[173]

R

Hillside

S. Leonards on Sea

June 5. 82

Dear Sir,

I am sorry [illeg] that the two enclosed herewith are the only letters of your fathers which I am at present able to lay hands upon. I fancied that I had several more in my possession — and will look carefully among my papers and forward any that I may recover. You are quite welcome to copy the enclosed and publish any part of them you think proper.

[173v]

I may as well mention, in order to explain a sentence in one of the enclosed about my having some "Kirby Blood" in me that I was brought up in Mr Kirby's parish of Barham — that he was my uncle — and that I ultimately became his Curate.

Hence [illeg] my love for natural history — from which however a London sphere of duty has all but precluded me.

It is just possible that my old friend Dr. Paget of Cambridge

[173b]

may be able to supply some reminiscences of your father. He certainly was one of Professor Henslow's parties where we went as mentioned in one of the enclosed papers to Gamlingay.

Possibly my dearest friend Thurtell, now of Oxburgh, Rectory, Stoke Ferry, Norfolk, may have had some acquintance with your father though he was 3 years his senior.

I mentioned that I could recall some of your fathers saying and doings these

[173c]

Are contained on the accompanying memoranda — But it is not easy to travel back in memory over so many years.

I trust that you may find better supplies from other quarters and can only say that I await your forthcoming memoir with the greatest interest.

I am

dear sir,

yours faithfully

JM Rodwell

Fr. Darwin Esq

P.S. The Rats alluded to in your fathers letter were rats apparently born blind found by scores in the ancient Fleet sewer. This sewer was constructed by the Romans originally

See Darwin To J. M. Rodwell   5 November [1860]. This was first published in Life and letters vol. 2, p. 348 and later in Correspondence vol. 8. The editors did not cite this letter or Rodwell's or his contacts with Francis Darwin whereby his letters became preserved. Darwin cited Rodwell in Variation 2: 337.