To R. F. Cooke   29 June [1875]1

Abinger Hall | Wotton, Surrey

June 29th.

My dear Sir

I mentioned no exact price to Mess. Appleton, but copied out Mr. Murray’s words which I cd. give if at home, & which certainly were to the effect “at a little above cost price.” & I told Mess Appleton I thought it quite affair that we shd. make a little profit by the transaction. An American naturalist expects a large sale there.—2

I am very glad of the 14s, for though I much like making money, I care very much more about the wide distribution of my books.3

I am uneasy about the present work, & cannot abide the thought of causing you loss, but it is a comfort to me to think that you have profited by my former books.— If in a month or two, you have any fairly good news of sale, pray let me hear. I sometimes think a man is a fool who writes books, but this is a bad doctrine for the book trade.

We return home on the 6th. & then I will finish “Climbing Plants” & Variation of Animals & Plants under Domestication, & this latter job is a heavy grind.—4

Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

1
The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from R. F. Cooke, 28 June 1875.
2
Cooke had earlier told CD that John Murray was willing to provide stereotype plates to CD’s US publisher D. Appleton & Co., at a small percentage over cost (see letter from R. F. Cooke, 24 May 1875). The American naturalist has not been identified, but may have been Charles Valentine Riley, who visited CD around this time (see letter to C. V. Riley, 25 June [1875] and n. 2).
4
CD stayed at Abinger Hall from 3 June to 6 July 1875 (see CD’s ‘Journal’ (Appendix II)). He had finished correcting Climbing plants on 29 March, when it was still planned that it would be appended to Insectivorous plants; Murray returned the manuscript for further correction on 9 April, after it was decided to publish it as a separate volume (letter from John Murray, 9 April [1875]). CD began work on Variation 2d ed. on 6 July, finishing on 3 October 1875 (see CD’s ‘Journal’ (Appendix II)).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 Surrey] before del ‘Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.’
1.3 a little] ‘a’ after del illeg
2.2 wide] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-10035,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-10035