l66 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xii 



The more I see of the place the more glad I am that I elected 

 to stay in London. I see much to admire and like ; but I am 

 more and more convinced that it would not suit me as a resi- 

 dence. 



Two more important points remain to be mentioned 

 among the occupations of the year. In January Huxley 

 was elected Secretary of the Geological Society, and with 

 this office began a form of administrative work in the scien- 

 tific world which ceased only with his resignation of the 

 Presidency of the Royal Society in 1885. 



Part of the summer Huxley spent in the North. On 

 August 3 he went to Lamlash Bay in Arran. Here Dr. 

 Carpenter had, in 1855, discovered a convenient cottage on 

 Holy Island — the' only one, indeed, on the island — well 

 suited for naturalists; the bay was calm and suitable both 

 for the dredge and for keeping up a vivarium. He proposed 

 that either the Survey should rent the whole island at a cost 

 of some £50, or, failing this, that he would take the cottage 

 himself, if Huxley would join him for two or three seasons 

 and share the expense. Huxley laid the plan before Sir 

 R. Murchison, the head of the Survey, who consented to try 

 the plan for a course of years, during three months in each 

 year. " But," he added, " keep it experimental ; for there 

 are no useful fisheries such as delight Lord Stanley." Here, 

 then, with an ascent of Goatfell for variety on the 21st, a 

 month was passed in trawling, and experiments on the 

 spawning of the herring appear to have been continued for 

 him during the winter in Bute. 



On the 29th Huxley left .Lamlash for a trip through 

 central and southern Scotland, continuing his geological 

 work for the Survey ; and wound up by attending the meet- 

 ing of the British Association at Aberdeen, leaving his wife 

 and the three children at Aberdour, on the Fifeshire coast. 



From Aberdeen, where Prince Albert was President of 

 the Association, Huxley writes on September 15 : — 



Owen's brief address on giving up the presidential chair was 

 exceedingly good. ... I shall be worked like a horse here. 

 There are all sorts of new materials from Elgin, besides other 

 things, and I daresay I shall have to speak frequently. In point 



