Macgillivray was naturalist--I was actually Assistant-Surgeon and nothing else. But I was recommended to Stanley by Sir John Richardson, my senior officer at Haslar, on account of my scientific proclivities. But scientific work was no part of my duty. How odd it is to look back through the vista of years! Reading your account of me, I had the sensation of studying a fly in amber. I had utterly forgotten the particular circumstance that brought us together. Considering what wilful tykes we both are (you particularly), I think it is a great credit to both of us that we are firmer friends now than we were then. Your kindly words have given me much pleasure. This is a deuce of a long letter to inflict upon you, but there is more coming. The other day a Miss --, a very good, busy woman of whom I and my wife have known a little for some years, sent me a proposal of the committee of a body calling itself the London Liberty League (I think) that I should accept the position of one of three honorary something or others, you and Mrs. Fawcett being the other two. Now you may be sure that I should be glad enough to be associated with you in anything; but considering the innumerable battles we have fought over education, vaccination, and so on, it seemed to me that if the programme of the League were wide enough to take us both for figure-heads, it must be so elastic as to verge upon infinite extensibility; and that one or other of us would be in a false position. So I wrote to Miss -- to that effect, and the matter then dropped. Misrepresentation is so rife in this world that it struck me I had better tell you exactly what happened. On the whole, your account of your own condition is encouraging; not going back is next door to going forward. Anyhow, you have contrived to do a lot of writing. We are all pretty flourishing, and if my wife does not get worn out with cooks falling ill and other domestic worries, I shall be content. Now this really is the end. Ever yours very truly, T.H. Huxley. 4 Marlborough Place, London, N.W., March 7, 1887. My dear Skelton [This letter is one of the twelve from T.H.H. already published by Sir John Skelton in his "Table Talk of Shirley" page 295 sq.], Wretch that I am, I see that I have never had the grace to thank you for "Maitland of Lethington" which reached me I do not choose to remember how long ago, and which I read straight off with lively satisfaction. There is a paragraph in your preface, which I meant to have charged you with having plagiarised from an article of mine, which had not appeared when I got your book. In that Hermitage of yours, you are up to any Esotericobuddhistotelepathic dodge! It is about the value of practical discipline to historians. Half of them know nothing of life, and still less of government and the ways of men. I am quite useless, but have vitality enough to kick and scratch a little when prodded.