iS65 LETTER TO DR. PARKER 293 



absence of illustrations, I do not believe there are half a dozen 

 men in Europe who will be able to follow you. Furthermore, 

 though the appendix is relevant enough — every line of it — to 

 those who have dived deep, as you and I have — to any one else 

 it has all the aspects of a string of desultory discussions. As 

 your father confessor, I forbid the publication of the appendix. 

 After having had all this trouble with you I am not going to 

 have you waste your powers for want of a little method, so I 

 tell you. 



What you are to do is this. You are to rewrite the intro- 

 duction and to say that the present paper is the first of a series 

 on the structure of the vertebrate skull ; that the second will be 

 " On the development of the osseous cranium of the Common 

 Fowl" [and here (if you are good), I will permit you to intro- 

 duce the episode on cartilage and membrane (illegible)] ; the 

 third will be " On the chief modifications of the cranium ob- 

 served in the Sauropsida." 



The fourth, " On the mammalian skull." 

 The fifth, " On the skull of the Ichthyopsida." 

 I will give you two years from this time to execute these five 

 memoirs ; and then if you have stood good-temperedly the 

 amount of badgering and bullying you will get from me when- 

 ever you come dutifully to report progress, you shall be left to 

 your own devices in the third year to publish a paper on " The 

 general structure and theory of the vertebrate skull." 



You have a brilliant field before you, and a start such that no 

 one is likely to catch you. Sit deliberately down over against 

 the city, conquer it and make it your own, and don't be wasting 

 powder in knocking dovi^n odd bastions with random shells. 



I write jestingly, but I really am very much in earnest. 

 Come and have a talk on the matter as soon as you can, for I 

 should send in my report. You will find me in Jermyn Street, 

 Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday mornings, Thursday after- 

 noon, but not Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon. Send a line 

 to say when you will come. — Ever yours faithfully, 



T. H. Huxley. 



