Has heard of mules of canary and other finches breeding occasionally, but it is rare, and there is hardly one authenticated case of two such mules breeding together.
Sixteen of the household at Down are sick with influenza.
Quiz has had to be killed because he became vicious.
Horace Darwin strangely ill.
Family and local news.
Family and local news, and memories of old times.
CD’s youngest son, Horace, is too delicate to go to school.
CD has had a bad summer, is still ill, can do very little work – "Botany … is all that I am good for".
CD thanks JBI for contribution to Down school.
George [Darwin] has passed his examination at Cambridge;
Henrietta has been poorly.
CD writes in detail about difficulties with Horsman’s financial accounts and the affairs of the parish.
Surprised and pleased JBI liked his "big book" [Variation].
Luckily, naturalists do not seem to think he has committed suicide with the work.
CD wants to turn over the school accounts to John Robinson [curate of Down]. Writes of other parish news.
Will vote in person for Sir John Lubbock.
Problems with Mr Robinson, who has suddenly departed for Ireland for a month. The parish urgently needs some respectable man to hold the living permanently.
Does not think the supposed cow–deer hybrid worth investigating.
John Robinson [the curate at Down] reported to be walking with girls at night.
Has received JBI’s two letters; agrees with him, but does not know what to do about [the alleged misconduct of] John Robinson. Reports in a long postscript on vain efforts to confirm rumours. Suggests JBI come to Down to see how affairs stand.
CD gets so many foolish letters from foolish people he has little heart to write to friends.
Gives Down news.
R. H. Hutton, editor of the Spectator, is a clever man.
CD has been much abused, praised, and chaffed by newspapers lately.
CD has forgotten about S. J. O. Horsman and the church organ and asks for any information that will help him inform his solicitors in connection with a document he has received and encloses. Will not apologise for what he said, but is ignorant of what it was.
CD’s anxiety about being examined in court if Horsman [former curate at Down] brings suit. He doubts it will happen, but if so will defend himself to utmost.
Has pleasant recollections of his relations with JBI.
CD’s health has been poor.
Appreciates JBI’s letter and his expression of friendship.
In the opinion of a Q.C., Horsman has no case.
Not surprised that JBI does not agree with him. Many professed naturalists do not. But there has been a great change since publication of Origin, and CD believes agreement on man will come soon, "as far as his corporeal frame is concerned".
Horsman has not been heard from.
On colour changes in rabbits. Suspects JBI’s is of impure origin.
Is correcting proof of Insectivorous plants.
JBI reports that the editor of Journal of Horticulture has identified the tree at Loch Carron as Sambucus racemosa, red-berried elder.
JBI on CD’s integrity and the separateness of science and religion.
Reports finding a wood pigeon’s nest on the ground, though woods are nearby.
Sends specimens of what he takes to be barnacles found on rocks in the mountains.