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OCR Rendition - approximate
Eugenics as a Creed and the Last Decade of Galton's Life 315 42, RUTLAND GATE, S.W. April 22, 1907. MY DEAR KARL PEARSON, I telegraphed in order to save a post .... It was purely a blunder of mine about Cambridge instead of Oxford for your second lecture. I wish you all success on May 19th and again on May 21st. Have you any proof that the ultimate atoms are unlike, other than by inferences But I shall see what. you say in good time. Of course it is most probable that they differ. I think my lecture will not trespass at all on yours except as far as the title may suggest. You are very good about the Albinism and the Eugenics publications. I like to feel that the Eugenics Laboratory is a sort of annexe to your Biometric Laboratory, using the same methods and working with similar precision under your guidance. I do not a bit understand the Royal Soc. Proc. memoir just out on the constitutional peculiarities of albinos. Anyhow it seems that their blood behaves differently in the presence of "proteids"--a mere name to me-from that of pigmented people. (Can people of piggish minds be properly styled pig-mented? I crave pardon!!) Ever affectionately yours, FRANCIS GALTON. [HAMPSTEAD.] May 3, 1907. MY DEAR FRANCIS GALTON, Here at last is my lecture typed by Miss Dickens's Office! It was hastily written and the tables have yet to be added. I should esteem it a great favour if you would write on the blank facing sheets any suggestions that occur to you, and let me have back the copy for emendation. I fear the whole thing is very laboured, but I am writing under much pressure and feel a good deal the want of a holiday. I hope all goes well with you. Affectionately, KARL PEARSON. Our letters for the next fortnight chiefly cover the last stages of the final drafting of the Weldon Prize regulations. Then they touch again the Oxford lectures. I will cite first the letter which reports my own lecture. 7, WELL ROAD, HAMPSTEAD, N.W. May 29, 1907. MY DEAR FRANCIS GALTON, I think you may care to hear how my Oxford campaign has passed off. My lecture on Friday was fairly well attended. It was in Balliol Hall, and I soon found that I must throw up my manuscript and take to talking. Of course this made me slip many points, but that won't so much matter as the lecture is to be printed. On Saturday I went through the mice with Mrs Weldon, had a talk with Schuster about his brain-work, and wrote about half my lecture for Sunday. That was given in Magdalen Summer Common Room to the Philosophical Club. The members seemed to me mostly groping in the field of obscure definitions. The metaphysicians did not understand me, and the few science folk present were hostile. They could not grasp how much wider the correlation category is than the causal. However, I think I did some good, although these Oxford dons did not impress me as a group of very clear and powerful minds* It was quite different when I faced in January the Cambridge mathematical lecturers-then one felt in the presence of men of superior intellectual power, and was rather ashamed of oneself. I hope at any rate I have done some Baptist work, and you will find the way straightened. They know now, or ought to, what Eugenics signifies and what the word correlation denotes. I had an interview with the Vice-Chancellor and hope the Weldon memorial will shortly now be settled. I trust this bitterly cold weatherr will not get a hold on you ; it makes me at times feel very incapable and inert. I hope your lecture has got written without too much effort, I hear it is to be given in the Sheldonian Theatre, which, I fear, will want more volume of sound than Balliol Hall. Always affectionately, KARL PEARSON. The following letters deal with Galton's lecture. 42, RUTLAND GATE, S.W. play 25, 1907. MY DEAR KARL PEARSON, Here is my lecture, but without the 9 diagrams on one page, and without the references to them in the text. They have been redrawn and are being '°processed." I send them thus as there is not too much time. Any suggestions in the text would be most welcome. Ever affectionately yours, FRANCIS GALTON. * Looking back on the discussion now, I think we were really speaking different tongues, wherein the same words carry different atmospheres. 40-2
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