Ɛpsilon

To Archibald Geikie   20 December [1871]1

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. [6 Queen Anne Street, London.]

Dec. 20th

My dear Sir

I hope that you will excuse me for troubling you, & for beginning my note in so familiar a manner; but your name has been so long & well known to me that I cannot help feeling as if I personally knew you.— Prof. Ramsay informs me that you have published some remarks on the denudation of flat or nearly flat surfaces, & I want much read them, as I have lately been making a few observations which I think throw some little light on this subject.2

Will you be so kind as to give me a reference; or if you could lend me a copy of your paper, I will promise to return it in under a week’s time.—3

I sincerely congratulate the students at Edinburgh at having secured your services as Professor of Geology.—4 Pray believe me, Yours very faithfully | Ch. Darwin

1
The date is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from Archibald Geikie, 24 December 1871.
2
Andrew Crombie Ramsay’s letter has not been found, but he later wrote to CD about a pavement between his house and his garden that had subsided owing to the activity of worms (see letter from A. C. Ramsay, 27 December 1871).
3
An annotated copy of Geikie’s paper ‘On modern denudation’ (Geikie 1868b) is in the Darwin Pamphlet Collection–CUL.
4
Geikie had been appointed first Murchison Professor of geology and mineralogy at Edinburgh University in 1871 (DNB).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

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Please cite as “DCP-LETT-8112,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-8112