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BRITISH ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT

OF SCIENCE

REPORT

OF THE

NINETY-SIXTH MEETING

(NINETY-EIGHTH YEAR)

GLASGOW—1928

SEPTEMBER 5-12

LONDON

OFFICE OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION

BURLINGTON HOUSE, LONDON, W. 1

1929

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DOWN HOUSE.

The following important announcement was made1 to the General Committee of the Association, meeting in Glasgow on September 5 regarding Darwin's home, Down House, in the County of Kent. Mr. George Buckston Browne, Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and of the Society of Antiquaries, London, having acquired the property from Prof. Charles Galton Darwin, F.R.S., grandson of the naturalist, has transferred its possession to the British Association under the most liberal conditions and with an endowment amply sufficient for its maintenance and preservation for all time.

At present Down House serves as a private school. When the tenant's lease falls in or is acquired, the donor desires that the property be regarded as a gift to the nation and opened to visitors every day of the week between the hours of 10 and 6, without charge. He also desires that the Association should use Down House and grounds for the benefit of science. The donor has also suggested that certain of the rooms—particularly the old 'study,' in which the Origin of Species was written—should be furnished, as near as may be possible, as they were when Darwin lived in them. The donor has already taken steps to secure this end and has obtained the willing co-operation and greatest assistance from various members of the Darwin family. Indeed, without the generous co-operation of the Darwin family the transfer of ownership could not have been effected. The late Mrs. Litchfield, the third daughter of Charles Darwin, bequeathed for Down House her father's study chair and letter-weighing machine. Thanks also to the generosity of other members and friends of the Darwin family Major Leonard Darwin, Prof. Charles G. Darwin, Mrs. Perrero, and Mrs. Berkeley Hill, together with acquisitions made by himself, Mr. Buckston Browne has already got together the nucleus of a Darwin collection for Down. He has commissioned the Hon. John Collier to paint replicas of his well-known portraits of Darwin and of Huxley to be hung at Down House; these commissions are already completed. It is hoped that the shelves of the old study may be filled with all editions of Darwin's works, and that Down House may become a repository of Darwiniana where students will have an opportunity of consulting all original documents concerning Darwin and his writings. Such an end can be attained only if the British Association succeeds in enlisting the sympathetic co-operation of all who may be the fortunate owners of articles which were in the possession of Darwin or were associated with his life.

The Donor.

Mr. George Buckston Browne was born in Manchester in 1850. the only son of a well-known medical man—Dr. Henry Browne, physician to the Manchester Royal Infirmary and Lecturer on Medicine to the Manchester Medical School. Dr. Henry Browne represented the fourth generation of a medical dynasty where son had succeeded father, the founder of the family having been Dr. Theophilus Browne of Derby who was townsman

1 By Prof. Sir Arthur Keith, F.R.S.

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and contemporary of Dr. Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of Charles Darwin. Mr. Buckston Browne continued the family tradition, representing the fifth medical generation. In 1866, at the age of sixteen, he matriculated as a student of London University, entered University College, was awarded medals in Anatomy, Chemistry and Midwifery, gained the gold medal for practical chemistry and the Liston gold medal in surgery. He became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1874 and gained in open competition the house-surgeoncy to his hospital (University College Hospital) where he served under Sir John Erichsen. He also taught anatomy under Prof. Vines Ellis. No one ever trained himself more thoroughly for his profession.

After his term in hospital, Mr. Buckston Browne was invited by Sir Henry Thompson, one of the most distinguished and accomplished surgeons of the Victorian era, to become assistant and afterwards collaborator. In 1884 he began practice on his own account and became very closely, and very successfully, engaged in work. Indeed, his application to his profession was such that for twenty-seven years, in the earlier period of his career, he had neither a free day nor holiday. Mr. Buckston Browne has contributed important articles to the literature of his profession, but it was his practical ability, unerring insight, and skilled hand which gained him his success and the esteem of his colleagues and of his patients. In 1926 the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons conferred on him the diploma of Fellow in recognition of his services to surgery.

The donor of Down House has had, as his many friends well know, not only a successful life but also a very happy one.

Mr. Buckston Browne's only daughter is the wife of Mr. Hugh Lett, C.B.E., Surgeon to the London Hospital, and brother of a distinguished artiste, Miss Phyllis Lett. In the Lett family Mr. Buckston Browne possesses three charming grand-daughters.

But since the war death has laid a heavy hand upon his family. In 1919 he lost his only son, Lt.-Col. George Buckston Browne, who was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for action in the field. Lt.-Col. Buckston Browne left an only son. He also was struck down in 1924, dying from typhoid fever in South Africa. A long line was thus brought to a sudden end. In 1926 Mrs. Buckston Browne died, a devoted partnership of fifty-two years being thus ended. Mrs. Buckston Browne rests in the churchyard of her native village, Sparsholt, Hants. Here her husband has endowed an alms house for aged villagers in her memory.

The History of Down2 House.

It may not be amiss to recount some of the circumstances which led up to the appeal for the preservation of Darwin's home. Some years before his death the late Sir Arthur Shipley, Master of Christ's College, Cambridge, where Darwin was an undergraduate, wrote to a member of the British Association as follows: 'It seems to me that Down House

2 On the Ordnance Survey maps the spelling is Downe, but as Darwin always wrote Down without an' e' the latter spelling has been adopted

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ought to be a national possession. Do you know of any means by which this can be brought about? On the eve of the Leeds Meeting of the British Association on August 31, 1927, the Council of the Association considered this matter and empowered the then President (Sir Arthur Keith) to make a public appeal at the close of his presidential address to the assembled Association. An urgent S.O.S. was sent out with the happy result which all now know. It was with as much surprise as satisfaction that Sir Arthur Keith learned that the man who answered the call was a Fellow of his own College. Indeed, he knew Mr. Buckston Browne as a generous benefactor to that College and to the Harveian Society, but was unaware of his love for Darwin and for Down. It was later that he learned that Darwin's friend Huxley had long ago exerted an abiding influence on the donor of Down.

Darwin's Association with Down House.

Darwin was born at Shrewsbury, February 12, 1809. Down House was purchased for him by his father, Dr. Darwin, and he took up his residence there on September 14, 1842. Darwin was then in his thirty fourth year; three years previously he had married his cousin, Emma Wedgewood. His two eldest children, William and Anne, were born in London; the third, Mary, was born and died just after arrival at Down. Then followed in 1843 Henrietta, who became Mrs. Litchfield; in 1845 George, who became Sir George Darwin, F.R.S., and whose son, Prof. Charles Darwin, F.R.S., succeeded to the ownership of Down and is the fifth of a succession of father and son who have been elected Fellows of the Royal Society—an unique record; in 1847 Elizabeth was born; in the following year Francis, who became Sir Francis Darwin, F.R.S.— a distinguished botanist and president of the British Association. His son, Bernard Darwin, is known to all as an exponent as well as an authority on golf. Leonard followed in 1850—Major Leonard Darwin, scientist, philanthropist and the founder and still active supporter of the Eugenics Society. Then came Horace, now Sir Horace Darwin, F.R.S., happily still alive. And last number 10, Charles Waring Darwin, who died in childhood. Down was thus the home of a large and happy family, perhaps the most gifted family ever born in England. There the great naturalist died on April 19, 1882, in his seventy-fourth year. He worked continuously at Down for almost forty years.

In that period he made his first draft of the Origin of Species (1842), he wrote his researches on the Zoology of the Beagle, on Coral Reefs, and prepared a new edition of a Naturalist's Voyage. Before he settled down to work at Barnacles, to which he gave seven years (1847-54), he prepared his papers on Volcanic Islands and on the Geology of South America. Preparations for the Origin of Species, which did not receive its final form until 1858-59, went on continuously from 1842 onwards. Then followed his inquiries into Fertilisations of Orchids (1862), Variations of Animals and Plants under Domestication (1868), Descent of Man (1871), the Expression of the Emotions (1872), Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants (1875); Insectivorous Plants appeared in the same year; Cross and Self Fertilisation in 1876, and his last work of all, one which was begun soon after he settled at Down, The Formation of Vegetable Mould

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[location map]

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[floor plan]

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through the Action of Worms. No single home in the world can show such a record. Truly from Down Charles Darwin shook the world and gave human thought an impress which will endure for all time. Down is a priceless heirloom not only for England but for the civilised world. One of the greatest men of all time lived there.

As to the character of Down House, much is to be learned from the account which Sir Francis Darwin has given in his father's biography:

'On September 14, 1842, my father left London with his family and settled at Down. In the autobiographical chapter his motives for moving in to the country are briefly given. He speaks of the attendance at scientific societies and ordinary social duties as suiting his health so "badly that we resolved to live in the country, which we both preferred and have never repented of."

'The choice of Down was rather the result of despair than of actual preference; my father and mother were weary of house-hunting, and the attractive points about the place thus seemed to them to counterbalance its somewhat more obvious faults. It had at least one desideratum— namely, quietness. Indeed, it would have been difficult to find a more retired place so near to London.. .. It is a place where newcomers are seldom seen, and the names occurring far back in the old church registers are still known in the village.

The house stands a quarter of a mile from the village, and is built, like so many houses of the last century, as near as possible to the road—a narrow lane winding away to the Westerham high road. In 1842 it was dull and unattractive enough; a square brick building of three storeys, covered with shabby whitewash and hanging tiles. The garden had none of the shrubberies or walls that now give shelter; it was overlooked from the lane, and was open, bleak, and desolate.

'The house was made to look neater by being covered with stucco, but the chief improvement effected was the building of a large bow of three storeys. This bow became covered with a tangle of creepers, and pleasantly varied the south side of the house. The drawing-room, with its verandah opening into the garden, as well as the study in which my father worked during the later years of his life, were added at subsequent dates.

'Eighteen acres of land were sold with the house, of which twelve acres on the south side of the house form a pleasant field, scattered with fair-sized oaks and ashes. From this field a strip was cut off and converted into a kitchen garden, in which the experimental plot of ground was situated, and where the greenhouses were ultimately put up.'

To fill in some further details of this picture of Down we may also draw upon the description given by Mrs. Litchfield, in the life of her mother, Mrs. Darwin (Emma Darwin, privately printed 1904).

'For some time there had been a growing wish on the part of my parents to live in the country. Their health made London undesirable in many ways, and they both preferred the freedom and quiet of a country life. They decided to buy a country house, but out of prudence resolved upon not going beyond a moderate price, and as they also wished to be near London, there was a weary search before they found anything at all suitable. In her little diary, under July 22, 1842, I find the entry "went

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to 'Down,'" and this I think must have been the first sight of her future home. It was bought for them by Dr. Darwin for about £2,200, and the purchase was quickly completed, for they moved in on September 14, 1842.

'Down was then ten miles from a station, and the whole neighbourhood was intensely rural and quiet, though only sixteen miles from London Bridge.'

The two accompanying plans, the data for which were obtained through the kindness of Major Leonard Darwin, will give a precise idea of the extent of the property and of the plan of Darwin's home. Fig. 1 shows the arrangement and extent of the grounds; the figures indicate the acreage of each part. Down House is seen to be situated at 565.7 feet O.D. The plantation with the sandwalk round it—Darwin's 'thinking path' — with the dry chalk valley beyond, are depicted; so, too, are the orchard, gardens and hot-houses. In Fig. 2 is given a plan of the ground floor of Down House, the dimensions of each room being indicated in feet. It will be seen to be a commodious house, and remains just as Darwin lived in it. He added a new wing—that which includes the New Study and the New Drawing Room.'