302 
PROFESSOR OWEN 
CH. IX. 
and October was devoted to work on the Sani- 
tary Commission, of which Edwin Chadwick 
was an active member ; but we see from the 
following letter, dated November 5, that Owen 
was able to relax his arduous labours on this 
public service : — 
‘ I have just returned from the first meeting 
this season of the Literary Club, and as we were 
favoured by the company of Mr. Brooke, the 
Rajah of Sarawak, I am induced to put down 
a few notes of the sayings and doings of the 
evening, and I believe they will interest you. 
It is something to see in real flesh and blood 
what one had been accustomed to regard as 
a mere myth of the nursery — viz., a man who 
had sailed away to seek his fortune, . conquered 
an island, and become a king. One had supposed 
that all such events and possibilities had long since 
passed away, and were altogether incompatible 
with this prosaic, matter-of-fact age ; but the 
history and achievements of the present hero and 
lion of the town is a literal paraphrase of the old 
fairy-tale adventure. He is a well-built, average- 
sized, middle-aged man, with a strong, square, 
rather overhanging forehead, and a good spice 
of determination marked by a beetling brow, 
compensated by a frank, good-natured character 
of the mouth and lower part of the face. When 
I arrived at the Club — St. James’s Palace clock 
was striking six as I passed — most of the members 
