312 LIFE AT DOWN. ^TAT. 33-45. [1845. 



visited the Dean of Manchester,* the great maker of Hybrids, 

 who gave me much curious information. I also visited 

 Waterton at Walton Hall, and was extremely amused with my 

 visit there. He is an amusing strange fellow ; at our early 

 dinner, our party consisted of two Catholic priests and two 

 Mulattresses ! He is past sixty years old, and the day before 

 ran down and caught a leveret in a turnip-field. It is a fine 

 old house, and the lake swarms with water-fowl. I then saw 

 Chatsworth, and was in transport with the great hothouse ; 

 it is a perfect fragment of a tropical forest, and the sight 

 made me think with delight of old recollections. My little 

 ten-day tour made me feel wonderfully strong at the time, 

 but the good effects did not last. My wife, I am sorry to 

 say, does not get very strong, and the children are the hope 

 of the family, for they are all happy, life, and spirits. I have 

 been much interested with Sedgwick's review ; f though I 

 find it far from popular with our scientific readers. I think 

 some few passages savour of the dogmatism of the pulpit, rather 

 than of the philosophy of the Professor's Chair ; and some of 



the wit strikes me as only worthy of in the * Quarterly.' 



Nevertheless, it is a grand piece of argument against muta- 

 bility of species, and I read it with fear and trembling, but 

 was well pleased to find that I had not overlooked any of the 

 arguments, though I had put them to myself as feebly as 



of primogeniture, so as to lessen the difference in land-wealth, and make 

 more small freeholders. How atrociously unjust are the stamp laws, which 

 render it so expensive for the poor man to buy his quarter of an acre ; it 

 makes one's blood burn with indignation." 



* Hon. and Rev. W. Herbert. The visit is mentioned in a letter to 

 Dr. Hooker: — " I have been taking a little tour, partly on business, and 

 visited the Dean of Manchester, and had very much interesting talk with 

 him on hybrids, sterility, and variation, &c., &c. He is full of self-gained 

 knowledge, but knows surprisingly little what others have done on the same 

 subjects. He is very heterodox on 'species': not much better, as most 

 naturalists would esteem it, than poor Mr. Vestiges." 



f Sedgwick's review of the ' Vestiges of Creation ' in the ' Edinburgh 

 Review,' July, 1845. 



