Category: Biographies

Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley — Volume 1

The American edition of the "Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley" calls for a few words by way of preface, for there existed a particular relationship between the English writer and his transatlantic readers.

Chapters

22. Chapter 22

One of the most important and most engrossing was the launching of a scientific quarterly to do more systematically and thoroughly what had been done since 1858 in the fortnight...

23. Chapter 23

[It has been seen that the addition of journalistic work in science to the mass of original research and teaching work upon which Huxley was engaged, called forth a remonstrance...

12. Chapter 12

[The year 1854 marks the turning-point in Huxley's career. The desperate time of waiting came to an end. By the help of his lectures and his pen, he could at all events stand an...

21. Chapter 21

[In the autumn he set to work to make good his promise of demonstrating the existence in the simian brain of the structures alleged to be exclusively human. The result was seen...

7. Chapter 7

When Huxley himself left Charing Cross Hospital in 1846, he had enjoyed a rich measure of instruction in anatomy and physiology. Thus trained, he took the post of naval surgeon,...

20. Chapter 20

Chapters 10 [The Geological Succession of Organic Beings], 11, 12 [Geographical Distribution], and Chapter 13 [Classification, Morphology, Embryology, and Rudimentary Organs] co...

8. Chapter 8

[The course pursued by the Government in the matter of Huxley's papers is curious and instructive. The Admiralty minute of 1849 had promised either money assistance for publishi...

4. Chapter 4

[The migration to Rotherhithe, noted under date of January 9, 1841, was a fresh step in his career. In 1839 both his sisters married, and both married doctors. Dr. Cooke, the hu...

6. Chapter 6

[The whole cruise of the "Rattlesnake" lasted almost precisely four years, her stay in Australian waters nearly three. Of this time altogether eleven months were spent at Sydney...

29. Chapter 29

[In 1869 Huxley published five paleontological papers, chiefly upon the Dinosaurs (see letter above to Haeckel, January 21, 1868). His physiological researches upon the developm...

5. Chapter 5

[It is a curious coincidence that, like two other leaders of science, Charles Darwin and Joseph Dalton Hooker, their close friend Huxley began his scientific career on board one...

3. Chapter 3

[In the year 1825 Ealing was as quiet a country village as could be found within a dozen miles of Hyde Park Corner. Here stood a large semi-public school, which had risen to the...

24. Chapter 24

[The year 1864 was much like 1863. The Hunterian Lectures were still part of his regular work. The Fishery Commission claimed a large portion of his time. from March 28 to April...

28. Chapter 28

[In 1868 he published five scientific memoirs, amongst them his classification of birds and "Remarks upon Archaeopteryx Lithographica" ("Proceedings of the Royal Society" 16 186...

9. Chapter 9

[Several letters dating from 1851 to 1853 help to fill up the outlines of Huxley's life during those three years of struggle. There is a description of the British Association m...

26. Chapter 26

[Besides his Fullerian lectures on Ethnology at the Royal Institution this year, Huxley published in February 1866 a paper in the "Natural History Review," on the "Prehistoric R...

14. Chapter 14

Up to his appointment at the School of Mines, Huxley's work had been almost entirely morphological, dealing with the Invertebrates. His first investigations, moreover, had been...

25. Chapter 25

[The progress of the American civil war suggested to Huxley in 1865 the text for an article, "Emancipation, Black and White," the emancipation of the negro in America and the em...

18. Chapter 18

[In November 1859 the "Origin of Species" was published, and a new direction was given to Huxley's activities. Ever since Darwin and Wallace had made their joint communication t...

15. Chapter 15

Throughout this period his health was greatly tried by the strain of his work and life in town. Headache! headache! is his repeated note in the early part of 1857, and in 1858 w...

27. Chapter 27

[It has already been noted that Huxley's ethnological work continued this year with a second series of lectures at the Royal Institution, while he enlarged his paper on "Two wid...

10. Chapter 10

reading, and is, perhaps, the best thing I have done yet. It will not be read till May, and I do not know whether they will print it or not afterwards; that will require care an...

17. Chapter 17

Busk, an old friend of mine. All translation and article writing is weary work, and I never do it except for filthy lucre. Lecturing I do not like much better; though one way or...

16. Chapter 16

[The programme laid down in 1857 was steadily carried out through a great part of 1859. Huxley published nine monographs, chiefly on fossil Reptilia, in the proceedings of the G...

11. Chapter 11

the greatest English comparative anatomist of the time, whose detailed work was of the highest value, but whose generalisations and speculations, based on the philosophy of Oken...

13. Chapter 13

Miss Heathorn and her parents reached England at the beginning of May 1855, and took up their abode at 8 Titchfield Terrace, not far from Huxley's own lodgings and his brothers'...

1. Chapter 1

The American edition of the "Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley" calls for a few words by way of preface, for there existed a particular relationship between the English wr...

19. Chapter 19

Since I read Von Baer's essays, nine years ago, no work on Natural History Science I have met with has made so great an impression upon me, and I do most heartily thank you for...

2. Chapter 2