To G. J. Romanes   7 March [1881]1

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

March 7th

My dear Romanes

I was quite mistaken about the Gardeners’ Chronicle; in my index there are only the few enclosed & quite insignificant references, having any relation to the minds of animals.—2

When I returned to my work, I found that I had nearly completed my statement of facts about worms plugging up their burrows with leaves &c &c.; so I waited until I had naturally to draw up a few concluding remarks. I hope that it will not bore you to read the few accompanying pages & in the middle you will find a few sentences with a sort of definition or with discussion on of intelligence.3 I am altogether dissatisfied with it. I tried to observe what passed in my own mind when I did the work of a worm.— If I come across a professed metaphysician, I will ask him to give me a more technical definition with a few big words, about the abstract, the concrete, the absolute & the infinite.

But seriously I shd. be grateful for any suggestions; for it will hardly do to assume that every fool knows what intelligent means. You will understand that the M.S is only the first rough copy & will need much correction.— Please return it for I have no other copy, only a few memoranda. When I think how it has bothered me to know what I mean by “intelligent”, I am sorry for you in your great work on the minds of animals.—4

My dear Romanes | Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

I daresay that I shall have to alter wholly this M.S.—

1
The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from G. J. Romanes, 7 March 1881.
2
No letter mentioning the index to Gardeners’ Chronicle has been found, but CD may have spoken to Romanes while he was in London from 24 February to 3 March 1881 (see CD’s ‘Journal’ (Appendix II)). CD evidently refers to the printed index as he is not known to have made his own. CD’s annotated bound copies of Gardeners’ Chronicle for the years 1841 to 1871 are in the Cambridge Botanic Garden Library. The enclosed references have not been found.
3
CD enclosed manuscript pages of Earthworms, chapter 2, which contained a discussion of the meaning of intelligence. Manuscript pages for this chapter are in DAR 24.1: B67–127; they are mostly written in the hand of a copyist and may be a later version than that sent to Romanes with this letter.
4
Romanes’s book, Animal intelligence, was published in 1882 (G. J. Romanes 1882).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 (Railway … S.E.R.)] parentheses added
1.2 having] above del ‘on’
2.2 until] after del ‘for’
2.5 or with … on] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13075,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13075