xxxvi] TWO INQUIRERS INTO SPIRITUALISM 319 



certainly did not occur to me that I was hitting below the 

 belt in alluding to matters so notorious ; but after receiving 

 this expression of your own opinion upon the matter, I shall 

 assuredly never do so again. Unfortunately what has been 

 done cannot be undone ; but perhaps you will allow me to 

 say that, rather than have offended you in this way, I would 

 have suppressed the article altogether. Perhaps, also, I may 

 add that in giving public expression to my opinion on the 

 relative nature of your different lines of publication it seemed 

 to me that I was only making 'fair comment.' If you were 

 to say that you thought my writings on Darwinism betokened 

 1 incapacity and absurdity,' but my experiments in physiology 

 the reverse, I do not think I should at all object. This, 

 however, is a matter of feeling about which it would be 

 fruitless to argue. So all that I can now do is to express my 

 sorrow, and promise never to allude to this subject again. 



■ ' Astrology ' I alluded to, because you once told me that 

 you were investigating it. You refused to hear argument 

 against it, and left me with the impression that you believed 

 in it. 



" Touching my correspondence with Mr. Darwin, fourteen 

 years is a long time to remember details, and I kept no 

 copies. But I do clearly remember two points. The first is 

 that the letters were to be strictly private, and the next is 

 that they were to be regarded as provisional. Now, after 

 these letters were written, further work with Williams showed 

 him to be an impostor. I spent an immense deal of time and 

 trouble over the matter, and in the end withdrew the opinions 

 expressed in these letters. 



" If you have gained your knowledge of their contents by 

 any occult process, I hope you will publish them as evidence, 

 which in that case I would not be wanting in courage to back. 

 But otherwise, in the event of your publishing them, I should 

 require to know the source from which they were obtained. 

 That it was not from Mr. Darwin himself, I am already 

 satisfied ; if it was from any member of his family, the condi- 

 tions under which they were written, and some time afterwards, 

 with my permission, submitted to their perusal, must have 



