xiv INTRODUCTION 



M therefore excludes him from the dining-room and 



all those opportunities of higher education which he would 

 have in my house." Frequently one finds a description of 

 some event, so vividly done that the mere reading of it 

 seems like a real experience. An account of Tennyson's 

 burial in Westminster is a typical bit of description: 



Bright sunshine streamed through the windows of the nave, 

 while the choir was in half gloom, and as each shaft of light 

 illuminated the flower-covered bier as it slowly travelled on, one 

 thought of the bright succession of his works 'between the dark- 

 ness before and the darkness after. I am glad to say that the 

 Royal Society was represented by four of its chief officers, and 

 nine of the commonalty, including myself. Tennyson has a right 

 to that, as the first poet since Lucretius who has understood the 

 drift of science. 



No parts of the Life and Letters are more enjoyable 

 than those concerning the " Happy Family," as a friend 

 Family f Huxley's names his household. His family of 

 Uie< seven children found their father a most engag- 



ing friend and companion. He could tell them wonderful 

 sea stories and animal stories and could draw fascinating 

 pictures. His son writes of how when he was ill with scarlet 

 fever he used to look forward to his father's home-com- 

 ing. " The solitary days for I was the first victim in 

 the family were very long, and I looked forward with 

 intense interest to one half-hour after dinner, when he 

 would come up and draw scenes from the history of a re- 

 markable bull-terrier and his family that went to the sea- 

 side in a most human and child-delighting manner. I have 

 seldom suffered a greater disappointment than when, one 

 evening, I fell asleep just before this fairy half-hour, and 

 lost it out of my life." 



The account of the comradeship between Huxley and 

 his wife reads like a good old-time romance. He was at- 

 tracted to her at first by her ''simplicity and directness 

 united with an unusual degree of cultivation," Huxley's 

 son writes. On her he depended for advice in his work, 

 and for companionship at home and abroad when wander- 

 ing in search of health in Italy and Switzerland. When 

 he had been separated from her for some time, he wrote, 



