Ɛpsilon

From R. F. Cooke   20 November 1872

50A, Albemarle Street, London, W.

Nov 20 1872

My dear Sir

We are in a precious quondary with these Heliotype Plates for yr new work.

At present I dont know what we are to do. We have advertised the work for Tuesday next & we have 7000 Books & only 3000 sets of Plates.1

It is impossible to make even a partial delivery with so small a number, we shd. satisfy no one & dissatisfy hundreds.

Daily & hourly do we communicate with the Manager & I enclose his letter of yesterday afternoon.2 I need not say, that we did not & have not received the promised 500.!!!

I have just returned from the office & find out now the real truth, there has been & is a conspiracy or a strike at the Works & they have been obliged to dismiss & not able to replace competent men.

The Manager still tells me that he feels almost sure we shall get the 500 today & he hopes 1000 tomorrow & all the rest the day following, but as this is what has been told me for the last week I have no confidence in the result.

The nuisance is great & the fact of the book having been reviewed so long before publication is annoying to the public & may be prejudicial to the work.

We have supplied all the foreign markets & have not taken care of ourselves.3

Yours faithfully | Robt. Cooke

C. Darwin Esq

1
On the problems with supplying heliotype plates for Expression, see the letters from R. F. Cooke, 2 October 1872 and 4 October 1872. ‘Tuesday next’ was 26 November.
2
The manager was a Mr Wright (see letter from R. F. Cooke, 4 October 1872); the enclosed letter has not been found. Mr Wright has not been identified.
3
CD’s US publishers, Appleton, had been sent at least 3000 sets of heliotypes in October (see letters from R. F. Cooke, 9 October 1872, 11 October 1872, and 22 October 1872).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-8637,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-8637