not very fit for anything else.  You will say that it is bad to be so entirely absorbed in these things, and to that I heartily say Amen!—­but you might as well argue with a man who has just mounted the favourite for the “Oaks” that it is a bad thing to ride fast.  He admits that, and is off like a shot when the bell rings nevertheless.  My bell has rung some time, and thank God the winning post is in sight.

Give my kindest regards to the doctor and special love to all the children.  I send a trifle for my godson and some odds and ends in the book line, among other things a Shakespeare for yourself, dear Liz.

Believe me, ever your affectionate brother,

T.H.  Huxley.

[In December the Edinburgh chair was practically offered to him undivided; but by that time the London authorities thought they had better make it worth his while to stay at Jermyn Street, and with negotiations begun for this end he refused to stand for Edinburgh.  In the following spring, however, he was again approached from Edinburgh—­not so much to withdraw his refusal and again become a candidate, as to let it be made known that he would accept the chair if it were offered him.  But his position in London was now established; and he preferred to live in London on a bare sufficiency rather than to enjoy a larger income away from the centre of things.

Two letters to Tyndall, which refer to the division of labour in the science reviews for the “Westminster,” indicate very clearly the high pressure at which Huxley had already begun to work:—­]

Tenby, South Wales, October 22, 1854.

My dear Tyndall,

I was rejoiced to find you entertaining my proposition at all.  No one believes how hard you work more than I, but I was not going to be such a bad diplomatist as to put that at the head of my letter, and if I had thought that what I want you to do involved any great accession thereto, I think I could not have mustered up the face to ask you.  But really and truly, so long as it is confined to our own department it is no great affair.  You make me laugh at the long face you pull about the duties, based on my phrase.  The fact is, you notice what you like, and what you do not you leave undone, unless you get an editorial request to say something about a particular book.  The whole affair is entirely in your own hands—­at least it is in mine—­as I went upon my principle of having a row at starting...

Now here is an equitable proposition.  Look at my work.  I have a couple of monographs, odds and ends of papers for journals, a manual and some three courses of lectures to provide for this winter.  “My necessities are as great as thine,” as Sir Philip Sidney didn’t say, so be a brick, split the difference, and say you will be ready for the April number.  I will write and announce the fact to Chapman.

What idiots we all are to toil and slave at this pace.  I almost repent me of tempting you—­after all—­so I promise to hold on if you really think you will be overdoing it.