i862.] BOURNEMOUTH. i;5 



abominable mud ; yet I cannot keep out of the question. 

 My dear Gray, I have written a deal of nonsense. 



Yours most cordially, 



C. Darwin. 



1862. 



[Owing to the illness from scarlet fever of one of his boys, 

 he took a house at Bournemouth in the autumn. He wrote 

 to Dr. Gray from Southampton (Aug. 21, 1862) : — 



" We are a wretched family, and ought to be exterminated. 

 We slept here to rest our poor boy on his journey to Bourne- 

 mouth, and my poor dear wife sickened with scarlet fever, 

 and has had it pretty sharply, but is recovering well. There 

 is no end of trouble in this weary world. I shall not feel 

 safe till we are all at home together, and when that will be I 

 know not. But it is foolish complaining." 



Dr. Gray used to send postage stamps to the scarlet fever 

 patient ; with regard to this good-natured deed my father 

 wrote — 



" I must just recur to stamps ; my little man has calcu- 

 lated that he will now have 6 stamps which no other boy in 

 the school has. Here is a triumph. Your last letter was 

 plaistered with many coloured stamps, and he long surveyed 

 the envelope in bed with much quiet satisfaction." 



The greater number of the letters of 1862 deal with the 

 Orchid work, but the wave of conversion to Evolution was 

 still spreading, and reviews and letters bearing on the subject 

 still came in numbers. As an example of the odd letters he 

 received may be mentioned one which arrived in January of 

 this year " from a German homoeopathic doctor, an ardent 

 admirer of the ' Origin.' Had himself published nearly the 

 same sort of book, but goes much deeper. Explains the 

 origin of plants and animals on the principles of homoeopa- 

 thy or by the law of spirality. Book fell dead in Germany. 

 Therefore would I translate it and publish it in England."] 



