50 EVOLUTION [CHAP. II 



Letter 17 a way by the old into unfavourable districts, and there mostly 

 perish. When one meets with such unexpected statistical 

 returns on the increase and decrease and proportion of deaths 

 and births amongst mankind, and in this well-known country 

 of ours, one ought not to be in the least surprised at one's 

 ignorance, when, where, and how the endless increase of our 

 robins and sparrows is checked, 



Thanks for your hints about terms of " mutation," etc. ; 

 I had some suspicions that it was not quite correct, and yet 

 I do not yet see my way to arrive at any better terms. It 

 will be years before I publish, so that I shall have plenty of 

 time to think of better words. Development would perhaps 

 do, only it is applied to the changes of an individual during 

 its growth. I am, however, very glad of your remark, and 

 will ponder over it. 



We are all well, wife and children three, and as flourishing 

 as this horrid, house-confining, tempestuous weather permits. 



Letter 18 To J. D. Hooker. 



Down [1845]. 



I hope you are getting on well with your lectures, and that 

 you have enjoyed some pleasant walks during the late de- 

 lightful weather. I write to tell you (as perhaps you might 

 have had fears on the subject) that your books have arrived 

 safely. I am exceedingly obliged to you for them, and will 

 take great care of them ; they will take me some time to 

 read carefully. 



I send to-day the corrected MS. of the first number of my 

 Journal 1 in the Colonial Library, so that if you chance to 

 know of any gross mistake in the first 214 pages (if you have 

 my Journal), I should be obliged to you to tell me. 



Do not answer this for form's sake ; for you must be very 

 busy. We have just had the Lyells here, and you ought to 

 have a wife to stop your working too much, as Mrs. Lyell 

 peremptorily stops Lyell. 



1 In 1842 he had written to his sister : " Talking of money, I reaped 

 the other day all the profit which I shall ever get from my Journal [Journal 

 of Researches, etc.~\ which consisted in paying Mr. Colburn 21 los. 

 for the copies which I presented to different people ; 1,337 copies have 

 been sold. This is a comfortable arrangement, is it not?" He was 

 proved wrong in his gloomy prophecy, as the second edition was published 

 by Mr. Murray in 1845. 



