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Summary
Unable to give information on Mrs Shaw of Crayford.
Mentions TCE’s interest in dog- and pig-skeleton researches.
Interested in seeing the Eyton Museum.
Reminisces about entomology [at Cambridge].
Transcription
Down Farnborough Kent
Oct. 25th
Dear Eyton
Crayfordf1 is a good way from here & I do not happen to know a soul at all in that direction, & therefore I am very sorry to say I can neither give, nor procure, any information regarding Mrs. Shaw.—f2
I am delighted to hear that you have begun to think of Dogs,f3 which subject would, I shd. think, make an excellent continuation of your capital Pig-skeleton researches.—f4
What a museum you will have!f5 and most truly shall I some day enjoy seeing it. Pray give my kind remembrances to Mrs. Eyton,f6 whom, it is very long since I have had the pleasure of seeing. Ah the good old times of Entomology, I have never enjoyed anything in Natural History so much since.f7
Most truly your’s | Ch. Darwin
Footnotes
- f1
- A village near Dartford, Kent, about ten miles north-east of Down.
- f2
- There is no information about Mrs Shaw, but a John Shaw is listed among the gentry living in Crayford (Post Office directory of the six home counties 1855).
- f3
- CD cited Eyton, ‘who has had much experience with dogs,’ concerning their period of gestation in Variation 1: 30.
- f4
- See Variation 1: 74, where CD reproduced a table from Eyton 1837, p. 23, showing the difference in the number of vertebrae and ribs in the different kinds of pigs.
- f5
- Eyton had collected extensively in many different fields of natural history. In 1855 he established a museum at the family seat at Eyton, Shropshire (DNB).
- f6
- Elizabeth Frances Eyton.
- f7
- Eyton had been one of CD’s insect-collecting friends when they were Cambridge undergraduates. He was also a Shropshire neighbour. See Correspondence vol. 1.