Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume II Part 46

The only two I know much about are Harcourt and Chamberlain, and the devil (in whom I now firmly believe) put it into my head to write to both.

The enormous stupidity of which I had been guilty in asking Chamberlain under the circ.u.mstances, and the sort of construction you and others might put upon it, never entered my head till this afternoon. It really made me ill, and I went straight to find you. If Providence is good to me the letter will miscarry and he won't come.

But anyhow I want you to know that I have been idiotically stupid, and that I shall wish the Presidency and the dinner and everything connected with it at the bottom of the sea, if you are as much disgusted with me as you have a perfect right to be.

Ever yours faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

[The following refers to the Tyneside Sunday Lecture Society at Newcastle, which had invited him to become one of its vice-presidents:--]

4 Marlborough Place, N.W., December 30, 1883.

My dear Morley,

The Newcastle people wrote to me some time ago telling me that Sir W.

Armstrong was going to be their President. [The actual words of the Secretary were "We have asked Sir W. Armstrong to be President," and Huxley was mistaken in supposing this intimation to imply that, as generally happens in such cases, Sir William had previously intimated his willingness to accept the position if formally asked.] Armstrong is an old friend of mine, so I wrote to him to make inquiries. He told me that he was not going to be President, and knew nothing about the people who were getting up the Society. So I declined to have anything to do with it.

However, the case is altered now that you are in the swim. You have no G.o.ds to swear by, unfortunately; but if you will affirm, in the name of X, that under no circ.u.mstances shall I be called upon to do anything, they may have my name among the V.-P.'s and much good may it do them.

All our good wishes to you and yours. The great thing one has to wish for as time goes on is vigour as long as one lives, and death as soon as vigour flags.

It is a curious thing that I find my dislike to the thought of extinction increasing as I get older and nearer the goal.

It flashes across me at all sorts of times with a sort of horror that in 1900 I shall probably know no more of what is going on than I did in 1800. I had sooner be in h.e.l.l a good deal--at any rate in one of the upper circles where the climate and company are not too trying. I wonder if you are plagued in this way.

Ever yours,

T.H. Huxley.

[The following letters, to his family or to intimate friends, are in lighter vein. The first is to Sir M. Foster; the concluding item of information in reply to several inquiries. The Royal Society wished some borings made in Egypt to determine the depth of the stratum of Nile mud:--]

The Egyptian exploration society is wholly archaeological--at least from the cut of it I have no doubt it is so--and they want all their money to find out the p.a.w.nbrokers' shops which Israel kept in Pithom and Rameses--and then went off with the pledges.

This is the real reason why Pharaoh and his host pursued them; and then Moses and Aaron bribed the post-boys to take out the linch pins.

That is the real story of the Exodus--as detailed in a recently discovered papyrus which neither Brugsch nor Maspero have as yet got hold of.

[To his youngest daughter:--]

4 Marlborough Place, N.W., April 12, 1883.

Dearest Pabelunza,

I was quite overcome to-day to find that you had vanished without a parting embrace to your "faded but fascinating" parent. [A fragment of feminine conversation overheard at the Dublin meeting of the British a.s.sociation, 1878. "Oh, there comes Professor Huxley: faded, but still fascinating."] I clean forgot you were going to leave this peaceful village for the whirl of Gloucester dissipation this morning--and the traces of weeping on your visage, which should have reminded me of our imminent parting, were absent.

My dear, I should like to have given you some good counsel. You are but a simple village maiden--don't be taken by the appearance of anybody. Consult your father--inclosing photograph and measurement (in inches)--in any case of difficulty.

Also give my love to the matron your sister, and tell her to look sharp after you. Treat her with more respect than you do your venerable P.--whose life will be gloom hidden by a film of heartless jests till you return.

Item.--Kisses to Ria and Co.

Your desolated Pater.

[To his eldest daughter:--]

4 Marlborough Place, May 6, 1883.

Dearest Jess,

Best thanks for your good wishes--considering all things, I am a hale old gentleman. But I had to speak last night at the Academy dinner, and either that or the quant.i.ty of cigars I smoked, following the bad example of our friend "Wales," has left me rather shaky to-day. It was trying, because Jack's capital portrait was hanging just behind me--and somebody remarked that it was a better likeness of me than I was. If you begin to think of that it is rather confusing.

I am grieved to have such accounts of Ethel, and have lectured her accordingly. She threatens reprisals on you--and altogether is in a more saucy and irrepressible state than when she left.

M-- is still in bed, though better--I am afraid she won't be able to go to Court next week. You see we are getting grand.

I hear great accounts of the children (Ria and Buzzer) and mean to cut out T'other Governor when you bring them up.

As we did not see Fred the other day, the family is inclined to think that the salmon disagreed with him!

Ever your loving father,

T.H. Huxley.

4 Marlborough Place, May 10, 1883.

My dear Mrs. Tyndall,

If you will give me a bit of mutton at one o'clock I shall be very much your debtor, but as I have business to attend to afterwards at the Home Office I must stipulate that my intellect be not imperilled by those seductive evil genii who are apt to make their appearance at your lunch table. [This is accompanied by a sketch of a champagne bottle in the character of a demon.]

M. is getting better, but I cannot let her be out at night yet. She thinks she is to be allowed to go to the International Exhibition business on Sat.u.r.day; but if the temperature does not rise very considerably I shall have two words to say to that.

Ever yours very sincerely,

T.H. Huxley.

I shall be alone. Do you think that I am "subdued to that I work in,"

and like an oyster, carry my brood about beneath my mantle?

CHAPTER 2.15.

1884.

[From this time forward the burden of ill-health grew slowly and steadily. Dyspepsia and the hyperchondriacal depression which follows in its train, again attacked Huxley as they had attacked him twelve years before, though this time the physical misery was perhaps less.

His energy was sapped; when his official work was over, he could hardly bring himself to renew the investigations in which he had always delighted. To stoop over the microscope was a physical discomfort; he began to devote himself more exclusively to the reading of philosophy and critical theology. This was the time of which Sir M.

Foster writes that "there was something working in him which made his hand, when turned to anatomical science, so heavy that he could not lift it. Not even that which was so strong within him, the duty of fulfilling a promise, could bring him to the work."

Up to the beginning of October, he went on with his official work, the lectures at South Kensington, the business as President of the Royal Society, and ex officio Trustee of the British Museum; the duties connected with the Inspectorship of Fisheries, the City and Guilds Technical Education Committee, and the University of London, and delivered the opening address at the London Hospital Medical School, on "The State and the Medical Profession" ["Collected Essays" 3 323), his health meanwhile growing less and less satisfactory. He dropped minor offices, such as the Presidency of the National a.s.sociation of Science Teachers, which, he considered, needed more careful supervision than he was able to give, and meditated retiring from part at least of his main duties, when he was ordered abroad at a moment's notice for first one, then another, and yet a third period of two months. But he did not definitely retire until this rest had proved ineffectual to fit him again for active work.