1884 PROPOSED RETIREMENT 371 



that I must get out of the hurly-burly of society ; (6) 

 that I must get out of the Presidency ; (c) that I must 

 get out of the Inspectorship, or rather I agree with 

 myself on that matter, you having expressed no opinion. 



That being so, it seems to me that I must, willy-nilly, 

 give up S.K. For and here is the point you had in 

 your mind when you lamented your possible impatience 

 about something I might say I swear by all the gods 

 that are not mine, nothing shall induce me to apply to 

 the Treasury for anything but the pound of flesh to which 

 I am entitled. 



Nothing ever disgusted me more than being the subject 

 of a battle with the Treasury over the H.O. appointment 

 which I should have thrown up if I could have done 

 so with decency to Harcourt. 



It's just as well for me I couldn't, but it left a nasty 

 taste. 



I don't want to leave the School, and should be very 

 glad to remain as Dean, for many reasons. But what I 

 don't see is how I am to do that and make my escape 

 from the thousand and one entanglements which seem 

 to me to come upon me quite irrespectively of any office 

 I hold or how I am to go on living in London as a 

 (financially) decayed philosopher. 



I really see nothing for it but to take my pension and 

 go and spend the winter of 1885-86 in Italy. I hear 

 one can be a regular swell there on 1000 a year. 



Six months' absence is oblivion, and I shall take to a 

 new line of work, and one which will greatly meet your 

 approval. 



As to X I am not a-going to not being given 

 to hopeless enterprises. That rough customer at Dublin 

 is the only man who occurs to me. I can't think of his 

 name, but that is part of my general unfitness. 



.... I suppose I shall chaff somebody on my death-bed. 

 But I am out of heart to think of the end of the lunches 

 in the sacred corner. Ever yours, T. H. HUXLEY. 



