Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume II Part 57

My dear Flower,

I am particularly glad to hear that things went right on Sat.u.r.day, as my conscience rather p.r.i.c.ked me for my desertion of the meeting.

[British Museum Trustees, July 25.] But it was the only chance we had of seeing our young married couple before the vacation--and you will rapidly arrive at a comprehension of the cogency of THAT argument now.

I will think well of your kind words about the Presidency. If I could only get rid of my eternal hypochondria the work of the Royal Society would seem little enough. At present, I am afraid of everything that involves responsibility to a degree that is simply ridiculous. I only wish I could s.h.i.+rk the inquiries I am going off to hold in Devons.h.i.+re!

P.R.S. in a continual blue funk is not likely to be either dignified or useful; and unless I am in a better frame of mind in October I am afraid I shall have to go.

Ever yours very faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

[A few weeks at Filey in August did him some good at first; and he writes cheerfully of his lodgings in] "a place with the worst-fitting doors and windows, and the hardest chairs, sofas, and beds known to my experience."

[He continues:--]

I am decidedly picking up. The air here is wonderful, and as we can set good cookery against hard lying (I don't mean in the Munchausen line) the consequent appet.i.te becomes a mild source of gratification.

Also, I have not met with more than two people who knew me, and that in my present state is a negative gratification of the highest order.

[Later on he tried Bournemouth; being no better, he thought of an entirely new remedy.]

The only thing I am inclined to do is to write a book on Miracles. I think it might do good and unload my biliary system.

[In this state of indecision, so unnatural to him, he writes to Sir M.

Foster:--]

I am anything but clear as to the course I had best take myself. While undoubtedly much better in general health, I am in a curious state of discouragement, and I should like nothing better than to remain buried here (Bournemouth) or anywhere else, out of the way of trouble and responsibility. It distresses me to think that I shall have to say something definite about the Presidency at the meeting of the Council in October.

[Finally on October 20, he writes:--]

I think the lowest point of my curve of ups and downs is gradually rising--but I have by no means reached the point when I can cheerfully face anything. I got over the Board of Visitors (two hours and a half) better than I expected, but my deafness was a horrid nuisance.

I believe the strings of the old fiddle will tighten up a good deal, if I abstain from attempting to play upon the instrument at present--but that a few jigs now will probably ruin that chance.

But I will say my final word at our meeting next week. I would rather step down from the chair than dribble out of it. Even the devil is in the habit of departing with a "melodious tw.a.n.g," and I like the precedent.

[So at the Anniversary meeting on November 30, he definitely announced in his last Presidential address his resignation of that] "honourable office" [which he could no longer retain] "with due regard to the interests of the Society, and perhaps, I may add, of self-preservation."

I am happy to say [he continued] that I have good reason to believe that, with prolonged rest--by which I do not mean idleness, but release from distraction and complete freedom from those lethal agencies which are commonly known as the pleasures of society--I may yet regain so much strength as is compatible with advancing years. But in order to do so, I must, for a long time yet, be content to lead a more or less anchorite life. Now it is not fitting that your President should be a hermit, and it becomes me, who have received so much kindness and consideration from the Society, to be particularly careful that no sense of personal gratification should delude me into holding the office of its representative one moment after reason and conscience have pointed out my incapacity to discharge the serious duties which devolve upon the President, with some approach to efficiency.

I beg leave, therefore, with much grat.i.tude for the crowning honour of my life which you have conferred upon me, to be permitted to vacate the chair of the Society as soon as the business of this meeting is at an end.

[The settlement of the terms of the pension upon which, after thirty-one years of service under Government, he retired from his Professors.h.i.+p at South Kensington and the Inspectors.h.i.+p of Fisheries, took a considerable time. The chiefs of his own department, that of Education, wished him to retire upon full pay, 1500 pounds. The Treasury were more economical. It was the middle of June before the pension they proposed of 1200 pounds was promised; the end of July before he knew what conditions were attached to it.

On June 20, he writes to Mr. Mundella, Vice-President of the Council:--]

My dear Mundella,

Accept my warmest thanks for your good wishes, and for all the trouble you have taken on my behalf. I am quite ashamed to have been the occasion of so much negotiation.

Until I see the Treasury letter, I am unable to judge what the 1200 pounds may really mean [I.e. Whether he was to draw his salary of 200 pounds as Dean or not.], but whatever the result, I shall never forget the kindness with which my chiefs have fought my battle.

I am, yours very faithfully,

T.H. Huxley.

[On July 16, he writes to Sir M. Foster:--]

The blessed Treasury can't make up their minds whether I am to be asked to stay on as Dean or not, and till they do, I can't shake off any of my fetters.

[Early in the year he had written to Sir John Donnelly of the necessity of resigning:--]

Nevertheless [he added], it will be a sad day for me when I find myself no longer ent.i.tled to take part in the work of the schools in which you and I have so long been interested.

[But that "sad day" was not to come yet. His connection with the Royal College of Science was not entirely severed. He was asked to continue, as Honorary Dean, a general supervision of the work he had done so much to organise, and he kept the t.i.tle of Professor of Biology, his successors in the practical work of the chair being designated a.s.sistant Professors.]

"I retain," [he writes,] "general superintendence as part of the great unpaid."

It is a comfort [he writes to his son] to have got the thing settled.

My great desire at present is to be idle, and I am now idle with a good conscience.

[Later in the year, however, a change of Ministry having taken place, he was offered a Civil List Pension of 300 pounds a year by Lord Iddesleigh. He replied accepting it:--]

4 Marlborough Place, November 24, 1885.

My dear Lord Iddesleigh,

Your letters of the 20th November reached me only last night, and I hasten to thank you for both of them. I am particularly obliged for your kind reception of what I ventured to say about the deserts of my old friend Sir Joseph Hooker.

With respect to your lords.h.i.+p's offer to submit my name to Her Majesty for a Civil List Pension, I can but accept a proposal which is in itself an honour, and which is rendered extremely gratifying to me by the great kindness of the expressions in which you have been pleased to embody it.

I am happy to say that I am getting steadily better at last, and under the regime of "peace with honour" that now seems to have fallen to my lot, I may fairly hope yet to do a good stroke of work or two.

I remain, my dear Lord Iddesleigh, faithfully yours,

T.H. Huxley.

4 Marlborough Place, November 24, 1885.

My dear Donnelly,

I believe you have been at work again!

Lord Iddesleigh has written to me to ask if I will be recommended for a Civil List Pension of 300 pounds a year, a very pretty letter, not at all like the Treasury masterpiece you admired so much.

Didn't see why I should not accept, and have accepted accordingly.

When the announcement comes out the Liberals will say the Tory Government have paid me for attacking the G.O.M.! to a dead certainty.

Ever yours,