an but he took
to be in the main honest and truthful, and no amount of
disappointment--not even losses of money and property incurred through
this faith in others' virtues--had the effect of altering this mental
habit of his.

His intellectual interests were very widely extended, and he once
confessed to me that they were agreeably stimulated by novelty and
opposition. An uphill fight in an unpopular cause, for preference a
thoroughly unpopular one, or any argument in favour of a generally
despised thesis, had charms for him that he could not resist. In his
later years, especially, the prospect of writing a new book, great or
small, upon any one of his favourite subjects always acted upon him like
a tonic, as much so as did the project of building a new house and
laying out a new garden. And in all this his sunny optimism and his
unfailing confidence in his own powers went far towards securing him
success.--J.W.S.

* * * * *

"Land Nationalisation" (1882), "Bad Times" (1885), and "Darwinism"
(1889) were written at Godalming, also the series of lectures which he
gave in America in 1886-7 and at various towns in the British Isles. He
also continued to have examination papers[43] to correct each year--and
a very strenuous time that was. Our mother used to assist him in this
work, and also with the indexes of his books.

We now began to make nature collections, in which he took the keenest
interest, many holidays and excursions being arranged to further these
engrossing pursuits. One or two incidents occurred at "Nutwood" which
have left clear impressions upon our minds. One day one of us brought
home a beetle, to the great horror of the servant. Passing at the
moment, he picked it up, saying, "Why, it is quite a harmless little
creature!" and to demonstrate its inoffensiveness he placed it on the
tip of his nose, whereupon it immediately bit him and even drew blood,
much to our amusment and his own astonishment. On another occasion he
was sitting with a book on the lawn under the oak tree when suddenly a
large creature alighted upon his shoulder. Looking round, he saw a fine
specimen of the ring-tailed lemur, of whose existence in the
neighbourhood he had no knowledge, though it belonged to some neighbours
about a quarter of a mile away. It seemed appropriate that the animal
should have selected for its attentions the one person in the district
who would not be alarmed at the sudden appe