The three months spent in this first visit to Sydney proved to be one of the most vital periods in the young surgeon's career. From boyhood up, vaguely conscious of unrest, of great powers within him working to find expression, he had yet been to a certain extent driven in upon himself. He had been somewhat isolated from those of his own age by his eagerness for problems about which they cared nothing; and the tendency to solitude, the habit of outward reserve imposed upon an unusually warm nature, were intensified by the fact that he grew up in surroundings not wholly congenial. One member alone of his family felt with him that complete and vivid sympathy which is so necessary to the full development of such a nature. When he was fourteen this sister married and left home, but the bond between them was not broken. In some ways it was strengthened by the lad's love for her children; by his grief, scarcely less than her own, at the death of her eldest little girl. Moreover they were brought into close companionship for a considerable time when, after his dismal period of apprenticeship at Rotherhithe—to which he could never look back without a shudder—he came to work under her husband. She had encouraged him in his studies; had urged him to work for the Botanical prize at Sydenham College; had brightened his life with her sympathy, and believed firmly in the brilliant future which awaited him—a belief which for her sake, if for nothing else, he was eager to justify by his best exertions.
He had not had, so far, much opportunity of entering the social world; but his visit to Sydney gave him an opportunity of entering a good society to which his commission in the navy was a sufficient introduction. He was eager to find friendships if he could, for his reserve was anything but misanthropic. It was not long before he made the acquaintance of William Macleay, a naturalist of wide research and great speculative ability; and struck up a close friendship with William Fanning, one of the leading merchants of the town, a friendship which was to have momentous consequences. For it was at Fanning's house that he met his future wife, Miss Henrietta Anne Heathorn, for whom he was to serve longer and harder than Jacob thought to serve for Rachel, but who was to be his help and stay for forty years, in his struggles ready to counsel, in adversity to comfort; the critic whose judgment he valued above almost any, and whose praise he cared most to win; his first care and his latest thought, the other self, whose union with him was a supreme example of mutual sincerity and devotion.
It was a case of love, if not actually at first sight, yet of very rapid growth when he came to learn the quiet strength and tenderness of her nature as displayed in the management of her sister's household. A certain simplicity and directness united with an unusual degree of cultivation, had attracted him from the first. She had been two years at school in Germany, and her knowledge of German and of German literature brought them together on common ground. Things ran very smoothly at the beginning, and the young couple, whose united ages amounted to forty-four years, became engaged.
The marriage was to take place on his promotion to the rank of full surgeon—a promotion he hoped to attain speedily at the conclusion of the voyage on the strength of his scientific work, for this was the inducement held out by the Admiralty to energetic subalterns. The following letter to his sister describes the situation:—]
Sydney Harbour, March 21, 1848.
…I have deferred writing to you in the hope of knowing something from yourself of your doings and whereabouts, and now that we are on the eve of departing for a long cruise in Torres Straits, I will no longer postpone the giving you some account of "was ist geschehen" on this side of the world. We spent three months in Sydney, and a gay three months of it we had,—nothing but balls and parties the whole time. In this corner of the universe, where men of war are rather scarce, even the old "Rattlesnake" is rather a lion, and her officers are esteemed accordingly. Besides, to tell you the truth, we are rather agreeable people than otherwise, and can manage to get up a very decent turn-out on board on occasion. What think you of your grave, scientific brother turning out a ball-goer and doing the "light fantastic" to a great extent? It is a great fact, I assure you. But there is a method in my madness. I found it exceedingly disagreeable to come to a great place like Sydney and think there was not a soul who cared whether I was alive or dead, so I determined to go into what society was to be had and see if I could not pick up a friend or two among the multitude of the empty and frivolous. I am happy to say that I have had more success than I hoped for or deserved, and then as now, two or three houses where I can go and feel myself at home at all times. But my "home" in Sydney is the house of my good friend Mr. Fanning, one of the first merchants in the place. But thereby hangs a tale which, of all people in the world, I must tell you. Mrs. Fanning has a sister, and the dear little sister and I managed to fall in love with one another in the most absurd manner after seeing one another—I will not tell you how few times, lest you should laugh. Do you remember how you used to talk to me about choosing a wife? Well, I think that my choice would justify even your fastidiousness…I think you will understand how happy her love ought to and does make me. I fear that in this respect indeed the advantage is on my side, for my present wandering life and uncertain position must necessarily give her many an anxious thought. Our future is indeed none of the clearest. Three years at the very least must elapse before the "Rattlesnake" returns to England, and then unless I can write myself into my promotion or something else, we shall be just where we were. Nevertheless I have the strongest persuasion that four years hence I shall be married and settled in England. We shall see.
I am getting on capitally at present. Habit, inclination, and now a sense of duty keep me at work, and the nature of our cruise affords me opportunities such as none but a blind man would fail to make use of. I have sent two or three papers home already to be published, which I have great hopes will throw light upon some hitherto obscure branches of natural history, and I have just finished a more important one, which I intend to get read at the Royal Society. The other day I submitted it to William Macleay (the celebrated propounder of the Quinary system), who has a beautiful place near Sydney, and, I hear, "werry much approves what I have done." All this goes to the comforting side of the question, and gives me hope of being able to follow out my favourite pursuits in course of time, without hindrance to what is now the main object of my life. I tell Netty to look to being a "Frau Professorin" one of these odd days, and she has faith, as I believe would have if I told her I was going to be Prime Minister.
We go to the northward again about the 23rd of this month [April], and shall be away for ten or twelve months surveying in Torres Straits. I believe we are to refit in Port Essington, and that will be the only place approaching to civilisation that we shall see for the whole of that time; and after July or August next, when a provision ship is to come up to us, we shall not even get letters. I hope and trust I shall hear from you before then. Do not suppose that my new ties have made me forgetful of old ones. On the other hand, these are if anything strengthened. Does not my dearest Nettie love you as I do! and do I not often wish that you could see and love and esteem her as I know you would. We often talk about you, and I tell her stories of old times.
[Another letter, a year later, gives his mother the answers to a string of questions which, mother-like, she had asked him, thirsting for exact and minute information about her future daughter-in-law:—]
Sydney, February 1, 1849.