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THE LATE CHARLES DARWIN.

We have been favoured with information as to the medical history of the great naturalist, which will be read with much interest. Under the domination of a many-sided, sensitive, and highly strung nervous system, the health of the late Charles Darwin was always delicate, and often seriously impaired. For many years, he was a sufferer from catarrhal dyspepsia; later, he suffered from various irregular manifestations of a gouty constitution, such as eczema, vaso-motor nerve-storms, vertigo, and other disorders of sensation. Nevertheless, by means of great care in diet, exercise, and regularity of sleep, he managed to keep himself in sufficiently good order for almost continual work of the highest kind. A year ago, he became subject to attacks of palpitation, with irregularity of the heart's action, occasionally accompanied by pain in the chest, spreading to the arms. A few months since, it was found that the heart and greater blood-vessels were degenerating. The anginal attacks became more frequent, and signs of heart failure more serious; and it was, as we understand, in one of these attacks that our greatest naturalist expired. There are two common errors concerning Charles Darwin: one is, that that illustrious man was a professor, whilst in fact he never held any chair or fulfilled any educational duties that would entitle him to be so called; the second is the prevalent opinion that, in pursuit of the study of his great theory, he worked from morning to night. The truth is, that the delicate state of his health rendered him incapable of prolonged thought for more than about three hours daily. His success was due to the fact that he concentrated all his powers of thought on one subject, so that the yearly sum of the very few hours devoted on each day to such thought amounted to the high display of mental energy, the result of which is demonstrated by his works, and by the great influence they have exercised on modern science and philosophy. More than one daily paper has compared Darwin to White, of Selborne fame; but they only resembled each other in being genial and scholarly gentlemen, living in the country, and saved from the disadvantages of constant interruption to thought by deficient worldly means. The author of the Natural History of Selborne was not a profound thinker on deep biological questions, but rather an active observer of the habits and instincts of animals, which he described in that picturesque manner and a pleasant literary style which has justly made him a popular favourite.