Life and Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 1 · Charles Darwin
"FEBRUARY 23, 1837."
I will now begin and go through your letter seriatim. I dare say your plan of putting the Elie de Beaumont's chapter separately and early will be very good; anyhow, it is showing a bold front in the first edition which is to be translated into French. It will be a curious point to geologists hereafter to note how long a man's name will support a theory so completely exposed as that of De Beaumont's has been by you; you say you "begin to hope that the great principles there insisted on will stand the test of time." BEGIN TO HOPE: why, the POSSIBILITY of a doubt has never crossed my mind for many a day. This may be very unphilosophical, but my geological salvation is staked on it. After having just come back from Glen Roy, and found how difficulties smooth away under your principles, it makes me quite indignant that you should talk of HOPING. With respect to the question, how far my coral theory bears on De Beaumont's theory, I think it would be prudent to quote me with great caution until my whole account is published, and then you (and others) can judge how far there is foundation for such generalisation. Mind, I do not doubt its truth; but the extension of any view over such large spaces, from comparatively few facts, must be received with much caution. I do not myself the least doubt that within the recent (or as you, much to my annoyment, would call it, "New Pliocene") period, tortuous bands--not all the bands parallel to each other--have been elevated and corresponding ones subsided, though within the same period some parts probably remained for a time stationary, or even subsided. I do not believe a more utterly false view could have been invented than great straight lines being suddenly thrown up.
When my book on Volcanoes and Coral Reefs will be published I hardly know; I fear it will be at least four or five months; though, mind, the greater part is written. I find so much time is lost in correcting details and ascertaining their accuracy. The Government Zoological work is a millstone round my neck, and the Glen Roy paper has lost me six weeks. I will not, however, say lost; for, supposing I can prove to others' satisfaction what I have convinced myself is the case, the inference I think you will allow to be important. I cannot doubt that the molten matter beneath the earth's crust possesses a high degree of fluidity, almost like the sea beneath the block ice. By the way, I hope you will give me some Swedish case to quote, of shells being preserved on the surface, but not in contemporaneous beds of gravel...
Remember what I have often heard you say: the country is very bad for the intellects; the Scotch mists will put out some volcanic speculations. You see I am affecting to become very Cockneyfied, and to despise the poor country-folk, who breath fresh air instead of smoke, and see the goodly fields instead of the brick houses in Marlborough Street, the very sight of which I confess I abhor. I am glad to hear what a favourable report you give of the British Association. I am the more pleased because I have been fighting its battles with Basil Hall, Stokes, and several others, having made up my mind, from the report in the "Athenaeum", that it must have been an excellent meeting. I have been much amused with an account I have received of the wars of Don Roderick (Murchison.) and Babbage. What a grievous pity it is that the latter should be so implacable...This is a most rigmarole letter, for after each sentence I take breath, and you will have need of it in reading it... I wish with all my heart that my Geological book was out. I have every motive to work hard, and will, following your steps, work just that degree of hardness to keep well. I should like my volume to be out before your new edition of 'Principles' appears. Besides the Coral theory, the volcanic chapters will, I think, contain some new facts. I have lately been sadly tempted to be idle--that is, as far as pure geology is concerned--by the delightful number of new views which have been coming in thickly and steadily,--on the classification and affinities and instincts of animals--bearing on the question of species. Note-book after note-book has been filled with facts which begin to group themselves CLEARLY under sub-laws.
Good night, my dear Lyell. I have filled my letter and enjoyed my talk to you as much as I can without having you in propria persona. Think of the bad effects of the country--so once more good night. Ever yours, CHAS. DARWIN. Pray again give my best thanks to Mrs. Lyell. [The record of what he wrote during the year does not give a true index of the most important work that was in progress,--the laying of the foundation-stones of what was to be the achievement of his life. This is shown in the foregoing letter to Lyell, where he speaks of being "idle," and the following extract from a letter to Fox, written in June, is of interest in this point of view: "I am delighted to hear you are such a good man as not to have forgotten my questions about the crossing of animals. It is my prime hobby, and I really think some day I shall be able to do something in that most intricate subject, species and varieties."] 1839-1841. [In the winter of 1839 (January 29) my father was married to his cousin, Emma Wedgwood. (Daughter of Josiah Wedgwood of Maer, and grand-daughter of the founder of the Etruria Pottery Works.) The house in which they lived for the first few years of their married life, No. 12 Upper Gower Street, was a small common-place London house, with a drawing-room in front, and a small room behind, in which they lived for the sake of quietness. In later years my father used to laugh over the surpassing ugliness of the furniture, carpets, etc., of the Gower Street house. The only redeeming feature was a better garden than most London houses have, a strip as wide as the house, and thirty yards long. Even this small space of dingy grass made their London house more tolerable to its two country-bred inhabitants.
Of his life in London he writes to Fox (October 1839): "We are living a life of extreme quietness; Delamere itself, which you describe as so secluded a spot, is, I will answer for it, quite dissipated compared with Gower Street. We have given up all parties, for they agree with neither of us; and if one is quiet in London, there is nothing like its quietness--there is a grandeur about its smoky fogs, and the dull distant sounds of cabs and coaches; in fact you may perceive I am becoming a thorough-paced Cockney, and I glory in thoughts that I shall be here for the next six months." The entries of ill health in the Diary increase in number during these years, and as a consequence the holidays become longer and more frequent. From April 26 to May 13, 1839, he was at Maer and Shrewsbury. Again, from August 23 to October 2 he was away from London at Maer, Shrewsbury, and at Birmingham for the meeting of the British Association. The entry under August 1839 is: "During my visit to Maer, read a little, was much unwell and scandalously idle. I have derived this much good, that NOTHING is so intolerable as idleness."
At the end of 1839 his eldest child was born, and it was then that he began his observations ultimately published in the 'Expression of the Emotions.' His book on this subject, and the short paper published in 'Mind,' (July 1877.) show how closely he observed his child. He seems to have been surprised at his own feelings for a young baby, for he wrote to Fox (July 1840): "He [i.e. the baby] is so charming that I cannot pretend to any modesty. I defy anybody to flatter us on our baby, for I defy any one to say anything in its praise of which we are not fully conscious...I had not the smallest conception there was so much in a five-month baby. You will perceive by this that I have a fine degree of paternal fervour." During these years he worked intermittently at 'Coral Reefs,' being constantly interrupted by ill health. Thus he speaks of "recommencing" the subject in February 1839, and again in the October of the same year, and once more in July 1841, "after more than thirteen months' interval." His other scientific work consisted of a contribution to the Geological Society ('Geol. Soc. Proc.' iii. 1842, and 'Geol. Soc. Trans.' vi), on the boulders and "till" of South America, as well as a few other minor papers on geological subjects. He also worked busily at the ornithological part of the Zoology of the "Beagle", i.e. the notice of the habits and ranges of the birds which were described by Gould.]
"If you attend at all to Natural History I send you this P.S. as a memento, that I continue to collect all kinds of facts about 'Varieties and Species,' for my some-day work to be so entitled; the smallest contributions thankfully accepted; descriptions of offspring of all crosses between all domestic birds and animals, dogs, cats, etc., etc., very valuable. Don't forget, if your half-bred African cat should die that I should be very much obliged for its carcase sent up in a little hamper for the skeleton; it, or any cross-bred pigeons, fowl, duck, etc., etc., will be more acceptable than the finest haunch of venison, or the finest turtle." Later in the year (September) he writes to Fox about his health, and also with reference to his plan of moving into the country:-- "I have steadily been gaining ground, and really believe now I shall some day be quite strong. I write daily for a couple of hours on my Coral volume, and take a little walk or ride every day. I grow very tired in the evenings, and am not able to go out at that time, or hardly to receive my nearest relations; but my life ceases to be burdensome now that I can do something. We are taking steps to leave London, and live about twenty miles from it on some railway."]
1842. [The record of work includes his volume on 'Coral Reefs' (A notice of the Coral Reef work appeared in the Geograph. Soc. Journal, xii., page 115.), the manuscript of which was at last sent to the printers in January of this year, and the last proof corrected in May. He thus writes of the work in his diary:-- "I commenced this work three years and seven months ago. Out of this period about twenty months (besides work during "Beagle's" voyage) has been spent on it, and besides it, I have only compiled the Bird part of Zoology; Appendix to Journal, paper on Boulders, and corrected papers on Glen Roy and earthquakes, reading on species, and rest all lost by illness." In May and June he was at Shrewsbury and Maer, whence he went on to make the little tour in Wales, of which he spoke in his 'Recollections,' and of which the results were published as "Notes on the effects produced by the ancient glaciers of Caernarvonshire, and on the Boulders transported by floating Ice." ('Philosophical Magazine,' 1842, page 352.) Mr. Archibald Geikie speaks of this paper as standing "almost at the top of the long list of English contributions to the history of the Ice Age." (Charles Darwin, 'Nature' Series, page 23.) The latter part of this year belongs to the period including the settlement at Down, and is therefore dealt with in another chapter.]
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.