"Notwithstanding her devotion to her husband's pursuits,"
says her son, Frank Buckland, in the preface to one of his
father's works, "she did not neglect the education of her
children, but occupied her mornings in superintending their
instruction in sound and useful knowledge. The sterling value of
her labours they now, in after-life, fully appreciate, and feel
most thankful that they were blessed with so good a mother." (19)
A still more remarkable instance of helpfulness in a wife is
presented in the case of Huber, the Geneva naturalist. Huber was
blind from his seventeenth year, and yet he found means to study
and master a branch of natural history demanding the closest
observation and the keenest eyesight. It was through the eyes of
his wife that his mind worked as if they had been his own. She
encouraged her husband's studies as a means of alleviating his
privation, which at length he came to forget; and his life was as
prolonged and happy as is usual with most naturalists. He even
went so far as to declare that he should be miserable were he to
regain his eyesight. "I should not know," he said, "to what
extent a person in my situation could be beloved; besides, to me
my wife is always young, fresh, and pretty, which is no light
matter." Huber's great work on 'Bees' is still regarded as a
masterpiece, embodying a vast amount of original observation on
their habits and natural history.
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