Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume II Part 55

Moreover, there is Catherine of Siena, of whom I am reading a delightful Catholic life by an Italian father of the Oratory. She died 500 years ago, but she was one of twenty-five children, and I think some of them must have settled in Kent and allied themselves with the Heathorns. Otherwise, I don't see why her method of writing to the Pope should have been so much like the way my daughters (especially the youngest) write to their holy father.

I wish she had not had the stigmata--I am afraid there must have been a LEETLE humbug about the business--otherwise she was a very remarkable person, and you need not be ashamed of the relations.h.i.+p.

I suppose we shall get to Florence some time this week; the address was sent to you before we left Rome--Hotel Milano, Via Cerretani. But I am loth to leave this lovely air in which, I do believe, I am going to pick up at last. The misfortune is that we did not intend to stay here more than three days, and so had letters sent to Florence.

Everybody told us it would be very cold, and, as usual, everybody told taradiddles.

M-- unites in fondest love to you all.

Ever your loving father,

T.H. Huxley.

[To his son.]

Siena, February 25, 1885.

...If you had taken to physical science it would have been delightful for me for us to have worked together, and I am half inclined to take to history that I may earn that pleasure. I could give you some capital wrinkles about the physical geography and prehistoric history (excuse bull) of Italy for a Roman History primer! Joking apart, I believe that history might be, and ought to be, taught in a new fas.h.i.+on so as to make the meaning of it a process of evolution--intelligible to the young. The Italians have been doing wonders in the last twenty years in prehistoric archaeology, and I have been greatly interested in acquainting myself with the general results of their work.

We moved here last Friday, and only regret that the reports of the weather prevented us from coming sooner. More than 1000 feet above the sea, in the midst of a beautiful hill country, and with the clearest and purist air we have met with in Italy, Siena is perfectly charming.

The window is wide open and I look out upon a vast panorama, something like that of the Surrey hills, only on a larger scale--"Raw Siena,"

"Burnt Siena," in the foreground, where the colour of the soil is not hidden by the sage green olive foliage, purple mountains in the distance.

The old town itself is a marvel of picturesque crookedness, and the cathedral a marvel. M. and I have been devoting ourselves this morning to St. Catarina and Sodoma's pictures.

I am reading a very interesting life of her by Capecelatro, and if my liver continues out of order, may yet turn Dominican.

However, the place seems to be doing me good, and I may yet, like another person, decline to be a monk.

[To his daughter, Mrs. Roller.]

March 8.

The great merit of Rome is that you have never seen the end of it. M.

and I have not worked very hard at our galleries and churches, but I have got so far as a commencing dislike for the fine arts generally.

Perhaps after a week or two I shall take to science out of sheer weariness.

Hotel de Milano, Florence, March 12, 1885.

My dear Foster,

My wife and I send you our hearty good wishes (antedated by four days). I am not sure we ought not to offer our best thanks to your mother for providing us with as staunch a friend as people ever were blessed with. It is possible that she did not consider that point nine and forty years ago; but we are just as grateful as if she had gone through it all on our own account.

We start on our way homeward to-morrow or next day, by Bologna to Venice, and then to England by the way we came--taking it easy. The Brenner is a long way round and I hear very cold. I think we may stay a few days at Lugano, which I liked very much when there before.

Florence is very charming, but there is not much to be said for the climate. My wife has been bothered with sore throat, to which she is especially liable, ever since we have been here. Old residents console her with the remark that Florentine sore throat is a regular thing in the spring. The alternations of heat and cold are detestable. So we stand thus--Naples, bad for both--Rome, good for her, bad for me--Florence, bad for her, baddish for me. Venice has to be tried, but stinks and mosquitoes are sure to render it impossible as soon as the weather is warm. Siena is the only place that suited both of us, and I don't think that would exactly answer to live in. Nothing like foreign travel for making one content with home.

I shall have to find a country lot suited to my fortunes when I am paid off. Couldn't you let us have your gardener's cottage? my wife understands poultry and I shall probably have sufficient strength to open the gate and touch my hat to the Dons as they drive up. I am afraid E. is not steady enough for waiting-maid or I would offer her services.

...I am rejoiced to hear that the lessons and the questions are launched. [The new edition of the "Elementary Physiology."] They loom large to me as gigantic undertakings, in which a dim and speculative memory suggests I once took part, but probably it is a solar myth, and I am too sluggish to feel much compunction for the extra trouble you have had.

Perhaps I shall revive when my foot is on my native heath in the shady groves of the Evangelist. [St. John's Wood.]

My wife is out photograph hunting--nothing diminishes her activity--otherwise she would join in love and good wishes to Mrs.

Foster and yourself.

Ever yours,

T.H. Huxley.

[The two worst and most depressing periods of this vain pilgrimage in pursuit of health were the stay at Rome and at Florence. At the latter town he was inexpressibly ill and weak; but his daily life was brightened by the sympathy and active kindness of Sir Spencer Walpole, who would take him out for short walks, talking as little as possible, and s.h.i.+eld him from the well-meant but tactless attentions of visitors who would try to] "rouse him and do him good" [by long talks on scientific questions.

His physical condition, indeed, was little improved.]

As for my unsatisfactory carca.s.s [he writes on March 6, to Sir J.

Donnelly], there seems nothing the matter with it now except that the brute objects to work. I eat well, drink well, sleep well, and have no earthly ache, pain or discomfort. I can walk for a couple of hours or more without fatigue. But half an hour's talking wearies me inexpressibly, and "saying a few words," would finish me for the day.

For all that, I do not mean to confess myself finally beaten till I have had another try.

[That is to say, he was still bent upon delivering his regular course of lectures at South Kensington as soon as he returned, in spite of the remonstrances of his wife and his friends.

In the same letter he contrasts Florence with Siena and its] "fresh, elastic air," [its] "lovely country that reminds one of a magnified version of the Surrey weald." [The Florentine climate was trying. (A week later he writes to Sir J. Evans--] "I begin to look forward with great satisfaction to the equability of English weather--to that dear little island where doors and windows shut close--where fires warm without suffocating--where the chief business of the population in the streets is something else than expectoration--and where I shall never see fowl with salad again. You perceive I am getting better by this prolonged growl...But half an hour's talking knocks me up, and I am such an effete creature that I think of writing myself p.R.S. With a small p.") "And then there is the awful burden of those miles of 'treasures of art.'" [He had been to the Uffizii;] "and there is the Pitti staring me in the face like drear fate. Why can't I have the moral courage to come back and say I haven't seen it? I should be the most distinguished of men."

[There is another reference to Gordon:--]

What an awful muddle you are all in in the bright little, tight little island. I hate the sight of the English papers. The only good thing that has met my eye lately is a proposal to raise a memorial to Gordon. I want to join in whatever is done, and unless it will be time enough when I return, I shall be glad if you will put me down for 5 pounds to whatever is the right scheme.

[The following to his daughter, Mrs. Roller, describes the stay in Florence.]

Hotel de Milano, Florence, March 7, 1885.

We have been here more than a week and have discovered two things, first that the wonderful "art treasures," of which all the world has heard, are a sore burden to the conscience if you don't go to see them, and an awful trial to the back and legs if you do; and thirdly, that the climate is productive of a peculiar kind of relaxed throat.

M.'s throat discovered it, but on inquiry, it proved to be a law of nature, at least, so the oldest inhabitants say. We called on them to-day.

But it is a lovely place for all that, far better than Rome as a place to live in, and full of interesting things. We had a morning at the Uffizii the other day, and came back with minds enlarged and backs broken. To-morrow we contemplate attacking the Pitti, and doubt not the result will be similar. By the end of the week our minds will probably be so large, and the small of the back so small that we should probably break if we stayed any longer, so think it prudent to be off to Venice. Which Friday is the day we go, reaching Venice Sat.u.r.day or Sunday. Pension Suisse, Ca.n.a.l Grande, as before. And mind we have letters waiting for us there, or your affectionate Pater will emulate the historical "c.o.c.ky."

I got much better at Siena, probably the result of the medicinal nature of the city, the name of which, as a well-instructed girl like you knows, is derived from the senna, which grows wild there, and gives the soil its peculiar pigmentary character.

But unfortunately I forgot to bring any with me, and the effect went off during the first few days of our residence here, when I was, as the Italians say, "molto ba.s.so nel bocca." However I am picking up again now, and if people wouldn't call upon us, I feel there might be a chance for me.

I except from that remark altogether the dear Walpoles who are here and as nice as ever. Mrs. Walpole's mother and sister live here, and the W's are on a visit to them but leave on Wednesday. They go to Venice, but only for two or three days.

We shall probably stay about a fortnight in Venice, and then make our way back by easy stages to London. We are wae to see you all again.

Doctor M-- [Mrs. Huxley] has just been called in to a case of sore throat in the person of a young lady here, and is quite happy. The young lady probably will not be, when she finds herself converted into a sort of inverted mustard-pot, with the mustard outside! She is one of a very nice family of girls, who (by contrast) remind us of own.

Ever your loving (to all) father,

Pater.

Mrs. M.-- has just insisted on seeing this letter.