From Emma Darwin to Leonard Darwin 17 September [1875]

My dear Old Man

Hen. was wishing she had written sooner that you might have had a letter to receive you on your arrival. We were all seized with a fit of repentance (when too late) for not having gone to see the last of you & the [Nizam]. F's repentance luckily came quicker & I was so glad that he had a sight of you & managed to make you see him (to yr gt astonishment). It was v. majestic seeing the great beast find its way out— William crossed the next night & must have had a perfect passage. George is rather better & enjoying himself in a v. lovely situation on the Gloucestershire hills— The Harrisons close by as they were last year at the Lakes, & the little Cooksons making him cut out paper things as before— He is ambitious & performed the Mistletoe & the Alberta in that style. You must have had a good passage. We have had steady N. E. wind & bright sun for the last week. F. has a most tough job in rewriting the Pangenesis part of his 2^nd ed of animals & plants & I am disappointed to see how little effect of his visit remains. He is so desperately tired every night.

Frank & Amy had been working hard (she doing the drawing) at the orange boring moth & when it was finished F. was vexed to find it all published in Paris—

However Ray Lankester has got it admitted into the Micros. Journal (of course giving credit to the other man's work)

Rowland & Carry are come from abroad—she is w. Louisa, & Rowland comes here today till Monday. He is harmless but such a miserable little soul body & mind to be a son of Uncle Harry.

I have just heard from William from Berne where he fell in with the Hectors. He hopes to entice them to Mürren. He has had a sharp bilious attack, which has put him off his legs, but I hope he has reached it by this time. Our weather is each day lovelier than the last & the moonlight evgs so lovely & calm—we sit in the verandah— I send you an old letter of mine which has turned up. It belongs more to you than to me, & you can burn it if you are not studiously enclined.

Yours my dear old man | E. Darwin .

We have been shewing your photo to Emily Thorley, & were amused at her not having a guess at it.

R. is still poorly & they prob. do something small. Normandy or so.