I hope when you next write to Osmaston, [you will] tell them my scheme, and give them my kindest regards and farewells.
Good-bye, my dear Fox, Yours ever sincerely, CHAS. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO R. FITZ-ROY. 17 Spring Gardens [October 17? 1831].
Dear Fitz-Roy,
Very many thanks for your letter; it has made me most comfortable, for it would have been heart-breaking to have left anything quite behind, and I never should have thought of sending things by some other vessel. This letter will, I trust, accompany some talc. I read your letter without attending to the name. But I have now procured some from Jones, which appears very good, and I will send it this evening by the mail. You will be surprised at not seeing me propria persona instead of my handwriting. But I had just found out that the large steam-packet did not intend to sail on Sunday, and I was picturing to myself a small, dirty cabin, with the proportion of 39-40ths of the passengers very sick, when Mr. Earl came in and told me the "Beagle" would not sail till the beginning of November. This, of course, settled the point; so that I remain in London one week more. I shall then send heavy goods by steamer and start myself by the coach on Sunday evening.
Have you a good set of mountain barometers? Several great guns in the scientific world have told me some points in geology to ascertain which entirely depend on their relative height. If you have not a good stock, I will add one more to the list. I ought to be ashamed to trouble you so much, but will you SEND ONE LINE to inform me? I am daily becoming more anxious to be off, and, if I am so, you must be in a perfect fever. What a glorious day the 4th of November will be to me! My second life will then commence, and it shall be as a birthday for the rest of my life.
Believe me, dear Fitz-Roy, Yours most sincerely, CHAS. DARWIN.
MONDAY.--I hope I have not put you to much inconvenience by ordering the room in readiness.
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.S. HENSLOW. Devonport, November 15, 1831.
My dear Henslow,
The orders are come down from the Admiralty, and everything is finally settled. We positively sail the last day of this month, and I think before that time the vessel will be ready. She looks most beautiful, even a landsman must admire her. WE all think her the most perfect vessel ever turned out of the Dockyard. One thing is certain, no vessel has been fitted out so expensively, and with so much care. Everything that can be made so is of mahogany, and nothing can exceed the neatness and beauty of all the accommodations. The instructions are very general, and leave a great deal to the Captain's discretion and judgment, paying a substantial as well as a verbal compliment to him.
...
No vessel ever left England with such a set of Chronometers, viz., twenty- four, all very good ones. In short, everything is well, and I have only now to pray for the sickness to moderate its fierceness, and I shall do very well. Yet I should not call it one of the very best opportunities for natural history that has ever occurred. The absolute want of room is an evil that nothing can surmount. I think L. Jenyns did very wisely in not coming, that is judging from my own feelings, for I am sure if I had left college some few years, or been those years older, I NEVER could have endured it. The officers (excepting the Captain) are like the freshest freshmen, that is in their manners, in everything else widely different. Remember me most kindly to him, and tell him if ever he dreams in the night of palm-trees, he may in the morning comfort himself with the assurance that the voyage would not have suited him.
I am much obliged for your advice, de Mathematicis. I suspect when I am struggling with a triangle, I shall often wish myself in your room, and as for those wicked sulky surds, I do not know what I shall do without you to conjure them. My time passes away very pleasantly. I know one or two pleasant people, foremost of whom is Mr.