From T. H. Farrer   9 October 1880

Abinger Hall, | Dorking. | (Gomshall S.E.R. | Station & Telegraph.)

9 Oct/80

My dear Mr Darwin,

I return the plans marked as well as I can.1 But what a treacherous thing is memory. I should have put the Upper Trench at the Eastern boundary of the 4th room. But that cannot be: it was not excavated till October, and you were here in August. The one trench must have been where I have put the X X. at the eastern end of the first room. The other trench I cannot remember: If parallel to the first it must have been about [CROSS IN CIRCLE] to [CROSS IN CIRCLE]: if at right angles probably next to the wall O to O.

The compass bearing in the printed plan is wrong. Allowing for magnetic pole the walls of the building run nearly due N & S & E & W— the hedge running E & W.2

The ground slopes from E to W

I will send you my rough notes of what was done at the time in a copy book.3

What is history & what are records when we are so much puzzled by what we did ourselves three years ago?

I have been astounded lately by the quantity which antiquarians manage to write about Avebury Sibbury and Silchester,4 as compared to the next to nothing which they know.

Effie has Mrs. Ds kind note this morning: and feels sure that if she can be of use or comfort she will be sent for— but the answer is what we looked for.5 Indeed there is little to be done, and what we have to hope is as little suffering as possible.

Ida & Horace come this evg which is very nice as Tom will be here too.6

Ever yrs sincerely | T H Farrer

No worm casts on the concrete this morning. Wise worms to keep indoors this weather!

I return your note as you may like to see your own questions—7 Please send it back to me.

CD annotations

5.1 What … Farrer 9.1] crossed pencil
1
CD had returned two plans of the excavation of the Roman villa at Abinger so that Farrer could mark the position of the trenches dug for CD during his stay at Abinger Hall from 20 to 25 August 1877 (letter to T. H. Farrer, 8 October 1880 and n. 1).
2
The printed plan appeared in the Builder, 5 January 1878, p. 20; the compass bearing shows the walls running north-west, south-west, north-east, and south-east, not due north, south, east, and west.
3
These notes have not been found.
4
Avebury henge and stone circle is a Neolithic site in Wiltshire; Silbury, near Avebury, the largest prehistoric artificial mound in northern Europe, had been supposed to be a burial site, observatory, or sundial; and Silchester in Hampshire was the site of a Roman town.
6
Ida and Horace Darwin and Thomas Cecil Farrer, Farrer’s eldest son from his first marriage.
7
CD had asked Farrer whether wormcasts still formed on the exposed concrete floor of the Roman villa. CD’s questions were in his letter to T. H. Farrer, 1 October 1880.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-12748,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-12748