think of how much labour in the past will thus be wasted.
However, I do not write to constitute you my confessor, but to thank you for your letter, and also to say that I am sending you a copy of my 'Examination of Weismannism,' just published by Longmans.
With our united kind regards to Mrs. Dyer and yourself, I remain, yours very sincerely,