From J. D. Hooker   [31 December 1862]1

Kew

Wednesday

Dr Darwin

It is rather jolly this writing about matters non-scientific— let’s give up Science when you have done the 3 vols & take to gossip.2 I quite agree with you that a holiday is an unendurable bore,3 but depend on it that is because we have no vices to indulge in, & if you will only join me in some good vice, such as talking about & writing about what will do no good to our neighbours & some harm to ourselves—we shall get on capitally, & scratch away. As luck would have it—I put aside the Ducal critique for a more careful reading with the Article itself.— I read the article itself, & in turn forgot I had put aside the smasher, which by a curious coincidence I stumbled upon yesterday, the day you wrote to me! so here it is. I congratulate you on so clever logical & acute a relative—4 Have I not met him at Down? many years ago.

I saw Mr Froud5 yesterday for first time at my Cousins wedding— what a singularly magnetic man he is to look at & talk (2 words) to; I think Frank P. has married a nice girl of a nice family.6

I have a great mind to send the Parthenon a s⁠⟨⁠creed⁠⟩⁠7 —The only 7 times I ap⁠⟨⁠plied⁠⟩⁠ for information at b⁠⟨⁠ritish museum⁠⟩⁠ I got none whatever ⁠⟨⁠and on one⁠⟩⁠ occasion the attendant could not find the Natural Order Cruciferæ!— The last time I went I found the invaluable plants of Loureiro,8 the only authentic scraps for identifying genera which it is impossible to make out by descriptions, in such a state of dirt, disorder & confusion that I came away determining never to try there again.

Ever Yrs affec | J D Hooker

1
Dated by the relationship to the letter to J. D. Hooker, 29 [December 1862] (see nn. 3 and 4, below), and by the reference to the wedding of Hooker’s cousin, Francis Turner Palgrave (see n. 6).
2
Variation was intended to be the first part of a three-volume work on natural selection (see Correspondence vol. 7, letter to T. H. Huxley, 16 December [1859], and Correspondence vol. 8, letter to Asa Gray, 28 January [1860]).
4
See letter to J. D. Hooker, 29 [December 1862] and n. 5. Hooker refers to a critique of George Douglas Campbell’s review of Orchids ([G. D. Campbell] 1862), published in the Saturday Review by CD’s nephew, Henry Parker ([Parker] 1862). CD had sent Hooker his copy of the critique before realising its authorship.
6
Hooker refers to the marriage of his cousin, F. T. Palgrave, to Cecil Grenville Milnes Gaskell on 30 December 1862 (see Gentleman’s Magazine n.s. 14 (1863): 231).
7
Hooker refers to a review, published in the Parthenon, 27 December 1862, pp. 1102–3, of part 1 of Bentham and Hooker 1862–83 (see letter to J. D. Hooker, 29 [December 1862]). The reviewer criticised the authors for having neglected the materials in the British Museum.
8
The reference is to João de Louriero, whose herbarium had been acquired by the British Museum (Taxonomic literature).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-3890,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-3890