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To A. A. Reade   13 February 1882

Down, Beckenham, Kent

Feb. 13, 1882

Private

Dear Sir

I have marked this note as private, as the details are too personal for the Public.1 I drink 1 glass of wine daily and believe I should be better without any, though all Doctors urge me to drink some or more wine as I suffer much from giddiness. I have taken snuff all my life and regret that I ever acquired the habit, which I have often tried to leave off and have succeeded for a time. I feel sure that it is a great stimulus and aid in my work. I also daily smoke 2 little paper cigarettes of Turkish tobacco. This is not a stimulus, but rests me after my work, or after I have been compelled to talk, which tires me more than anything else. I am now 73 years old.2

Dear Sir | Yours faithfully | Ch. Darwin.

Copy

1
Reade’s letter, to which this is a response, has not been found, but in Reade ed. 1883, p. ii, Reade explained that he had asked several people engaged in intellectual work whether they used alcohol or tobacco, and whether they found it a help or hindrance in their work. In spite of CD’s having marked his response ‘Private’, Reade published it, omitting the first sentence, after CD’s death, first in Field Naturalist and Scientific Student, 1 June 1882, p. 24, and later in Reade ed. 1883, p. 38. The transcription that appeared in both these publications differed slightly from this copy made, presumably from the original, by Francis Darwin. In Reade ed. 1883, Reade dated the letter 9 February 1882; in Field Naturalist it was undated.
2
CD’s 73d birthday was on 12 February 1882.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13685,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13685