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.