From Emma Darwin to W. E. Darwin [10 November 1861]

My dear William

I came home yesterday from S^t Leonards after a sad enough visit. Aunt Charlotte is very much weaker & I don't think there are any hopes of her getting any more strength except just for a day or so. She has quite to be lifted up from her chair. She sits up however most of the day but that is because her breathing is easier than when she lies down. Towards evening she gets sadly tired, but sits up as long as she can, as she often cannot lie down till late in the night after she goes to bed. Uncle Charles was very low & unhappy the first two days but Charlotte revived a little after having some good nights & he was in better spirits. He thinks of nothing else the whole day. I never saw such care & tenderness. Aunt Eliz. is quite cheerful but not much more hopeful than he is. She & I went one evening to hear Dickens read the Christmas carol & the Trial scene in Pickwick which last was very good fun & I am to read it à la Dickens tonight to the boys. Dickens himself is very horrid looking with a light coloured ragged beard which weaggles up & down. He looks ruined & a roué which I don't believe he is however.

I found the boys arrived from school. George is 2^nd boy in Maths  The boy above him is at an immense interval & is likely to be Senior Wrangler as some of his brothers have been by name Carpmael. The weather is provoking for the boys, only George is so absorbed in M^r King's moths that it does not much signify. I heard from Aunt Jessie today. She was very nervous on receiving M^r H. Rawson but they like him very much. He is very tall & a fine figure, but but a plain face.

The Laurenny hounds met at Woodfield for the sake of the girls who all went a hunting with M^r Rawson & a hound called "Bridesmaid w^d run into the house which caused a great laugh at the time. They are not alarmingly rich & will not be married till Feb or March. Poor Lenny is rather too hard worked at his Latin so that he has hardly any thing else, but I suppose he will be more comf. at school for it. Uncle Ch. has been persuading Edmund to give up reading for honours which as his eyes prevent him reading at night will only end in disappointment. He & John Allen were equal in the Littlego which was a disappointment to the Archdeacon. It seems to us as you have not written for a good while & we want to hear about Capt. Vignolles: Goodbye my dear old man

Papa is quite poorly today which is provoking for the boys. His Primula paper is sent off & his Orchises have all gone wrong just lately.

Yours E.D.