s I received the usual official circular of
acknowledgement, but at the bottom was written an instruction to
call at Somerset House on such a day. I thought that looked like
business, so, at the appointed time I called and sent in my card,
while I waited in Sir William's ante-room. He was a tall,
shrewd-looking old gentleman, with a broad Scotch accent--and I
think I see him now as he entered with my card in his hand. The
first thing he did was to return it with the frugal reminder that
I should probably find it useful on some other occasion. The
second was to ask whether I was an Irishman. I suppose the air of
modesty about my appeal must have struck him. I satisfied the
Director-General that I was English to the backbone, and he made
some enquiries as to my student career, finally desiring me to
hold myself ready for examination. Having passed this, I was in
Her Majesty's service, and entered on the books of Nelson's old
ship, the _Victory_, for duty at Haslar Hospital, about a couple
of months after I made my application."

About the same time he passed the examination of the Royal College of
Surgeons and so became a fully qualified medical man. Haslar Hospital
was the chief naval hospital to which invalided sailors were sent.
There was a considerable staff of young surgeons, as navy surgeons
were usually sent for a term to work in the hospital before being
gazetted to a ship in commission. In connection with the hospital,
there was a museum of natural history containing a collection of
considerable importance slowly gathered from the gifts of sailors and
officers. The museum curator was an enthusiastic naturalist, and
Huxley must have had the opportunity of extending his knowledge of at
least the external characters of many forms of life hitherto unknown
to him. A few years later, the curator of the museum, with the help of
two of Huxley's successors, published a _Manual of Natural History for
the Use of Travellers_, and it is certain that Huxley at least did not
lose at Haslar any of the enthusiasm for zooelogy with which he had
been inspired at the Charing Cross Hospital. The chief of the hospital
was Sir John Richardson, an excellent naturalist, and well known as an
arctic explorer. He seems to have recognised the peculiar ability of
his young assistant, and although he was a silent, reserved man, who
seldom encouraged his assistants