i88g AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 245 



for the evolution of tent-pegs. What wonderful people there 

 are in the world ! 



Many thanks for calling my attention to " Antiqua Mater." 

 I will look it up. I have such a rooted objection to returning 

 books, that I never borrow one or allow anybody to lend me 

 one if I can help it. 



I hear that Wace is to have another innings, and I am very 

 glad of it, as it will give me the opportunity of putting the case 

 once more as a connected argument. 



It is Baur's great merit to have seen that the key to the 

 problem of Christianity lies in the Epistle to the Galatians. No 

 doubt he and his followers rather overdid the thing, but that is 

 always the way with those who take up a new idea. 



I have had for some time the notion of dealing with the 

 Three great myths" i. Creation; 2. Fall; 3. Deluge; but I 

 suspect I am getting to the end of my tether physically, and 

 shall have to start for the Engadine in another month's time. 



Many thanks for your congratulations about my daughter's 

 marrrage. No two people could be better suited for one another, 

 and there is a charming little grand-daughter of the first mar- 

 riage to be cared for. Ever yours very faithfully, 



T. H. HUXLEY. 



One more piece of writing dates from this time. He 

 writes to his wife on March 2 : 



A man who is bringing out a series of portraits of celebrities, 

 with a sketch of their career attached, has bothered me out of my 

 life for something to go with my portrait, and to escape the 

 abominable bad taste of some of the notices, I have done that. 

 I shall show it you before it goes back to Engel in proof. 



This sketch of his life is the brief autobiography which 

 is printed at the beginning of vol i. of the Collected Essays. 

 He was often pressed, both by friends and by strangers, to 

 give them some more autobiography ; but moved either by 

 dislike of any approach to egotism, or by the knowledge that 

 if biography is liable to give a false impression, autobiog- 

 raphy may leave one still more false, he constantly refused 

 to do so especially so long as he had capacity for useful work. 

 I found, however, among his papers, an entirely different 

 sketch of his early life, half-a-dozen sheets describing the 

 time he spent in the East end, with an almost Carlylese 



