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To George Bentham   27 December 1880

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | (Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.)

Dec 27 1880

My dear Mr Bentham

If you would not object to sign the enclosed Certificate for my son Francis, it would greatly please him & me.1 Though he has done no systematic work, some of his Botanical papers appear to me to possess some value.—2 If, however, you doubt whether my son ought to be proposed, I trust that you will merely return the certificate without your signature in the enclosed envelope.—

Believe me, my dear Mr Bentham | Yours sincerely | Charles Darwin

1
Bentham’s signature appears on Francis Darwin’s certificate of proposal for fellowship of the Royal Society of London; Francis was elected on 8 June 1882 (Royal Society archives, GB 117 EC/1882/09).
2
In addition to his work in physiological botany, Francis had also worked on animal morphology and physiology.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 (Railway … S.E.R.)] parentheses added
1.3 Botanical] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-12942,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-12942