To John Murray   9 February [1868]

Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.

Feb 9—

My dear Sir

I am heartily glad for your sake & my own at the sale of the book— I think you are right to publish a rather smaller 2nd Edit. for the public will soon find out that it is dull, though I maintain that it is valuable in a scientific point of view.1

I beg leave to acknowledge & thank you for your bill for £300.2 Considering the great expense this seems a fair profit, but I hope it will be greater for the next edition. I have sent to Messrs Clowes by today’s post a few corrections, but they will not break the pages.3 The index is admirable; by the way Mr Dallas said to me in a letter recd yesterday that he had not yet heard from you.4 If not too much trouble, I shd like to hear what the corrections alone cost, so that I may hold them in terrorem over myself for my next book.5

Many thanks for your kind congratulations about my son.6 You know I am always greedy for presentation copies so I hope you will give me a few.

I am extremely pleased & remain my dear Sir | yours very faithfully | Ch. Darwin

LS

3
William Clowes & Sons were the printers of Variation. CD had received a list of corrections for the book (see letter from J. Daly, [before 9 February 1868]). The second printing of Variation also contained a small amount of new material (see Freeman 1978). CD meant that the corrections were not so extensive as to require the book to be repaginated.
4
William Sweetland Dallas compiled the index for Variation. CD refers to the letter from W. S. Dallas, 6 February 1868.
5
There is an annotation at the top of the page that reads ‘corrections | £176.—’.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-5854,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-5854