MEMOT?IR. Ixxv 
he lived close by. I had dined there before and knew the family; so accepted. 
He lives in very plain style. We had a little cold mutton and a meat and 
potato pasty, with beer. Colenso was very talkative, and appeared in a hope- 
ful, pleasant frame of mind ; quite different from the thoughtful, pre-occupied 
state he was in when Dr. and Mrs. Hooker, and Wallace and I dined with him 
eight months ago. He said things looked now very promising for the triumph 
of truth and the overthrow of superstition, owing to the recent decision in the 
Essays and Reviews appeal case. He should now proceed to the Cape in the 
autumn, and conduct his case against the Bishop of Cape Town, and he 
intended (in the event of his success, which he seems not to doubt of for a 
moment) ta pursue vigorously a new method of missionising at Natal. Teach- 
ing no dogmas, but in their place promoting secular education, science, 
rational religion and morality. As to his book, that must be finished at his 
leisure.”’ 
Dr. Hooker’s prediction that Bates must wait several years 
before remunerative recognition came was happily falsified, thanks 
to his large-hearted and keen-eyed publisher. 
In the early part of 1864 the assistant-secretaryship of the 
Royal Geographical Society fell vacant through the premature 
death of Mr. Greenfield ; and the condition into which the Society’s 
affairs had lapsed, through lack of proper administration, rendered 
the appointment of an efficient successor of great importance. 
“* At this juncture the strong recommendation of Mr. Murray, the publisher, 
was the fortunate circumstance that determined the election of Mr. Bates of 
whose merits, otherwise than as an enterprising traveller, as a naturalist of high 
distinction, and as a charming writer, most of us on the council were ignorant. 
Mr. Murray assured us, 1n addition to all this, of Mr Bates’s methodical and 
orderly ways, and of his business-like habits, without which the other qualifi- 
cations, high and rare as they are, would not have sufficed to make a good 
seeretary.”’ * 
For this, as the future career of the Society showed, geographical 
science is lastingly indebted to the late John Murray. The 
absorbing demands on the time of both men caused them common 
regret at the lessened frequency of their intercourse, but> the 
friendship was broken only by death, Bates always speaking of his 
publisher and patron—who survived him only a few weeks—in 
terms of deep affection. 
The post was no sinecure. Presidents might come and go, and 
the Zersonnel of the council be changed from time to time, but the 
assistant-secretary remained the permanent directing mind of the 
Society ; superintending the immense correspondence with travellers 
and geographers all over the world; the arrangement of even- 
* Mr. Francis Galton, F.R.S., in Proceedings of Royal Geog. Soc., April 1892. 
