372 LIFE AT DOWN. yliTAT. 33~4$. [1849. 



C. Danvin to Hugh Strickland. 



Down, Feb. loth [1849]. 



MY DEAR STRICKLAND, I have again to thank you cor- 

 dially for your letter. Your remarks shall fructify to some 

 extent, and I will try to be more faithful to rigid virtue and 

 priority ; but as for calling Balanus " Lepas " (which I did 

 not think of), I cannot do it, my pen won't write it it is 

 impossible. I have great hopes some of my difficulties will 

 disappear, owing to wrong dates in Agassiz, and to my having 

 to run several genera into one, for I have as yet gone, in but 

 few cases, to original sources. With respect to adopting my 

 own notions in my Cirripedia book, I should not like to do so 

 without I found others approved, and in some public way 

 nor, indeed, is it well adapted, as I can never recognise a 

 species without I have the original specimen, which, for- 

 tunately, I have in many cases in the British Museum. Thus 

 far I mean to adopt my notion, as never putting mihi or 

 ' Danvin " after my own species, and in the anatomical text 

 giving no authors' names at all, as the systematic Part will 

 serve for those who want to know the History of a species as 

 far as I can imperfectly work it out 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



[The Lodge, Malvern, 



March 28th, 1849.] 



MY DEAR HOOKER, Your letter of the I3th of October 

 has remained unanswered till this day ! What an ungrateful 

 return for a letter which interested me so much, and which 

 contained so much and curious information. But I have had 

 a bad winter. 



On the 1 3th of November, my poor dear father died, and 

 no one who did not know him would believe that a man above 

 eighty-three years old could have retained so tender and 

 affectionate a disposition, with all his sagacity unclouded to 

 the last I was at the time so unwell, that I was unable to 



