Il6 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY CHAP. VII 



just about to make another application to the present Govern- 

 ment on the subject. While this business has been dragging 

 on of course I have not been idle. I have four memoirs (on 

 various matters in Comparative Anatomy) in the Philosophical 

 Transactions, and they have given me their Fellowship and one 

 of the Royal medals. I have written a whole lot of things for 

 the journals — reviews for the British and Foreign Quarterly 

 Medical, etc. I am one of the editors of Taylor's Scientific 

 Memoirs (German scientific translations). In conjunction with 

 my friend Busk I am translating a great German book on the 

 Microscopical Anatomy of Man, and I have engaged to write 

 a long article for Todd's Cyclopaedia. Besides this, have read 

 two long memoirs at the British Association, and have given 

 two lectures at the Royal Institution — one of them only two days 

 ago, when I was so ill with influenza I could hardly stand or 

 speak. 



Furthermore, I have been a candidate for a Professorship of 

 Natural History at Toronto (which is not even yet decided) ; 

 for one at Aberdeen, which has been given against me ; and at 

 present I am a candidate for the Professorship of Physiology 

 at King's College, or, rather, for half of it — Todd having given 

 up, and Bowman, who remains, being willing to take only half, 

 and that he will soon give up. My friend Edward Forbes — a 

 regular brick, who has backed me through thick and thin — 

 is backing me for King's College, where he is one of the Pro- 

 fessors. My chance is, I believe, very good, but nothing can be 

 more uncertain than the result of the contest. If they don't 

 take one of their own men I think they will have me. It would 

 suit me very well, and the whole chair is worth £400 a year, and 

 would enable me to live. 



Something I must make up my mind to do, and that speedily. 

 I can get honour in Science, but it doesn't pay, and "honour 

 heals no wounds." In truth I am often very weary. The 

 longer one lives the more the ideal and the purpose vanishes 

 out of one's life, and I begin to doubt whether I have done 

 wisely in giving vent to the cherished tendency towards Science 

 which has haunted me ever since my childhood. Had I given 

 myself to Mammon I might have been a respectable member of 

 society with large watch-seals by this time. I think it is very 

 likely that if this King's College business goes against me, I 

 may give up the farce altogether — burn my books, burn my 

 rod, and take to practice in Australia. It is no use to go on 

 kicking against the pricks. . . . 



