Ɛpsilon

To G. J. Romanes   10 December [1881]1

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

Dec. 10th

(My dear Mrs. Romanes, I have addressed this to you to forward to Mr R. if you think fit).2

My dear Romanes

I write a line to catch todays post, to say that I fear that I cannot help Mr Ewart. I have given R. Lankester so strong a testimonial that it wd. stultify me to give another, & moreover I have on this ground declined to give one to Dr Mc.Intosh, of whose work I have a very high opinion.—3 From what you have said I have no doubt that Mr Ewart is a very fit man, but this wd not justify me in giving a testimonial.— I well remember my most interesting interview with Mr E. & the Bacteria at U. Coll. Lab.—4

We shall be in London after Thursday, & I shall be extremely glad to see you.—5

Yours in Haste | Ch. Darwin

1
The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter to E. R. Lankester, 31 October 1881.
2
Presumably, Romanes was not in London; CD evidently thought Romanes’s wife, Ethel Romanes, would know whether to forward the letter or wait for Romanes to arrive.
3
CD had recommended Edwin Ray Lankester for the professorship in natural history at Edinburgh. William Carmichael McIntosh also applied for the position. See letter to E. R. Lankester, 31 October 1881 and n. 1, and letter to W. C. McIntosh, [after 21 November 1881].
4
James Cossar Ewart had been curator of the zoological museum at University College, London, when he worked on the life cycle of the bacteria Bacillus anthracis; most of his experimental work had been carried out at the Brown Animal Sanatory Institution, which was headed by John Scott Burdon Sanderson (Ewart 1878, p. 161). CD may have seen Ewart’s specimens at the museum or a laboratory at the institute at some time when he was visiting London in the mid-1870s.
5
The Darwins visited London from Tuesday 13 to Tuesday 20 December 1881 (Emma Darwin’s diary (DAR 242)). In the event, CD did not see Romanes because he was not feeling well on the day of his planned visit (letter from Emma Darwin to H. E. Litchfield, [16 December 1881] (DAR 219.9: 280)).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 (Railway … S.E.R.)] parentheses added
0.3 (My … fit) 0.4] square brackets in ms; salutation underl red crayon
1.4 very] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13544,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13544