1875 LETTERS TO BAYNES 187 



have been hanging vaguely in my mind for years. If 

 Amphibia is done by the end of January it is as much as 

 it will be. 



In February I must give myself or at any rate my 

 spare self up to my Kectorial Address, 1 which (tell it 

 not in Gath) I wish at the bottom of the Eed Sea. And 

 I do not suppose I shall be able to look seriously at either 

 Animal Kingdom or Anthropology before the address is 

 done with. And all depends on the centre of my micro- 

 cosm intestinum colon which plays me a trick every 

 now and then. 



I will do what I can if you like, but if you trust me 

 it is at your proper peril. 



Feb. 8, 1874. How astonished folks will be if eloquent 

 passages out of the address get among the Amphibia, and 

 comments on Frog anatomy into the address. As I am 

 working at both just now this result is not improbable. 



Meanwhile the address and the ten days' stay at 

 Aberdeen had been "playing havoc with the 

 Amphibia," but on returning home, he went to work 

 upon the latter, and writes on March 12 : 



I did not care to answer your last letter until I had 

 an instalment of Amphibia ready. Said instalment was 

 sent off to you, care of Messrs. Black, yesterday, and now 

 I feel like Dick Swiveller, when happy circumstances 

 having enabled him to pay off an old score he was able 

 to begin running up another. 



June 8. I have had sundry proofs and returned 

 them. My writing is lamentable when I am in a hurry, 

 but I never provoked a strike before ! I declare I think 

 I write as well as the editor, on ordinary occasions. 



He was pleased to find someone who wrote \as 

 badly as, or worse than, himself, and several times 

 1 His Rectorial Address at Aberdeen. (See above, p. 122.) 



