As Huxley sought a scientific career, first at sea and then in London, during the late 1840s and early 1850s, he drew on a range of models of manliness from the imperial culture of exploration and conquest and from the heroes of sentimental fiction. He also appropriated ideals of Victorian womanhood and domesticity to distance himself from and obtain moral authority over other forms of commercial and industrial endeavor. Isolated for much of this period from the metropolitan world of learning, he conferred a social meaning upon his scientific work through the novels he read, the journal he kept, and the extensive correspondence he undertook with his fiancée. How then did Huxley conduct himself with other gentleman practitioners whose company he now wished to join? How did he position himself within this diverse scientific community? Who became his models, mentors, and patrons?

At mid-century, the sciences in Britain had little of the career structure and few of the defining institutions of today, such as the large research laboratory with its team of experts, the academic department, or the university degree.