258 KEW : 1879-1885 



will to make friends ! Dear Col vile hit off exactly when he 

 called me ' the most unclubable of men.' . . . But however 

 to be accounted for, the fact remains, that I am the most 

 unclubable of men ; and, as a necessary consequence, I 

 cling to you now that Colvile is gone, with all my heart as 

 being almost the only thorough friend I have left. You 

 are younger than me who have entered my 81st year. 

 But neither of us can look to many years here below, and 

 therefore we naturally begin 'to look,' as you say, 'more 

 wistfully than ever to the hope of a permanent reunion 

 in the unknown land,' with the friends we have known on 

 earth. 



A little later he exclaims to Darwin (June 18, 1881) : 



We have lost no end of friends this year, and it is difficult 

 to resist the pessimist view of creation. When I look back, 

 however, my beloved friend, to the days I have spent in 

 intercourse with you and yours, that view takes wings to 

 itself and flies away ; it is a horrid world to be sure, but 

 it could have been worse. 



Two months later died Darwin's elder brother, Erasmus, a 

 man whose intellectual gifts and great personal charm were, 

 owing to ill health, only known within the circle of his imme- 

 diate friends and relations. 



To Charles Darwin 



August 29, 1881. 



I have just seen the announcement of your brother's 

 death and must send you a few words of heartfelt sympathy. 

 I have somehow come to think those the happiest who, 

 like myself, lost an only brother when very young ; it seems 

 now as if they could then be best spared — a blunder no 

 doubt — but we know better what we lose after having lived 

 so long together as you and your brother have. 



It was in your brother's house, near Park Lane, that I 

 first became acquainted with you — and shall never for- 

 get his kind face and kinder welcome — that was nearly 

 40 years ago ! — I well remember thinking him then quite an 

 elderly man and yet I see he was then under forty. 



