258 [CHAP, xvin 



CHAPTER XVIII 



18821884 



A letter to Anthony Rich and his answer Leonard Darwin's mar- 

 riage The purchase of the Grove at Cambridge Francis 

 Darwin working at the Life of his father His marriage to Ellen 

 Wordsworth Crofts George Darwin's marriage The Green- 

 hill and Stonyfield. 



AFTER my father's death his children agreed that the fol- 

 lowing letter should be sent to Mr Anthony Rich 



W. E. Darwin to Anthony Eich. 



MY DEAR MR RICH, C-^ 1882]. 



Since my father's death my brothers and sisters 

 and I have been thinking much over your generous inten- 

 tion of leaving your property to my father, and, as we 

 understood, to us as his heirs. We wish to tell you how 

 truly grateful we feel to you for this emphatic recognition 

 of his services to science and the world. It deeply gratified 

 him, and we never shall forget this. I gather that it was 

 your intention that his death should make no difference in 

 the disposition of your property, but we want you to be 

 assured that we feel that a new state of things has arisen, 

 and one of which you could not calculate the effect until 

 it actually came. No one as long as they live can help 

 acquiring new interests, and it is impossible for you to 

 foresee what may happen in the years I hope you may still 

 have to live. 



We, therefore, earnestly beg you to remember that if 

 you should see fit to alter the disposition of your property, 



