VOLUME I.

DEDICATED WITH AFFECTION AND RESPECT, TO

SIR JOSEPH HOOKER

IN REMEMBRANCE OF HIS LIFELONG FRIENDSHIP WITH CHARLES DARWIN

"You will never know how much I owe to you for your constant kindness

and encouragement"

CHARLES DARWIN TO SIR JOSEPH HOOKER, SEPTEMBER 14, 1862

PREFACE

The "Life and Letters of Charles Darwin" was published in 1887. Since

that date, through the kindness of various correspondents, additional

letters have been received; among them may be mentioned those written by

Mr. Darwin to Mr. Belt, Lady Derby, Hugh Falconer, Mr. Francis Galton,

Huxley, Lyell, Mr. John Morley, Max Muller, Owen, Lord Playfair, John

Scott, Thwaites, Sir William Turner, John Jenner Weir. But the material

for our work consisted in chief part of a mass of letters which, for

want of space or for other reasons, were not printed in the "Life and

Letters." We would draw particular attention to the correspondence with

Sir Joseph Hooker. To him Mr. Darwin wrote with complete freedom, and

this has given something of a personal charm to the most technical

of his letters. There is also much correspondence, hardly inferior in

biographical interest, with Sir Charles Lyell, Fritz Muller, Mr. Huxley,

and Mr. Wallace. From this unused material we have been able to compile

an almost complete record of Mr. Darwin's work in a series of letters

now published for the first time. We have, however, in a few instances,

repeated paragraphs, or in one or two cases whole letters, from the

"Life and Letters," where such repetition seemed necessary for the sake

of clearness or continuity.

Our two volumes contain practically all the matter that it now

seems desirable to publish. But at some future time others may find

interesting data in what remains unprinted; this is certainly true of a

short series of letters dealing with the Cirripedes, which are omitted

solely for want of space. (Preface/1. Those addressed to the late Albany

Hancock have already appeared in the "Transactions of the Tyneside Nat.

Field Club," VIII., page 250.)

We are fortunate in being permitted, by Sir Joseph Hooker and by Mr.

Wallace, to publish certain letters from them to Mr. Darwin. We have

also been able to give a few letters from Sir Charles Lyell, Hugh

Falconer, Edward Forbes, Dr. Asa Gray, Professor Hyatt, Fritz Muller,

Mr. Francis Galton, and Sir T. Lauder Brunton. To the two last named,

also to Mrs. Lyell (the biographer of Sir Charles), Mrs. Asa Gray and

Mrs. Hyatt, we desire to express our grateful acknowledgments.

The present volumes have been prepared, so as to give as full an idea

as possible of the course of Mr. Darwin's work. The volumes therefore

necessarily contain many letters of a highly technical character, but

none, we hope, which are not essentially interesting. With a view to

saving space, we have confined ourselves to elucidating the letters

by full annotations, and have for the same reason--though with some

regret--omitted in most cases the beginnings and endings of the letters.

For the main facts of Mr. Darwin's life, we refer our readers to the

abstract of his private Diary, given in the present volume.

Mr. Darwin generally wrote his letters when he was tired or hurried, and

this often led to the omission of words. We have usually inserted

the articles, and this without any indication of their absence in the

originals. Where there seemed any possibility of producing an alteration

of meaning (and in many cases where there is no such possibility) we

have placed the introduced words in square brackets. We may say once for

all that throughout the book square brackets indicate words not found

in the originals. (Preface/2. Except in a few places where brackets are

used to indicate passages previously published. In all such cases the

meaning of the symbol is explained.) Dots indicate omissions, but many

omissions are made without being so indicated.

The selection and arrangement of the letters have not been easy. Our

plan has been to classify the letters according to subject--into such

as deal with Evolution, Geographical Distribution, Botany, etc., and in

each group to place the letters chronologically. But in several of the

chapters we have adopted sectional headings, which we believe will be a

help to the reader. The great difficulty lay in deciding in which of the

chief groups a given letter should be placed. If the MS. had been cut up

into paragraphs, there would have been no such difficulty; but we feel

strongly that a letter should as far as possible be treated as a whole.

We have in fact allowed this principle to interfere with an accurate

classification, so that the reader will find, for instance, in the

chapters on Evolution, questions considered which might equally well

have come under Geographical Distribution or Geology, or questions

in the chapter on Man which might have been placed under the heading

Evolution. In the same way, to avoid mutilation, we have allowed

references to one branch of science to remain in letters mainly

concerned with another subject. For these irregularities we must ask

the reader's patience, and beg him to believe that some pains have been

devoted to arrangement.

Mr. Darwin, who was careful in other things, generally omitted the date

in familiar correspondence, and it is often only by treating a letter

as a detective studies a crime that we can make sure of its date.

Fortunately, however, Sir Joseph Hooker and others of Darwin's

correspondents were accustomed to add the date on which the letters were

received. This sometimes leads to an inaccuracy which needs a word of

explanation. Thus a letter which Mr. Darwin dated "Wednesday" might be

headed by us "Wednesday [January 3rd, 1867]," the latter half being

the date on which the letter was received; if it had been dated by the

writer it would have been "Wednesday, January 2nd, 1867."

In thanking those friends--especially Sir Joseph Hooker and Mr.

Wallace--who have looked through some of our proof-sheets, we wish to

make it clear that they are not in the smallest degree responsible for

our errors or omissions; the weight of our shortcomings rests on us

alone.

We desire to express our gratitude to those who have so readily supplied

us with information, especially to Sir Joseph Hooker, Professor Judd,

Professor Newton, Dr. Sharp, Mr. Herbert Spencer, and Mr. Wallace. And

we have pleasure in mentioning Mr. H.W. Rutherford, of the University

Library, to whose conscientious work as a copyist we are much indebted.

Finally, it is a pleasure to express our obligation to those who have

helped us in the matter of illustrations. The portraits of Dr. Asa Gray,

Mr. Huxley, Sir Charles Lyell, Mr. Romanes, are from their respective

Biographies, and for permission to make use of them we have to thank

Mrs. Gray, Mr. L. Huxley, Mrs. Lyell, and Mrs. Romanes, as well as the

publishers of the books in question. For the reproduction of the

early portrait of Mr. Darwin we are indebted to Miss Wedgwood; for the

interesting portraits of Hugh Falconer and Edward Forbes we have to

thank Mr. Irvine Smith, who obtained for us the negatives; these being

of paper, and nearly sixty years old, rendered their reproduction a work

of some difficulty. We also thank Messrs. Elliott & Fry for very kindly

placing at our disposal a negative of the fine portrait, which forms the

frontispiece to Volume II. For the opportunity of making facsimiles of

diagrams in certain of the letters, we are once more indebted to Sir

Joseph Hooker, who has most generously given the original letters to Mr.

Darwin's family.

Cambridge, October, 1902.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME I.

Outline of Charles Darwin's Life, etc.