X4O THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.' [1860. 



I have ordered Dr. Bree,* and will lend it to you, if you 

 like, and if it turns out good. 



I am very glad that I misunderstood you about 



species not having the capacity to vary, though in fact few do 

 give birth to new species. It seems that I am very apt to mis- 

 understand you ; I suppose I am always fancying objections. 

 Your case of the Red Indian shows me that we agree en- 

 tirely 



I had a letter yesterday from Thwaites of Ceylon, who 

 was much opposed to me. He now says, " I find that the 

 more familiar I become with your views in connection with 

 the various phenomena of nature, the more they commend 

 themselves to my mind." 



C. Darwin to J. M. Ro dwell. \ 



15 Marine Parade, Eastbourne. 



November 5th [1860]. 



MY DEAR SIR, I am extremely much obliged for your 

 letter, which I can compare only to a plum-pudding, so full 

 it is of good things. I have been rash about the cats : J yet 

 I spoke on what seemed to me, good authority. The Rev. 

 W. D. Fox gave me a list of cases of various foreign breeds 

 in which he had observed the correlation, and for years he 

 had vainly sought an exception. A French paper also gives 

 numerous cases, and one very curious case of a kitten which 

 gradually lost the blue colour in its eyes and as gradually 

 acquired its power of hearing. I had not heard of your 

 uncle, Mr. Kirby's case * (whom I, for as long as I can re- 



* ' Species not Transmutable,' by C. R. Bree, 1860. 



f Rev. J. M. Rodwell, who was at Cambridge with my father, remem- 

 bers him saying : " It strikes me thit all our knowledge about the struct- 

 ure of our earth is very much like what an old hen would know of a hun- 

 dred acre field, in a corner of which she is scratching." 



| " Cats with blue eyes are invariably deaf," ' Origin of Species,' ed. i. 

 p. 12. 



* William Kirby, joint author with Spence, of the well-known ' Intro- 

 duction to Entomology,' 1818. 



