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Darwin Correspondence Project

To J. M. Herbert   30 January [1868]1

Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.

Jan 30

My dear old Friend

Many thanks for your very kind congratulations. Our son’s success has given us very great pleasure, & no small part of it has been derived from the sympathy of our friends.2 Talking & thinking so much of wranglers has recalled to my mind so vividly the old time when we gloried in Whitley being Senior Wrangler & you being I think 7 th .3 I never see that old Microscope which to my amazement I received anonymously without thinking with pleasure of our old friendship.4

Pray give our united very kind regards to Mrs Herbert5 & believe me yours ever | very sincerely | Charles Darwin

Footnotes

The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from J. M. Herbert, 26 January 1868.
See letter from J. M. Herbert, 26 January 1868. George Howard Darwin was second in the final examination for the mathematical tripos at Cambridge (that is, second wrangler; Cambridge University calendar 1868).
Charles Thomas Whitley, a cousin of Herbert’s, had been at Shrewsbury School with CD, and graduated as senior wrangler at Cambridge in 1830. See Correspondence vol. 1.
Herbert had given CD the microscope shortly after CD had taken his degree at Cambridge (see Correspondence vol. 1, letter from [J. M. Herbert], [early May 1831]).

Bibliography

Cambridge University calendar: The Cambridge University calendar. Cambridge: W. Page [and others]. 1796–1950.

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Summary

Thanks JMH for his congratulations.

Recalls gift of microscope [from JMH in 1831]. [See 99].

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-5815
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
John Maurice Herbert
Sent from
Down
Source of text
American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.344)
Physical description
LS 3pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 5815,” accessed on 20 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-5815.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 16

letter