1858.] THE 'ABSTRACT.' 489 



unpublished work; nevertheless, I repeat, I am extremely 

 glad I have begun in earnest on it. 



I hope you and Mrs. Hooker will have a very very pleas- 

 ant tour. Farewell, my dear Hooker. 



Yours affectionately, 



C. DARWIN. 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Norfolk House, Shanklin, Isle of Wight, 



Thursday [Aug. 5, 1858]. 



MY DEAR HOOKER, I should think the note apologetical 

 about the style of the abstract was best as a note .... But 

 I write now to ask you to send me by return of post the 

 MS. on big genera, that I may make an abstract of a couple 

 of pages in length. I presume that you have quite done with 

 it, otherwise I would not for anything have it back. If you 

 tie it with string, and mark it MS. for printing, it will not cost, 

 I should think, more than 4^. I shall wish much to say that 

 you have read this MS. and concur ; but you shall, before I 

 read it to the Society, hear the sentence. 



What you tell me after speaking with Busk about the 

 length of the Abstract is an immense relief to me ; it will make 

 the labour far less, not having to shorten so much every single 

 subject ; but I will try not to be too diffusive. I fear it will 

 spoil all interest in my book,* whenever published. The 

 Abstract will do very well to divide into several parts : thus 

 I have just finished " Variation under Domestication," in 

 forty-four MS. pages, and that would do for one evening; but 

 I should be extremely sorry if all could not be published 

 together. 



What else you say about my Abstract pleases me highly, 

 but frightens me, for I fear I shall never be able to make it 

 good enough. But how I do run on about my own affairs to 

 you ! 



* The larger book begun in 1856. 



