From H. E. Litchfield to Leonard Darwin 14 September 1875

Dear Leo.

Here we are not gone yet & so I am going to write you the first letter— R. is very little bad but not well & they think we had better not go off anywhere just yet— So we are staying down here for a bit till we make up our minds when & where to go.

The parents came home all night on Sat. tho' Mother was very tired in the evening. They saw W^m. off on Friday. Coming home Mother said to Pearce ""It must have been a very nice change for Alice & James they must be quite sorry to come home–-""& then Pearce burst out with a long tale of their woes— How M^r. Virtue had been so intolerably disagreeable to them all they hadn't known how to bear it. On Sunday the usual dissipation of Down began with Old Carlyle & his little niece. The Franks were fetched over from the other house & he harangued us all for more than an hour. He is a fine old prophet & R, who had never seen him, thought it great luck to hear him in such force. Poor old Mother had a headach yesterday—her first for a month nearly & as B. was away I was quite useful. A Russian ornithologist forced his way in accompanied by an English ditto as keeper. They were to come to lunch & be sent off directly after & so the horror was great when there came a letter from L^y. Derby proposing to come at the very same time & special messengers had to be sent off to stop them—& all the horses were out so scrimmage were many— The Russian was the most awful of all the foreigners that I've ever seen in this house. He was a perfectly unintelligible unwashed savage— Hideously ugly with a voice to match & his face all gashed with the masks of where other savages had tried to cut his head off. Amy sat by him at lunch & had to keep admiring the lanscape not to look his way. We had a little tennis yesterday a 4 game of 2 women & 2 men wh. answered v. well for the women at any rate.

Isn't it funny these old letters coming back after all this time. I don't thk there is a scrap m. news that I can think of— Horace is gone to stay with Dicky—& the peaches are very good. I suppose you'll get fruit in Malta— I hope I shall almost come in for yr first letter—

Horace enjoyed his Portmouth trip extremely—& says the [Nizan] feels quite small now. Goodbye dear old Pouts.

your affect | H.E.L.

Mother all right today & Father pretty well tho' busy & bothered with Pangenesis