Ɛpsilon

To W. E. A. Axon   7 April [1882]1

Down, Beckenham, Kent

April 7,

Dear Sir

I have been interested and amused by the Essay which you have been so kind as to send me, and which shows a wonderful amount of research.2 Your plan of a Journal seems an excellent one and I wish it success, but I cannot offer to contribute an article to it, for I have made it a rule not to write in Periodicals, except to communicate new facts.3 I have just lately refused two applications and during the last few years a large number of similar ones. I have given the same answer to all, and I must keep to my resolution, otherwise the very little strength which I still possess would all be frittered away. Pray excuse me and believe me that I honour you for undertaking the work.

Yours faithfully | Ch. Darwin

Copy

1
The year is established by the publication date of the first issue of the Field Naturalist and Scientific Student (see n. 3, below).
2
The essay was probably Axon’s statement about founding a new periodical titled Field Naturalist and Scientific Student (later published at the beginning of the first issue), in which Axon expressed his hope that the journal would be inclusive and that its contents would be ‘exact without being technical’, ‘chatty without being trivial’, and would ‘not neglect the the little things of nature even for grander phenomena and more intricate problems’ ([Axon] 1882).
3
The first issue of the Field Naturalist and Scientific Student was published on 1 June 1882. The periodical folded after the ninth issue in early 1883, after which all the issues were published in a single volume; this did not have the opening statement by Axon (see n. 2, above), but instead a short preface explained the demise of the journal and stated that it had commenced with ‘the good wishes of the late Charles Darwin’ (Axon ed. 1883, Preface).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13762,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13762