198 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY cHAP. VIII 



quiet and within reacli of home and skilled medical 

 attendance. 



Saturday to Monday we were at Down, after six or 

 seven yeare' interruption of our wonted visits. It was 

 very pleasant if rather sad. Mrs. Darwin is wonderfully 

 well — naturally aged — but quite bright and cheerful as 

 usual. Old Parslow turned up on Sunday, just eighty, 

 but still fairly hale. Fuimus fuimus ! 



[Parslow was the old butler who had been in Mr. 

 Darwin's service for many years.] 



To HIS Daughter, Mrs. Eoller 



HoDESi.EA, Eastbourne, 

 Mmj 5, 1891. 



You dear people must have entered into a conspiracy, 

 as I had letters from all yesterday. I have never been so 

 set up before, and begin to think that fathei-s (like port) 

 must improve in quality with age. (No irreverent jokes 

 about their getting crusty, Miss.) 



Julian and Joyce taken together may perhaps give a 

 faint idea of my perfections as a child. I have not only 

 a distinct recollection of being noticed on the score of my 

 good looks, but my mother used to remind me painfully 

 of them in my later years, looking at me mournfully 

 and saying, " And you were such a pretty boy ! " 



Much as he would have liked to visit the Maloja 

 again this year, the state of his wife's health forbade 

 such a long journey. He writes just after his attack 

 of influenza to Sir M. Foster, who had been suffering 

 in the same way : — 



I 



II 



