84 DARWINIANISM. 



dissipated low-minded young men." But he, evidently, 

 very soon forsook it. His son, Mr. Francis Darwin, tells 

 us, " I remember, in my innocence as a small boy, asking 

 him if he had ever been tipsy ; and he answered very 

 gravely that he was ashamed to say he had once drunk 

 too much at Cambridge : " may we not make bold to 

 regard that one occasion as the occasion also of his 

 rupture with " the sporting set " ? 



That brief excitement over, Charles Darwin approved 

 himself at Cambridge, as the steady, well-regulated young 

 man he had always been everywhere else. As at Edin- 

 burgh, so here, he associated only with such respectable 

 young men as every respectable young man always should 

 associate with. His daily companions, besides Fox, the 

 enthusiastic entomologist, were, as they were eventually 

 designated, H. Thompson, M.P., Eailway Chairman, lead- 

 ing agriculturist ; Albert Way, " the well-known archaeo- 

 logist ; " Whitley, Canon of Durham ; Herbert, County 

 Court Judge at Cardiff; Heaviside, Canon of Norwich ; 

 Cameron, Vicar of Shoreham ; Blane, who held a high 

 post during the Crimean War ; Lowe, brother of Lord 

 Sherbrooke ; Watkins, Archdeacon of York ; Dawes, 

 Dean of Hereford ; Eyton of Eyton ; Rarnsay, brother of 

 Sir Alexander Ramsay ; Wood, nephew of Lord London- 

 derry, etc. etc. 



To have such friends as these was, for any well-con- 

 ducted young man, much ; but it was a good deal more 

 to be the favourite attendant of the most eminent 

 professors. Professor Henslow, father-in-law of Sir 

 Joseph Hooker, was much won upon by the young man, 

 and took to him with the most open consideration, " a 

 circumstance which," says Darwin, " influenced my whole 

 career more than any other." It led by and by, namely, 

 to his appointment to the Beagle ; but was quite as 

 influential, perhaps, in a general scientific way otherwise. 



