56 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. Ill 



month (April), and shall be away for ten or twelve 

 months surveying in Torres Straits. I believe we are to 

 refit in Port Essington, and that will be the only place 

 approaching to civilisation that we shall see for the whole 

 of that time ; and after July or August next, when a 

 provision ship is to come up to us, we shall not even get 

 letters. I hope and trust I shall hear from you before 

 then. Do not suppose that my new ties have made me 

 forgetful of old ones. On the other hand, these are if 

 anything strengthened. Does not my dearest Nettie love 

 you as I do ! and do I not often wish that you could see 

 and love and esteem her as I know you would. We 

 often talk about you, and I tell her stories of old times. 



Another letter, a year later, gives his mother the 

 answers to a string of questions which, mother-like, 

 she had asked him, thirsting for exact and minute 

 information about her future daughter-in-law : 



SYDNEY, Feb. 1, 1849. 



(After describing how he had just come back from a 

 nine months' cruise) First and foremost, my dear 

 mother, I must thank you for your very kind letter of 

 September 1848. I read the greater part of it to Nettie, 

 who was as much pleased as I with your kindly wishes 

 towards both of us. Now I suppose I must do my best 

 to answer your questions. First, as to age, Nettie is 

 about three months younger than myself that is the 

 difference in our years, but she is in fad as much younger 

 than her years as I am older than mine. Next, as to 

 complexion she is exceedingly fair, with the Saxon 

 yellow hair and blue eyes. Then as to face, I really 

 don't know whether she is pretty or not. I have never 

 been able to decide the matter in my own mind. Some- 

 times I think she is, and sometimes I wonder how the 

 idea ever came into my head. Whether or not, her 

 personal appearance has nothing whatever to do with the 



