To G. H. Darwin   10 June 1874

Down, | Beckenham, Kent.

June 10th 74

My dear George

Your paper strikes me as very clearly & modestly written. An impression of distrust & doubt is necessarily raised by the difficulties which you reveal at every point. I had no idea what a complex subject it is. As far as my judgment goes, I think your paper is well worth publishing. To take the lowest ground, it is well to show how difficult a problem it is.— I suppose you intend to add a general summary or conclusion giving the limit of error within which the percentage of cousiny marriages can be arrived at with fair confidence. The general reader would much desire this, & he would trust you largely from the honesty shown throughout your paper. To men not accustomed to mathematic your abbreviations are perplexing in the Tables. I have marked some of them with pencil; for I did not at first take a glimmering of meaning. A Table ought, I think, to be intelligible without reading the context.— Certainly I hope that you will publish your paper, & have it read before the Statistical Socy.1

We were very glad to get your letter this morning with a somewhat better account of yourself & about those accursed exam: papers.2

We are making a hole in the Proof-sheets, & shall soon come to Part II.— I have not received for some days any new sheet.— I have detected very few errata—one or two, as age for ago & full-stop omitted.—3

I cannot resist correcting rather more than you do,—but not much, so do not see Revises.

I have sent your interesting notes on direction to Spalding.—4

I return old Proofs & your Paper.

Yours affect | C. Darwin

1
George had been analysing data on the marriage of first cousins and its effects on the health of their children since 1873; he read a paper on the subject to the Statistical Society of London on 16 March 1875 (G. H. Darwin 1875a; see also G. H. Darwin 1875b, and letter from G. H. Darwin, 20 April 1874 and n. 2). The draft seen by CD has not been found.
2
The letter has not been found; George had complained of ill health in his letter of 30 May 1874. George was an examiner in mathematics and classics for Trinity College, Cambridge; the examinations took place between 8 and 13 June 1874 (Trinity College Archive, Head Lecturer’s Book 1801–1900).
3
George was checking proof-sheets for the second edition of Descent, which was published as a single volume whereas the first edition was in two parts (see letter from G. H. Darwin, 30 May 1874 and n. 1).
4
Douglas Alexander Spalding had recently visited CD and discussed his work on inherited instinct; George’s notes have not been found (see letters to G. H. Darwin, 27 May [1874] and [29 May 1874]).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

1.8 from] altered from ‘for’
1.10 with pencil] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-9487,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-9487