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But a heavier loss was soon to follow. On April 19, 1882, died Charles Darwin, the friend of forty years, in science the ally and inspirer, in personal affection and intimate sympathy the closest of his circle. Hooker's sorrow and weariness were broken in upon by the request for an obituary notice to appear in Nature. Happily he was spared this task to which he felt sadly unequal.

Kew: April 21, 1882.

Dear Huxley,—Romanes, after asking me to write the notice of Darwin for Nature, now telegraphs that you had, unknown to him, been asked by the Sub-editor to undertake it, and had accepted.

I am right glad of it, as I am utterly unhinged and unfit for work and am not feeling well in my præcordia, and have not been for some time—pray say nothing of this, but I sometimes fear I shall have to seek rest if I would not that it were found for me. Nothing but the feeling that I was shrinking from duty induced me to assent to Romanes's request. If I can help you with any notice of Darwin's early life I will come over to you on Sunday. Up to the time of his going to Cambridge, though he had flirted a little with Nat. Hist., he had no notion of pursuing it, and had devoted himself to fox-hunting and partridges. I did not feel our loss yesterday, but to-day I am depressed terribly, and a touching letter from Mrs. Darwin quite upset me.

I have heard nothing about the Abbey, though Spottiswoode promised to telegraph the answer to me. I have no fancy for the bitter taste of these ceremonials.

Ever, dear old boy, yours,

J. D. Hooker.

Kew: April 24, 1882.

Dear Huxley,—It is well indeed that I turned Darwin over to you—the only idea I had parallel to yours was a comparison with Faraday. I have sent your eloquent and most impressive éloge on to Keltie (1), with a note to send proof to you.

(1) Dr. John Scott Keltie (1840) was for some years sub-editor of Nature, becoming in 1885 Librarian, and 1892-1915 Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society.

[page] 260

You are right; it is too soon for any sort of biographical notice of life or works. As for myself, I have had a ten days' bout of my Anginic pains, night and day, and am in a state of nervous worry, with Bentham failing fast (82) and pressing the Genera Plantarum on me, and no end of work in the Garden. In short I have my warning note struck.

[page] 298

During 1886 and 1887, as the Life of Charles Darwin was advancing towards completion, Hooker had much correspondence with (Sir) Francis Darwin, reading the first proofs and making various notes and suggestions out of his close knowledge of his old friend's work, and the scientific circles of the time. One note is of interest for all biographers, and in this direction, the Life, when published, left nothing to be desired.

I think you have rather a paucity of footnotes referring to men's position, works, &c. Remember how little the next generation will think of E. Forbes, Hancock (1) and many great Guns of your father's lifetime. It added enormously to the interest of the life of Lyell to be told in footnotes who even the now second-class workers were of whom he spoke, and who were luminaries in his day.

The question was raised as to Darwin's purpose in spending eight years upon his monograph of the Cirripedes.

To F. Darwin

                                                                                                          Dec. 31, 1885.

MY DEAR FRANK,

When I can get at the letters I may find something that will throw light on the question you raise—but I am helpless till my Library is shelved and painted, when I shall bring down the letters, which, with my books, are all in boxes at Kew, waiting.

1 Albany Hancock (1806-73), zoologist. Received the Royal Society's medal for his paper on ' The Organisation of Brachiopoda,' 1857; F.L.S. 1862; collaborated also in works on Mollusca.

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I do not understand that passage of Huxley's to imply, as you seem to think, that your father first went in for Barnacles deliberately thinking they would be good training; but that he took to monographing the Order under that impression, and in this Huxley is I know right.

Your father had Barnacles on the brain, from Chili onwards! He talked to me incessantly of beginning to work at his 'beloved Barnacles' (his favorite expression) long before he did so methodically. It is impossible to say at what stage of progress he realised the necessity of such a training as monographing the Order offered him; but that he did recognize it and act upon it as a training in systematic biological study, morphological, anatomical, geographical, taxonomic and descriptive, is very certain; he often alluded to it to me as a valued discipline and added that even the 'hateful' work of digging out synonyms and of describing, not only improved his methods, but opened his eyes to the difficulties and merits of the works of the dullest of cataloguers.

One result was that he would never allow a depreciatory remark to pass unchallenged on the poorest class of scientific workers, provided their work was honest and good of its kind. I always regarded this as one of the finest traits of his character—this generous appreciation of the hodmen of science and of their labors, and which culminated in the 'Steudel' (i.e. the Index Kewensis), and it was monographing the Barnacles that brought it about. The fact is that no one goes into such a piece of work as his Barnacles upon a cut and dried motive. When once begun various motives supervene or grow that direct the course adopted to this and that end. Your father recognized in conversation with me three stages in his career as biologist, the mere collector, in Cambridge &c.; the collector and observer, in the Beagle and for some years after; and the trained naturalist after, and only after, the Cirripede work. That he was a thinker all along is true enough, and there is a vast deal in his writings previous to the Cirripedes that a trained Naturalist could but emulate.

I have no more to say but that it would have been marvellous if your father had not felt the want of such a training as monographing the Cirripedes would give, and

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if he had not consciously taken advantage of it with his eyes open to its value in weighing all evidence pro and con evolution.

If you will let me make a suggestion, it is that you alter the expression 'could be considered well spent,' for eight years so spent by any other man would establish his reputation for all time, and whether as a discipline to your father, or for its results, I cannot conceive his spending it better, at that period of his career especially.

Probably it all came out in this wise—the original idea was to work out the problem of the complementary males: this he told me over and over again. When once begun he told me that he felt the want of training and discipline in every detail of work; he applied to me (1844-6) for microscopes and lenses and for lessons in dissecting under it, for information as to the relative value of male and female organs in plants, of characters afforded by buds and flowers, fruits and seed, and no end of matters as to synonymy, priority, and the practical details of descriptive biology. We even dissected and drew together; he all along calling himself a learner in these matters of research.

You are welcome to send this desultory scrawl to Huxley, or to make any other use of it. I have been interrupted over and over again, for I am writing all after page 1 on New Year's Day—of which I wish you and yours many returns and all good with them.

To F. Darwin

Oct. 22, 1886.

I was present with Lyell at the meeting. We both think said something impressing the necessity of profound

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attention (on the part of Naturalists) to the papers and their bearing on the future of Nat. Hist. &c, &c, &c, but there was no semblance of discussion.

The interest excited was intense, but the subject too novel and too ominous for the old School to enter the lists before armouring. It was talked over after the meeting, 'with bated breath.' Lyell's approval, and perhaps in a small way mine, as his Lieutenant in the affair, rather overawed those Fellows who would otherwise have flown out against the doctrine, and this because we had the vantage ground of being familiar with the authors and their themes.

Bell, the President, in the Chair, was, though a personal friend of your father's, hostile to the end of his life. Busk, who was present as Secretary, said nothing, nor did Bennett, the Bot. Sec. Bentham was also there, and silent.

I do not remember Huxley being present, you might ask him.

Huxley has sent me the proof of his contribution to the 'Life.' I do not think it too severe. The Quarterly then held the highest place amongst the first class Reviews and was most bound to be fair and judicious, but proved unjust and malicious and ignorant. It went indefinitely

beyond severity and into scurrility, and for all Huxley says he cites abundant proof. It is not for us, who repeat ad nauseam our contempt for the persecutors of Galileo and the sneerers at Franklin, to conceal the fact that our own great discoverers met the same fate at the hands of the highest in the land of Literature and Science, as represented by its most exalted organ, the Q. R.

I talked to X. about it in as strong terms as I could, when he turned round to me and asked if I really believed the doctrine, and on my response he pointed to the poker, and with fatuous solemnity said,

'Dr. Hooker! I would as soon believe that that poker bred rabbits.'

It amused me to think, that if the Apocalypse had said that pokers bred rabbits he would have believed it devoutly, and thought your father wicked to disbelieve.

To return to Huxley, I suggested his replacing the word 'person' by 'reviewer,' in the bottom of the first slip, and to omit 'tricks' of 'in alluding to Owen's style, because it weakened the force of the passage. As for the rest, if

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not vigorous it would not be Huxley's, and if we ask a man for a specimen of himself, we must let him appear in his own colours.

When he made these suggestions to Huxley the day before, he wrote:

These are the only points as to which your articles could be hypercriticised in the matter of taste. For the rest I would not alter anything… The Quarterly does not get one iota more than it deserves, or than the public should see it gets.

 

To F. Darwin

The Camp, Sunningdale: Oct. 23, 1886.

DEAR FRANK,

I was not aware that the Bishop [1] had acknowledged the Review in his Essays. It certainly does appear that this should be stated, but I would like to see the passage acknowledging it, before considering how much or how little of it should come in. No one who was present at the Bishop's attack on Huxley at the Oxford Meeting [2] could wonder at Huxley's delighting in 'paying him off.'

I believe that the Q. R. has just treated Gosse as badly almost as it did the 'Origin,' and if so Huxley's dressing is not inopportune. It is abominable that a Review of such standing should seek out ignorant and incompetent and even prejudiced and hostile reviewers to write in such cases.

I quite feel with you that it is a pity that the 'Life' of one so far above all fierceness of disposition should have to treat of matters requiring such stern and hot handling. But the

Q. R. was, from its influence and position, the head and front of the offending, and if the history of Evolution has to be dealt with, it must be brought to the front to be pilloried;

and given Huxley as executioner, the rest follows! Nothing short of recasting the whole of his contribution as regards the Quarterly would meet the case. Were Owen or the Bishop in Huxley's place, and the tables turned, you would have a contribution of malignant sneers and innuendoes. It is the old story, 'the greater the truth, the greater the libel.'

[page] 303

To F. Darwin

[n.d] 1887.

Unfortunately we have not got the best point in Huxley's answer to the Bishop. It was to this effect—

'The Bishop asks how would I like it if my Mother had been an ape. I answer, putting aside the bad taste of the allusion to a relationship which I have in my own case regarded as calling up the tenderest memories, and having regard to that argument from the 'Godlike gift' of language which the Bishop has put forward as paramount against Mr. Darwin's theory, that I would rather I had a parent wanting that "Godlike gift," than a parent who devoted that great and godlike gift to the perversion of truth or to diverting the minds of an audience from the facts that support a great scientific hypothesis by ridicule,' &c.

This was the sense of it—the words I cannot recall. The telling point was that Huxley showed how keenly wounded he was by an allusion to a relationship which he regarded so tenderly (having) been driven home in so indelicate a manner.

I shall see Huxley to-morrow and if I can get him to attend to me will endeavour to obtain from him a more definite account, for use or not, and will let you know.

Have you any account of the Oxford meeting? If not, I will, if you like, see what I can do towards vivifying it (and vivisecting the Bishop) for you. I had utterly forgotten that letter of mine, and am amused to find that it recalls the scene so clearly. (Oct. 30, 1886.)

Here is my screed. I do not like it altogether, but can do no better. I should like Huxley to see it if you put it in print. Pray Anglicize it where necessary. ... I have been driven wild formulating it from memory.

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I find, however, on enquiry of others, that they did not understand the Bishop to allude to Huxley's Mother, but his Grandmother, so pray make no alteration in what you have written as to the Oxford meeting except Huxley approves. It is impossible to be sure of what one heard, or of impressions formed, after nearly 30 years of active life.

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The following letters refer to the Darwin Obituary (Proc. Roy. Soc, 1888), afterwards republished in Huxley's Collected Essays, vol. ii. His memory of what had happened thirty and forty years before was rarely at fault, despite his depreciation of it; yet looking back, it was in such a far away vista of the past that he was moved to exclaim 'Darwinism is all a dream to me now.' (November 3, 1890.)

 

To T. H. Huxley

March 25, 1888.

I have not seen Dana's obit, notice of Gray. I suppose it is in Silliman—I will send for it and tell you what I think. I never attached much importance to Gray's philosophy of Darwinism. He 'illuminated' the text, but did not advance the subject in a scientific point of view; only in a general and popular one.

Darwin has nowhere that I can think of dealt with the causes of variation. My impression is that he regarded them as inscrutable, and I doubt his assenting to the view that they were in any scientific sense limited or directed by external conditions—except in so far as that conditions which kill an organism limit its powers of variation!

Organisms vary from whatever you please to call type, under no known fashion; and this whether the conditions are favorable or unfavorable to life: if they are favorable so much the better for them.

I very much hope that you will carry out your Primer idea. I feel myself ever apt to go astray on the subject,

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and hark back on pre-Darwinian ideas that were not necessarily anti-Darwinian, but which should not be confounded with these.

[page] 306

The Camp, Sunningdale: May 2, 1888,

Dear Huxley,—The evolution of Darwin is excellent, it makes quite a Natural Order of him.

You will find an X on page 1 in reference to Darwin's father. I understood from D. that his father had not only scientific proclivities, but ambition, and that he presented to the R.S. a communication on some optical subject, which, being rejected, disgusted him, and led to his stifling his own early scientific tendencies and scoffing at those of others.

If worth following this up Frank might confirm or refute my memory.

[…]

                                                                                                Ever yours,

J. D. Hooker.

[page] 430

To F. Darwin

February 1, 1899.

MY DEAR FRANK, I will gladly help you all I can; so have no scruples. By all means send me

any of my letters you think I can throw light upon. You are right to make the book

uncompromisingly scientific. It will be greatly valued. I am getting so old and oblivious that I

fear I may not be of much use.

                                                                             Ever affectionately yours,

Jos. D. HOOKER.

[page] 431

February 24, 1899.

I had no idea that your father had kept my letters. Your account of 742pp. of them is a revelation. I do enjoy rereading your father's; as to my own, I regard it as a punishment

for my various sins of blindness, perversity, and inattention to his thousand and one facts and hints that I did not profit by as I should have, all as revealed by my letters. I do not think I gave my mind as I ought to have but I had always my head and hands full of all sorts of duties, and my correspondence with your father was the sweet, amongst many bitters.

Yes, I will gladly go down at some future time and confab with you.

March 21, 1899.

I enclose copies of your father's letters to mine. The first refers to his testimonial towards my candidature for the Botany Chair of Edinburgh University. If you care for a copy of this I will send it, though it savours of vanity to offer it.

                                                                             Ever affectionately yours,

Jos. D. HOOKER.

P.S. You are most welcome to the originals of my letters to your father. If I had them I should be tempted to burn them!

For he was, as ever, very critical of his bygone letters, as he dipped again and again into the four red portfolios of them now at his elbow:

'From what I read of them, I thought they were very poor stuff' (February 1, 1901). He preferred his present idle of throwing light where it was needed on Darwin's current interests, and again insisted,

'Do not hesitate to ask me for any information I can give you.'

Going over the slip proofs in May 1902 was no burden; but a pleasure:

'To me the letters are most refreshing they bring all Down home to me.'

The crowning pleasure came as the book neared completion, and the authors proposed to dedicate it to Darwin's closest friend.

[page] 427

He was an almost life-long friend of Charles Darwin. He was the first confidant to whom the Species Theory was entrusted. Excepting Wallace, he was its first whole-hearted adherent. He was also Darwin's constant and welcome adviser and critic, drawing upon his unrivalled knowledge of botanical detail as evidence for, or check upon, the advancing theoretical position. The published letters of Darwin reveal in a way that none of the completed works of Darwin or of Hooker could have done, the steps in the growth of the great generalisation, and the part in it which Hooker himself took. We read of the doubt of one or the other: the gradual accumulation of material facts: the criticisms and amendments in face of new evidence: and the slow progress from tentative hypothesis to assured belief. We ourselves have grown up since the clash of opinion for and against the mutability of species died down.

It is hard for us to understand the strength of the feelings aroused: the bitterness of the attack by the opponents of the theory, and the fortitude demanded from its adherents.

It is best to obtain evidence on such matters at first hand; and this is what is supplied by the correspondence between Darwin and Hooker. From the letters it is clear that his friendship, advice, and alliance were of incalculable benefit to Darwin himself, who summed this up in the words:

          'You have represented for many years the whole great public to me.'

 But while this in itself gives Hooker his natural place in history, it must never be forgotten that he himself upheld in the 'Flora Tasmaniae' the mutability of species, and based his opinion, as Darwin stated, on 'his own self-thought.'

Among botanists Hooker was in fact the Protagonist of Evolution. His influence during that stirring period, though quiet, was far-reaching and deep. His work was both critical and constructive. His wide knowledge, his keen insight, his fearless judgment were invaluable in advancing that intellectual revolution which found its pivot in the mutability of species.

The share he took in it was second only to that of his life-long friend, Charles Darwin.

[page] 432

To F. Darwin

July 18, 1902.

I can imagine nothing that would greet my declining years with anything approaching the pleasure of having the letters dedicated to me, and I do heartily thank you and Mr. Seward for thinking of me. I do feel as if it would add years to my life.

 

The first page of the book bears these words :

DEDICATED, WITH AFFECTION AND EESPECT, TO

SIE JOSEPH HOOKER

IN REMEMBRANCE OF HIS LIFELONG FRIENDSHIP WITH CHARLES DARWIN

 

[page] 458

To F. Darwin

                                                                                                January 4, 1905.

(Answering an enquiry as to what plants are represented on the Darwin Medal.)

MY DEAR FRANK, I have botanised over the reverse of the medal and make out:

1. At the bottom Dionaea, followed on each side by

2. Primula,

3. A confused group of leaves and flowers of some tropical Orchid I cannot remember its name, though I recognise the flower. It is not figured in your Father's two works, i.e. Forms of Flowers and Orchids. I will run it down. Neither Nepenthes nor Drosera are thus.

4. Ampelopsis.

 

January 6, 1905.

The Orchid on the medal is Phalaenopsis Schilleriana.

1. Hooker stayed with the Darwins from 10 October 1846 for three days and again on 14 January 1847 for "a week or ten days" (LL Sir J. D. Hooker, vol. 1: 222). Emma Darwin's diaries for years 1846 and 1847 are missing. Darwin wrote on 6 October 1846 inviting Hooker to come on the Saturday which is 10 October. On the 8th, Darwin asked if Hooker could spare, and to bring to him a copy of Lamarck's "Corallinas or Nulliporas" (CCD3: 351).

To W. E. Darwin

                                                                                                February 19, 1905.

(The 'Letters of Emma Darwin,' edited by her daughter, which have since been published, were privately printed in 1905.)

I have read every word of Henrietta's interesting volume with great pleasure; and with emotion in respect of what relates to your parents. I often recall with deep feeling your Mother's winning reception of me on my first visit to Down in 1848 [1]. It was followed by your father, who was earnest in acquiring botanical information, inviting me to come and stay for a week at a stretch, bringing my own work; his reason being that he could not (owing to his head symptoms) discuss scientific matters for more than one half hour a day; and that my shorter stays would involve endless corres-

[page] 459

pondence. On these visits your Mother did everything to make me feel at home. Often I worked in the dining room, (latterly in the billiard room) through which your mother often passed on her way to the store closet in the end, when she would take a pear, or some good thing, and lay it by my side with a charming smile as she passed out. Then in the evening she always played to me, and sometimes asked me to whistle to her accompaniment of some simple air! Those were happy-days to me. Your father and I never discussed scientific questions except for the half hour after breakfast and even that always fatigued him. At other times we had long chats by which I profited enormously, especially during the forenoon and afternoon sand walks,1 for which he invariably summoned me.

I cannot express the pleasure that your sister's work has given me.

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The great event of 1909 was the centenary of Darwin birth. Of all the galaxy of notable men who saw the light

[page] 467

in the annus mirabilis 1809, Darwin, least in the public eye, came to have the profoundest influence in the world, transcending, beyond all others, the limits of his own country and his own lifetime. It was fitting that this honour should be paid to his memory and his enduring inspiration by Cambridge, his old University, where, if Darwin himself had profited little save by Henslow's direction of his bent towards science, science had since sprung up lustily under the Darwinian impulse, and a strong personal link with his name was kept up by the active work in the University of his distinguished sons.

The proceedings extended over three days, the 22nd, 23rd, and 24th of June; 1500 invitations were sent out. The first evening there was a reception by the Chancellor, Lord Rayleigh, in the Fitzwilliam Museum. Next morning, a presentation of addresses by delegates of Universities, Colleges, Academies, and Learned Societies, in the Senate House; in the afternoon, a garden party at Christ's College; in the evening, a banquet in the New Examination Hall, followed by a reception at Pembroke. On the Thursday, honorary degrees were conferred in the Senate House; the Rede Lecture [1] delivered by Sir Archibald Geikie, P.R.S., and in the afternoon a garden party given by the members of the Darwin family in Trinity College. There was an exhibition also of portraits, books, and other objects of interest in connexion with Darwin, in the Old Library of Christ's, his own College.

It was a brilliant function, resplendent with the bright and many coloured academic robes of various distinctions from a hundred seats of learning in every quarter of the civilized world. Of the guests who represented science at large or some personal link with the Darwin tradition, over five hundred sat down to the great banquet, a polyglot assembly keyed to the highest appreciation, where the admirable interest of Mr. Balfour's historic speech was only eclipsed by the sense of personal charm in, Mr. W. E. Darwin's reminiscences [2] of his father [1]. Simple, direct, instinct with the same rich, unassuming humanity that they affectionately depicted, his words seemed to reveal from a still living source the very qualities of his father. 'Now,' one who had met Darwin whispered to his

[page] 468

neighbour, 'those who never saw him will be able to understand why Darwin was so much beloved by his friends.'

Writing to Mrs. Paisley [3] on August 11, Hooker describes his share in the celebrations.

At Cambridge we stayed with one of the Darwin family Horace, the youngest of Mr. Darwin's sons, a scientific instrument maker in Cambridge and F.R.S. (as are two other of Mr. Darwin's sons, George, Prof. of Astronomy, Frank of Botany). The celebration was most successful and nothing could exceed the delight of the Delegate foreigners, some of whom were invited to bring their wives and daughters. The number of lady guests was remarkable and added brilliance to all the functions, besides amazing the foreigners, who are not accustomed to see ladies at their Jubilees. The hospitality was boundless, and what struck me most was Mr. Balfour's address at the Banquet (at which I was not present); he grasped every salient point in Darwin's character, works, and their results on the progress of science and civilisation in a truly magic manner.

Of course H. [Hyacinth, Mrs. Hooker] took care that I took only corners and snatches of the intellectual food that was spread over every day and part of every night; and living as I was in the heart of the Darwin family as a brother, I did indeed feel grateful and happy with what I had.

He tells also of their meeting with the famous Dr. Metchnikoff of the Pasteur Institute (1) whose wonderful sour milk cure Lady Hooker had been trying, and of his amusement when Hooker introduced her as a patient who had benefited by his nostrum.

Of the public functions, he attended the presentation of addresses by the delegates, where the German orator, not yet by Imperial decree cursing where he had blessed, was amongst the most brilliant of the speakers; he attended the garden parties and even the late reception at the Fitzwilliam, when the inward eye can still see him, robed in his LL.D gown as he rested in a sheltered alcove, receiving the affectionate

(1) Dr. Elias Metchnikoff (d. 1916), F.L.S. 1880, was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society, 1905, and awarded the Copley Medal in 1906.

[page] 469

homage of his friends and admirers. The marks of a hale, serene, and dignified old age were upon him in the softly lightened colour of his face, encircled by a complete halo silver hair and fringing beard; in the enhanced prominence and luminous quality of his eyes, which shone very blue from under the veritable penthouse of his eyebrows. As he sat there, still firm and upright, it was hard to believe that he as ninety-two years old. Indeed the two figures which most strongly caught the general imagination as living links with all that those days commemorated, members of Darwin's generation and his close friends in the great days of the past, were such as might move men to love and admire the best gifts of old age. One was Hooker, the other Mrs. T. H. Huxley, then eighty-four. She also was staying in one of the Darwin households, and an historic memento of the reunion of the three families is the photograph here reproduced of the youngest and the oldest representatives of the living tradition: Sir Joseph and Lady Hooker, Mrs. Huxley, and, in her arms, Darwin's great-grandchild, Ursula Darwin [4].

[…]