I have just played and won as hard a match against time as I ever knew in the days of my youth.  The proofs, happily, arrived by the first post, so I got to work at them before 9, polished them off by 12, and put them into the post (myself) by 12.5.  So you ought to have them by 6 P.M.  And, to make your mind easy, I have just telegraphed to you to say so.  But, Lord’s sake! let some careful eye run over the part of which I have had no revise—­for I am “capable de tout” in the way of overlooking errors.

I am very glad you like the thing.  The second instalment shall be no worse.

I grieve to say that my estimation of Balfour, as a thinker, sinks lower and lower, the further I go.

God help the people who think his book an important contribution to thought!  The Gigadibsians who say so are past divine assistance!

We are very glad to hear the grandchild and mother are getting on so well.

Ever yours very truly,

T.H.  Huxley.

Hodeslea, Eastbourne, March 8, 1895.

My dear Knowles,

The proofs have just arrived, but I am sorry to say that (I believe for the first time in our transactions) I shall have to disappoint you.

Just after I had sent off the manuscript influenza came down upon me with a swoop.  I went to bed and am there still, with no chance of quitting it in a hurry.  My wife is in the same case; item one of the maids.  The house is a hospital, and by great good fortune we have a capital nurse.

Doctor says its a mild type, in which case I wonder what severe types may be like. ("But in the matter of aches and pains, restless paroxysms of coughing and general incapacity, I can give it a high character for efficiency.” [To M. Foster, March 7.]) I find coughing continuously for fourteen hours or so a queer kind of mildness.

Could you put in an excuse on account of influenza?

Can’t write any more.

Ever yours,

T.H.  Huxley.

Hodeslea, Eastbourne, March 19, 1895.

My dear Knowles,

I am making use of the pen of my dear daughter and good nurse, in the first place to thank you for your cheque, in the second place to say that you must not look for the article this month.  I haven’t been out of bed since the 1st, but they are fighting a battle with bronchitis over my body.

Ever yours very faithfully,

For T.H.H., Sophy Huxley.

[The next four months were a period of painful struggle against disease, borne with a patience and gentleness which was rare even in the long experience of the trained nurses who tended him.  To natural toughness of constitution he added a power of will unbroken by the long strain; and for the sake of others to whom his life meant so much, he wished to recover and willed to do everything towards recovery.  And so he managed to throw off the influenza and the severe bronchitis which attended it.  What was marvellous at his age, and indeed would scarcely have been expected in a young man, most serious mischief induced by the bronchitis disappeared.  By May he was strong enough to walk from the terrace to the lawn and his beloved saxifrages, and to remount the steps to the house without help.