_Or, Memoirs of a Missing Link_.
I've no particular reason to think an account of my life will interest
anybody. That being so, I don't know why I write it. But I do. I suppose
it's Chance. +H-xl-y+ (who _is_ such fun!) calls my Memoir, because I'm
a F.R.S., a case of "_Fellow-De-Se_."
[Illustration: Seal making a Deep Impression.]
Talking of Chance, everything that has ever happened to me _has_ been
Chance!
For instance, what could have been more a matter of luck than my
choosing a house at Down? +H-xl-y+ says something about being "Down on
my luck." (What a master of style old +H-xl-y+ is, to be sure!)
Then there was that voyage on the _Sea-Mew_. If it hadn't been that my
Uncle kicked me six times round his garden at Shrewsbury, because I said
"I'd be jiggered if I went," I don't believe I should ever have had
courage to accept the appointment of Naturalist to the expedition. That
voyage gave me an object in life. My nose had _made_ me an object in
life before that (_vide Portrait_), but Natural Selection triumphed over
my nose, and so I became in due time famous, and an Ag-nose-tic!
+My Schooldays.+
At school I was an exceptionally naughty boy. I cannot conceive what
induced me to tell another little boy that I had often produced
crab-apples by taking a dead crab and burying it in an orchard, but I
did. My little friend, I recollect, didn't believe me, and indeed pulled
my nose (always a sore point with me, but he made its point much sorer)
for telling what he called "beastly crams." We had a fight, I also
remember. Perhaps I ought to call it a "struggle for existence." He was
much the "fittest," and he survived. _I_ got licked.
+Choice of Calling.+
My extreme naughtiness continued unabated when I became a young man.
Nobody expected I should ever "do" anything--except six months' hard
labour! At Cambridge I was so shockingly "rowdy," that my father
declared, there was no alternative but to send me into the Church. But
as I was hunting with the College drag at the hour when I ought to have
been in for my Ordination Examination, the Bishop failed to see matters
in the same light. I then decided to be a Doctor. If I had stuck to this
profession I fancy that my turn for trying experiments would have landed
me in some exalted position--possibly at Newgate. As it was, after
attending a lecture on Surgery, I was discovered in the local Hospital
trying to cut off a patient's leg on an entirely new principle, with a
pair of scissors and an old meat-saw, and I was nearly "run in" for
manslaughter. I decided to give up Medicine, and a slight shindy over a
supposed error of mine in calculating a score having prevented my
becoming a success as a Public-house Billiard-marker, I thought I would
make my mark in another way, as a breeder of race-horses. Being,
however, forcibly chucked out of Newmarket Heath one day for an alleged
irregularity which I never could understand, I began really to wonder
what profession I _was_ fitted to adorn.
+I become a Naturalist.+
It was at this time that the Captain of the _Sea-Mew_ offered me that
post of which I have before spoken. I accepted it, and began at once to
lower the record in sea-sickness, being never once well on board ship
_for three whole years_! It was a new experience, and altered me a good
deal. From being rowdy and idle I became quiet and abnormally diligent.
If you don't believe this, ask +H-xl-y+ (who is such fun!). On returning
to England I at once settled Down, and began to write books.
+The "Origin of Species."+
This work is my title to fame. It only took me thirty-three years and
six months to write. I felt quite glad when it was finished. People who
have read it tell me they feel the same, The row it caused was
frightful! If you want to see "+Soapy Sam's+" slashing _Quarterly
Review_ article pulverised, read +H-xl-y's+ reply. (But, query--isn't
this scientific log-rolling?) The remark which was made, after perusing
the book, by that eminent Botanist, my friend Professor +Hookey+,
was--"Walker!" But he was soon converted.
+My Way of Working.+
This, also, can't interest anybody, yet I give it. I get up at 4 A.M.,
and take a walk. From 7 to 10 I work. After dinner--with champagne--I
take another stroll. I have made most astonishing scientific discoveries
at this time. I could, point out the exact spot in the road where I
became convinced that _the whole country had been elevated sixteen feet
since the morning_! +H-xl-y+, who was with me, quite agreed, and said
that we must all have been elevated at the same time, without knowing
it.
+My Favourite Authors.+
These are, of course, +Lyell+ on _Lias_, and +Hookey+ on _Herbaceous
Foraminifera_. They are far superior to +Shakspeare+, who bores me. I
like novels, the trashier the better. Only let 'em end well, and I don't
care how they begin, or whether they begin at all. In newspapers, the
best part, I think, is the Parliamentary Debates. In reading them I have
often got valuable hints as to the "Origin of Speeches," and they
frequently afford conclusive evidence of the "Descent of Man." I thought
of bringing Parliamentary manners in as a chapter in my book on
"Earth-worms," but +H-xl-y+ advised me not to, and I didn't.
+My Nose.+
I think I've mentioned this feature before. It troubles me. It is
undoubtedly of a low type, yet it has survived! Why have I not been
fitted with a fitter one? It is another instance of the fact that
everything--including my fame--has come to me by sheer luck. +H-xl-y+
says "there's a Dar-winning modesty about this last remark." Also says,
"I've found the 'Philosopher's Tone.'" (What screaming fun +H-xl-y+
always is!)
+My Portraits.+
Perhaps I may be allowed to say one word as to the Photographs preceding
these volumes. _They aren't the least little bit like me_! In Volume One
I appear as the unmistakable "Country Butcher." In Volume Two I am "The
Gorilla Asleep," or "Beetle-brow Napping" (after a beetle-hunt,
probably). Volume Three represents me as the Typical Brigand of
Transpontine Melodrama.
Why, too, has the Photographer insisted on bringing out that unfortunate
feature of mine so prominently?
Why? indeed! Who nose?
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