LITERARY STYLE 23 



profit to countless thousands. Yet the eminently lucid 

 easy style so many have admired was the result of 

 laborious work and much re-writing, a concrete instance 

 of that "ars celare artem" which has distinguished many 

 masters of English prose. And his standard became 

 ever higher as time went on. To quote the words of 

 a well-known orator and man of letters, " in these days 

 even a man of science is expected to be a good speaker 

 and writer," an expectation largely due to Huxley's 

 example, the outcome of his dictum that " science and 

 literature are not two things, but two sides of the same 

 thing." This salutary attitude has done no little for 

 science, and something for literature. 



When, in 1 891, de Varigny was engaged in translating 

 some of Huxley's works he received a letter containing 

 this passage : — 



" The fact is that I have a great love and respect for my 

 native tongue, and take great pains to use it properly. Some- 

 times I write essays half-a-dozen times before I can get them 

 into the proper shape ; and I believe I become more fastidious 

 as I grow older " (Life, ii, p. 291). 



It is a matter of common knowledge that these striv- 

 ings after a proper use of the mother tongue were 

 successful in no mean degree. 



