2 THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 



straightforwardness, unrivalled powers of criticism and 

 generalization, and an equally remarkable faculty of rapid 

 intuition, of which last he says : " If my time were to 

 come over again, there is nothing I would less will- 

 ingly part with than my inheritance of mother wit." To 

 these must be added, as supposed endowments from the 

 paternal side, a sufficiently hot temper, and a vast 

 tenacity of purpose, " which unfriendly observers some- 

 times call obstinacy," but without which he could never 

 have persisted in the upward climb to distinction which 

 in its earlier stages often necessitated — to use his own 

 phrase — "hanging on by the eyelids." From his father 

 was inherited, too, the artistic power which rendered 

 such signal service to his scientific work, and which 

 made his lightning blackboard sketches during lecture 

 both the despair and delight of his pupils. His artistic 

 faculties also included an intense appreciation of music, 

 which his strenuous life enabled him all too infrequently 

 to gratify, as well as very strong literary tastes. 



Had Huxley been the eldest child, he might perhaps 

 have become an " infant phenomenon," but as the seventh, 

 this stunting experience, fortunately for science and the 

 world at large was spared him. His experience of 

 " unreformed public school-life," between the ages of 

 eight and ten, leaves little that is pleasant to record, the 

 memory of a successful fight being the only illuminating 

 spot. 



In 1835 his father returned to the original home at 

 Coventry, to become manager of a savings bank, and 

 from this time on the boy's systematic school education 

 seems practically to have come to an end. But this was 

 far more than compensated by his passion for reading, 

 and friendships contracted with older persons. For a 

 boy of twelve to read — and appreciate — Hutton's Geology, 



