Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume II Part 42

[...Then as regards women's powers. The Professor said he did not believe in their ever succeeding in a compet.i.tion with men. Then he went on:--] "I can't help looking at women with something of the eye of a physiologist. Twenty years ago I thought the womanhood of England was going to the dogs," [but now, he said, he observed a wonderful change for the better. We asked to what he attributed it. Was it to lawn tennis and the greater variety of bodily exercises?] "Partly,"

[he answered,] "but much more to their having more PURSUITS--more to interest them and to occupy their thoughts and time."

[The following letter bears upon the question of employing retired engineer officers in administrative posts in the Science and Art Department:--]

The Rookery, Lynton, September 19, 1882.

My dear Donnelly,

Your letter seems to have arrived here the very day I left for Whitby, whither I had to betake myself to inspect a weir, so I did not get it until my return last night.

I am extremely sorry to hear of the possibility of Martin's giving up his post. He took so much interest in the work and was so very pleasant to deal with, that I do not think we shall easily find any one to replace him.

If you will find another R.E. at all like him, in Heaven's name catch him and put him in, job or no job.

The objection to a small clerk is that we want somebody who knows how to deal with men, and especially young men on the one hand, and especially cantankerous (more or less) old scientific buffers on the other.

The objection to a man of science is that (1) we want a man of business and not a m.s., and (2) that no man scientifically worth having that I know of is likely to take such an office.

"As at present advised" I am all for an R.E., so I cannot have the pleasure even of trying to convert you.

With our united kindest regards,

Ever yours very faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

I return next Monday.

[Two letters of thanks follow, one at the beginning of the year to Mr.

Herbert Spencer for the gift of a very fine photograph of himself; the other, at the end of the year, to Mr. (afterwards Sir John) Skelton, for his book on Mary Queen of Scots and the Casket Letters.

As to the former, it must be premised that Mr. Spencer abhorred exaggeration and inexact talk, and would ruthlessly p.r.i.c.k the airy bubbles which endued the conversation of the daughters of the house with more buoyancy than strict logic, a gift which, he averred, was denied to woman.]

4 Marlborough Place, January 25, 1882.

My dear Spencer,

Best thanks for the photograph. It is very good, though there is just a touch of severity in the eye. We shall hang it up in the dining-room, and if anybody is guilty of exaggerated expressions or bad logic (five womenkind habitually sit round that table), I trust they will feel that that eye is upon them.

Ever yours very faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

4 Marlborough Place, January 31, 1882.

My dear Skelton,

If I may not thank you for the book you have been kind enough to send me, I may at any rate wish you and Mrs. Skelton a happy New Year and many on 'em.

I am going to read your vindication of Mary Stuart as soon as I can.

Hitherto I am sorry to say I have cla.s.sed her with Eve, Helen, Cleopatra, Delilah, and sundry other glorious --s who have lured men to their destruction.

But I am open to conviction, and ready to believe that she blew up her husband only a little more thoroughly than other women do, by reason of her keener perception of logic.

Ever yours very faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

CHAPTER 2.14.

1883.

[The pressure of official work, which had been constantly growing since 1880, reached its highest point in 1883. Only one scientific memoir was published by him this year, and then no more for the next four years. (Contributions to Morphology, Ichthyopsida, Number 2. On the Oviducts of Osmerus; with remarks on the relations of the Teleostean with the Ganoid Fishes "Proceedings of the Zoological Society" 1883 pages 132-139). The intervals of lecturing and examining were chiefly filled by fishery business, from which, according to his usual custom when immersed in any investigation, he chose the subject, "Oysters and the Oyster Question," both for his Friday evening discourse at the Royal Inst.i.tution on May 11, and for his course to Working Men between January 8 and February 12.

There are the usual notes of all seasons at all parts of England. A deserted hotel at Cromer in January was uninviting.]

My windows look out on a wintry sea, and it is bitter cold.

Notwithstanding, a large number of the aquatic gentleman to whom I shall have the pleasure of listening, by and by, are loafing against the railings opposite, as only fishermen can loaf.

[In April he had been ill, and his wife begged him to put off some business which had to be done at York. But unless absolutely ordered to bed by his doctor, nothing would induce him to put personal convenience before public duty. However, he took his son to look after him.]

I am none the worse for my journey [he writes from York], rather the better; so Clark is justified, and I should have failed in my duty if I had not come. H. Looks after me almost as well as you could do.

[To make amends, fishery business in the west country during a fine summer had] "a good deal of holiday in it," [though a cross journey at the beginning of August from Abergavenny to Totness made him write:--]

If ever (except to-morrow, by the way) I travel within measurable distance of a Bank Holiday by the Great Western, may jacka.s.ses sit on my grandmother's grave.

[As the business connected with the Inspectors.h.i.+p had been enlarged in the preceding years by exhibitions at Norwich and Edinburgh, so it was enlarged this year, and to a still greater extent, by the Fisheries Exhibition in London. This involved upon him as Commissioner, not only the organisation of the Conference on Fish Diseases and the paper on the Diseases of Fish already mentioned, but administration, committee meetings, and more--a speech on behalf of the Commissioners in reply to the welcome given them by the Prince of Wales at the opening of the Exhibition. On the following day he expressed his feelings at this mode of spending his time in a letter to Sir M. Foster.]

I am dog-tired with yesterday's function. Had to be at the Exhibition in full fig at 10 a.m., and did not get home from the Fishmongers'

dinner till 1.20 this morning.

Will you tell me what all this has to do with my business in life, and why the last fragments of a misspent life that are left to me are to be frittered away in all this drivel?

Yours savagely,

T.H. Huxley.

[Later in the year, also, he had to serve on another Fishery Commission much against his will, though on the understanding that, in view of his other engagements, he need not attend all the sittings.

A more satisfactory result of the Exhibition was that he found himself brought into close contact with several of the great city companies, whose enormous resources he had long been trying, not without some success, to enlist on behalf of technical and scientific education.

Among these may be noted the Fishmongers, the Mercers, who had already interested themselves in technical education, and gave their hall for the meetings of the City and Guilds Council, of which Huxley was an active member; the Clothworkers, in whose schools he distributed the prizes this year; and, not least, the Salters, who presented him with their freedom on November 13. Their master, Mr. J.W. Clark, writing in August, after Huxley had accepted their proposal, says: "I think you must admit that the City Companies have yielded liberally to the gentle compa.s.sion you have exercised on them. So far from helping you to act the traitor, we propose to legitimise your claim for education, which several of us shall be willing to unite with you in promoting."

(See above.)

The crowning addition, however, to Huxley's official work was the Presidency of the Royal Society. He had resigned the Secretarys.h.i.+p in 1880, after holding office for nine years under three Presidents--Airy, Hooker, and Spottiswoode. Spottiswoode, like Hooker, was a member of the x Club, and was regarded with great affection and respect by Huxley, who in 1887 wrote of him to Mr. John Morley:--]

It is quite absurd you don't know Spottiswoode, and I shall do both him and you a good turn by bringing you together. He is one of my best friends, and comes under the A1 cla.s.s of "people with whom you may go tiger-hunting."