To John Lubbock 23 February 1874
Down, | Beckenham, Kent.
Feb 23. 1874
My dear Lubbock
I am going to beg a great favour of you, in the hope that you will be inclined to grant it. I believe that when I & my wife are dead this house would sell much better if the little wood which I rent from you belonged to the property.1 In the Agreement the land is said to be 1 acre 2 rods & 16 perches. Now will you sell it me, which I shd prefer as I have not too much land for my cows; or if not, will you exchange it for part of a field of mine between this house & Luxted. The part coloured blue in the enclosed plan2 will shew you the position of the land, & an area, (as measured by my son Leonard) approximately the same as your little wood. This I should be very glad to exchange with you. It is old pasture land, bought several years ago from Mr Wood,3 & you will see that it adjoins your own land. I think any agent whom you might send to view this field will admit that it is of considerably better quality than the field from which the wood was taken. A surveyor wd have to measure off from my field the exact quantity, & I wd of course make the new fence & pay all law & other expences.
Pray reflect over my request & if you can, grant it.
Believe me | my dear Lubbock | yours very sincerely | Charles Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Summary
CD wishes to acquire a piece of JL’s land.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-9310
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Lubbock, 4th baronet and 1st Baron Avebury
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 261.7: 8a (EH 88205933)
- Physical description
- LS(A) 4pp & ADraftS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 9310,” accessed on 10 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-9310.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 22