INTRODUCTION vii 



tion of modern zoology," was published by the Royal Society 

 in 1849 ; two years later he was elected a Fellow, and in the 

 following year (1852), when but twenty-seven years of age, he 

 was awarded the Gold Medal of this same society. 



Resigning from the naval service he endeavored to find 

 congenial work, preferably in London. But an opening did 

 not occur for some time. Deluged with invitations " while 

 not earning enough to pay cab-fare," rejected as an applicant 

 for a professorship by Toronto, Aberdeen, Cork, and King's 

 College, tormented by illness, selling his Royal Medal with its 

 two hundred and fifty dollars' worth of gold to assist a 

 brother's widow, Huxley never gave up the fight. When 

 down in the depths, with characteristic boldness and opti- 

 mism he wrote the following : " I don't know and I don't care 

 whether I shall ever be what is called a great man. I will 

 leave my mark somewhere, and it shall be clear and distinct 



and free from abominable blur of cant, humbug and self- 

 seeking." 



But better times came. In 1854 he was appointed Pro- 

 fessor of Natural History and Paleontology in the Royal 

 School of Mines, and Curator of Fossils in the Museum of 

 Practical Geology. His financial circumstances then per- 

 mitted him to marry, after long years of waiting, Henrietta 

 Anne Heathorn of Sidney, whom he had met in Australia 

 while on the cruise of the Rattlesnake. Other important 

 appointments followed, among which were the position of 

 Examiner in the University of London, the Fullerian Profes- 

 sorship in the Royal Institution, and the Croonian Lecture- 

 ship. Between 1862 and 1884 Huxley served on ten royal 



