226 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. IX 



While he was in Edinburgh for the third time, 

 his attention was called to an article in the Echo, the 

 organ of the anti- vivisection party. He writes : 



The Echo is pretty. It is one of a long series of 

 articles from the same hand, but I don't think they hurt 

 anybody and they evidently please the writer. For some 

 reason or other they have not attacked me yet, but I 

 suppose my turn will come. 



Again : 



Thank you for sending me John Bright's speeches. 

 They are very good, but hardly up to his old mark of 

 eloquence. Some parts are very touching. 



His health was improving, as he notes with 

 satisfaction : 



Every day this week we have had about four hours of 

 the Commission, and I have dined out four days out of 

 the six. But I'm no the waur, and the late dinners 

 have not been visited by fits of morning blue devils. 

 So I am in hopes that I am getting back to the normal 

 state that Clark prophesied for me. 



4 MAELBOKOUGH PLACE, LONDON, N.W., 

 April 29, 1877. 



MY DEAR SKELTON Best thanks for your second 

 edition. You paint the system 1 in such favourable 

 colours, that I am thinking of taking advantage of it for 

 my horde of " young barbarians." I am sure Scotch air 

 would be of service to them and in after-life they might 

 have the inestimable advantage of a quasi-Scotch nation- 

 ality that greatest of all practical advantages in Britain. 



1 I.e. of Scotch education. 



