1 4 THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.' [i860. 



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. Rodwell.\ 



15 Marine Parade, Eastbourne. 



November 5th [i860]. 



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, i860. 



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

 bers him saying : — " It strikes me that 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. 



