1851-1853.
[Several letters dating from 1851 to 1853 help to fill up the outlines
of Huxley's life during those three years of struggle. There is a
description of the British Association meeting at Ipswich in 1851]
("Forbes advises me to go down to the meeting of the British Association
this year and make myself notorious somehow or other. Thank Heaven I
have impudence enough to lecture the savans of Europe if necessary. Can
you imagine me holding forth?" [June 6, 1851.]), with the traditional
touch of gaiety to enliven the gravity of its proceedings, and the
unconventional jollity of the Red Lion Club (a dining-club of members of
the Association), whose palmy days were those under the inspiration of
the genial and gifted Forbes. This was the meeting at which Huxley first
began his alliance with Tyndall, with whom he travelled down from town,
although he does not mention his name in this letter. With Hooker he had
already made acquaintance; and from this time forwards the three were
closely bound together by personal regard as well as by similarity of
aims and interests.
Then follow his sketch of the English scientific world as he found it in
1851, given in his letter to W. Macleay; several letters to his sister;
the description of his first lecture at the Royal Institution, which,
though successful on the whole, was very different in manner and
delivery from the clear and even flow of his later style, with the voice
not loud but distinct, the utterance never hurried beyond the point of
immediate comprehension, but carrying the attention of the audience with
it, eager to the end. Two letters of warning and remonstrance against
the habits of lecturing in a colloquial tone, suitable to a knot of
students gathered round his table, but not to a large audience--of
running his words, especially technical terms, together--of pouring out
new and unfamiliar matter at breakneck speed, were addressed to him--one
by a "working man" of his Monday evening audience at Jermyn Street in
1855, the other, undated, by Mr. Jodrell, a frequenter of the Royal
Institution, and afterwards founder of the Jodrell Lectureships at
University College, London, and other benefactions to science, and these
he kept by him as a perpetual reminder, labelled "Good Advice." How much
can be done by the frank acceptance of criticism and by careful practice
is shown by the difference between the feelings of the later audiences
who flocked to his lectures, and those of the members of an Institute in
St. John's Wood, who, as he often used to tell, after hearing him in his
early days, petitioned "not to have that young man again."]
July 12, 1851.
The interval between my letters has been a little longer than usual, as
I have been very busy attending the meeting of the British Association
at Ipswich. The last time I attended one was at Southampton five years
ago, when I went merely as a spectator, and looked at the people who
read papers as if they were somebodies. (See Chapter 2, ad fin.) This
time I have been behind the scenes myself and have played out my little
part on the boards. I know all about the scenery and decorations, and no
longer think the manager a wizard.
Any one who conceives that I went down from any especial interest in the
progress of science makes a great mistake. My journey was altogether a
matter of policy, partly for the purpose of doing a little necessary
trumpeting, and partly to get the assistance of the Association in
influencing the Government.
On the journey down, my opposite in the railway carriage turned out to
be Sir James Ross, the Antarctic discoverer. We had some very pleasant
talk together. I knew all about him, as Dayman (one of the lieutenants
of the "Rattlesnake") had sailed under his command; oddly enough we
afterwards went to lodge at the same house, but as we were attending our
respective sections all day we did not see much of one another.
When we arrived at Ipswich there was a good deal of trouble about
getting lodgings. My companions located themselves about a mile out of
the town, but that was too far for my "indolent habits"; I sought and at
last found a room in the town a little bigger than my cabin on board
ship for which I had the satisfaction of paying 30 shillings a week.
You know what the British Association is. It is a meeting of the savans
of England and the Continent, under the presidency of some big-wig or
other,--this year of the Astronomer-Royal,--for the purpose of
exchanging information. To this end they arrange themselves into
different sections, each with its own president and committee, and
indicated by letters. For instance, Section A is for Mathematics and
Physics; Section B for Chemistry, etc.; my own section, that of Natural
History, was D, under the presidency of Professor Henslow of Cambridge.
I was on the committee, and therefore saw the working of the whole
affair.
On the first day there was a dearth of matter in our section. People had
not arrived with their papers. So by way of finding out whether I could
speak in public or not, I got up and talked to them for about twenty
minutes. I was considerably surprised to find that when once I had made
the plunge, my tongue went glibly enough.
On the following day I read a long paper, which I had prepared and
illustrated with a lot of big diagrams, to an audience of about twenty
people! The rest were all away after Prince Albert, who had been
unfortunately induced to visit the meeting, and fairly turned the heads
of the good people of Ipswich. On Saturday a very pleasant excursion on
scientific pretences, but in fact a most jolly and unscientific picnic,
took place. Several hundred people went down the Orwell in a steamer.
The majority returned, but I and two others, considering Sunday in
Ipswich an impossibility, stopped at a little seaside village,
Felixstowe, and idled away our time there very pleasantly. Babington the
botanist and myself walked into Ipswich on Sunday night. It is about
eleven miles, and we did it comfortably in two hours and three quarters,
which was not bad walking.
On Monday at Section D again. Forbes brought forward the subject of my
application to Government in committee, and it was unanimously agreed to
forward a resolution on the subject to the Committee of Recommendations.
I made a speechification of some length in the Section about a new
animal.
On Thursday morning I attended a meeting of the Ray Society, and to my
infinite astonishment, the secretary, Dr. Lankester, gave me the second
motion to make. The Prince of Casino moved the first, so I was in good
company. The great absurdity of it was that not being a member of the
Society I had properly no right to speak at all. However, it was only a
vote of thanks, and I got up and did the "neat and appropriate" in
style.
After this a party of us went out dredging in the Orwell in a small
boat. We were away all day, and it rained hard coming back, so that I
got wet through, and had to pull five miles to keep off my enemy, the
rheumatics.
Then came the President's dinner, to which I did not go, as I preferred
making myself comfortable with a few friends elsewhere. And after that,
the final evening meeting, when all the final determinations are
announced.
Among them I had the satisfaction to hear that it was resolved--that the
President and Council of the British Association should co-operate with
the Royal Society in representing the value and importance, etc., of Mr.
T.H. Huxley's zoological researches to Her Majesty's Government for the
purpose of obtaining a grant towards their publication. Subsequently I
was introduced to Colonel Sabine, the President of the Association in
1852, and a man of very high standing and considerable influence. He had
previously been civil enough to sign my certificate at the Royal
Society, unsolicited, and therefore knew me by reputation--I only mean
that as a very small word. He was very civil and promised me every
assistance in his power.
It is a curious thing that of the four applications to Government to be
made by the Association, two were for Naval Assistant-Surgeons, namely
one for Dr. Hooker, who had just returned from the Himalaya Mountains,
and one for me. How I envied Hooker; he has long been engaged to a
daughter of Professor Henslow's, and at this very meeting he sat by her
side. He is going to be married in a day or two. His father is director
of the Kew Gardens, and there is little doubt of his succeeding him.
Whether the Government accede to the demand that will be made upon them
or not, I can now rest satisfied that no means of influencing them has
been left unused by me. If they will not listen to the conjoint
recommendations of the Royal Society and the British Association, they
will listen to nothing...
July 16, 1851.
I went yesterday to dine with Colonel Sabine. We had a long discourse
about the prospects and probable means of existence of young men trying
to make their way to an existence in the scientific world. I took, as
indeed what I have seen has forced me to take, rather the despairing
side of the question, and said that as it seemed to me England did not
afford even the means of existence to young men who were willing to
devote themselves to science. However, he spoke cheeringly, and advised
me by no means to be hasty, but to wait, and he doubted not that I
should succeed. He cited his own case as an instance of waiting,
eventually successful. Altogether I felt the better for what he said...
There has been a notice of me in the "Literary Gazette" for last week,
much more laudatory than I deserve, from the pen of my friend Forbes.
[An appreciation of his papers on the Physophoridae and Sagitta,
speaking highly both of his observations and philosophic power, in the
report of the proceedings in Section D.]
In the same number is a rich song from the same fertile and versatile
pen, which was sung at one of our Red Lion meetings. That is why I want
you to look at it, not that you will understand it, because it is full
of allusions to occurrences known only in the scientific circles. At
Ipswich we had a grand Red Lion meeting; about forty members were
present, and among them some of the most distinguished members of the
Association. Some foreigners were invited (the Prince of Casino,
Buonaparte's nephew, among others), and were not a little astonished to
see the grave professors, whose English solemnity and gravity they had
doubtless commented on elsewhere, giving themselves up to all sorts of
fun. Among the Red Lions we have a custom (instead of cheering) of
waving and wagging one coat-tail (one Lion's tail) when we applaud. This
seemed to strike the Prince's fancy amazingly, and when he got up to
return thanks for his health being drunk, he told us that as he was
rather out of practice in speaking English, he would return thanks in
our fashion, and therewith he gave three mighty roars and wags, to the
no small amusement of every one. He is singularly like the portraits of
his uncle, and seems a very jolly, good-humoured old fellow. I believe,
however, he is a bit of a rip. It was remarkable how proud the Quakers
were of being noticed by him.
To W. Macleay, of Sydney.
41 North Bank, Regent's Park, November 9, 1851.
My dear Sir,
It is a year to-day since the old "Rattlesnake" was paid off, and that
reminds me among other things that I have hardly kept my promise of
giving you information now and then upon the state of matters scientific
in England. My last letter is, I am afraid, nine or ten months old, but
here in England the fighting and scratching to keep your place in the
crowd exclude almost all other thoughts. When I last wrote I was but at
the edge of the crush at the pit-door of this great fools' theatre--now
I have worked my way into it and through it, and am, I hope, not far
from the check-takers. I have learnt a good deal in my passage.
[Follows an account of his efforts to get his papers
published--substantially a repetition of what has already been given.]
Rumours there are scattered abroad of a favourable cast, and I am told
on all hands that something will certainly be done. I only asked for 300
pounds sterling, something less than the cost of a parliamentary
blue-book which nobody ever hears of. They take care to obliterate any
spark of gratitude that might perchance arise for what they do, by
keeping one so long in suspense that the result becomes almost a matter
of indifference. Had I known they would keep me so long, I would have
published my work as a series of papers in the "Philosophical
Transactions."
In the meanwhile I have not been idle, as I hope to show you by the
various papers enclosed with this. You will recollect that on the
Salpae. No one here knew anything about them, and I thought that all my
results were absolutely new--until, me miserum! I found them in a little
paper of Krohn's in the "Annales des Sciences" for 1846, without any
figures to draw anybody's attention.
The memoir on the Medusae (which I sent to you) has, I hear, just
escaped a high honour--to wit, the Royal Medal. The award has been made
to Newport for his paper on "Impregnation." I had no idea that anything
I had done was likely to have the slightest claim to such distinction,
but I was informed yesterday by one of the Council that the balance hung
pretty evenly, and was only decided by their thinking my memoir was too
small and short.
I have been working in all things with a reference to wide views of
zoological philosophy, and the report upon the Echinoderms is intended
in common with the mem. on the Salpae to explain my views of
Individuality among the lower animals--views which I mean to illustrate
still further and enunciate still more clearly in my book that is to be.
[He lectured on this subject at the Royal Institution in 1852.] They
have met with approval from Carpenter, as you will see by the last
edition of his "Principles of Physiology," and I think that Forbes and
some others will be very likely eventually to come round to them, but
everything that relates to abstract thought is at a low ebb among the
mass of naturalists in this country.
In the paper upon "Thalassicolla," and in that which I read before the
British Association, as also in one upon the organisation of the
Rotifera, which I am going to have published in the Microscopical
Society's "Transactions," I have been driving in a series of wedges into
Cuvier's Radiata, and showing how selon moi they ought to be
distributed.
I am every day becoming more and more certain that you were on the right
track thirty years ago in your views of the order and symmetry to be
traced in the true natural system.
During the next session I mean to send in a paper to the Royal Society
upon the "Homologies of the Mollusca," which shall astonish them. I want
to get done for the Mollusca what Savigny did for the Articulata, namely
to show how they all--Cephalopoda, Gasteropoda, Pteropoda, Heteropoda,
etc.--are organised in each. What with this and the book, I shall have
enough to do for the next six months.
You will doubtless ask what is the practical outlook of all this?
whether it leads anywhere in the direction of bread and cheese? To this
also I can give a tolerably satisfactory answer.
As you WON'T have a Professor of Natural History at Sydney--to my great
sorrow--I have gone in as a candidate for a Professorial chair at the
other end of the world, Toronto in Canada. In England there is nothing
to be done--it is the most hopeless prospect I know of; of course the
Service offers nothing for me except irretrievable waste of time, and
the scientific appointments are so few and so poor that they are not
tempting...
Had the Sydney University been carried out as originally proposed, I
should certainly have become a candidate for the Natural History Chair.
I know no finer field for exertion for any naturalist than Sydney
Harbour itself. Should such a Professorship be hereafter established, I
trust you will jog the memory of my Australian friends in my behalf. I
have finally decided that my vocation is science, and I have made up my
mind to the comparative poverty which is its necessary adjunct, and to
the no less certain seclusion from the ordinary pleasures and rewards of
men. I say this without the slightest idea that there is anything to be
enthusiastic about in either science or its professors. A year behind
the scenes is quite enough to disabuse one of all rose-pink illusions.
But it is equally clear to me that for a man of my temperament, at any
rate, the sole secret of getting through this life with anything like
contentment is to have full scope for the development of one's
faculties. Science alone seems to me to afford this scope--Law,
Divinity, Physic, and Politics being in a state of chaotic vibration
between utter humbug and utter scepticism.
There is a great stir in the scientific world at present about who is to
occupy Konig's place at the British Museum, and whether the whole
establishment had better not, quoad Zoology, be remodelled and placed
under Owen's superintendence. The heart-burnings and jealousies about
this matter are beyond all conception. Owen is both feared and hated,
and it is predicted that if Gray and he come to be officers of the same
institution, in a year or two the total result will be a caudal vertebra
of each remaining after the manner of the Kilkenny cats.
However, I heard yesterday, upon what professed to be very good
authority, that Owen would not leave the College under any
circumstances.
It is astonishing with what an intense feeling of hatred Owen is
regarded by the majority of his contemporaries, with Mantell as
arch-hater. The truth is, he is the superior of most, and does not
conceal that he knows it, and it must be confessed that he does some
very ill-natured tricks now and then. A striking specimen of one is to
be found in his article on Lyell in the last Quarterly, where he
pillories poor Quekett--a most inoffensive man and his own immediate
subordinate--in a manner not more remarkable for its severity than for
its bad taste. That review has done him much harm in the estimation of
thinking men--and curiously enough, since it was written, reptiles have
been found in the old red sandstone, and insectivorous mammals in the
Trias! Owen is an able man, but to my mind not so great as he thinks
himself. He can only work in the concrete from bone to bone, in abstract
reasoning he becomes lost--witness "Parthenogenesis" which he told me he
considered one of the best things he had done!
He has, however, been very civil to me, and I am as grateful as it is
possible to be towards a man with whom I feel it necessary to be always
on my guard.
Quite another being is the other leader of Zoological Science in this
country--I mean Edward Forbes, Paleontologist to the Geological Survey.
More especially a Zoologist and a Geologist than a Comparative
Anatomist, he has more claims to the title of a Philosophic Naturalist
than any man I know of in England. A man of letters and an artist, he
has not merged the MAN in the man of science--he has sympathies for all,
and an earnest, truth-seeking, thoroughly genial disposition which win
for him your affection as well as your respect. Forbes has more
influence by his personal weight and example upon the rising generation
of scientific naturalists than Owen will have if he write from now till
Doomsday.
Personally I am greatly indebted to him (though the opinion I have just
expressed is that of the world in general). During my absence he
superintended the publication of my paper, and from the moment of my
arrival until now he has given me all the help one man can give another.
Why he should have done so I do not know, as when I left England I had
only spoken to him once.
The rest of the naturalists stand far below these two in learning,
originality, and grasp of mind. Goodsir of Edinburgh should I suppose
come next, but he can't write intelligibly. Darwin might be anything if
he had good health. Bell is a good man in all the senses of the word,
but wants qualities 2 and 3. Newport is a laborious man, but wants 1 and
3. Grant and Rymer Jones--arcades ambo--have mistaken their vocation.
My old chief Richardson is a man of men, but troubles himself little
with anything but detail zoology. What think you of his getting married
for the third time just before his last expedition? I hardly know by
which step he approved himself the bolder man.
I think I have now fulfilled my promise of supplying you with a little
scientific scandal--and if this long epistle has repaid your trouble in
getting through it, I am content.
Believe me, I have not forgotten, nor ever shall forget, your kindness
to me at a time when a little appreciation and encouragement were more
grateful to me and of more service than they will perhaps ever be again.
I have done my best to justify you.
I send copies of all the papers I have published with one exception, of
which I have none separate. Of the Royal Society papers I send a double
set. Will you be kind enough to give one with my kind regards and
remembrances to Dr. Nicholson? I feel I ought to have written to him
before leaving Sydney, but I trust he will excuse my not having done so.
I shall be very glad if you can find time to write.
Ever yours faithfully,
T.H. Huxley.
W. Macleay, Esq.
P.S.--Muller has just made a most extraordinary discovery, no less than
the generation of Molluscs from Holothuriae!!! You will find a
translation of his paper by me in the "Annals" for January 1852.
December 13, 1851.
[To his sister.]
May 20, 1851.
...Owen has been amazingly civil to me, and it was through his writing
to the First Lord that I got my present appointment. He is a queer fish,
more odd in appearance than ever...and more bland in manner. He is so
frightfully polite that I never feel thoroughly at home with him. He got
me to furnish him with some notes for the second edition of the
"Admiralty Manual of Scientific Inquiry," and I find that in it Darwin
and I (comparisons are odious) figure as joint authorities on some
microscopic matters!!
Professor Forbes, however, is my great ally, a first-rate man,
thoroughly in earnest and disinterested, and ready to give his time and
influence--which is great--to help any man who is working for the cause.
To him I am indebted for the supervision of papers that were published
in my absence, for many introductions, and most valuable information and
assistance, and all done in such a way as not to oppress one or give one
any feeling of patronage, which you know (so much do I retain of my old
self) would not suit me. My notions are diametrically opposed to his in
some matters, and he helps me to oppose him. The other night, or rather
nights, for it took three, I had a long paper read at the Royal Society
which opposed some of his views, and he got up and spoke in the highest
terms of it afterwards. This is all as it should be. I can reverence
such a man and yet respect myself.
I have been aspiring to great honours since I wrote to you last, to wit
the F.R.S., and found no little to my astonishment that I had a chance
of it, and so went in. I must tell you that they have made the admission
more difficult than it used to be. Candidates are not elected by the
Society alone, but fifteen only a year are selected by a committee, and
then elected as a matter of course by the Society. This year there were
thirty-eight candidates. I did not expect to come in till next year, but
I find I am one of the selected. I fancy I shall be the junior Fellow by
some years. Singularly enough, among the non-selected candidates were
Ward, the man who conducted the Botanical Honours Examination of
Apothecaries' Hall nine years ago, and Bryson, the surgeon of the
"Fisguard," i.e. nominally my immediate superior, and who, as he
frequently acts as Sir William Burnett's deputy, WILL VERY LIKELY
EXAMINE ME WHEN I PASS FOR SURGEON R.N.!! That is awkward and must be
annoying to him, but it is not my fault. I did not ask for a single name
that appeared upon my certificate. Owen's name and Carpenter's, which
were to have been appended, were not added. Forbes, my recommender, told
me beforehand not to expect to get in this year, and did not use his
influence, and so I have no intriguing to reproach myself with or to be
reproached with. The only drawback is that it will cost me 14 pounds
sterling, which is more than I can very well afford.
By the way, I have not told you that after staying for about five months
with George, I found that if I meant to work in earnest his home was not
the place, so, much to my regret,--for they made me very happy there,--I
summoned resolution and "The Boy's Own Book" and took a den of my own,
whence I write at present. You had better, anyhow, direct to George, as
I am going to move and don't know how long I may remain at my next
habitation. At present I am living in the Park Road, but I find it too
noisy and am going to St. Anne's Gardens, St. John's Wood, close to my
mother's, against whose forays I shall have to fortify myself.
[It was a minor addition to his many troubles that after a time Huxley
found a grudging and jealous spirit exhibited in some quarters towards
his success, and influence used to prevent any further advance that
might endanger the existing balance of power in the scientific world.
But this could be battled with directly; indeed it was rather a relief
to have an opportunity for action instead of sitting still to wait the
results of uncertain elections. The qualities requisite for such a
contest he possessed, in a high ideal of the dignity of science as an
instrument of truth; a standard of veracity in scientific workers to
which all should subordinate their personal ambitions; a disregard of
authority as such unless its claims were verified by indisputable fact;
and as a beginning, the will to subject himself to his own most rigid
canons of accuracy, thoroughness, and honesty; then to maintain his
principle and defend his position against all attempts at browbeating.]
March 5, 1852
I told you I was very busy, and I must tell you what I am about and you
will believe me. I have just finished a Memoir for the Royal Society
["On the Morphology of the Cephalous Mollusca" "Scientific Memoirs"
volume 1 page 152.], which has taken me a world of time, thought, and
reading, and is, perhaps, the best thing I have done yet. It will not be
read till May, and I do not know whether they will print it or not
afterwards; that will require care and a little manoeuvring on my part.
You have no notion of the intrigues that go on in this blessed world of
science. Science is, I fear, no purer than any other region of human
activity; though it should be. Merit alone is very little good; it must
be backed by tact and knowledge of the world to do very much.
For instance, I know that the paper I have just sent in is very original
and of some importance, and I am equally sure that if it is referred to
the judgment of my "particular friend" -- that it will not be published.
He won't be able to say a word against it, but he will pooh-pooh it to a
dead certainty.
You will ask with some wonderment, Why? Because for the last twenty
years -- has been regarded as the great authority on these matters, and
has had no one to tread on his heels, until at last, I think, he has
come to look upon the Natural World as his special preserve, and "no
poachers allowed." So I must manoeuvre a little to get my poor memoir
kept out of his hands.
The necessity for these little stratagems utterly disgusts me. I would
so willingly reverence and trust any man of high standing and ability. I
am so utterly unable to comprehend this petty greediness. And yet withal
you will smile at my perversity. I have a certain pleasure in overcoming
these obstacles, and fighting these folks with their own weapons. I do
so long to be able to trust men implicitly. I have such a horror of all
this literary pettifogging. I could be so content myself, if the
necessity of making a position would allow it, to work on anonymously,
but -- I see is determined not to let either me or any one else rise if
he can help it. Let him beware. On my own subjects I am his master, and
am quite ready to fight half a dozen dragons. And although he has a
bitter pen, I flatter myself that on occasions I can match him in that
department also.
But I was telling you how busy I am. I am getting a memoir ready for the
Zoological Society, and working at my lecture for the Royal Institution,
which I want to make striking and original, as it is a good opportunity,
besides doing a translation now and then for one of the Journals.
Besides this, I am working at the British Museum to make a catalogue of
some creatures there. All these things take a world of time and labour;
and yield next to no direct profit; but they bring me into contact with
all sorts of men, in a very independent position, and I am told, and
indeed hope, that something must arise from it. So fair a prospect opens
out before me if I can only wait. I am beginning to know what WORK
means, and see how much more may be done by steady, unceasing, and
well-directed efforts. I thrive upon it too. I am as well as ever I was
in my life, and the more I work the better my temper seems to be.
April 30, 1852, 11.30 P.M.
I have just returned from giving my lecture at the Royal Institution, of
which I told you in my last letter. ["On Animal Individuality"
"Scientific Memoirs" volume 1 page 146 cp. supra.]
I had got very nervous about it, and my poor mother's death had greatly
upset my plans for working it out.
It was the first lecture I had ever given in my life, and to what is
considered the best audience in London. As nothing ever works up my
energies but a high flight, I had chosen a very difficult abstract
point, in my view of which I stand almost alone. When I took a glimpse
into the theatre and saw it full of faces, I did feel most amazingly
uncomfortable. I can now quite understand what it is to be going to be
hanged, and nothing but the necessity of the case prevented me from
running away.
However, when the hour struck, in I marched, and began to deliver my
discourse. For ten minutes I did not quite know where I was, but by
degrees I got used to it, and gradually gained perfect command of myself
and of my subject. I believe I contrived to interest my audience, and
upon the whole I think I may say that this essay was successful.
Thank Heaven I can say so, for though it is no great matter succeeding,
failing would have been a bitter annoyance to me. It has put me
comfortably at my ease with regard to all future lecturings. After the
Royal Institution there is no audience I shall ever fear.
May 9.
The foolish state of excitement into which I allowed myself to get the
other day completely did for me, and I have hardly done anything since
except sleep a great deal. It is a strange thing that with all my will I
cannot control my physical organisation.
[To his sister.]
April 17, 1852.
...I fear nothing will have prepared you to hear that one so active in
body and mind as our poor mother was has been taken from us. But so it
is...
It was very strange that before leaving London my mother, possessed by a
strange whim, as I thought, distributed to many of us little things
belonging to her. I laughed at her for what I called her "testamentary
disposition," little dreaming that the words were prophetic.
[The summons to those of the family in London reached them late, and
their arrival was made still later by inconvenient trains and a midnight
drive, so that all had long been over when they came to Barning in Kent,
where the elder Huxleys had just settled near their son James.]
Our mother had died at half-past four, falling gradually into a more and
more profound insensibility. She was thus happily spared the pain of
fruitlessly wishing us round her, in her last moments; and as the hand
of Death was upon her, I know not that it could have fallen more
lightly.
I offer you no consolation, my dearest sister; for I know of none. There
are things which each must bear as he best may with the strength that
has been allotted to him. Would that I were near you to soften the blow
by the sympathy which we should have in common...
May 3, 1852.
So much occupation has crowded upon me between the beginning of this
letter and the present time that I have been unable to finish it. I had
undertaken to give a lecture at the Royal Institution on the 30th April.
It was on a difficult subject, requiring a good deal of thought; and as
it was my first appearance before the best audience in London, you may
imagine how anxious and nervous I was, and how completely I was obliged
to abstract my thoughts from everything else.
However, I am happy to say it is well over. There was a very good
audience--Faraday, Professor Forbes, Dr. Forbes, Wharton Jones, and [a]
whole lot of "nobs," among my auditors. I had made up my mind all day to
break down, and then go and hang myself privately. And so you may
imagine that I entered the theatre with a very pale face, and a heart
beating like a sledge-hammer nineteen to the dozen. For the first five
minutes I did not know very clearly what I was about, but by degrees I
got possession of myself and of my subject, and did not care for
anybody. I have had "golden opinions from all sorts of men" about it, so
I suppose I may tell you I have succeeded. I don't think, however, that
I ever felt so thoroughly used up in my life as I did for two days
afterwards. There is one comfort, I shall never be nervous again about
any audience; but at one's first attempt, to stand in the place of
Faraday and such big-wigs might excuse a little weakness.
The way is clear before me, if my external circumstances will only allow
me to persevere; but I fully expect that I shall have to give up my
dreams.
Science in England does everything--but PAY. You may earn praise but not
pudding.
I have helping hands held out to me on all sides, but there is nothing
to help me to. Last year I became a candidate for a Professorship at
Toronto. I took an infinity of trouble over the thing, and got together
a mass of testimonials and recommendations, much better than I had any
right to expect. From that time to this I have heard nothing of the
business--a result for which I care the less, as I believe the chair
will be given to a brother of one of the members of the Canadian
ministry, who is, I hear, a candidate. Such a qualification as that is,
of course, better than all the testimonials in the world.
I think I told you when I last wrote that I was expecting a grant from
Government to publish the chief part of my work, done while away. I am
expecting it still. I got tired of waiting the other day and wrote to
the Duke of Northumberland, who is at present First Lord of the
Admiralty, upon the subject. His Grace has taken the matter up, and I
hope now to get it done.
With all this, however, Time runs on. People look upon me, I suppose, as
a "very promising young man," and perhaps envy my "success," and I all
the while am cursing my stars that my Pegasus WILL fly aloft instead of
pulling slowly along in some respectable gig, and getting his oats like
any other praiseworthy cart-horse.
It's a charming piece of irony altogether. It is two years yesterday
since I left Sydney harbour--and of course as long since I saw Nettie. I
am getting thoroughly tired of our separation, and I think she is,
though the dear little soul is ready to do anything for my sake, and yet
I dare not face the stagnation--the sense of having failed in the whole
purpose of my existence--which would, I know, sooner or later beset me,
even with her, if I forsake my present object. Can you wonder with all
this, my dearest Lizzie, that often as I long for your brave heart and
clear head to support and advise me, I yet rarely feel inclined to
write? Pray write to me more often than you have done; tell me all about
yourself and the Doctor and your children. They must be growing up fast,
and Florry must be getting beyond the "Bird of Paradise" I promised her.
Love and kisses to all of them, and kindest remembrances to the Doctor.
Ever your affectionate brother,
T.H. Huxley.
[To Miss Heathorn]
November 13, 1852.
Going last week to the Royal Society's library for a book, and like the
boy in church "thinkin' o' naughten," when I went in, Weld, the
Assistant Secretary, said, "Well, I congratulate you." I confess I did
not see at that moment what any mortal man had to congratulate me about.
I had a deuced bad cold, with rheumatism in my head; it was a beastly
November day and I was very grumpy, so I inquired in a state of mild
surprise what might be the matter. Whereupon I learnt that the Medal had
been conferred at the meeting of the Council on the day before. I was
very pleased...and I thought you would be so too, and I thought moreover
that it was a fine lever to help us on, and if I could have sent a
letter to you immediately I should have sat down and have written one to
you on the spot. As it is I have waited for official confirmation and a
convenient season.
And now...shall I be very naughty and make a confession? The thing that
a fortnight ago (before I got it) I thought so much of, I give you my
word I do not care a pin for. I am sick of it and ashamed of having
thought so much of it, and the congratulations I get give me a sort of
internal sardonic grin. I think this has come about partly because I did
not get the official confirmation of what I had heard for some days, and
with my habit of facing the ill side of things I came to the conclusion
that Weld had made a mistake, and I went in thought through the whole
enormous mortification of having to explain to those to whom I had
mentioned it that it was quite a mistake. I found that all this, when I
came to look at it, was by no means so dreadful as it seemed--quite
bearable in short--and then I laughed at myself and have cared nothing
about the whole concern ever since. In truth...I do not think that I am
in the proper sense of the word ambitious. I have an enormous longing
after the highest and best in all shapes--a longing which haunts me and
is the demon which ever impels me to work, and will let me have no rest
unless I am doing his behests. The honours of men I value so far as they
are evidences of power, but with the cynical mistrust of their judgment
and my own worthiness, which always haunts me, I put very little faith
in them. Their praise makes me sneer inwardly. God forgive me if I do
them any great wrong.
...I feel and know that all the rewards and honours in the world will
ever be worthless for me as soon as they are obtained. I know that
always, as now, they will make me more sad than joyful. I know that
nothing that could be done would give me the pure and heartfelt joy and
peace of mind that your love has given me, and, please God, shall give
for many a long year to come, and yet my demon says work! work! you
shall not even love unless you work.
Not blinded by any vanity, then, I hope...but viewing this stroke of
fortune as respects its public estimation only, I think I must look upon
the award of this medal as the turning-point of my life, as the
finger-post teaching me as clearly as anything can what is the true
career that lies open before me. For whatever may be my own private
estimation of it, there can be no doubt as to the general feeling about
this thing, and in case of my candidature for any office it would have
the very greatest weight. And as you will have seen by my last letter,
it only strengthens and confirms the conclusion I had come to. Bid me
God-speed then...it is all I want to labour cheerfully.
November 28.
...You will hear all the details of the Great Duke's state funeral from
the papers much better than I can tell you them. I went to the Cathedral
[St Paul's] and had the good fortune to get a capital seat--in front,
close to the great door by which every one entered. It was bitter cold,
a keen November wind blowing right in, and as I was there from eight
till three, I expected nothing less than rheumatic fever the next day;
however I didn't get it. It was pitiful to see the poor old Marquis of
Anglesey--a year older than the Duke--standing with bare head in the
keen wind close to me for more than three quarters of an hour. It was
impressive enough--the great interior lighted by a single line of light
running along the whole circuit of the cornice, and another encircling
the dome, and casting a curious illumination over the masses of uniforms
which filled the great space. The best of our people were there and
passed close to me, but the only face that made any great impression
upon my memory was that of Sir Charles Napier, the conqueror of Scinde.
Fancy a very large, broad-winged, and fierce-looking hawk in uniform.
Such an eye!
When the coffin and the mourners had passed I closed up with the
soldiers and went up under the dome, where I heard the magnificent
service in full perfection.
All of it, however, was but stage trickery compared with the noble
simplicity of the old man's life. How the old stoic, used to his iron
bed and hard hair pillow, would have smiled at all the pomp--submitting
to that, however, and all other things necessary to the "carrying on of
the Queen's Government."
I send Tennyson's ode by way of packing--it is not worth much more, the
only decent passages to my mind being those I have marked.
The day after to-morrow I go to have my medal presented and to dine and
make a speech.
[The Royal Medal was conferred on November 30, and the medallists were
entertained at the anniversary dinner of the Society on that day. In the
words with which the President, the Earl of Rosse, accompanied the
presentation of the medal, "it is not difficult," writes Sir M. Foster,
"reading between the lines, to recognise the appreciation of a new
spirit of anatomical inquiry, not wholly free from a timorous
apprehension as to its complete validity." ("In these papers (on the
Medusae) you have for the first time fully developed their structure,
and laid the foundation of a rational theory for their classification."
"In your second paper 'On the Anatomy of Salpa and Pyrosoma,' the
phenomena, etc., have received the most ingenious and elaborate
elucidation, and have given rise to a process of reasoning, the results
of which can scarcely yet be anticipated, but must bear in a very
important degree upon some of the most abstruse points of what may be
called transcendental physiology." See "Royal Society" Obituary Notices
volume 59 page 1.) For the difference between this and the labours of
the greatest English comparative anatomist of the time, whose detailed
work was of the highest value, but whose generalisations and
speculations, based on the philosophy of Oken, proved barren and
fruitless, lay in the fact that Huxley, led to it doubtless by his
solitary readings in his Charing Cross days, had taken up the method of
Von Baer and Johannes Muller, then almost unknown, or at least unused in
England--"the method which led the anatomist to face his problems in the
spirit in which the physicist faced his."
He had been warned by Forbes not to speak too strongly about the
dilatoriness of the Government in the matter of the grant, so he
writes:] "I will 'roar you like any sucking dove' at the dinner, though
I felt tempted otherwise." [On December 1 he tells how he carried out
this advice.]
My dear Forbes,
You will, I know, like to learn how I got on yesterday. The President's
address to me had been drawn up by Bell. It was, of course, too
flattering, but he had taken hold of the right points in my work--at
least I thought so.
Bunsen spoke very well for Humboldt.
There was a capital congregation at the dinner--sixty or seventy Fellows
there...
When it came to my turn to return thanks, I believe I made a very
tolerable speechification, at least everybody says so. Lord Rosse had
alluded to "science having to take care of itself in this country," and
in winding up I gave them a small screed upon that text. That you may
see I kept your caution in mind, I will tell you as nearly as may be
what I said. I told them that I could not conceive that anything I had
hitherto done merited the honour of that day (I looked so preciously
meek over this), but that I was glad to be able to say that I had so
much unpublished material as to make me hopeful of one day diminishing
the debt. I then said, "The Government of this country, of this GREAT
country, has been two years debating whether it should grant the three
hundred pounds sterling necessary for the publication of these
researches. I have been too long used to strict discipline to venture to
criticise any act of my superiors, but I venture to hope that before
long, in consequence of the exertions of Lord Rosse, of the President of
the British Association, and the goodwill, which I gratefully
acknowledge, of the present Lord of the Admiralty, I shall be able to
lay before you something more worthy of to-day's award."
I had my doubts how the nobs would take it, but both Lord Rosse and
Sabine warmly commended my speech and regretted I had not said even more
upon the subject.
[Some light is thrown upon his habits at this time by the following,
part of his letter to Forbes of November 19:--]
I have frequent visits from --. He is a good man, but direfully
argumentative, and in that sense to me a bore. Besides that, the
creature will come and call upon me at nine or ten o'clock in the
morning before I am out of bed, or if out of bed, before I am in
possession of my faculties, which never arrive before twelve or one.
[This morning incapacity was of a piece with his hatred of the
breakfast-party of the period. To go abroad from home or to do any work
before breakfasting ensured him a headache for the rest of the day, so
that he never was one of those risers with the dawn who do half a day's
work before the rest of the world is astir. And though necessity often
compelled him to do with less, he always found eight hours his proper
allowance of sleep.
But in the end of 1853 we hear of a reform in his ways, after a bad bout
of ill-health, when he rises at eight, goes to bed at twelve, and
eschews parties of every kind as far as possible, with excellent results
as far as health went.
After his marriage, however, and indeed to the beginning of his last
illness, he always rose early enough for an eight o'clock breakfast,
after which the working day began, lasting regularly from a little after
nine till midnight.
4 Upper York Place, St. John's Wood, February 6, 1853.
Many thanks, my dearest sister, for your kind and thoughtful letter--it
went to my heart no little that you, amidst all your trials and
troubles, should find time to think so wisely and so affectionately of
mine. Though greatly tempted otherwise, I have acted in the spirit of
your advice, and my reward, in the shape of honours at any rate, has not
failed me, as the Royal Society gave me one of the Royal medals last
year. It's a bigger one than I got under your auspices so many years
ago, being worth 50 pounds sterling, but I don't know that I cared so
much about it.
It was assigned to me quite unexpectedly, and in the eyes of the world
I, of course, am greatly the bigger--but I will confess to you privately
that I am by no means dilated, and am the identical Boy Tom I was before
I achieved the attainment of my golden porter's badge. Curiously it was
given for the first Memoir I have in the Royal Society's "Transactions,"
sent home four years ago with no small fear and trembling, and, "after
many days," returning with this queer crust of bread. In the speech I
had to make at the Anniversary Dinner I grew quite eloquent on that
point, and talked of the dove I had sent from my ark, returning, not
with the olive branch, but with a sprig of the bay and a fruit from the
garden of the Hesperides--a simile which I thought decidedly clever, but
which the audience--distinguished audience I ought to have
said--probably didn't, as they did not applaud that, while they did some
things I said which were incomparably more stupid. This was in November,
and I ought to have written to you about it before, my dear Lizzie, but
for one thing I am very much occupied, and for the other (shall I
confess it?) I was rather puzzled that I had not heard from you since I
wrote. Now my useless conscience, which never makes me do anything right
in time, is pitching in to me when it is too late.
The medal, however, must not be jested at, as it is most decidedly of
practical use in giving me a status in the eyes of those charming
people, "practical men," such as I had not before, and I am amused to
find some of my friends, whose contempt for my "dreamy" notions was not
small in time past, absolutely advising me to take a far more dreamy
course than I dare venture upon. However, I take very much my own course
now, even as I have done before--Huxley all over.
However, that is enough about myself just now. In the next letter I will
tell you more at length about my plans and prospects, which are mostly,
I am sorry to say, only provocative of setting my teeth hard and saying,
"Never mind, I WILL." But what I write in a hurry about and want you to
do at once, is to write to me and tell me exactly how money may be sent
safely to you. It is inexpedient to send without definite directions,
according to the character you give your neighbours. Don't expect
anything vast, but there is corn in Egypt...
Two classes of people can I deal with and no third. They are the good
people--people after my own heart, and the thorough men of the world.
Either of these I can act and sympathise with, but the others, who are
neither for God nor for the Devil, but for themselves, as grim old Dante
has it, and whom he therefore very justly puts in a most uncomfortable
place, I cannot do with...
So Florry is growing up into a great girl; the child will not remember
me, but kiss her and my godson for me, and give my love to them all. The
Lymph shall come in my next letter for the young Yankee. I hope the
juices of the English cow will prevent him from ever acquiring the
snuffle.
Tell the Doctor all about the medal, with my kindest regards, and
believe me, my dearest Lizzie, your affectionate brother,
Tom.
4 Upper York Place, St. John's Wood, April 22, 1853.
My dearest Lizzie,
First let me congratulate you on being safe over your troubles and in
possession of another possible President. I think it may be worth coming
over twenty years hence on the possibility of picking up something or
other from one of my nephews at Washington.
[He sends some money.] Would it were more worth your having, but I have
not as yet got on to Tom Tiddler's ground on this side of the water. You
need not be alarmed about my having involved myself in any way--such
portion of it as is of my sending has been conquered by mine own sword
and spear, and the rest came from Mary. [Mrs. George Huxley]...
[After giving a summary of his struggle with the Admiralty, he
proceeds]--If I were to tell you all the intriguing and humbug there has
been about my unfortunate grant--which yet granted--it would occupy this
letter, and though a very good illustration of the encouragement
afforded to Science in this country, would not be very amusing. Once or
twice it has fairly died out, only to be stirred up again by my own
pertinacity. However, I have hopes of it at last, as I hear Lord Rosse
is just about to make another application to the present Government on
the subject. While this business has been dragging on of course I have
not been idle. I have four memoirs (on various matters in Comparative
Anatomy) in the "Philosophical Transactions," and they have given me
their Fellowship and one of the Royal medals. I have written a whole lot
of things for the journals--reviews for the "British and Foreign
Quarterly Medical," etc. I am one of the editors of Taylor's "Scientific
Memoirs" (German scientific translations). In conjunction with my friend
Busk I am translating a great German book on the "Microscopical Anatomy
of Man," and I have engaged to write a long article for Todd's
"Cyclopaedia." Besides this, have read two long memoirs at the British
Association, and have given two lectures at the Royal Institution--one
of them only two days ago, when I was so ill with influenza I could
hardly stand or speak.
Furthermore, I have been a candidate for a Professorship of Natural
History at Toronto (which is not even yet decided); for one at Aberdeen,
which has been given against me; and at present I am a candidate for the
Professorship of Physiology at King's College, or, rather, for half of
it--Todd having given up, and Bowman, who remains, being willing to take
only half, and that he will soon give up. My friend Edward Forbes--a
regular brick, who has backed me through thick and thin--is backing me
for King's College, where he is one of the Professors. My chance is, I
believe, very good, but nothing can be more uncertain than the result of
the contest. If they don't take one of their own men I think they will
have me. It would suit me very well, and the whole chair is worth 400
pounds sterling a year, and would enable me to live.
Something I must make up my mind to do, and that speedily. I can get
honour in Science, but it doesn't pay, and "honour heals no wounds." In
truth I am often very weary. The longer one lives the more the ideal and
the purpose vanishes out of one's life, and I begin to doubt whether I
have done wisely in giving vent to the cherished tendency towards
Science which has haunted me ever since my childhood. Had I given myself
to Mammon I might have been a respectable member of society with large
watch-seals by this time. I think it is very likely that if this King's
College business goes against me, I may give up the farce
altogether--burn my books, burn my rod, and take to practice in
Australia. It is no use to go on kicking against the pricks...