I859-] HEALTH FAILING. 513 



thought we could not make our ideas clear to each other by 

 talk, or if either of us had time to write in extenso. 



I imagine from some expressions _(but if you ask me what, 

 I could not answer) that you look at variability as some 

 necessary contingency with organisms, and further that there 

 is some necessary tendency in the variability to go on diverg- 

 ing in character or degree. If you do, I do not agree. " Re- 

 version " again (a form of inheritance), I look at as in no 

 way directly connected with Variation, though of course \ 

 inheritance is of fundamental importance to us, for if a varia- \ 

 tion be not inherited, it is of no significance to us. It was | 

 on such points as these I fancied that we perhaps started ' 

 differently. 



I fear that my book will not deserve at all the pleasant 

 things you say about it ; and Good Lord, how I do long to 

 have done with it ! 



Since the above was written, I have received and have I 

 been 77iuch interested by A. Gray. I am delighted at his note | 

 about my and Wallace's paper. He will go round, for it is | 

 futile to give up very many species, and stop at an arbitrary 

 line at others. It is what my grandfather called Unitarian- 

 ism, "a feather bed to catch a falling Christian." . . . 



C. Dariviii to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, May iSth [1859]. 



My dear Hooker, — My health has quite failed. I am 

 off to-morrow for a week of Hydropathy. I am very very 

 sorry to say that I cannot look over any proofs * in the week, 

 as my object is to drive the subject out of my head. I shall 

 return to-morrow week. If it be worth while, which probably 

 it is not, you could keep back any proofs till my return home. 



In haste, ever yours, 



C. Darwin. 



* Of Sir J. Hooker's Introduction to the ' Flora of Australia.' 



