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CHAPTER IX. 



LIFE AT DOWN. 

 1842-1854. 



" My life goes on like clockwork, and I am fixed on the spot where I 

 shall end it." 



Letter to Captain Fitz-Roy, October, 1846. 



[WITH the view of giving, in the next volume, a connected 

 account of the growth of the ' Origin of Species,' I have taken 

 the more important letters bearing on that subject out of 

 their proper chronological position here, and placed them 

 with the rest of the correspondence bearing on the same 

 subject ; so that in the present group of letters we only get 

 occasional hints of the growth of my father's views, and we 

 may suppose ourselves to be looking at his life, as it might 

 have been looked at by those who had no knowledge of 

 the quiet development of his theory of evolution during this 

 period. 



On Sept. 14, 1842, my father left London with his family 

 and settled at Down.* In the Autobiographical chapter, his 

 motives for taking this step in the country are briefly given. 

 He speaks of the attendance at scientific societies, and 

 ordinary social duties, as suiting his health so "badly that 



* I must not omit to mention a friend and servant, for forty years, 



member of the household who and became, as Sir Joseph Hooker 



accompanied him. This was his once remarked to me, " an integral 



butler, Joseph Parslow, who re- part of the family, and felt to be 



mained in the family, a valued such by all visitors at the house." 



