To John Lubbock [September 1854]1
[Down]
Thursday
Dear Lubbock
I do not know whether you care about Beetles, but for the chance I send this in a Bottle, which, I never remember having seen, though it is excessively rash to speak from a 26 year old remembrance. Whenever we meet you can tell me whether you know it.—
I have been so much interested by Westwood, that I have ordered a copy.2 I feel like an old war-horse at the sound of the trumpet, when I read about the capturing of rare beetles— is not this a magnanimous simile for a decayed entomologist. It really almost makes me long to begin collecting again.
Adios.— “Floreat Entomologia”, to which toast at Cambridge, I have drunk many a glass of wine,3 so again “Floreat Entomologia”. N.B. I have not now been drinking any glasses full of wine.
Your’s | C. D.—
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Westwood, John Obadiah. 1839–40. An introduction to the modern classification of insects; founded on the natural habits and corresponding organisation of the different families. 2 vols. London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman.
Summary
Sends beetle he cannot identify.
Reading J. O. Westwood [Introduction to the modern classification of insects (1839–40)] has reawakened his passion for entomology.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-1585
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Lubbock, 4th baronet and 1st Baron Avebury
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 263: 8 (EH 88206457)
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 1585,” accessed on 26 September 2022, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-1585.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 5
