Ɛpsilon

To Armand de Quatrefages   15 January [1860]1

Down Bromley Kent

Jan. 15th

Dear Sir

I beg pardon for troubling you. I wrote some time since asking you to interest yourself in getting a French Translation of my Book, & I begged you not to write without you had anything favourable to communicate.2 This morning I have received a letter from a French gentleman (M. Talandier) who is anxious to translate it, but he is not a naturalist. I have in answer told him that I could not agree till I heard from Paris.3 Perhaps you will kindly write me one line at once, if you have anything to communicate; but if I do not hear in a few days, I will assume what is in itself very probable, that you know not any Naturalist who would undertake the task. From a letter from M. Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire, I have put myself into communication with Madame Belloc again; but I do not believe she has any intention of translating it.—4

With most sincere apologies for the great liberty which I have taken in troubling you, I remain with much respect.— | Yours faithfully & obliged | Charles Darwin

1
The year is established by the allusion to Origin, which was published in November 1859.
3
CD’s correspondence with Pierre Theodore Alfred Talandier has not been found; he was a political exile from France and taught French at Sandhurst.
4
Louise Swanton Belloc. See this volume, Supplement, letter to Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, 12 January [1860] and n. 6. Quatrefages’s reply to this letter has not been found, but see Correspondence vol. 8, letter to J. L. A. de Quatrefages de Bréau, 21 January [1860].

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-2652F,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-2652F