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.