1858 LETTER TO HOOKER 229 



past two years, I am wonderfully better this session, and 

 i'eel capable of any amount of work. It was in the 

 course of one of these trips that I went, as you have 

 rightly heard, half way up Mont Blanc. But I was not 

 in training and stuck at the Grands Mulcts, while my 

 three companions went on. I spent seventeen hours 

 alone on that grand pinnacle, the latter part of the time 

 in great anxiety, for I feared my friends were lost ; and 

 as I had no guide my own neck would have been in con- 

 siderable jeopardy in endeavouring to return amidst the 

 maze of crevasses of the Glacier des Bois. But it was 

 glorious weather and the grandest scenery in the world. 

 In the previous year I saw much of the Bernese and 

 Monte Rosa country, journeying with a i;reat friend of 

 mine well known as a natural philosopher Tyndall, and 

 partly seeking health and partly exploring the glaciers. 

 You will find an article of mine on that subject in the 

 Westminster Review for 1857. 



I used at one time to write a good deal for that 

 Review, principally the Quarterly notice of scientific 

 books. But I never write for the Reviews now, as original 

 work is much more to my taste. The articles you refer 

 to are not mine, as, indeed, you rightly divined. The 

 only considerable book I have translated is Kolliker's 

 Histology in conjunction with Mr. Busk, an old friend 

 of mine. All translation and article writing is weary 

 work, and I never do it except for filthy lucre. Lecturing 

 I do not like much better ; though one way or another 

 I have to give about sixty or seventy a year. 



Now then, I think that is enough about my "Ich." 

 You shall have a photographic image of him and my wife 

 and child as soon as I can find time to have them done. . . . 



1 ELDON PLACE, BROADSTAIRS, 

 Sept. 5, 1858. 



MY DEAR HOOKER I am glad Mrs. Hooker has found 

 rest for the sole of her foot. I returned her Tyndall's 

 letter yesterday. 



