154 MEMORIES OF MY LIFE
Notwithstanding the Norway cruise, my health remained out of sorts, and a little later in the year, while some of my old fever was on rne, I could not resist a dangerous exposure in order to witness the funeral of the Duke of Wellington. This made me seriously ill ; I could hardly stand, but somehow made my way to my mother's house at Claverdon, where she and, my sister Emma nursed me tenderly, and then, as I got better, it was agreed that we should all go together to Dover for a complete change.
There I recovered completely, and became engaged to my future wife, the daughter of the Very Rev. George Butler, Dean of Peterborough, who had been Headmaster of Harrow during many years. My wife had three sisters and four brothers, the latter all highly distinguished for scholastic and administrative ability.
I shrink, yet cannot wholly refrain from speaking of the affection I freely received from them, their relatives and their friends, all owing to that happy marriage, which lasted forty-four years, and ended
at Royat in 1897, followed by a grave in the cemetery
at Clermont Ferrand.
I shall say little about my purely domestic life, which, however full ()f interest to myself, would the
uninteresting to 90'angenr4, t;i) I attcnit)t no wore th{1uu
to give brief accounts of the friendships and events
that followed my marriage in 1853 up) to about 1866.
This interval of thirteen years occupies a fairly well defined part of my life owing to two reasons, namely, that my scientific interests during its latter half became concentrated on heredity, and because it was
