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LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xxn 



dustry, at the disposition of his friend Darwin. And really, I 

 begin to despair of what possible answer could be given to the 

 critics whom the Royal Society, meeting as it does on Novem- 

 ber 30, has lately been very apt to hear about on December I. 

 Naturally there occurred to my mind that famous and comfort- 

 able line, which I suppose has helped so many people under like 

 circumstances, " They also serve who only stand and wait." I 

 am bound to confess that the standing and waiting, so far as I 

 am concerned, to which I refer, has been of a somewhat peculiar 

 character. I can only explain it, if you will permit me to nar- 

 rate a story which came to me in my old nautical days, and 

 which, I believe, has just as much foundation as a good deal 

 of other information which I derived at the same period from 

 the same source. There was a merchant ship in which a mem- 

 ber of the Society of Friends had taken passage, and that ship 

 was attacked by a pirate, and the captain thereupon put into 

 the hands of the member of the Society of Friends a pike, and 

 desired him to take part in the subsequent action, to which, as 

 you may imagine, the reply was that he would do nothing of 

 the kind; but he said that he had no objection to stand and wait 

 at the gangway. He did stand and wait with the pike in his 

 hands, and when the pirates mounted and showed themselves 

 coming on board he thrust his pike with the sharp end forward 

 into the persons who were mounting, and he said, " Friend, 

 keep on board thine own ship." It is in that sense that I venture 

 to interpret the principle of standing and waiting to which I 

 have referred. I was convinced as firmly as I have ever been 

 convinced of anything in my life, that the Origin of Species 

 was a ship laden with a cargo of rich value, and which, if she 

 were permitted to pursue her course, would reach a veritable 

 scientific Golconda, and I thought it my duty, however natu- 

 rally averse I might be to fighting, to bid those who would dis- 

 turb her beneficent operations to keep on board their own ship. 

 If it has pleased the Royal Society to recognise such poor serv- 

 ices as I may have rendered in that capacity, I am very glad, 

 because I am as much convinced now as I was 34 years ago that 

 the theory propounded by Mr. Darwin— I mean that which he 

 propounded, not that which has been reported to be his by too 

 many ill-instructed, both friends and foes — has never yet been 

 shown to be inconsistent with any positive observations, and if 

 I may use a phrase which I know has been objected to, and 

 which I use in a totally different sense from that in which it 

 was first proposed by its first propounder, I do believe that on 



