Ɛpsilon

From W. E. Darwin   22 November [1880]1

Bank

Nov 22

My dear Father,

Thank you for the copy of your book.2 I am much interested in reading a good deal of it; it almost makes one dizzy to think of the enormous labour of so many observations. I was delighted to see the article in the Times.3 What a wonderful sign of change of feeling that the old Times dares to write such an article without a sneer or a smile of pity.

It was really interesting and explained well I thought to the world in general the drift of your work—and it certainly is a compliment to have not merely a notice but an article.

I hope soon to go over to Beaulieu to get some worm castings,4 but the days are very short, & it is difficult to catch a fine day on which I can get away early enough.

My gardiner5 is an odd mixture of theory & sense; he has a great reverence for worms and calls them “our civil engineers”. I promised to tell Frank6 that he says that in order to make a shoot bend in any direction he only plucks off a few leaves on that side and he says the sunlight playing on the stem bends it over.

Goodbye dear Father   I hope Mother is well. it is very jolly to think of Christmas being so near | Your affect son | W. E Darwin

CD annotations

4.2 I promised … side 4.4] double scored red crayon, ‘I remember analogous case’ blue crayon
1
The year is established by the allusion to Movement in plants (see n. 3, below).
2
William’s name appears on CD’s presentation list for Movement in plants (see Appendix IV).
3
A highly favourable review of Movement in plants appeared in The Times, 20 November 1880, p. 9.
4
Beaulieu Abbey was in Hampshire; see letters to W. E. Darwin, 18 June 1880 and 10 September [1880].
5
William’s gardener has not been identified.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-12840F,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-12840F