[The next, to Lord Farrer, is apropos of quite an extensive correspondence in the "Times" as to the correct reading of the well-known lines about the missionary and the cassowary, to which both Huxley and Lord Farrer had contributed their own reminiscences.]
Hodeslea, October 15, 1892.
My dear Farrer,
If YOU were a missionary
In the heat of Timbuctoo
YOU'd wear nought but a nice and airy
Pair of bands—p'raps cassock too.
Don't you see the fine touch of local colour in my version! Is it not obvious to everybody who understands the methods of high a priori criticism that this consideration entirely outweighs the merely empirical fact that your version dates back to 1837—which I must admit is before my adolescence? It is obvious to the meanest capacity that mine must be the original text in "Idee," whatever your wretched "Wirklichkeit" may have to say to the matter.
And where, I should like to know, is a glimmer of a scintilla of a hint that the missionary was a dissenter? I claim him for my dear National Church.
Ever yours,
T.H. Huxley.
[The following is about a document which he had forgotten that he wrote:—]
Hodeslea, Eastbourne, November 24, 1892.