Now I don't want to croak. No one knows better than I, the fatal necessity for any one in your position: more than that, the duty in many cases of plunging into public functions, and all the guttle, guzzle, and gammon therewith connected. But do let me hold myself up as the horrid example of what comes of that sort of thing for men who have to work as you are doing and I have done. To be sure you are a "lungy" man and I am a "livery" man, so that your chances of escaping candle-snuff accumulations with melancholic prostration are much better. Nevertheless take care. The pitcher is a very valuable piece of crockery, and I don't want to live to see it cracked by going to the well once too often. I am in great spirits about the new University movement, and have told the rising generation that this old hulk is ready to be towed out into line of battle, if they think fit, which is more commendable to my public spirit than my prudence. Ever yours, T.H. Huxley. Hodeslea, June 20, 1892. My dear Romanes, My wife and I, no less than the Hookers who have been paying us a short visit, were very much grieved to hear that such a serious trouble has befallen you. In such cases as yours (as I am sure your doctors have told you) hygienic conditions are everything--good air and idleness, CONSTRUED STRICTLY, among the chief. You should do as I have done--set up a garden and water it yourself for two hours every day, besides pottering about to see how things grow (or don't grow this weather) for a couple more. Sundry box-trees, the majority of which have been getting browner every day since I planted them three months ago, have interested me almost as much as the general election. They typify the Empire with the G.O.M. at work at the root of it! Ever yours very faithfully, T.H. Huxley. Hodeslea, October 18, 1892. My dear Romanes, I throw dust and ashes on my head for having left your letter almost a week unanswered. But I went to Tennyson's funeral; and since then my whole mind has been given to finishing the reply forced upon me by Harrison's article in the "Fortnightly", and I have let correspondence slide. I think it will entertain you when it appears in November--and perhaps interest--by the adumbration of the line I mean to take if ever that "Romanes" Lecture at Oxford comes off. As to Madeira--I do not think you could do better. You can have as much quiet there as in Venice, for there are next to no carts or carriages. I was at an excellent hotel, the "Bona Vista," kept by an Englishman in excellent order, and delightfully situated on the heights outside Funchal. When once acclimatised and able to bear moderate fatigue, I should say nothing would be more delightful and invigorating than to take tents and make the round of the island. There is nothing I have seen anywhere which surpasses the cliff scenery of the north side, or on the way thither, the forest of heaths as big as sycamores.