Ɛpsilon

To Robert Everest?1   18 June [1856]2

Down Bromley Kent

June 18th.

Dear Sir

Our mutual friend Dr. Falconer has told me that I might use his name as an apology for troubling you.—3 I am very much interested on the subject of the variation of our domestic animals; & I have seen in several works, statements on the degeneracy of dogs in India & that Bull-Dogs, for instance, not only lost courage, but actually changed in form.4 I never could quite believe this, but Dr. Falconer says he feels pretty sure that it is true.5 He thinks that you could give me reliable information on this head; & it would be a very great kindness, if you could.—6

The danger of a cross seems the obvious source of error. If you would be so kind, when at leisure, to answer this note, I should feel extremely much obliged.— I have sometimes gone so far as to doubt whether climate has any direct influence even on colour.—

Pray believe me | Dear Sir | Your’s faithfully & obliged | Charles Darwin

1
The correspondent is conjectured on the basis that CD cited Everest in Variation on the deterioration of European breeds in India. Everest, a keen geologist and author of papers on the geology and climate of India, was listed in the Clergy list 1855 as residing in Calcutta (see n. 3, below).
2
Dated from CD’s particular interest in eliciting information about domestic animals in other countries at this time (see letter to E. L. Layard, 8 June [1856]).
3
Hugh Falconer, at the time resident in England, had been superintendent of the Calcutta botanic garden and professor of botany at the Calcutta Medical College from 1848 to 1855.
4
In Variation 1: 36 n. 65, CD cited William Youatt 1845, p. 15, and ‘The veterinary’ (The Veterinarian, or monthly journal of veterinarian science) 11 (1838): 235 (a mistake for p. 535) on the degeneration of dogs in India.
5
CD cited Falconer on the subject of the bulldog in Variation 1: 38.
6
In Variation 1: 36, CD cited Everest on Newfoundland dogs (Everest 1834, p. 19) and two pages later stated that: The Rev. R. Everest informs me that he obtained a pair of setters, born in India, which perfectly resembled their Scotch parents: he raised several litters from them in Delhi, taking the most stringent precautions to prevent a cross, but he never succeeded, though this was only the second generation in India, in obtaining a single young dog like its parents in size or make; …

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-1906,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-1906