132 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY cHAP. VI 



rot and die thau to be kept wliole and lively by State 

 interference, partly from tbe blind opponents of properly 

 conducted physiological experimentation, who prefer that 

 men should suffer than rabbits or dogs, and partly from 

 those who for other but not less powerful motives hate 

 everything which contributes to prove the value of strictly 

 scientific methods of enquiry in all those questions which 

 affect the welfare of society. I sincerely trust that the 

 good sense of the meeting over which your Lordship wiU 

 preside will preserve it from being influenced by those 

 unworthy antagonisms, and that the just and benevolent 

 enterprise you have undertaken may have a happy issue. 

 — I am, my Lord Mayor, your obedient servant, 



Thomas H. Huxley. 



Hotel Kursaal, Maloja, Haute Engadine, 



July 8, 1889. 



My dear Lankester — Many thanks for your letter. 

 I was rather anxious as to the result of the meeting, 

 knowing the malice and subtlety of the Philistines, but 

 as it turned out they were effectually snubbed. I was 

 glad to see your allusion to Coleridge's impertinences. 

 It will teach him to think twice before he abuses his 

 position again. I do not understand Stead's position in 

 the Pall Mall. He snarls but does not bite. 



I am glad that the audience (I judge from the Times 

 report) seemed to take the points of my letter, and live 

 in hope that when I see last week's Spectator I shall find 

 Hutton frantic. 



This morning a letter marked " Immediate " reached 

 me from Bourne, date July 3. I am afraid he does not 

 read the papers or he would have known it was of no 

 use to appeal to me in an emergency. I am writing to 

 him. — Ever yours very faithfully, T. H. Huxley. 



On his return to England, however, a fortnight of 

 London, interrupted though it was by a brief visit to 



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