428 MISCELLANEOUS, 1850-1860 



Mrs. Hooker. Being constrained to send his wife's second 

 letter, as he had sent her first, under cover to Hooker himself, 

 the Professor, while roundly asserting that * the first lieu- 

 tenant scorns the idea of being " worritted " about anything,' 

 took occasion to poke fun at his friend : * The obstinate manner 

 in which Mrs. Hooker and you go on refusing to give any 

 address leads us to believe that you are dwelling peripatetically 

 in a " Wan " with green door and brass knocker somewhere on 

 Wormwood Scrubbs, and that " Kew " is only a blind.' (See 

 * Life of T. H. H.,' i. ch. 17, under the erroneous date of 1861.) 



Kew Gardens : Saturday, November 19, 1859. 



MY DEAR YOUNG FRIEND, When you are wanted you 

 will find out where I am. Very soon I shall have a half 

 sheet of probabilities for you to calculate for me (in which 

 you may find that x = 0). 



I have elected to dwell in obscurity for past 3 months 

 and should like to continue to do so for the future, and shall 

 try to. I have neither house, wife; nor children, 1 and were I 

 not as uxorious as a guinea-pig, and philoprogenitive to a 

 fault, I should not sigh for change. I am living with my 

 ancestors who take their turns of taking to bed it being 

 now the Mater who is prostrate, with a bad leg. As to 

 going to town, I have not the smallest idea of doing so till 

 my wife comes to wake me up, which will be when the house 

 is ready for her and she for it, and Henslow ready to part 

 with her, he being absolutely lone now but for her. 



I have avoided suicide by working extremely hard with 

 my head, hands; and legs, have finished 2 papers for 

 Linn. Trans.; 2 for Linn.- Journal, the Tasmanian Essay 

 which has run to 130 pages, and the Flora of that ilk in 700. 

 Except a week in Norfolk where I geologised 3 days with 

 Lyell and Gunn, I have been nowhere but for an occasional 

 Sabbath (I forget how to spell it, but know when it comes) 

 to Hitcham. 2 



1 Mrs. Hooker and the children were staying with Professor Henslow at 

 Hitcham, while the house into which they were moving was being painted. 



2 A little later he tells Huxley how, besides his own ordinary duties and 

 works, he had in one week * revised proofs for five different authors' works, 

 contributed stuff for two lectures [by non-botanical friends] and precious stuff 

 too ! and read three authors' MSS., and reported on a long fossil paper.' 



Amid ' all this mental rumpus ' without apparent end which made him 



