xlviii 



Torres Strait,- the Louisiade Archipelago, and the S.E. Coasts of 

 New Guinea. Huxley, with joy accepted the offer and sailed from 

 Plymouth, on December 12, 1846. Though he had been chosen by 

 his chief by reason of his scientific promise, his position in the 

 expedition was simply a professional one. The post of Naturalist to 

 the expedition was filled by Mr. J. Macgillivray ; Huxley was merely 

 the ship's surgeon. 



Calling on her way at Madeira, Rio Janeiro, the Cape, and Mau- 

 ritius, the " Rattlesnake " reached Sydney on July 15, 1847. Here, 

 during^ a stay of nearly three months, while preparations were being 

 made, the young naval surgeon, seeking relaxation from his profes- 

 sional work and his studies in the society of Sydney, became a general 

 favourite, and happily for himself met, loved, and gained the love of 

 the lady, then Miss Henrietta A. Heathorn, who was to be after- 

 wards for so many years his devoted helpmate. On October 11 the 

 vessel started on its cruise, but reaching only as far as Port Curtis 

 and Cape Upstart, returned to Sydney in the following March. In 

 April it started on its second cruise, reaching Cape York, landing 

 Kennedy's ill-fated expedition on its way at Rockingham Bay, going on 

 to Port Essington, and returning by the Timor Sea and Indian Ocean 

 to Sydney, which was reached in January of 1849. In the following 

 May the vessel started on its third cruise to explore the Louisiade 

 Archipelago and the S.E. coast of New Guinea, returning to Sydney 

 in the following March, 1850. Here the lamented death of Captain 

 Stanley led to their being ordered home. Leaving Sydney on May 2, 

 returning by the South Pacific and Cape Horn, and calling at the 

 Falkland Islands and the Azores, the " Rattlesnake " reached 

 England and was paid off at Chatham on November 9. A full 

 narrative of the voyage was published by Mr. Macgillivray in 1852, 

 most of the illustrations being reproductions of drawings by 

 Huxley. 



The career of many a successful man has shown that obstacles 

 often prove the mother of endeavour, and never was this lesson 

 clearer than in the case of Huxley. Working amid a host of diffi- 

 culties, in want of room, in want of light, seeking to unravel the in- 

 tricacies of minute structure with a microscope lashed to secure- 

 steadiness, cramped within a tiny cabin, jostled by the tumult of a 

 crowded ship's life, with the scantiest supply of books of reference,, 

 with no one at hand of whom he could take counsel on the problems- 

 opening up before him, he gathered for himself during these four 

 years a large mass of accurate, important, and in most cases novel 

 observations, and illustrated them with skilful pertinent drawings. 

 Even his intellectual solitude had its good effects ; it drove him to 

 ponder over the new facts which came before him, and all his obser- 

 vations were made alive with scientific thought. 



