To W. D. Fox   16 [March 1863]

Down

16th

My dear Fox

Very many thanks for your to me very interesting letter.—1 I did not think it likely that you could add much.— if you should hear what Ram was I shd. like to add it.2

After writing I found sentence in your old letter, which I had overlooked saying that you believed white & slate Musks breed true, so I have put it in cautiously.—3 These facts interest me greatly.

I suppose we must go to Malvern; but it breaks my heart.—4 I am tired with a lot of letters, so goodBye with many thanks | Ever yours | C. Darwin

Endorsement: ‘March 17/63’

Postmark: MR 16 63

2
See letter from W. D. Fox, 12 March [1863]. Fox’s reply has not been found, but see the letter to W. D. Fox, 23 March [1863]. See also CD’s description of the ram in Variation 2: 30.
3
The letter from Fox to which CD refers has not been found; however, see the letter to W. D. Fox, 9 March [1863] and n. 1. The crosses conducted by Fox are briefly mentioned in Variation 2: 40.
4
See letter to W. D. Fox, 9 March [1863], and letter from W. D. Fox, 12 March [1863]. CD refers to James Manby Gully’s hydropathic establishment in Great Malvern, Worcestershire, where Anne Elizabeth Darwin, CD’s eldest daughter and favourite child, died in 1851 (see Correspondence vol. 5).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

2.1 sentence] above del ‘P.S’
3.1 Malvern;] ‘;’ over ‘.—’

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-4044,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-4044