MR. W. E. DARWIN. n 



Mr. WILLIAM ERASMUS DARWIN said : Chancellor, your 

 Excellencies, my Lords and Gentlemen, I need hardly say 

 that this assemblage of distinguished men, met together from 

 all quarters of the world to do honour to his memory, would 

 have almost overwhelmed my father, and I am very conscious 

 of the great difficulties that meet me and of the very great 

 honour that is paid me in being called upon to express 

 the feelings of my family on this occasion. I remember 

 that my father once wrote to Sir Joseph Hooker, whom 

 we are so delighted to have with us in Cambridge 

 to-day, on an occasion when Sir Joseph Hooker had to 

 make an address or after-dinner speech, that he pitied him 

 from the bottom of his soul, and that it made his flesh 

 creep to think of it. I am sure that he would have pitied 

 me ten-fold in these very especial circumstances, and I can 

 only trust to your kind consideration, and ask that my short- 

 comings be not too severely criticised. When I had the 

 honour of being asked to speak to-night I was most kindly 

 given a free field, with no limitations or directions of any 

 kind ; but it was clear to me that it would be utterly unfitting 

 and presumptuous on my part if I attempted, before such an 

 audience as this, to speak of my father in regard to his 

 scientific career, even if I were in other respects qualified. 

 Therefore I can only speak of him as a man and as I knew 

 him from a child. 



I have been thinking over the characteristics of my 

 father which are quite apart from the qualities on which his 

 influence and his success as a man of science depended, and I 

 think the quality -which stands out in my mind most pre- 

 eminently is his abhorrence of anything approaching to 

 oppression or cruelty, and especially of slavery ; combired 

 with this he had an enthusiasm for liberty of the in- 

 dividual and for liberal principles. I can give you one 

 or two illustrations, which are very slight in themselves, 

 but one of them has remained impressed on my memory 

 since early boyhood. There was living very near us at Down 

 .a gentleman farmer, with whom my father was slightly 

 acquainted. It became reported that this man had allowed 

 some sheep to die of starvation. My father heard of it and t 



