To W. B. Tegetmeier   4 June [1856]1

Down Bromley Kent

June 4th

My dear Sir

The Rabbit arrived safely & I thank you heartily for all the trouble which you have so kindly taken for me.2

I send a P.O. (payable to William B. Tegetmeier) for 1£, as I thought it would be best to send even sum, & you can keep, if you kindly will, the few shillings in advance.3 Then you will have to pay a Porter to bring the Birds to me on Saturday morning the 21st of June.—4

With my repeated thanks. | In Haste | Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

How cheap the Rabbit was!

1
Dated by an entry in CD’s Account book (Down House MS) (see n. 3, below).
3
There is an entry in CD’s Account book (Down House MS) for a payment to Tegetmeier on 4 June 1856. It reads: ‘Tegetmeier Rabbit & Pigeon: Peas [pigeon food]’.
4
Tegetmeier sent a pair of laughing pigeons to Erasmus Alvey Darwin’s house on 21 June for CD to take home with him on his return from London (see letters to W. B. Tegetmeier, 31 May [1856] and 24 June [1856]).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-1888,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-1888