470 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xxix 



4 Marlborough Place, /an. 22, 1875. 



My dear Darwin — I quite agree with your letter about vivi- 

 section as a matter of right and justice in the first place, and 

 secondly as the best method of taking the wind out of the 

 enemy's sails. I will communicate with Burden Sanderson and 

 see what can be done. 



My reliance as against and her fanatical following is 



not in the wisdom and justice of the House of Commons, but in 

 the large number of fox-hunters therein. If physiological ex- 

 perimentation is put down by law, hunting, fishing and shooting, 

 against which a much better case can be made out, will soon 

 follow.— Ever yours, very faithfully, ^ ^ Huxley 



South Kensington, Apri/ 21, 1875. 



My dear Darwin — The day before yesterday I met Playfair 

 at the club, and he told me that he had hekrd from Miss Elliott 

 that I was getting up what she called a " Vivisector's Bill," and 

 that Lord Cardwell was very anxious to talk with some of us 

 about the matter. 



So you see that there is no secret about our proceedings. I 

 gave him a general idea of what was doing, and he quite con- 

 firmed what Lubbock said about the impossibility of any action 

 being taken in Parliament this session. 



Playfair said he should like very much to know what we 

 proposed doing, and I should think it would be a good thing to 

 take him into consultation. 



On my return I found that Pfliiger had sent me his memoir 

 with a note such as he had sent to you. 



• I read it last night, and I am inclined to think that it is a 

 very important piece of work. 



He shows that frogs absolutely deprived of oxygen give off 

 carbonic acid for twenty-five hours, and gives very strong 

 reasons for believing that the evolution of carbonic acid by 

 living matter in general is the result of a process of internal 

 rearrangement of the molecules of the living matter, and not 

 of direct oxidation. 



His speculations about the origin of living matter are the 

 best I have seen yet, so far as I understand them. But he 

 plunges into the depths of the higher chemistry in which I am 

 by no means at home. Only this I can see, that the paper is 

 worth careful study. — Ever yours faithfully, 



T. H. Huxley. 



