Summary

Concerned about ED’s headaches, CD writes an affectionate letter.

Believes he has found a rare slave-making species of ant.

Is reading novels: Beneath the surface and Three chances.

Summary

Two letters for WED at E. A. Darwin's. G. H. Darwin has been to dentist. Please collect and pay for GHD’s skates.

Summary

They are impatient for CD’s arrival.

EW is reading F. Head’s "gallop" [Rapid journeys across the Pampas (1826)] "to get up a little knowledge for him".

CD has nearly settled in favour of living in Cambridge.

Summary

CD will not get to Maer that week. The Langtons are leaving and will meet him at Shrewsbury.

Summary

Describes her compassion for all his sufferings and writes of her wish that his gratitude could be offered to heaven as well as to herself. To her, the only relief is to try to believe that suffering and illness are from God’s hand "to help us to exalt our minds & to look forward with hope to a future state".

Summary

The Darwin family are anxious for FEEW’s and Hensleigh’s opinions of CD’s journal. EW is convinced that Henry Holland is wrong if he thinks it not worth publishing.

Summary

CD much obliged for specimen and drawings.

Summary

Trying to persuade CD to visit JL.

Summary

CD too ill to write.

He thanks Appleton for most beautiful work of natural history he has ever seen.

Summary

WED thinks Bournemouth a suitable holiday destination for ED and CD.

Summary

Glad to hear of the plant; CD instructs WED to make further observations. If it is a good case he will insist on WED’s sending a communication to the Linnean Society.

Summary

His [first] railway journey was disappointing.

Summary

Sets out estimate for cutting blocks for illustrations of a trap.

Summary

Encloses a four-page printed pamphlet on the cruelty of steel traps [see Collected papers 2: 83–4].

Summary

Thanks to WDF’s directions, Anne’s tombstone has been found.

CD improved, but recovery is slow. She describes treatment.

Encloses paper she and CD have written [see 4294, which was wrongly addressed by ED and had not reached WDF].

Summary

Apologises that CD is too unwell to do any work, but he is most interested in the frequent occurrence of inherited variations in one locality. It would have been a pleasure to visit if his health had permitted.

Summary

Sorry to hear of CD’s poor health.

Summary

CD’s health.

Family and local news.

Summary

Returns a borrowed extract from the [Zoological?] Record.

Summary

Asks whether he ought to write to CD while he is ill.

Wonders if he might use Haast’s notes on introduced animals for a notice he is preparing ["Note on the replacement of species in the colonies and elsewhere", Nat. Hist. Rev. n.s. 4 (1864): 123–7].