To John Allen 25 May 1847
Down Farnborough Kent
May 25th. /47
My dear Sir
I am much obliged by your note of the 21st, which I consider as a great compliment.1 I am more than doubtful whether I could at all succeed in so very difficult a task as that proposed, but I am sorry to say that my powers of work, owing to my health are so slight, and having much materials in Nat. Hist. half worked out, that I am unwilling to undertake anything fresh.2 If I had the time & felt that I could do justice to your proposal, the doubt of my work being accepted, should not prevent a trial, for I fully appreciate the great importance of such works: it has often been a castle in the air with me, how much useful information, supposing that the proper man could be caught, might be given to the poor in early life, on subjects most useful to them, & yet about which they are profoundly ignorant.3
My wife begs to join me in our kind remembrances to Mrs. Allen4 & to yourself & pray believe me, My dear Sir | Yours very sincerely | C. Darwin
Rev. J. Allen.
I see that I have written this note the wrong way first—5
Footnotes
Summary
Thanks for JS’s note concerning a proposal [concerning some aspect of education of poor children?] which CD has to decline because of his poor health and his work in Natural History.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-1090F
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Allen
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- The National Library of Israel (Abraham Schwadron collection, Schwad 03 04 07)
- Physical description
- ALS 4pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 1090F,” accessed on 1 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-1090F.xml