From Samuel Butler to Francis Darwin   [before 30 May 1872]1

15. Clifford’s Inn | Fleet Street

Dear Darwin

My young friend May has brought me these this morning:   he tells me to say that they are entirely at Mr Darwin’s disposal, and that he shall be delighted in case he finds them in any way useful.2 I don’t think the lower one satisfies him, but I should think that a suggestion would be attended to: he said he found it so far more difficult to get a dog into the fighting attitude than the fawning one, that he had less chance of studying.

I send the drawings to you rather than to your father because it is no use troubling him at all unless you think them likely to please him. Would you like to meet the youth? he seems to me to shape uncommonly well.

Your’s very truly | S. Butler.

1
The date is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from Samuel Butler, 30 May 1872.
2
CD used Arthur Dampier May’s drawings of a hostile and an affectionate dog in Expression, pp. 54–5.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-8305,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-8305