340 DIRECTOR-GENERAL OF THE SURVEY CHAP, x 



whole, I have always been a pretty good hand at 

 scientific dreaming, and I believe this dream will come 

 true, if I can only find time to work it out.' 



A heartrending tragedy occurred during the autumn 

 of 1876 in the family at Dolaucothi. The butler 

 shot Mr. Johnes, severely wounded Mrs. Cookman, 

 and afterwards committed suicide. As these were 

 Ramsay's dearest friends, the event was a crush- 

 ing trial for him, and in some measure saddened all 

 his later life. His diary and his letters of this period 

 afford touching proofs of the tender affection and deep 

 sympathy of his nature. 



But the vortex of London life swept him on. ' We 

 are all well enough,' he wrote later in the year to his 

 Dolaucothi friends, ' and, as usual, occupied with those 

 innumerable busynesses which take up so much of 

 people's lives in London, that anything like leisure 

 becomes an unknown quantity. Of course, I am at 

 work on a book in scraps of time, and if it were only 

 finished I fancy I might breathe more freely, but I 

 know that something else is sure to succeed it. The 

 Survey men both of Scotland and Ireland are crying 

 to me " Come," and go to both I must, some time 

 this year. 



* The invasion of scientific foreigners has also set 

 in with unusual severity at an earlier season than 

 usual. I invite them to dinner ; some of them cannot 

 come, and some do come, and then we have a Babel of 

 languages. To add to that, we have got a German 

 housemaid who as yet speaks no English. 



' Since writing that last word, dispatches have 

 arrived from Nova Scotia requiring immediate atten- 

 tion, the writer asking a letter from me, which, being 

 shown, shall stimulate the Governor of Newfoundland 



