Ɛpsilon

From J. D. Hooker   7 April 1868

Royal Gardens Kew

April 7/68.

Dear Darwin

I am going to North Wales with Huxley on Thursday— will you lend me the Duke’s Reign of Law: which I want to understand if I can, & would take with me.—1

Thanks for your note, I get more & more unhappy about the address as the time draws on.2 Nothing on earth would induce me to do a thing so damned indelicate as to force such a position on an unwilling soul.— Science might go to the Devil before I would do so, by an enemy even. You see I am working up myself to the starting point—

I have often thought of History of great steps in Botany, but it would take a deal of reading, & I have no time for any—& then when we come down to later years I should offend every body.—3 And after all, should a President’s address be a “Scientific thesis”. I think not.— Who ever consulted such addresses, or regarded such as authorities?

Smith will supply the Euryalias & notes— he is again very poorly with palpitations of heart &c.4

I saw Woolner yesterday— he is to let me know when he goes to Down.5

Ever Yr affec | J D Hooker

1
The reference is to Thomas Henry Huxley. Hooker also refers to George Douglas Campbell’s The reign of law (Campbell 1867; CD’s copy is in the Darwin Library–CUL).
3
In his letter of 3 April [1868], CD had suggested the history of botany as a topic for Hooker’s presidential address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science.
4
Hooker refers to John Smith. See letter to J. D. Hooker, 3 April [1868] and n. 2.
5
Thomas Woolner visited Down in November 1868 (Emma Darwin’s diary (DAR 242)).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-6099,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-6099