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1891 BRITISH ASSOCIATION AT OXFORD 327 



Huxley," ^ he sank deeper into his chair upon the very- 

 front of the platform and restlessly tapped his foot. 

 His situation was an unenviable one. He had to thank 

 an ex-Prime Minister of England and present Chancellor 

 of Oxford University for an address, the sentiments of 

 which were directly against those he himself had been 

 maintaining for twenty-five years. He said afterwards 

 that when the proofs of the ]\Iarquis's address were put 

 into his hands the day before, he realised that he had 

 before him a most delicate and diflficult task. Lord 

 Kelvin (Sir William Thomson) one of the most dis- 

 tinguished living physicists, first moved the vote of 

 thanks, but his reception was nothing to the tremendous 

 applause which greeted Huxley in the heart of that 

 University whose cardinal principles he had so long 

 been opposing. Considerable anxiety had been felt by 

 his friends lest his voice should fail to fill the theatre, 

 for it had signally failed during his Romanes Lecture 

 delivered in Oxford the year before, but when Huxley 

 arose he reminded you of a venerable gladiator returning 

 to the arena after years of absence. He raised his figure 

 and his voice to its full height, and, with one foot 

 turned over the edge of the step, veiled an unmistakable 

 and vigorous protest in the most gracious and dignified 

 speech of thanks. 



Throughout the subsequent special sessions of this 

 meeting Huxley could not appear. He gave the im- 

 pression of being aged but not infirm, and no one realised 

 that he had spoken his last word as champion of the 

 law of evolution.2 



Such criticism of the address as he actually 

 expressed reappears in the leading article, " Past and 

 Present," which he wrote for Nature to celebrate the 



' This phrase was actually used by the Times. 

 ^ See, however, p. 342. 



