130 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. V 



hand, that you have been at the Derby Statue, and are 

 to make an oration apropos of the Priestley Statue in 

 Birmingham on the 1st August ! ! ! 



4 MARLBOROUGH PLACE, LONDON, N.W., 

 July 22, 1874. 



MY DEAR TTNDALL I hope you have been taking 

 more care of your instep than you did of your leg in old 

 times. Don't try mortifying the flesh again. 



I was uncommonly amused at your disgustful wind- 

 up after writing me such a compassionate letter. I am 

 as jolly as a sandboy so long as I live on a minimum 

 and drink no alcohol, and as vigorous as ever I was in 

 my life. But a late dinner wakes up my demoniac colon 

 and gives me a fit of blue devils with physical precision. 



Don't believe that I am at all the places in which the 

 newspapers put me. For example, I was not at the 

 Lord Mayor's dinner last night. As for Lord Derby's 

 statue, I wanted to get a lesson in the art of statue un- 

 veiling. I help to pay Dizzie's salary, so I don't see why 

 I should not get a wrinkle from that artful dodger. 



I plead guilty to having accepted the Birmingham 

 invitation. 1 I thought they deserved to be encouraged 

 for having asked a man of science to do the job instead 

 of some noble swell ; and, moreover, Satan whispered 

 that it would be a good opportunity for a little ventila- 

 tion of wickedness. I cannot say, however, that I can 

 work myself up into much enthusiasm for the dry old 

 Unitarian who did not go very deep into anything. But 

 I think I may make him a good peg whereon to hang a 

 discourse on the tendencies of modern thought. 



I was not at the Cambridge pow-wow not out of 

 prudence, but because I was not asked. I suppose that 

 decent respect towards a secretary of the Koyal Society was 

 not strong enough to outweigh University objections to the 



1 To unveil the statue of Joseph Priestley. See above, p. 127 



