HOW OTHERS SAW HLM 81 



doubt, because, from the very fir.st time I saw him 

 (now more than forty years ago), I recognised his 

 vast sup.^riority in ability, in knowledge, and in all 

 those qualities that enable a man to take a foremost 

 place in the world. I owe him thanks for much 

 kindness and for assistance always cordially given, 

 and although we had many differences of opinion, 

 I never received from him a harsh or unkind word." 

 For a man of Wallace's mental calibre and attain- 

 ments to be able to ^^Tite that of Huxley speaks 

 volumes. 



The late Professor Jeffrey Parker thus speaks of 

 Huxley as a teacher : " His lectures were like his 

 writings, luminously clear, without the faintest dis- 

 jwsition to descend to the level of his audience ; 

 eloquent, but with no trace of the empty rhetoric 

 which so often does duty for that qualit}^ ; full of a 

 high seriousness, but with no suspicion of pedantry ; 

 lightened by occasional epigram or flashes of caustic 

 humour, but with none of the small jocularities in 

 which it is such a temptation to indulge. To me 

 his lectures before his small class at Jermyn Street 

 or South Kensington were almost more impressive 

 than the discourses at the Royal Institute, where 

 for an hour and a half lie poured forth a stream of 

 dignified, earnest, sincere words in perfect lit^,'rary 

 form, and without the assistance of a note." 



A grapliic picture of Huxley as a lecturer is that 

 given by Professor Fairfield Osborn : "He entered 

 the lecture-room promptly as the clock was striking 

 nine, rather quickly, and with his head bent forward, 

 * as if oppressive with its mind,' but usually glanced 

 attention to his class of about ninety, and began 



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