[But these words conjured up terrible possibilities, and Mr. Romanes wrote back in great alarm to ask the exact state of the case. The two following letters show that the alarm was groundless:—]
Hodeslea, April 26, 1893.
My dear Romanes,
I fear, or rather hope, that I have given you a very unnecessary scare.
You may be quite sure, I think, that, while I should have refused to give the lecture if any pledge of a special character had been proposed to me, I have felt very strongly bound to you to take the utmost care that no shadow of a just cause for offence should be given, even to the most orthodox of Dons.
It seems to me that the best thing I can do is to send you the lecture as it stands, notes and all. But please return it within two days at furthest, and consider it STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL between us two (I am not excluding Mrs. Romanes, if she cares to look at the paper). No consideration would induce me to give any ground for the notion that I had submitted the lecture to any one but yourself.
If there is any phrase in the lecture which you think likely to get you into trouble, out it shall come or be modified in form.
If the whole thing is too much for the Dons' nerves—I am no judge of their delicacy—I am quite ready to give up the lecture.
In fact I do not know whether I shall be able to make myself heard three weeks hence, as the influenza has left its mark in hoarseness and pain in the throat after speaking.
So you see if the thing is altogether too wicked there is an easy way out of it.