xxni THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY 385 



It may surprise some people to know, but that he has told 

 it himself in an exceedingly interesting and delightfully 

 written short autobiographical sketch prefixed to his works, 

 that Huxley was not in early life anything of what is 

 commonly called a naturalist. Most men who have dis- 

 tinguished themselves in the field of zoology or palaeon- 

 tology have loved the subject from their early boyhood, a 

 love generally shown by the formation of collections of 

 specimens. Huxley never did anything of the kind. His 

 early tastes were for literature and for engineering. He 

 attributed the awakening of his interest in anatomy to 

 Professor Wharton Jones's lectures at Charing Cross Hospital, 

 where he received his medical education. Wharton Jones was 

 one of the pioneers of microscopic research in this country ; 

 a great enthusiast in his work, but a man of modest and 

 exceedingly retiring disposition, and very little known outside 

 a small circle of friends. He published several papers on 

 histology in the Philosophical Transactions, and made a 

 specialty of ophthalmic surgery. Perhaps of his various 

 contributions to the advancement of his subject, not the 

 least important was that of making a scientific anatomist 

 of Huxley. 



The next man who had a real influence upon Huxley's 

 professional career was Sir John Eichardson, a very keen 

 zoologist, at that time principal medical officer at Haslar 

 Hospital, near Portsmouth, where the naval assistant surgeons 

 first proceeded on appointment. It was through him that 

 Huxley was appointed to the surveying ship, H.M.S. Rattlesnake. 

 He was not naturalist to the expedition, as has been some- 

 times said ; indeed, he would at this time have been hardly 

 qualified for such a post, for, although he had published a 

 short paper on the microscopic structure of the human hair, 

 he had as yet done no zoological work. Moreover, the ship 

 did carry an accredited naturalist, John Macgillivray, who 

 published a Narrative of the Voyage of H.M.S. " Rattlesnake" 

 during 1846-50, in two volumes (1852). 



Huxley's official duties were only with the health of the 

 crew, and as he had a surgeon above him, he had plenty of 

 leisure at his command. How this leisure was employed in 



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