This year his friend Hooker moved to Kew to act as second in command to his father, Sir William Hooker, the director of the Botanical Gardens. This move made meetings between the two friends, except at clubs and societies, more difficult, and was one of the immediate causes of the foundation of the x Club. It is this move which is referred to in the following letters; the "poor client" being the wife of an old messmate of his on the "Rattlesnake":—]
Jermyn Street, November 17.
My dear Hooker,
My wife wrote to yours yesterday, the enclosed note explaining the kitchen-revolution which, it seems, must delay our meeting. When she had done, however, she did not know where to direct it, and I am no wiser, so I send it to you.
It's a horrid nuisance and I have sworn a few, but that will not cook the dinner, however much it may prepare me for being cooked elsewhere. To complete my disgust at things in general, my wife is regularly knocked up with dining out twice this week, though it was only in the quietest way. I shall have to lock her up altogether.
X— has made a horrid mess of it, and I am sorry to say, from what I know of him, that I cannot doubt where the fault lies. The worst of it is that he has a wife and three children over here, left without a penny or any means of support. The poor woman wrote to me the other day, and when I went to see her I found her at the last shilling and contemplating the workhouse as her next step. She has brothers in Australia, and it appeared to me that the only way to do her any good was to get her out. She cannot starve there, and there will be more hope for her children than an English poor-house. I am going to see if the Emigration Commissioners will do anything for her, as of course it is desirable to cut down the cost of exportation to the smallest amount.
It is most lamentable that a man of so much ability should have so utterly damned himself as X— has, but he is hopelessly Celtic.
I shall be at the Phil. Club next Thursday.
Ever yours faithfully,
T.H. Huxley.