To W. E. Darwin 13 May [1857]1
Down
May 13th
My dear Willy
We have got your Sunday & Tuesday letters.— Will you tell Mrs Kynnersley2 that I am very sorry to say that really have not one single aquaintance left in S. America: it is now 24–25 years since I was there, & the English population is a floating & changeable one.—
Mamma has used you very ill, & quite forgot about your Flute, but I have found it, & it shall go off tomorrow morning by the Post together with this note.— So you may “tootle” to your heart’s content. What a dining out gentleman you have become!—
With respect to allowance we will settle it this summer Holidays: £40 sounds a good lot, nearly as much as Parslow’s wages;3 but I daresay it is not too much. Try & find out more particulars, & whether any other Boys have an allowance.—
Mamma, Miss Thorley & Etty returned yesterday:4 I grieve to say Etty is not one bit better: everything must bend to her health, & Mamma will take her to Moor Park in a fortnight’s time, stay a fortnight, & then I shall go there again for a bit.—5 What we shall do in summer, it is really impossible to say: if we do not go to Malvern, we will try our best to think of some lark or amusement for all of you.—6 Mamma thinks if Water Cure does suit Etty, we had better go to Malvern to complete it, but I shd. prefer leaving her longer at Moor Park.—7 It is very disheartening for me, that all the wonderful good which Moor Park did me at the time, has gone all away like a flash of lightening, now that I am at work again. And eheu, eheu, I have left off Snuff for nothing!—8
On Friday Aunt Susan is coming, on Saturday Uncle Harry & Aunt Jessie, on Monday Fanny Frank, & on tomorrow week Aunt Catherine, so we have lots of visitors expected,—a good lot too many, now poor dear Etty is so indifferent.9
What a capital Hand you have directed your two last notes in; it was quite Ducal.—
Ever my dear Son | Your’ affect Father | C. Darwin
Footnotes
Summary
Discusses family health and affairs.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-2091
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- William Erasmus Darwin
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 210.6: 15
- Physical description
- ALS 7pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 2091,” accessed on 21 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-2091.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 6