784 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1804. 



ation of a foreign language, hesita- 

 tion Avould he less likely to recur 

 than in speaking those vords and 

 sentences in m liich he had been ac- 

 customed to liesitate. About his 

 twelfth jear he was committed to 

 the care of the scientific, the learned, 

 the modest, and worthy Mr. Dick- 

 inson, now rector of Blimel, in 

 Shropshire. 



That the purpose of the experi- 

 ment might not be frustrated, Dr. 

 Darwin impressed that good man's 

 mind with the necessity of not per- 

 mitting his pupil to converse in 

 English ; nor even to hear it uttered 

 after he covild at all comprcliend the 

 French language. Charles Darwin 

 returned to England, after a two 

 year's residence on the continent, 

 completely cured of stammering, 

 ■with which he was not afterwards 

 troubled. 



Dr. Johnson was several times at 

 Lichfield, while Dr. Darwin was 

 one of its inhabitants. They had 

 one or tv.o interviews, but never 

 afterwards sought; each other. Mu- 

 tual and strong dislike subsisted 

 between them. It is curious that 

 in Dr. Johnson's various letters to 

 Mrs. Thralc, now Mrs. Piozzi,])ub- 

 lislied by that lady after his death, 

 many of them, at different periods, 

 dated from Lichjield, the name of 

 Darwin cannot be found. 



Though Dr. Darwin's hesitation 

 in speaking precluded his iiow of 

 colloquial eloquence, it did not im- 

 pede, or at all lessen, the force of 

 that conciser quality, itif. Of sa- 

 tiric wit he possessed a very pecu- 

 liar species. 



About the year 1771 commenced 

 that great zeork, the Zoonomia, 

 first published in 1791 ; Dr. Dar- 

 win read his chapter on instinft 

 to a lady, who wdn in the habit of 



breeding canary birds. SIic ob- 

 served, that the pair which he then 

 saw building their nest in her cage, 

 were a male and a female who had 

 been hatched and reared in that very 

 cage, and were not in existence 

 wlien the mossy cradle was fabri- 

 cated, in which titej/ first saw light. 

 She asked him how, upon his prin- 

 ciple of imi{(ttion, he could account 

 for the nest he then saw building, 

 being constru6ted, even to the dis- 

 posal of every hair and shred of 

 wool, upon the model of that in 

 which the pair were bortij and on 

 which every other canary-bird's 

 nest is constru61ed, where the pro- 

 per materials are furnished. That of 

 the pye-finch, added she, is of much 

 compacter form, warmer, and more 

 comfortable. Pull one of them io 

 pieces for its materials ; place ano- 

 ther before these canary-birds, as a 

 pattern, and see if thej' will make the 

 slightest effort to imitate their mo- 

 del ! No, the result of their labour 

 Avill, upon instinctive, hereditary 

 impulse, be exactly the slovenly lit- 

 tle mansion of their race ; the same 

 Avith that which their parents built 

 before themselves were hatched. 

 The doctor could not do a-way the 

 force of that single fact, with which 

 his system was incompatible ; yet he 

 maintained that system with philoso- 

 phic sturdiness, though experience 

 brought confutation from a thou- 

 sand sources. 



A few years before Dr. Darwin 

 left Lichfield as a residence, he 

 commenced a botanical society in 

 that city. It consisted of himself,- 

 sir Brooke Boothby, then Mr. 

 Boothby, and a proctor in the ca- 

 thedral jurisdiction, whose name 

 was Jackson. The doctor was pro- 

 bably disappointed that no recruits 

 flocked to his botanical standard at 



Lichfield. 



