352 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. XIV 



what is going on than I did in 1800. I had sooner be in 

 hell a good deal at any rate in one of the upper circles 

 where the climate and company are not too trying. I 

 wonder if you are plagued in this way. Ever yours, 



T. H. H 



The following letters, to his family or to intimate 

 friends, are in lighter vein. The first is to Sir M. 

 Foster ; the concluding item of information in reply 

 to several inquiries. The Eoyal Society wished some 

 borings made in Egypt to determine the depth of the 

 stratum of Nile mud : 



The Egyptian exploration society is wholly archaeo- 

 logical at least from the cut of it I have no doubt it is 

 so and they want all their money to find out the pawn- 

 brokers' shops which Israel kept in Pithom and Rameses 

 and then went off with the pledges. 



This is the real reason why Pharaoh and his host pur- 

 sued them ; and then Moses and Aaron bribed the post- 

 boys to take out the linch pins. 



That is the real story of the Exodus as detailed in a 

 recently discovered papyrus which neither Brugsch nor 

 Maspero have as yet got hold of. 



To HIS YOUNGEST DAUGHTER 



4 AlAKLBOROUGH PLACE, N.W., 



April 12, 1883. 



DEAREST PABELTJNZA I was quite overcome to-day to 

 find that you had vanished without a parting embrace to 

 your " faded but fascinating " a parent. I clean forgot 



1 A fragment of feminine conversation overheard at the Dublin 

 meeting of the British Association, 1878. " Oh, there comes 

 Professor Huxley : faded, but still fascinating." 



