I think that he will get it (782/7. He was elected Plumian Professor of Astronomy and Experimental Philosophy in 1883.) when Challis is dead, and he is very near his end. He has all the great men--Sir W. Thomson, Adams, Stokes, etc.--on his side. He has lately been chief examiner for the Mathematical Tripos, which was tremendous work; and the day before yesterday he started for Southampton for a five-weeks' tour to Jamaica for complete rest, to see the Blue Mountains, and escape the rigour of the early spring. I believe that George will some day be a great scientific swell. The War Office has just offered Leonard a post in the Government Survey at Southampton, and very civilly told him to go down and inspect the place, and accept or not as he liked. So he went down, but has decided that it would not be worth his while to accept, as it would entail his giving up his expedition (on which he had been ordered) to Queensland, in Australia, to observe the Transit of Venus. (782/8. Major Leonard Darwin, late R.E., served in several scientific expeditions, including the Transits of Venus of 1874 and 1882.) Dear old William at Southampton has not been very well, but is now better. He has had too much work--a willing horse is always overworked--and all the arrangements for receiving the British Association there this summer have been thrown on his shoulders.
But, good Heavens! what a deal I have written about my sons. I have had some hard work this autumn with the microscope; but this is over, and I have only to write out the papers for the Linnean Society. (782/9. i. "The Action of Carbonate of Ammonia on the Roots of Certain plants." [Read March 16th, 1882.] "Journ. Linn. Soc." Volume XIX., 1882, page 239. ii. "The Action of Carbonate of Ammonia on Chlorophyll-bodies." [Read March 6th, 1882.] Ibid., page 262.) We have had a good many visitors; but none who would have interested you, except perhaps Mrs. Ritchie, the daughter of Thackeray, who is a most amusing and pleasant person. I have not seen Huxley for some time, but my wife heard this morning from Mrs. Huxley, who wrote from her bed, with a bad account of herself and several of her children; but none, I hope, are at all dangerously ill. Farewell, my kind, good friend.
Many thanks about the picture, which if I survive you, and this I do not expect, shall be hung in my study as a perpetual memento of you.
(782/10. The concluding chapter of the "Life and Letters" gives some account of the gradual failure in health which was perceptible in the last year of Mr. Darwin's life. He died on April 19th, 1882, in his 74th year.)
THE END.