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Darwin Correspondence Project

To Bernhard Studer   13 August [1847]

Down Farnborough Kent

August 13

My dear Sir

I have just received your note & heard with pleasure of your arrival in London.—. I suppose you received my letter addressed to Berne,1 in answer to yours, informing me of your intended visit to England. If you can spare the time, I should feel very great pleasure & honour in seeing you here at my house; if you cannot come here, & will be in town & at home on Monday morning, I will joyfully come up for the pleasure of making your acquaintance.— If you will favour me with a visit here, I will send my carriage to meet you half way. You would probably be glad to have your morning in London, & in that case if you will start by the Croydon Railway from London Bridge at 3o.15’, (from Hungerford St to London Bridge will take 34 of hour in a cab) you will get to Croydon (fare only 1s”3d) at 3o, 45’, where my one horse phaeton shall be waiting for you, & it will bring you in one hour & a half to this house, in time for dinner. And you can return the same way any day you like.—

Will you be so kind as to write me a note on Saturday morning, which I shall get on Sunday & will either come up myself, (if you remain in town) or gladly send my phaeton to meet you at Croydon. The distance is too great for you to come here & return the same day.—

You will have received incomparably better advice & assistance from Mr L. Horner & others than I can give; but if you have not seen Mr. Daniel Sharpe of 2. Adelphi Terrace, Strand, I would advise you to call on him, as he knows well Wales & has attended to cleavage: I informed him of your expected arrival.— If you intend travelling in Wales, I wd. advise you strongly to join for a time the Ordnance Survey2 & see them at work. When I heard of your intended visit, I wrote to Sir H. Delabeche,3 & he has given me instructions, how to find out where the party is, & if you like to join them, I can put you on the way.

I am well aware how little use I can be of, but if you can suggest anything, I shall be much pleased.— Have you Murchis⁠⟨⁠on’s⁠⟩⁠ Silurian System?4 if not, would you like to borrow from me the maps, they would perhaps be useful to you, in travelling.—

With much respect | Believe me | dear Sir | Yours very faithfully | C. Darwin To | Prof. B. Studer | &c &c &c

Footnotes

CD refers to the Geological Survey of Great Britain rather than to the Ordnance Survey. The Geological Survey was at this time working in Wales (Geikie 1895); the Ordnance Survey had completed its maps of the area by 1846 (Seymour ed. 1980, p. 115).
Henry Thomas De la Beche, director-general of the Geological Survey since 1835.
Murchison 1839. CD’s copy, including the maps, is in the Darwin Library–CUL.

Bibliography

Geikie, Archibald. 1895. Memoir of Sir Andrew Crombie Ramsay. London and New York: Macmillan.

Murchison, Roderick Impey. 1839. The Silurian system, founded on geological researches in the counties of Salop, Hereford, Radnor, Montgomery, Caermarthen, Brecon, Pembroke, Monmouth, Gloucester, Worcester, and Stafford; with descriptions of the coal-fields and overlying formations. 2 pts. London. [Vols. 4,7]

Summary

Invites BS to visit Down. Advises him to call on Daniel Sharpe. Suggests he see the work of the Ordnance Survey in Wales.

Offers to lend him Murchison’s The Silurian system [3 vols. (1839)].

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-1107
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
Bernhard Studer
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Burgerbibliothek Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Physical description
ALS 3pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 1107,” accessed on 28 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-1107.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 4

letter